Author Archives: es138090

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7KDRbO01u8

Discrimination and racism are a big issue in our world today. People are segregated and looked down upon depending on their race or background. Immigrants like myself have it hard in US. We do not speak English as well as “Americans”; I quoted it because all the Americans are in fact descendants of people who colonized America. People are refused jobs just because they are black or Spanish, I’m white but I’m still an immigrant and I’m still looked down upon when I want to get hired anywhere.

People always think of themselves better than others therefore there will always be segregation and different social classes and standards. The video I have picked shows an example of an Iranian lady being refused apple products because of her heritage and background. She is viewed inferior and untrustworthy just because she comes from a different place. Later on in the video they explain on how you can’t import apple stuff into Iran, it’s not like this lady is going to sell it. She wants to buy an apple product for her own needs, not being able to buy it and use it is a good example of discrimination. I’m honestly sick of the people today, all this segregation and discrimination is not getting us anywhere, every day you heard on the news of new examples of discrimination and racism. This country is full of it. I just hope that as we live on this will slowly change but I’m afraid that life is too short for this to happen. At least for the time being.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKIE3IUkkp8

Bureaucracy is in all of our lives; actually it is even in our schools. How many times have you been asked to go from one room to another to fill out forms or to find out where the hell are you supposed to go to get your question solved. I know I had a lot of these situations. Today we think of bureaucracy as a negative thing, it is even an insult to call someone a bureaucrat.

The idea of a large amount of people being split up into their little tasks seems really good in paper, it makes it easier on the worker because he does not have to worry about everything and it also makes it easier for the people who go to that place for whatever reason they have. Sure it sound great but the reality is what it is, it sucks. The frustration of trying to get something resolved is immense that before I go get something done I have to mentally prepare myself for what is coming ahead.

I believe that Max Weber had the right idea of what would make for a good system but in reality it doesn’t work as well. It is the people who work there that make it a terrible experience. They are mostly undertrained, lazy and don’t know what they are talking about. It is easy to pass on the blame or the task when you got hundredths of other people working with you. The video I have picked shows what it feels like for us customers, it might be a bit exaggerated but it is accurate in showing how bureaucracy really looks. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9mzbpftczU

I believe that deviance is important in our society today. It makes us follow rules and know what is acceptable in our society today and what isn’t. However it can also be harmful like in the book. The example of Kelly Michaels proves that society can sometimes be harsh and unjust when faced with a problem of extreme norm breach. Kelly might have been innocent and interpreted wrongly. Kids often lie and don’t differentiate from right or wrong. The example of that psychologist saying that the more the kids deny it the more it becomes true is just stupid. Let’s face it, Kelly was given no chance. The decision was made before she was even sentenced with anything. The way people think and act is sometimes unfair because in the eyes of the society they are right and justified. The people who are singled out are basically exiled from the society and are treated as people who are weird and their opinion does not matter anymore. I believe that this should be changed, but how can we.

The video I have chosen talks about what I’ve just written, it explains in detain on how we act as a society and how we view deviance. I think that there are stages of deviance. We have our basic deviant acts like crossing the street on a red light, going over the speed limit and yelling and acting weird in public. Then we have a second level that is basically a bit more serious. Shoplifting would be one of them, beating someone up would be another. Finally we have the 3^rd level which is basically the worst and viewed as the most horrible thing you can do. Killing someone would be one of them, sexually abusing children many times like supposedly Kelly did would be another example. I think that deviance is a good idea that we have a society; however the way we sometimes act accordingly is what makes it not so great. There are many examples of people being unjustly branded for life for something they did not do and in cases like these there is little if not nothing we can do. Deviance is a broad topic and it is viewed differently by everyone because everyone has a different opinion of what’s wrong or right and now how do we tell who is right?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apwuvU9HJs4

Culture is a very important aspect in our development. It is what defines us and lets us progress and stay as a group of people. It tells us who we were who we are and what we might become. Not all the cultures are the same; in fact they are very different. Because it is so different we sometimes just don’t understand it because we only see it one way, our way.

Culture is divided into few categories to help us understand and see more clearly on how our ways are different. There is the material culture which talks about artifacts, structures and daily tools that the society has used or is using at the current moment. Non-material culture talks about ideas and non-materialistic things that the society created one of them being for example, a language.

Culture makes us who we are and for the societies that don’t exist anymore materialistic culture helps them live on in our museums today. Artifacts that survived thousands of years can tell us tons about who these people were. The art on some of the artifacts can often show us what these people were thinking about and what they valued.

The video I choose is short but it underlines the importance of culture and materialistic goods to history. By making urns, jewelry we sometimes don’t know how important it might be, thousand years from now future humans will see an iPod as the most primitive thing just like we do with urns from thousand years ago today. What we do and make today will survive so other cultures can learn and know who we were.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqvnVAL8-1g

Sociological Imagination is a pretty big topic that we are reading now in class. It talks about how society sets standards for us that we must follow and choices that are sometimes out of our hands and control. Few of the examples in the story like Andre who can’t land a job because of a bad economic status are not rare in fact common today. Well maybe less today than in 2004. The clip I chose is a bit unorthodox but it shows the issues we are talking about very well. It is about Wile. E coyote and his quest of catching the roadrunner, his life goal. We can all relate because we are want to pursue something. We are chasing something that might be impossible at the moment. We fail but we keep trying until we get it. Sometimes when we do we are actually surprised and don’t know what to just like Coyote in the clip.

A good example of that view would be let’s say a child in Elementary who is not the brightest decades that he wants to go to Princeton. He will keep trying his hardest, a goal that might be just out of his reach but he does not give up and keeps trying. Along the way he might get influenced by the society and realize that he will never make it because of things like money, social status or even his personal abilities. He becomes discouraged and starts to question his own abilities. Even though his goal might have been achievable he fell victim to everyone around him who said, “ No that is not possible”.

I guess the clip I picked is somewhat similar because it is an endless quest of catching the roadrunner. The quest had its ending decided by the producers and the makers of the cartoon way before Wile. E knew what it is. The coyote was never destined to reach his goal, he will never catch the roadrunner but he still keeps trying. The society being the makers is telling him you will never catch him, it is not possible but the Coyote keeps on going with his futile attempts to reach his goal. We can all relate to that somehow because we all have or had dreams that just did not happen. Those dreams were mostly not achievable because of the society and its effects on us by telling us and influencing our opinions. We all tried to achieve those goals but were troughed by an outside force sometimes that being our parents, friends, teachers or even the media. Going back to the reading people like Andre or Michael who were never at any fault in the end they just fell victim to the grasp that the society has on us and there is nothing we can do.