A small report on Life

Life matters.  Not just mine, or yours, but all life.  I have been told this by so many people that it has stuck with me every time I try to discourage another person’s way of thinking.  It’s not as if I needed to be right, but it seems that even the most trivial view of some has a greater intolerance to others.  I have decided that taking Soc 101 is a great avenue to see the world as a whole.

 

Aristotle’s quote: “The Sum of the Parts is greater than the whole” could be used in a greater context than even he thought possible.  With so many people on this planet; you, in your whole life, would only get to see a fraction of this.  Still it would be only just a part of the whole. You would think of the world as a whole instead of the many different, wonderful, and yet, sometimes terrifying, things in this world that would offer your view to be obscured in one way or another.  

 

Take America, for instance, our country is founded by English immigrants that came to settle here and the Natives that were already here.  The constant exposure to new cultures has left us more tolerant, yet still unrefined, in our ambitious lives.  The Eclectic compilation of people here is but a fraction of the whole.  
 
 

The fact that in one city you would find a Native American community, an African American community, an Anglo community, French, Asian, Indian; it is these eclectic groups of people that would broaden your horizon to distinguish where this person was from or that person and learn new things about yourself that you had never even fathomed before.  

 

Racism within communities is to be expected, because of the ignorance of others.  That is where you could change your perspective on the matter as a whole.  A person, whether they have light skin, dark skin, brown or olive skin; it’s a matter of who that person is, not what they are that defines them.  When you take a person you just met into consideration and act on the importance of actually getting to know that person, you would see something that most cannot.  

 

In my younger days I was bullied, so I became a bully.  It wasn’t a bright and shining way of life, so do you see?  If you discriminate against a person you are teaching your child that its okay, when it’s not; or you are teaching the person that you are harassing that your entire race is the same way.  When that train of thought enters a person’s mind it sticks and then you’re stuck with another bigoted person that the world has no need for.  Our brothers-in-arms, so to speak, are the ones not afraid to stand on the front lines beside you and tell your, bully, captor, or whatever, that no matter what you have a support system.

 

It is with this way of thinking that I touch on a research topic that stems from my brief lecture from my Soc 101 Professor.  In his introduction, he spoke of the Pine Ridge reservation in Pine Ridge, SD; But also of his home land across the ‘pond’.  He said the similar conditions of Pine Ridge and his home country had made him feel actually very homely.  His approach of the reservation was actually quite refreshing, as opposed to the tired sayings that ‘natives are good for nothing’ and drunks.  A native student attending an all-Caucasian academy would be able to tell you how it feels to be ostracized for the color of your skin.  I, myself, have been in that situation.  It is not pleasant.  Using my experience as the only native person in an entire school system, with the exception of my younger brother, it brought with it an amount of attention that I had never been accustomed to.  I had been accosted by many people asking what my ancestors were like. How did it feel to live in a Tipi.  It was actually quite difficult to get through a day of school when everyone stared at you like had an extra head and were the color purple.  I got through it and ended up making friends.  The novelty wore off and I was more than ecstatic to return to my home at the end of the first semester.  I didn’t think I’d have been able to deal with the new incoming students and their questions.  My brother, on the other hand, loved the attention he was given.  He was, and still is, a ham for attention.  As I got older I found that meeting new people broadened my views of the people in this world.  It’s their way of thinking that had changed my own.  I was grateful to teachers that I had once thought were not worth my time.

 

I will forever be grateful to my Elementary principle for the patience he had with me and explaining the race issue that seemed to drive people to do their ignorant actions.  So in conclusion, I just wanted to touch this little project that I will be starting soon.  Thank you for reading my nonsense.  Have a good day.