I'll Give You a Dollar to Shut Up!

Today it was announced that the Los Angeles public school system is going to pay $30 million dollars to settle some of the 191 claims of sexual lewd acts by a former elementary school teacher. The article claims that about 58 of the students' lawsuits will be settled by the price of $400,000 to $500,000 dollars. The alleged offender's victims were students ranging from 7-10 years. Besides the students who are settling their claims, their are also 23 others who have filed criminal cases for which the former teacher is still being held for.
All of the settlements will be paid by tax dollars and the elementary school's insurance fund. David Holmquist, general counsel for the Los Angeles Unified School District, claims, "we are not admitting liability" but, "we thought we would put this behind us by resolving it through remediation and early dispute resolution." Although Holmquist is not "admitting" anything, by definition "remediation" means the correction of something bad and it sounds as if the settlements are an attempt at an apology to the affected families. Why would the school system going so far to "put this behind us" if they weren't guilty?
Where I find the issue here is the "money makes everything better" attitude. With these many children claiming sexual lewd acts it seems very likely the teacher is guilty and in that case I think these children need more than money to help them. Not only could they suffer physical damage from their offender but also at such a young age they are vulnerable and could end up with serious mental/emotional issues. This teacher should be brought to justice for all the crimes he committed and not have some of his wrongs made right by the victims getting paid of with their own tax dollars!
Do you think that money can settle these wrongs? Why do you think the school system is trying to settle all these claims with money rather than in court?

Good News! You're a Minority

     In kindergarten my teacher always said my classmates and I were all the same no matter what we looked like because it was what was on the inside that counted. Only later in life did I find out that how we look not only matters but in some cases it is more important then what's on the inside. For this blog to make more sense I would also like to note that I have tan skin from my mom's Chinese nationality.

     Last month, my field hockey team was chosen to be the face of a national campaign for USA field hockey. I did not think my coach would ever choose me for the photo shoot so, I was flattered when I received the e-mail. Until, I saw who else was on the mailing list: the one other Asian girl, the only four black girls in the club, and two white girls. My coach even quoted, "this photo shoot might not work if we can't show the diversity of our club so, I hope all you girls can make it". She uses the word "show" as if we have to prove something. 

I made the picture small because
it's not very flattering but, at least
it shows USA field hockey
welcomes all races!

     It's not only my coach who tries to prove diversity. My American Studies class has been reviewing television shows and how they try to prove their own diversity and fight racism complaints. Even out of television, places in our reality such as colleges and businesses use people just for their ethnicity. I think this becomes a problem when people start to receive things only for being a different skin color. Not only is it unfair to the less wanted majority races, but it also does not feel good knowing you were only chosen for something based on what's on the outside.
Do you think our world could handle buisnesses and colleges that don't have to reach diversity quotas?

Our Country's Band-Aid for Illegal Immigrants: A Temporary Fix

In Chicago, several thousand people line up in Aug. 15 to get
information about the deferred action program for young illegal immigrants.
 Ferima Samake, who came to the United States from Mali at age 13,
and Juan Suchil, who arrived from Mexico at age 6 held up their numbers in line.

As a junior in high school, college applications are on my mind quite a bit. Many of my extended family has told me “you are a shoe in you will make colleges diverse, so they are going to want you”.  But I still do not understand why being diverse is so important and will have such a big impact on my college career?

Diversity has also been on my mind and a lot of other people’s minds because of Obama’s new “deferred action program for young illegal immigrants”(caption). The picture shown was taken by Daniel Boris for The New York Times and is present in a slideshow called “2012: The Year in Pictures”. The slideshow only previews less than 100 photographs from the year. So, the ones shown had to be carefully selected for a reason. So why put this one in?

Illegal immigrants have been a topic of conversation in the United States for awhile now. With so many currently living in the U.S. many people have argued over their futures. Now, with this “deferred action program” people are actually starting to see some progress being made. In the photo there is two young immigrants who have just received their information about applying for deferred action. The photography expert over at The New York Times chose to highlight these two people in particular. Both of them are people of color, the girl is African and the boy is Mexican. Choosing to put two minority figures highlights that these two figures are probably not American just because they are not white. Also, putting one boy and one girl of two different races reflects on how many this program is helping. One more observation is the simple clothing that both are wearing. This is something to be observed because I think it is a statement meant to show these two are just a couple of “regular joes” just like us so why shouldn't they be American citizens too? This photo represents the increasing influence of illegal immigrants, especially of the minority races in the United States.

Who should be able to be an American citizen is a topic we have been discussing in class. After the thirteenth amendment was passed there was a grey area about whether freedman would be allowed the same civil rights as the white American citizens. Andrew Johnson believed that the freedman should “only then become citizens upon proof that they are of good moral character”. What kind of “proof” does Johnson need? Have all Americans proven that they are of “good moral character”? These two young immigrants in the photo have to go through an application process in order to prove the should become temporary citizens. With the increasing influence of minorities in this country it is interesting to see that people are still questioning their citizenship.

Lily Schroeder has also noticed in influence of minority groups, in such things as the presidential election, and has even written a blogpost on it. Her post called “Here But Not Here” states that “Latinos rewarded Mr. Obama with 71% of their votes, and now it is Obama’s turn to act on the Dream Act”. This quote gives us an insight into the future on how minority groups might “reward” politicians with their vote by addressing issues like making illegal immigrants citizens.

For now politicians, like Obama have pacified the country by creating this temporary fix. A temporary fix that also pacified the country was The Missouri Compromise. This compromise created a line in which slavery could not spread to the north. The deferred action program had temporarily solved in issue, but it also leaves a grey area for the future. So, we can say that the illegal immigrant issue is far from being over and will have an impact in our future especially in elections.

Let My People Know

     This week in my American Studies class we discussed papers we wrote on restricting civil liberties during perilous times such as, times of war. One of the wars I talked about in my paper was the War on Terror. Even though I use it as an example in my paper and I am currently living during it, I still don't know a lot about this war (maybe that it why I have a lot of revising to do). Then, when I was searching through my classmates' blogs to post a comment, I came across a blog by Sarah H called "Faces of the Fallen". In Sarah's blog she also found that there was a lack of information about the War on Terror.
     In "Faces of the Fallen" Sarah discussed a Washington Post article that was about all the service members who have died this past year in the war and how the article was very vague about the causes of death. Sarah's blog inspired me to start thinking about who gets to decide how much information we as American citizens get to know? I now think that the government might restrict our knowledge of the war in order to decrease the number of people against the war. Maybe if we don't hear about the painful deaths some of these soldiers went through, then maybe the War on Terror will seem less harmless. If the government is really in charge of withholding information about the War on Terror, then this very much connects to my paper that I wrote about in the beginning. The government has a lot of power over the American citizens and I think they abuse it sometimes.
     Would you like to have more information about the war, even if some of the details were about gruesome deaths of American soldiers? How much information do you think the government should be allowed to withhold for the citizens?

He Ain't No Morgan Freeman but He Makes a Good Point

     In the week before my school's winter break my American Studies class dedicated some time to a discussion about the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The same day, I went home to read a post on Facebook about Morgan Freeman's "thoughts" on the Sandy Hook shooting. However, when I did more research on the post I discovered that it was a hoax. Morgan Freeman had not made any of his thoughts public about Sandy Hook, and the Facebook post had been written by a man from Canada. To read the post written by the man in Canada and the story about the whole hoax scandal read this article.
    Even though the widely read Facebook post was not written by an Academy Award winning actor, I think the author brought up some good points. The man talked about how the media is partly to blame for the shootings at Sandy Hook and others multiple victim shootings. The murderers in the shootings always become instantly famous after. People across the nation know more about the killer than the victims that lost their lives. And therefore killers have the incentive of becoming famous when they kill innocent people. I think that this is a good point. If the media didn't put the killers in such a spotlight maybe devastating incidents like Sandy Hook wouldn't happen as often.
    How do you think people who watch the news would react to less attention being put on the killers? Do you think the media could have an affect on the number of multiple shootings?

Can we come up with a new plot?

     In my American Studies class, this week, we talking about authors writing about their own lives. How did they chose what part went into the book? Why did they pick those selected parts? This week I was watching the TV show The Walking Dead and I started thinking about how writers come up with plot ideas that are non-fiction. However they create their idea, a lot of writer must think a lot alike because now-a-days there are a lot of shows, movies, and books about post-apocalyptic societies.
     On TV right now there are about ten shows about post-apocalyptic societies. I think that we can blame all of these shows on the Mayans prediction of our upcoming apocolypse. A lot of the plots especially focus on apocolypses with zombies. I wonder if these writers actually believe in what they are writing or if they are writing to entertain?
     I wonder how so many shows, books, and movies can have the same plot and can be so popular?

The Cuban Prisoner Crisis

     In my American Studies class we just turned in a paper about  civil liberties in perilous times. One of the historical examples I used in my paper had to do with prisoners at Guantanamo Bay during The War on Terror. The U.S. government was not giving prisoners the same rights as American citizens. In the news this week, I read an article about an American man who is being held in prison and needs the U.S. government's help to be released.
     Alan Gross, the prisoner, has not had any help from the U.S. government for the three years he has been there and is still waiting for some. The prisoner was arrested in Cuba for "smuggling sophisticated satellite and other telecommunications equipment into the country to give to the island's tiny Jewish community"(article). However, Gross claims he was trying "increase internet access" and he claims he was a pawn in a U.S. government program to change the Castro regime. I think that no matter what is true the U.S. should help Gross even to just get a trial because as an American citizen he should have to his constitutional rights. 
    Other than the fact that Gross just wants to come home, he also has a sick mother back in the U.S. who he wants to see before it is too late. Do you think the government should start helping Gross to be released? Do you feel that Alan Gross is guilty?