Author: YASSER AISAA

I took this picture back in the summer of 2017. It was one of the best summers I ever spent with my family. We flew to Florida and it was first time ever seeing a hot-air balloon and riding one too. It was around 8pm and I feel like I captured a beautiful picture of the hot -air balloon. A warm night with lights all around made this picture even better than if it were to be taken during the day . The reflection from the water just makes this picture even better to me than it already was and it will always remind of this specific summer.

I chose to talk about Adrian Piper’s “Decide Who You Are, Anita Hill” Already, the text is in red drawing my attention. At first glance, it could like like any other text or thought, but the deeper i looked into it, the more i found. This painting was made during the “MeToo movement”. The artist must have specifically chose red to show pain and suffering with their voices not able to be projected. Some examples were, “You’ll get over it” and “You’re overreacting”. This sounds like it can be to quiet down the victim or specifically gas lightning them making them seem like there is nothing wrong when in fact there is. This happens in todays society still some are afraid to speak up against their oppressors from fear. This artwork is very powerful and can motivate anyone who might come across this and would like to know more about it.

After reading “Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and the limits of representation”, Iv’e read and i agreed with most people with the things said in the article. It mostly talks about  how politicians, such as Biden and Harris, declare verbally to symbolize positive races however there’s no guarantee of their support while they are elected into workplace. In 1993, Biden confirmed his assist in the direction of assisting the 1994 crime invoice that targeted younger black humans, which brought about the stereotyping of all black people to be offenders even though it isn’t really the case. “This, of direction, was now not handiest approximately supposedly out-of-manage kids;  Biden has never taken duty for his actions in harming Black families. Cantrell refused to assist the working magnificence from getting better pay, which would appear surprising considering that’s who she was assisting before she changed into in workplace. This teaches us as vote casting residents to be careful of who we vote for to symbolize our town, city, or us as a whole. Actions will always speak louder than words.

I lived in New York my whole life, I’ve seen how neoliberalism affects the people in my neighborhood before i moved from Brooklyn to Staten Island back in the 10th grade. There have always been people in my community struggling with health insurance given by the government. Although they some what help, health insurance is hard to acquire for people with low income . They’re also people that are immigrants who don’t receive health insurance at all since they don’t have have a social security to be eligible to apply for it. A couple years later after I’ve moved the pandemic hit. Ever since the pandemic, there has been a supply for a Covid-19 testing kit given to the public by the government for free. It was a great way to support the community considering New York has had one of the most highest rates of residents testing positive for Covid-19 of all states. People would test themselves instead of going out their way and getting tested in public places protecting others to stop the spread of the disease. Soon after, the government had started to place a price on these Covid-19 kits which were originally given free to the community. This isn’t fair for the people that can not afford the kits, especially people who aren’t financially stable. They shouldn’t be paying for something as simple as testing if they have Covid-19. It would actually be more helpful for everyone else if they had the free kit to test themselves in order to protect other people such as family, friends, e.t.c.

Through both articles, (“New York’s Invisible Climate Migrants” and “Racial Capatilocne”) there seems to be an underlying problem with the way race effects the way of living for people more specifically people of color. In the first article, an area called Canarsie in New York has had “62 percent of the population identified as black ” and it has been difficult for them to keep homes since they were “targeted by subprime lenders” which then led to a large increase of foreclosure in the area. This has been doing nothing but affecting their lives. In the article “Racial Capatilocne” there was a publication in 1987 of “Toxic Waste and Race in the United States” that mentions how “race was the single most important factor in determining where toxic facilities were sited in the United States”. This shows how racial equality was not of much importance to the government and affects the lives of these people. Its also stated in the report that ” three out of every five Black and Hispanic Americans lived in communities with uncontrolled toxic waste sites” so not only do these people of the community live through these harsh conditions, but they have no say in where these toxic waste sites should be located since that can only be controlled by the government. Although both articles “New York’s Invisible Climate Migrants” and “Racial Capatilocne” aren’t really discussing the same topic, they both have similar opinions discussing the inequality of particular races living in the environment and the harsh conditions they have to endure.