Author: AARON AMIRIAN

Kobe Brant is amount a small select view of people that had the privilege of having such a big impact on the world. His ability to play the game on and off the court enabled him to inspire many people and also enabled him to have such a significant voice in society. Although this may be true, the late Kobe Bryant was also part of another select view. He embarked on a horrid action in 2003 that should have ended his career. In sports this seems to be the case way too often. Player involvement in sexual assault and rape is extremely common, but for whatever reason had low implications for Kobe. Why, you may ask? In sports and frankly in life, people that are in places of power seemed to be viewed as above morality. Since they are “winners” and since Kobe is the star player, he is able to get away with the rape of a young women. This so called immunity that people in power have, from abiding by the rules of society is beyond me. In my opinion, if you are given the spotlight then you should have to act like you deserve it on all fronts.

Kobe’s lack of ethics and morality is one feature that, in my opinion, should discredit his other good features. Even though I truly admire Kobe’s work ethic and killer attitude, it’s extremely significant to understand that he is flawed and even though he is a great basketball players, does not mean he has the right to get away with those flaws. If he was not as good of a basketball player would he still have that immunity? That is the burning question that no one wants to know, but everyone needs too.

Can something not be your fault and still be your responsibility?

This question poses a million thoughts through my head, as my morality seems to be playing a tether match with the ideas Coats addresses. As I review this idea of responsibility over and over in my head, I simply can not tell whether he is correct or not. On one hand I am being told that people can not be held responsible for the actions of their descendants. I have always been taught that each person is their own, and can only be judged by the actions they control. This is a concept that i hold near and dear to my heart, as I review the holocaust. As portrayed in “The Case for Reparations’ ‘, being held accountable for people’s actions is an extremely relevant topic that can be related to the halacaust, Coates argument, and my ideas, all in one. Less than a hundred years ago 6 million of my people were slaughtered in Germany for the sole fact that they were jewish. This hatred that consumed the hearts of people in Germany, that would allow this to happen or even help, is inconceivable. Although this may be true and the holocaust will be a tragedy that will be engraved into my mind forever, I will not judge the ansestors of said Germans to impact my treatment toward them. I will allow them the luxury of making their own legacy for themselves, apart from the horrid actions of their descendants. While I see this side of the argument, the other side is clear as well. Coates explanation about Mitch Maconels failure to take responsibility goes far beyond the slavery that was abolished after the cviil war. It even goes beyond the terrorism, rasism, and discrimination that African Americans endured in this country with the Jim Crow Laws and other acts terrorizing black people. Coates makes a similar argument that is made in “The Case for Reparations”. Coates brings light to the fact that slavery has not been reprimanded, but transformed. Rather than cleaning up white people’s homes, they are sent to prisons where black people are the largest population, even though they are a minority. Rather than picking cotton, they endure the “red lining”. Rather than being forced to use separate bathrooms, they suffer “black homeowner looting of sum over 4 billions dollars”. This country has found a new way to disguise utter racism as societal normalities, subjecting African American’s to a different society than the one other Americans live in. Coates says something in his video that seems to have made my argument one sided. He exclaims, “ While emancipation dead bolted the door against the bandits of America, Jim Crow wedged the windows wide open… It was a hundred fifty years ago and it was right now.”

Coates in the passage of “The Case for Reparations” makes a resounding argument about the facade of separation. His goal is to illustrate that no matter what people try to scapegoat as the reason for discriminations is, it all leads back to black and white. To portray this argument he compared the poor white man to the black slave, and their progression over time. They had similar tasks and similar points in society, but their improvement was significantly different. If anything at one point the Slaves degreased as poor white men were granted citizenship and right to bear arms. Thus, pushing the racial gap even bigger as the threshold for blacks to gain rights seemed to grow larger. All the dreams that Americans had for equality ,during the reconstruction era after the civil war, went out the window as klansman, white liners and red shirts seized the opportunity to terrorize black people. By doing this, they dehumanized African Americans and made them feel as though no progress had been maid, regardless of all their fighting. This essentially depicts the picture that Coates is painting. No matter the amount of improvement made, separation of black and white people seems to be an everlasting theme that people do not want to truly let go of.

My topic is the analysis of the fundamentals of the Men’s NCAA league. A multibillion dollar organization containing vast demographic of fans, where there players are not payed. My question is: Should NCAA players be payed more than a mere scholarship? Both sides have a clear argument as this topic is extremely 2 sided and is hard to pick a side. This topic also tends to my interest in sports and money, allowing me to study a corporation that has many different revenue streams.

America is a nation that is supposedly built on many foundations. One of the biggest foundations of this is the equality of opportunity. The American Dream seems to have evolved into the amazing idea that anyone, from anywhere, can come to America and can accomplish anything. America seems to have built a name of dreams, as people travel from all over the world in order to accomplish their dreams and follow them, or so they have us believe. This may have been the case at one time in the past, but as many people have come to realize, is that America is not as open as presumed. America, although job saturated and capitalist, has some boundaries and exceptions that prohibit this so-called American Dream that is open to everyone. This idea excludes the likes of many minority groups as they are discriminated against and are put at a severe disadvantage. As the fight for slavery ended and people received “equality”, people assumed that life would be as they dreamed. Just because there is equality by law, does not mean there will be equality by society. Racism still occurs as it still occurs today. This is mirrored in the American Dream as black people now are set to believe that they have opportunities, but are merely being played as the facade of economic mobility clouds their minds. They are placed in towns with terrible educational standards and terrible crime. Children that are supposed to be equal, from birth, are taught that they need to work 3 times as hard for the same benefit as a white man. There is no space for economic mobility with the exclusion of education. This is done so the world does not complain about unequal treatment because by law that is what’s going on. “What is completely missed in the rare public debates today about the plight of African Americans is that a huge percentage of them are not free to move up at all. It is not just that they lack opportunity, attend poor schools, or are plaguety.” The goal of this action is to keep the minority colored community economically dormant, as they live in an America of disbelief and false confidence. They live in an America without the American Dream. The racial caste in America has indeed been redesigned as African Americans are extremely malnourished in countless of areas that are crucial to their success in America. 

In the review I read about “Coach Carter” the author takes an interesting standpoint on the way the movie wants us to view the school system. In a world where it is obvious that some races are viewed as below others, the stereotype that black children are not meant to graduate, and make a educational pathed life for themselves out of them selfs, seems to be evident as shown in the movie. The review wants us to understand that this hypocrisy of teaching student, with out actually trying to help them learn and do well is the basis for a lower class black community. As Carter argues with the principle that he needs the players teachers to send in the players class assessment, the principle seems to be dumbfounded by Carter’s interest in these students academic path. She says that for some of these kids basketball is the highlight of their lives. He responds by saying that that is the whole problem. If teachers and schools stoped subjugating these kids to the false narrative that they don’t have the ability to be successful and get a college education, then maybe the stereotype of lazy black community will change. Maybe there will be a insurgence of opportunity for this minority community that lacks the incentive to improve their school systems. This is the standpoint taken by the author of this analysis.  I most certainly agree with this argument, as Carter is what those students needed. He was the only one who believed in their future and allowed them the opportunity for potential. In the end of the movie, we are shown the futures of the Richmond players. We are shown the extremely positive impact their Coach had on them as they are playing for school where scholarships are involved.  One of the main characters, Kenyan, had the privilege of getting a full ride to Syracuse where the school offered to help him with his pregnant girlfriend, Kira. When Carter first walked into that gym, college had not even crossed Kenyan’s mind, but because of Carter’s aspirations in him, Kenyan was able to go to college and make his own path, regardless of any cultural stereotype places onto him by society. The analysis by this author shows us how much of a disadvantage black minority groups are, in terms of schooling and treatment of children and how Coach Carter disregarded this and followed his heart.

“Asian Americans have not been radicalized in a vacuum, isolated from other group; to the contrary, Asian Americans have been racializes relative to and through interaction with Whites and Blacks. A such, the respective radicalization trajectories of these groups are profoundly interrelated. The problem with the racial hierarchy approach, on the other hand, is that its notion of a single scale of status and privledghe is belied by the fact that Whites appear to have ordered other racial groups along at least two dimensional or axes historically”. This quote form The Racial Triangle  Of Asian Americans illuminates the tension that Asian American feel from the rest of society. They feel isolated and ostracized as a indirect result of the White mans repression. The white man does not want them to be involved in the society’s  social hierarchy. Rather the goal of the white community is to indirectly strip them of their social rights just as they did with opportunity for the black people. The only difference is that the white people did it to the Blacks directly. The white man does their best to keep the Asian community right where they want them and limit their social mobility by labeling them with a good stereotype that simultaneously has a negative connotation and allows them less opportunities to be successful on a social level. This is the cultural indifference withdrawn upon the Asian population as provided by The Racial Triangulation of Asian Americans in terms of social stature.