Unfortunately there is going to be a massive delay in me getting any posts to you all today or tomorrow or maybe even Monday because my laptop has gone in for repair and I can't rely on my phone to run this blog.
Hopefully it will all be better by next Saturday and we can return to the normal schedule, but I will try to keep you updated. I still haven't decided what to write for Sociology Sunday so I guess this is kind of a blessing in disguise for me... *wink*
However the next Confidence post will be all about appreciating the face and the next "wild card Monday" should be about me leaving work.
Until then, I hope you all have a wonderful week,
Speak soon,
Stephanie
Showing posts with label somethingswrong. Show all posts
Showing posts with label somethingswrong. Show all posts
Saturday, 22 August 2015
Thursday, 11 December 2014
Long Time Coming: Institutionalised Racism
This blog post, which I present to you today has been a long time coming, and I hope you can leave feeling more educated on a matter that is, quite frankly, disgraceful.
I am, of course, talking about the Ferguson case where a white cop has shoot down a black teenager and has managed to get away with it scot free and the Eric Garner case where, once again, a black teenager has been killed by a brutal attack at the hands of a man who is supposedly in charge of the safety of American civilians and has suffered no consequence.
First we'll deal with the facts.
FERGUSON CASE
The only real statement received by the officer in question, Darren Wilson, obviously describes the situation as a direct threat to his own safety. He says that he was just trying to chase up a report he had received about a robbery. The report described two black teenagers wearing hoodies. Nothing else was said apparently, so this was all he had to go on.
Darren Wilson says he had requested of them both to stop on the sidewalk so he could question them, but the victim, Mike Brown got very angry with this and started hitting Wilson. Wilson describes him as looking like a "demon". Wilson, fearing for his life, took out the "Only weapon suitable" and fired shots. He states that there were some blanks fired first before a bullet was fired into Brown. All through this Brown was trying to take the gun from Wilson.
Once Brown had started running (after having been shot once in the chest) Wilson followed, deciding to keep an eye on him in case he was responsible for the robbing. When Brown entered an alley and turned around Wilson described Brown as looking very aggressive and he shot again and again until the fatal shot was fired into Brown's skull.
White Police Officer Darren Wilson characterized black teenager Michael Brown as a Demon. This is very significant. It reveals the unconscious racist mindset of the police officer. The devil is a demon; he is black. As such police officer Wilson feels justified in killing Michael Brown. The unconscious mind of Wilson reveals the intentions. The killing of Michael Brown was a racist act.
Piaget Crenshaw, Mitchell's co-worker, said she saw what happened from her apartment while waiting for Mitchell: "The officer was just trying to pull him into the vehicle – that's just what it looked like."
I am, of course, talking about the Ferguson case where a white cop has shoot down a black teenager and has managed to get away with it scot free and the Eric Garner case where, once again, a black teenager has been killed by a brutal attack at the hands of a man who is supposedly in charge of the safety of American civilians and has suffered no consequence.
First we'll deal with the facts.
FERGUSON CASE
The only real statement received by the officer in question, Darren Wilson, obviously describes the situation as a direct threat to his own safety. He says that he was just trying to chase up a report he had received about a robbery. The report described two black teenagers wearing hoodies. Nothing else was said apparently, so this was all he had to go on.
Darren Wilson says he had requested of them both to stop on the sidewalk so he could question them, but the victim, Mike Brown got very angry with this and started hitting Wilson. Wilson describes him as looking like a "demon". Wilson, fearing for his life, took out the "Only weapon suitable" and fired shots. He states that there were some blanks fired first before a bullet was fired into Brown. All through this Brown was trying to take the gun from Wilson.
Once Brown had started running (after having been shot once in the chest) Wilson followed, deciding to keep an eye on him in case he was responsible for the robbing. When Brown entered an alley and turned around Wilson described Brown as looking very aggressive and he shot again and again until the fatal shot was fired into Brown's skull.
White Police Officer Darren Wilson characterized black teenager Michael Brown as a Demon. This is very significant. It reveals the unconscious racist mindset of the police officer. The devil is a demon; he is black. As such police officer Wilson feels justified in killing Michael Brown. The unconscious mind of Wilson reveals the intentions. The killing of Michael Brown was a racist act.
Tiffany Mitchell, who was picking up a colleague to go to work, said she saw some of the confrontation. Wilson and Brown were "tussling through the window." "It looked as if the kid was pulling away and the officer was pulling him in." "A shot was fired through the window."
"The cop gets out of his vehicle shooting," Mitchell said. "(Brown's) body jerked as if he was hit from behind, and he turned around, and he put his hands up. ... The cop continued to fire until he just dropped down to the ground, and his face just smacks the concrete."
Crenshaw: "He started chasing after the boy. I'm hearing shots fired ... one did graze him. ... At the end he just turned around ... and then was shot multiple times."
These accounts, along with those supplied by the other teenager present highlight the severity of this case and, if nothing else, the case should have been investigated further by the court, but it wasn't and the fact remains, the police officer Darren Wilson, was let off too easily with no repercussions whilst one family has to grieve the loss of a son with no comfort that justice has been served.
ERIC GARNER
Eric Garner was caught by the police attempting to break up a fight that occurred in New York. When the police confronted him he spoke back, tried to defend himself from their verbal attack against him, but Garner was not willing to let himself be pushed around when he knew he was in the right. The police, who are there to "protect and serve" were not happy with this and place Garner in a choke hold after slamming a knee into his neck and repeatedly bashing his head against the wall.
Garner, who was by no means a man in excellent shape, repeatedly told the officers, "I can't breathe!" but they didn't listen, they continued to hold him and choke him until Garner eventually died after a cardiac arrest. This unprovoked attack could have been avoided if the police hadn't been so offended that a black man, who was doing no wrong, decided to defend his rights.
Garner did not resist the choke hold at any point during the confrontation and all he could do whilst more than 5 officers pinned him down was beg for help... He did not receive this.
This case has less grey area than the Ferguson case. Eric Garner was wrongfully murdered by the police force in New York and as a man with 6 children and 2 grandchildren plus an entire nationality scared to go out on the streets, I have to ask myself, what has our world come to?
At the end of the day, there is no way for me to ever truly understand the level of oppression that black people are feeling as of now, but I can certainly say without a doubt that I m ashamed to say that my nationality is still not over this discrimination that has haunted our world for generations and I can only hope that by never forgetting what has happened and by standing up to racism seen in every day I can help the world we live in progress further. Because black lives do matter and everyone deserves the right to breathe.
If you have any questions or disagree with any of my points then please feel free to comment,
Until next time,
Stephanie
Thursday, 17 July 2014
Bye Bye Michael Gove.
Dearly Beloved, we are gathered here today to celebrate the firing of Michael Gove as the Education Secretary in the UK. He will not be sorely missed.
As I am sure my constant readers will know, I am not a fan of Mr Michael Gove as I think the only thing he can do is screw over the UK's education system. Luckily for us, he has stepped down and a new woman has stepped up to the plate for her chance at reforming education for the better.
Her name: Nicky Morgan
Her task: Fix the mess Gove has left her
Nicky Morgan has made her way into parliament very quickly, only being elected in 2010, but, thanks to David Cameron's cabinet reshuffle in a bid to win more votes, she has been promoted to Education Secretary. The Conservatives have never been great with allowing women onto the team, despite Margaret Thatcher (the only female Prime Minister we have ever had) being one of them. Morgan is one of only two mothers who are in the latest cabinet which I think is an outrage seeing as having a child and sending it through the education system would give our politicians a better idea of what we go through... That being said most Torys end up going to private school anyway.
On the subject of Conservatives' belief system she has spoken against her party in saying that they need to "hate less" Morgan said in January the party needed to have a more constructive message than simply: "we're against this, we're anti-that, we don't like them, we don't want them here, we don't want them doing this." This, for me, makes her seem like a great choice for the person helping out the future generations.
However, things are not all peachy keen with the new Education Secretary. She voted against Gay marriage stating that: "I totally support civil partnerships and that same-sex relationships are recognised in law. But marriage, to me, is between a man and a woman." and she has also campaigned for the upper limit of abortion to go down from 24 weeks to 20 weeks.
Overall, I think the only thing we can do, despite me disagreeing with some of her morals, is wait and see if she can clean up the mess before the 2015 elections mean Cameron and his archaic party get the boot.
As always, thanks for listening and feel free to give me your own opinions below.
Stephanie.
As I am sure my constant readers will know, I am not a fan of Mr Michael Gove as I think the only thing he can do is screw over the UK's education system. Luckily for us, he has stepped down and a new woman has stepped up to the plate for her chance at reforming education for the better.
Her name: Nicky Morgan
Her task: Fix the mess Gove has left her
Nicky Morgan has made her way into parliament very quickly, only being elected in 2010, but, thanks to David Cameron's cabinet reshuffle in a bid to win more votes, she has been promoted to Education Secretary. The Conservatives have never been great with allowing women onto the team, despite Margaret Thatcher (the only female Prime Minister we have ever had) being one of them. Morgan is one of only two mothers who are in the latest cabinet which I think is an outrage seeing as having a child and sending it through the education system would give our politicians a better idea of what we go through... That being said most Torys end up going to private school anyway.
On the subject of Conservatives' belief system she has spoken against her party in saying that they need to "hate less" Morgan said in January the party needed to have a more constructive message than simply: "we're against this, we're anti-that, we don't like them, we don't want them here, we don't want them doing this." This, for me, makes her seem like a great choice for the person helping out the future generations.
However, things are not all peachy keen with the new Education Secretary. She voted against Gay marriage stating that: "I totally support civil partnerships and that same-sex relationships are recognised in law. But marriage, to me, is between a man and a woman." and she has also campaigned for the upper limit of abortion to go down from 24 weeks to 20 weeks.
Overall, I think the only thing we can do, despite me disagreeing with some of her morals, is wait and see if she can clean up the mess before the 2015 elections mean Cameron and his archaic party get the boot.
As always, thanks for listening and feel free to give me your own opinions below.
Stephanie.
Wednesday, 25 June 2014
The Education System (UK)
I am currently a 17 year old female working my way through the UK's corrupted education system whilst Michael Gove (God save us all) messes around with not only my future, but that of my younger siblings.
The first time I ever heard about Michael Gove was at the end of Year 10 when I was informed that my classmates and I would have to take all our controlled assessments again in Year 11, ruining the original plan set out by our teachers. Why? Because Michael no-idea-how-to-run-the-education-system Gove decided to raise the English grade boundaries by 9 marks leaving me with a grade that was two marks less that I should have got (I went down from an A to a C).
The original system would have meant that we would have done most of our CAs in Year 10 and then one or two in Year 11, leaving us with plenty of time to prepare for our exams. Seems fair enough right? Not for Michael Gove.
The new system meant we had two or three weeks after our CAs were all finished to prepare for the exams and I came out with a horribly low grade. You see, I got an A* in my CAs, but with my exam grades taken into account I got a B which isn't bad, but take into account that my exam would have had to be a very low C at the most to bring it down that much.
Which brings me onto the second part of the education system that annoys me, the exams. While I am aware exams are a good way to determine who tests better than others, I don't agree that we should base our entire future off of a grade we got from writing for up to 2 and a half hours without any available resources. That isn't going to happen in real life situations is it? Coursework and CAs are definitely a more reliable representation of how well we will perform in the workplace, especially for subjects that involve essay writing (English, Philosophy, History etc.)
Therefore, another reason for me to take a strong dislike to Michael Gove is his policy to get rid of all forms of CAs and Coursework and leave students with exams at the end of both GCSE or A level years. This means that students will have to remember all of the information for the entire course after two years. I could barely cope with one and before my year they had January exams to split it up as well. Even they found it difficult. Exams are getting harder than ever and the world of work is restricted to those who do well in them, but there are plenty of people like me who can't succeed in exams. I just can't, no matter how much time I spend revising, do well in exams and I feel as though alienating others like me is the wrong way to go.
The next, and most recent development in education policy I want to complain about, is the banning of any literature that isn't British English. This means Classic American Authors such as John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, F.Scott Fitzgerald and J.D Salinger, will not be taught to the children of England. Whilst there are some fantastic English authors such as Shakespeare, Dickens, Austen etc, there is so much more to the world of Literature that needs to be taught to students to prevent them from becoming close-minded adults who are unaware of the amazing literature that exists outside the borders of a, frankly, quite racially elitist country.
Finally, I want to talk about tuition fees, this is one of the most famous decisions made by the current government in Britain and is one of the reasons the Lib Dems will hopefully not be in power after the next election. In the UK we went from a £1,000 tuition fee in 1998 to a £9,000 to date. I am aware in places like the US it gets even worse than this and I think it is one of the most frustrating part of being a student.
We are told from a very young age that we need to go to school, get good grades, go to college, get good grades, go to university, finish with a degree, go into the world of work, pay off all the money you owe now you have achieved what they practically force you to achieve. I have found, after researching other countries where I can study that there are places in Europe where the students get a free education right up until the point they choose to leave the system and there are multiple routes into the top positions.
For me, England has become a very unattractive place to study my chosen degree and I would rather study somewhere like Germany or Holland where there system, though different, is less corrupted and focuses more on the students than the fat cats who have too much power.
As always feel free to ask me any questions in the comments,
Until next time,
Stephanie
The first time I ever heard about Michael Gove was at the end of Year 10 when I was informed that my classmates and I would have to take all our controlled assessments again in Year 11, ruining the original plan set out by our teachers. Why? Because Michael no-idea-how-to-run-the-education-system Gove decided to raise the English grade boundaries by 9 marks leaving me with a grade that was two marks less that I should have got (I went down from an A to a C).
The original system would have meant that we would have done most of our CAs in Year 10 and then one or two in Year 11, leaving us with plenty of time to prepare for our exams. Seems fair enough right? Not for Michael Gove.
The new system meant we had two or three weeks after our CAs were all finished to prepare for the exams and I came out with a horribly low grade. You see, I got an A* in my CAs, but with my exam grades taken into account I got a B which isn't bad, but take into account that my exam would have had to be a very low C at the most to bring it down that much.
Which brings me onto the second part of the education system that annoys me, the exams. While I am aware exams are a good way to determine who tests better than others, I don't agree that we should base our entire future off of a grade we got from writing for up to 2 and a half hours without any available resources. That isn't going to happen in real life situations is it? Coursework and CAs are definitely a more reliable representation of how well we will perform in the workplace, especially for subjects that involve essay writing (English, Philosophy, History etc.)
Therefore, another reason for me to take a strong dislike to Michael Gove is his policy to get rid of all forms of CAs and Coursework and leave students with exams at the end of both GCSE or A level years. This means that students will have to remember all of the information for the entire course after two years. I could barely cope with one and before my year they had January exams to split it up as well. Even they found it difficult. Exams are getting harder than ever and the world of work is restricted to those who do well in them, but there are plenty of people like me who can't succeed in exams. I just can't, no matter how much time I spend revising, do well in exams and I feel as though alienating others like me is the wrong way to go.
The next, and most recent development in education policy I want to complain about, is the banning of any literature that isn't British English. This means Classic American Authors such as John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, F.Scott Fitzgerald and J.D Salinger, will not be taught to the children of England. Whilst there are some fantastic English authors such as Shakespeare, Dickens, Austen etc, there is so much more to the world of Literature that needs to be taught to students to prevent them from becoming close-minded adults who are unaware of the amazing literature that exists outside the borders of a, frankly, quite racially elitist country.
Finally, I want to talk about tuition fees, this is one of the most famous decisions made by the current government in Britain and is one of the reasons the Lib Dems will hopefully not be in power after the next election. In the UK we went from a £1,000 tuition fee in 1998 to a £9,000 to date. I am aware in places like the US it gets even worse than this and I think it is one of the most frustrating part of being a student.
We are told from a very young age that we need to go to school, get good grades, go to college, get good grades, go to university, finish with a degree, go into the world of work, pay off all the money you owe now you have achieved what they practically force you to achieve. I have found, after researching other countries where I can study that there are places in Europe where the students get a free education right up until the point they choose to leave the system and there are multiple routes into the top positions.
For me, England has become a very unattractive place to study my chosen degree and I would rather study somewhere like Germany or Holland where there system, though different, is less corrupted and focuses more on the students than the fat cats who have too much power.
As always feel free to ask me any questions in the comments,
Until next time,
Stephanie
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