Racism/Discrimination

I know I may have done previous blogs about how much I hate this, but I recently had to do a PowerPoint presentation for my computer class and I chose to do it on the topic of racism/discrimination. Now mind you, I do not think this way, I personally feel it's horrible to think this way about people. Here's what I found out:

Stereotypes

Italian stereotypes
Some of the most common ones include:

• Tolerant of violence
• Labor bosses
• Ignorant
• Organized crime association
• Political corruption
• Overly emotional/dramatic
• Superstitious
• Hot Blooded
• Aggressive
• Obsessed with food
• Prone to vengeance
• Males will be big and muscular, very good looking.
• Men will be sexually well endowed, but lack skills in the bedroom
• Loud tastes in clothing
• Expensive jewelry made cheaply
• Has the name Michael, Joe, Sal, or Tony
• All talk and no bite
• Braggers
• Loud talkers and not knowing when to be quiet
• Supposedly cruel and overly demanding bosses
• flirtatious, exotic young women with a taste in Italian-made items like Prada, Gucci, Armani
• Gum cracking, big haired, air head girlfriend of a Mafia soldier

Some of the stereotypical Italian-held jobs include: peddlers, chefs, construction workers, any working class jobs

Latino stereotypes
Some of the most common ones include:

• Being heavily tattooed
• Enjoy low rider cars
• Having too greasy hair
• The "Latin Lover"-suave, charming, romantic
• Large families
• Can't speak English
• Drug dealers(thanks to the 1983 movie Scarface)
• Mouthy
• Laborers
• Enjoy clothing in loud, obnoxious colors
• Maid/housekeeper
• gardener/landscaper
• All are Mexican
• Mutiple kids
• They all steal
• They all own large cars, trucks or SUVs
• Short
• Uneducated
• All listen to the same music and eat hot food

Black stereotypes

• Blacks are shown to be overly religious, superstitious, joyous, naive, ignorant
• They'll be shown as lazy, criminals, ignorant, overly religious, violent
• They'll be shown eating fried chicken, drinking Kool-Aid or eating watermelon
• They'll be shown living in slums/ghettos
• They'll be shown as people with big lips, heavyset, alot of kids and no knowledge of where the father is, being school dropouts, good at sports, confident, 'gangstas', love white women, good at dancing

Asian stereotypes

• Asians have ben shown as hard working, studious, very grateful, inoffensive, intelligent, politically inactive, productive people who raise their social standing through diligence and good merit
• 25.2% of American-born Asians over the age of 25 hold a Bachelor's Degree compared to 15.5% of general Americans of the same age hold a Bachelor's Degree
• Asian men have been shown as chauvinists, meaning they treat women unfairly
• There is also a stererotype about image. The epicanthic fold of Asian people's eyes is sometimes referred to in a positive light 'almond shaped' or in a negative light' slant eye', there is also a stereotypical haircut- bowl cut for boys, overgrown bangs for girls. And it's also assumed that all Asians are born with the knowledge of how to perform martial arts, are short and have difficulty with the English language

Jewish stereotypes

• nit picky stingy misers
• Associated with circumcision, bagels, Mazel Tov, Oy Vey
• In pictures, shown as people with big hook noses, olive skin, curly hair, dark eyes, big lips, wearing kippahs, aka yamecahs

British stereotypes

• Big teeth, yellow teeth
• Bad hygiene
• Snooty, stuck up
• obsessed with soccer
• obsessed with The Queen
• Tight-fitting clothing
• Boisterous
• Heavy smokers/drinkers
• British men are gay

More common stereotypes include:

• British men are gay(i.e. Mick Jagger dancing around like an idiot level) or be suave romantic lovers
• British women will be stuck up
• British men will have the word Sir before their name(i.e. Sir Paul McCartney, Sir Mick Jagger, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Sir Michael Caine)
• That people in England will all be walking around wearing bowler hats, carrying umbrellas, and say things like "Cheerio"
• That British men will be tall, thin and ugly

American Indian stereotypes

• Not all Indians will be doing arts and crafts or live on a reservation
• Not all Indians will be experts on their culture/heritage

Media Stereotypes

Italian stereotypes

• The HBO show The Sopranos came under fire when it first premiered because it showed too many stereotypes, like mob association
• The 2009 show Jersey Shore came under fire as well because it showed too many Italian stereotypes, like the exotic young women and hot blooded young guys
• Sometimes mobsters or movies about the mob will glorify the topic, like people like John 'The Dapper Don' Gotti will made out like a hero
• There is also a stereotype about appearance, that all Italians have dark features

Famous Italians

• Steven Tyler(hottie!)
• Joe Perry(hottie!)
• Federico Castellucio(hottie!)
• Ferrucio Lamborghini
• Marisa Tomei
• Michael Imperioli(hottie!)

Steven Tyler

Marisa Tomei

Federico Castellucio

Michael Imperioli

Latino stereotypes

• Did you know: that less than 1% of all news stories involve Latinos?
• Did you know: that the Latino population accounts for 13% of the US population?
• In 2001, crime, poverty, illegal immigration, welfare accounted for 66% of all news stories involving Latinos
• Famous Latino people:
• Salma Hayek
• John Leguizamo(hottie!)
• Penelope Cruz
• Steven Bauer(hottie!)
• Eva Mendes
• Andy Garcia(cutie!)

Salma Hayek                         John Leguizamo
              

Steven Bauer                             Andy Garcia
               
Black stereotypes

• In movies, blacks and whites are seen differently:
• Using vulgar language: whites-17%, blacks- 89%
• Having to be physically restrained: whites-6%, blacks-55%
• Being physically abusive: whites-11%, blacks-56%
• Blacks will be shown as bad, they're not. You certainly don't hear about black people abusing their wives or whatever, always been whites doing that!
• Famous people:
• Halle Berry(Fave actress!)
• Rosa Parks
• Martin Luther King Jr(He inspires me!)
• Medgar Evers(He was shot for no reason!)
• Malcolm X
• Harriet Tubman
• Sojourner Truth

Halle Berry                           Martin Luther King Jr
                 

Medgar Evers                           Rosa Parks
                
Asian stereotypes

• A good example of an Asian media stereotype is the super geek stereotype. A good example is Gedde Watanabe's character of Long Duk Dong in Sixteen Candles.
• A good example of the asexual martial artist stereotype is in the 2001 movie Romeo Must Die. Jet Li's character of Han Sing was supposed to kiss Aaliyah's Trish O'Day at the end, but instead gave him a big hug. It was edited for fear some Asians wouldn't feel comfortable seeing an Asian man portrayed in a sexual light
• Another thing people like to assume is that all Asians look alike, with their dark hair, dark eyes, oval faces and tan skin tone.
• An example of the martial artist expert is the 2002 movie Bulletproof Monk with Chow Yun-fat. In that movie, he played a martial artist monk who travels to modern day New York
• In pop culture, there was a character named Charlie Chan, who was a Chinese-Hawaiian detective based on real-life detective Chang Apana. In the movies, his wife and kids were all actually Asian, but the actors who played him were not Asian, but white British actors, like Warner Oland, Roland Winter and Sidney Toler
• Famous Asians:
• Ken Watanabe(Cute!)
• Jet Li(hottie!)
• Lucy Liu(fave actress!)
• Michelle Yeoh(very beautiful and fave actress!)
• Ziyi Zhang(very pretty!)
• Will Yun Lee(hot!)
• Kristy Yamaguchi(awesome athlete!)
• Noriyuki 'Pat' Morita(very funny man, and cool!)
• Tim Kang
• Jason Wu
• James Iha

Ken Watanabe                            Kristy Yamaguchi
                      

Jet Li                                        Ziyi Zhang
                 
Jewish stereotypes

• nit picky stingy misers
• Associated with circumcision, bagels, Mazel Tov, Oy Vey
• In pictures, shown as people with big hook noses, olive skin, curly hair, dark eyes, big lips, wearing kippahs, aka yamecahs
• Famous Jewish people:
• Gene Simmons
• Judd Hirsch
• David Krumholtz
• LeeLee Sobieski

Gene Simmons                           David Krumholtz
             

Judd Hirsch                          


British stereotypes

• In media, British people will always be shown as being, proper, prim, prudish
• In American films, the baddies always have English accents
• They will be shown as being upper class with strong English accents(i.e. Hugh Grant, who might I add is HOT!)
• That British men will be the Butler or Gentleman in movies
• Disney movies are notorious for the 'Bad Brit' stereotype. A few examples are:
• Judge Frollo-The Hunchback of Notre Dame- voiced by Tony Jay. The character is supposed to be French, but was voiced by a British actor
• Jafar-Aladdin
• Maleficent-Sleeping Beauty
• Mrs. Trunchbull-Matilda
• Scar-The Lion King. Voiced by a white British actor named Jeremy Irons
• Count Olaf-A Series of Unfortunate Events
• Lady Tremaine-Cinderella
• Professor Ratigan-The Great Mouse Detective
• Famous people from England:
• The Rolling Stones(Mick Jagger and Ronnie Wood are my faves!!!!They're still HOT!!!)
• Rowan Atkinson
• Colin Firth(hot in an English gentleman sort of way, he looks charming, I like that!)
• Kate Winslet
• Helena Bonham-Carter
• Jeremy Irons
• Hugh Laurie
• Zoe Wanamaker

The Rolling Stones                            Rowan Atkinson
               
Colin Firth                                   Jeremy Irons
                 
American Indian stereotypes
Now mind you, these are just stereotypes, I don't feel this way about anyone!

• Wise elder
• Indian princess
• loyal sidekick
• obese, impoverished
• They are devoted environmenatlists devoted to preserving Mother Earth
• Being shown as people full of passive, child like innocence, rapists, primitive, lower intellect
• Bloodthirsty savages
• Famous Indians
• Wes Studi
• Graham Greene
• Eddie Spears
• Irene Bedard

Wes Studi                                          Graham Green
      

Christmas/Weekends

Ah yes, it's that time of year again, time again for the greed of the holidays to make its presence known. Have you ever noticed that only a few years ago, you never seen as many Christmas commercials, but nowadays, you see more Christmas commercials than ever. You see these people buying undeserving people expensive Caddies, expensive jewelry, that's not what Christmas is all about. It's about the birth of Jesus Christ for God's sake. It's right there in the name. In my house, we remember the TRUE meaning of Christmas. In my house, it isn't about the greed or whatever associated with what everyone considers Christmas now. And also a few years ago, you never seen commercials for Christmas until about November, now you're seeing them in September. But with some people they like to get Christmas shopping done early. My mom, my step-dad Greg's sisters Jeanne and Carol are 3 people who I know do their shopping early every year to get it done. They say it's a pain. But I've kind of strayed away from liking Christmas anymore. I used to love it, I used to be able to not sleep on Christmas Eve, wondering what Santa brought me, that's when Christmas was magical.

Nowadays, when it's morning, I usually walk right past what 'Santa' brought me, it just doesn't feel the same as back then. Is that what growing up does to you? Makes you forget that Christmas is a time for magic and miracles? I guess I've forgotten that magic when I keep seeing those stupid commercials advertising more greed and people getting what they don't deserve more than anything. What people need to do is realize the true meaning of Christmas-- the birth of Christ for God's sake, it's right there in the name for cryin' out loud! I do a little Christmas shopping every year and this year, I've got some money I've scrounged up for the past 2 years to do some serious shopping. I have a lot to buy-- for my dad I have to get him this old movie he wants, called Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, it's one of those old 1950s sci-fi B-movies, for my sister I'm getting her a blanket that has her favorite show on it, Invader Zim, she's a sucker for all that stuff from Hot Topic, for my mom, I'm getting her this book about the mob, she loves reading books about the mob, for my step-dad I'm getting him a picture, a hand drawn one of Tahiti at sunset. And I know where I can get it, at this place called In-Light Studio in the Eastgate Mall. You should really see this place, it's awesome, they have a picture of virtually anyone. So you can say I'm up to my eyes in shopping for the holidays.


My weekend was pretty cool though. Last night, I got to see that new Karate Kid movie with Jaden Smith and Jackie Chan. It was totally awesome, way better than the old 1980's one, but that one is good too, my dad kept talking during the movie though, and there was this little kid who kept bullying Jaden Smith's character Dre Parker, and my dad kept saying that the little Oriental kid who was bullying him should get smacked so hard his eyes become straight. I told him this wasn't right. You see, my dad sometimes jokes about racial stuff like this, and sometimes it's hard to tell if he's joking. If he is, I tell him that it's not right to make racial/ethnic cracks about people. But I watched the movie last night and it was awesome! I love movies like that.


And what's stupid? I bought 2 movies with some birthday money, and I haven't even watched them yet. I bought Bulletproof Monk and Unleashed, one has Chow Yun-fat in it and the other has Jet Li in it, I haven't even watched them yet, but this Friday, if I'm not doing anything particularly interesting, I'm watching them.


And here's a video that's really cool, and I think perfect for any hard worker, it's the song Nothin But a Good Time by Poison, here's the link to the video.
http://new.music.yahoo.com/videos/--2162500
If you see my stupid email adress thing, sorry. It's off my video playlist thing on Yahoo. But the song is really cool, I guarantee it.

Bullying

Bullying: Yes the title is what it means--bullying. Have you ever been bullied in school for reasons you are unsure of? I have, from grade school until senior year of high school. In 7th grade people would call me four eyes or coke bottle because I wear glasses, but what they fail to realize is coke bottle is a name for really thick lenses, my eyes aren't that bad, but they aren't that good. Another name was Harry Potters' girlfriend because of the glasses issue and because I said the guy who played him was cute, and as time went on, I started getting bullied for different reasons, like in 9th grade, somehow without me saying a thing, word had spread about me being a virgin. I had not said a thing about this to anyone, its private, but you know how high school is, nothing is private. I don't mean to make this sound personal, but I'm just curious if there's anyone else out there who has been bullied before. This one girl I went to school with started asking me all these questions one day in my 12th grade marketing class and I felt really uncomfortable answering them. By then, the entire class was focused on me and I felt like I had been thrust into the spotlight. She started asking me if I smoked, if I did drugs, if I slept around with guys, I did the good thing and stayed quiet. Then in 12th grade, a fellow classmate wrote an offensive thing on my locker. For those who don't know, I have a step-dad who is of Italian ancestry, and this guy wrote Italian racial slurs in red marker all over my locker door. Then after it was cleaned off, a week later there was more stuff marked all over my locker door, only it wasn't Italian slurs, it was British racial slurs because of my liking of British rock, under these horrible words, it said "Start liking music from THIS country." So I have been bullied from grade 3 until grade 12. I was the prime victim of bullying. People would call me fat, ugly, tell me no one would ever love me, that no one would want me around, and sometimes it would stress me out so much that I thought about doing something about it, and one day I got blamed for something I didn't even do, I supposedly got accused of knocking the lights out of this guy I went to school with, the thing being I was nowhere even near him, I was on the other side of the room from him when this "hit" supposedly happened. I had to serve a Friday detention for that and this Friday DT was also his I had to serve. I didn't get out of there until 7:00 that night, it ticked me off to no end for that. But there has to be a way to stop the bullying, no kid should have to go through being bullied because of their appearance, their size, their likes/dislikes, their race you name it. Hopefully someone out there agrees about ending bullying.

Random Thoughts and stuff

Random Thoughts: The title means what it means. Random thoughts just buzzing around. I recently discovered a new singer I like, people may have heard of her, Aaliyah. She's actually really good, I recently bought one of her albums, because I'm a big fan of R&B, which is the kind of music I was told she does. There's this one song by her I especially love, it's called 'Try Again'. It's really sad that she is no longer with us, she passed away in 2002, from a plane crash, poor girl. And not too long ago, I discovered the band U2, they are actually really good too. It's amazing what I can learn to like around others. Now, if anyone knows me well, they know what makes me annoyed, what makes me happy, what makes me calm, and so on and so forth. One thing that really ticks me off is when people are disrespectful to each other. Tremayne, whose blog is Quirky Embrace, he was right about people being selfish. I'm with him! He has a good head on his shoulders. People need to start being nicer to each other. And I believe there are more pressing matters to attend to than seeing/hearing about Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan getting busted for drugs repeatedly. You'd think they learned the first time?
              I guess not! And this 'Jersey Shore' fad, don't even get me started! I will be here all day talking and voicing my opinions on the show! One thing that does actually tick me off is when people disrespect each other, when people bring racism up. If you know me like my high school graduates do, they know that I hate when people bring race into conversations. When someone brings that up in conversations, I walk away because if not, I'll be tempted to put in my 2 cents and believe me, you don't want my 2 cents, because it'll be the cold, hard, truth! How the topic of my hate for racism came up is Sunday after church, my aunt wanted to go to Burlington Coat Factory in search of a new winter coat. When we pulled in to the parking lot, I saw a kind looking Asian family and black family going in and right then and there, that's when she started. I'm not going to say what she actually said, but just use your imagination. It was pretty brutal what she said about them.
         I'm the kind, sweet person that has this philosophy: "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." It confuses me to no end as to why people in my family have to talk bad about others they don't know. If racism was a crime, my aunt would be on death row for it. She is guilty of this, she will openly use racial slurs towards people. My dad, however, says he jokes about it, and sometimes he does, sometimes he don't. Last night, he was making fun of the British accent and using bad names towards them, especially racial slurs, just because I said something about wanting to get a CD of Paul McCartney for my birthday. That's the way my dad is! And this one guy I graduated with, don't even get me started! But I'll just tell you a little about him, he proudly calls himself a redneck! He knows it drives me nuts to call people bad names and he knows it gets a rise out of me. He not too long ago insulted my step-dad, I don't know how he found out I had a step-dad, I guess one of my fellow graduates was chatty because I was talking to a friend of mine about spending the weekend with him and my mom. When he found out that I had a step-dad, he stupidly asks what race he was! That was a slap in my face to ask that! So he decided to find out elsewhere. When he found out my step-dad was Italian, he went nuts. He started insulting him using Italian slurs and I'm not saying them. I'm not racist, and don't plan on it. This is the most evil thing anyone ever came up with! 'Separating' people into different groups, there's no need to call people Asian-American, Latin-American, African-American if they were born in this country, then they are Americans! No need putting their ethnic background ahead!
                       Sorry to be sounding like I'm ranting, but I just needed to get this out of my system. I just can't bring my self to understand why people have to be disrespectful to each other because of race, gender, age, whatever! I was raised not to see that stuff, as far as I'm concerned, everyone is the same on the inside, we just all come in different packages. To me, the world is like a rainbow: each person is a different color and if we all come together and ignore the racism ideas, this world would be beautiful. Sorry, it's so long!

Reality TV, OMG!

I really need to get this out. What is the big thing for reality TV nowadays? I swear, I think they are running out of locations for Survivor, I have a really funny idea: how about Survivor: Cincinnati? Let's see if anyone of those Einsteins on the show can survive one day in this city! I grow tired of hearing about the TV networks making big deals out of these little tiny reality shows, like Degrassi, they keep showing these girls getting sleazier and sleazier, stealing boyfriends, guys kissing guys, etc, they keep advertising it. I don't watch the show and have no desire to. And Jersey Shore: don't even get me started! There is no one on that show that is even from New Jersey! Pauly is from Rhode Island, Mike Sorrentino is a Staten Islander, 'Snooki' is a Chilean born girl, not even Italian! But I'm just tired of hearing about the networks advertising some new stupid reality show! And Dancing with the Stars? I can tolerate that because I enjoy dancing, whether it be swing dance, the Tango, you name it, even ballet! Oh how I wish I could learn ballet again. I learned when I was younger, around maybe 11 or 12 years old. But did you hear about who is going to be on Dancing with The Stars? Bristol Palin! America's favorite unwed mother who became pregnant while her mother was up on her soapbox preaching about abstinence. Where was she when her daughter was having sex and getting pregnant? And Mike 'The Situation' Sorrentino, he's on there too. It showed him the other night flashing his abs to some girl on there. He must obviously think that just because he's Italian, has a Sylvester Stallone body and is tall, tan and gorgeous, that his chances of winning go up like an elevator in fast forward. I really hope he does not win because that I think will make his ego soar, it will make his already overinflated ego bigger than the entire country of Italy. And some comedian named Margaret Cho will be on there, I've seen pictures of her and I've seen her a couple times here and there on Comdey Central, she isn't bad, she's funny sometimes, I really hope she or someone else wins, they always end up finding people I have no clue who they are to be on the show, but I hope someone good wins, not America's favorite unwed mother or Mr. "Jersey Boy". Now I'm not sure if Cake Boss is considered a reality show, but if it is, it's a good reality show. I just love watching how he does all these little intricate details on stuff. I was watching this episode the other day where he had to make a cake celebrating the anniversary of Come Fly Away, which was a play that had Frank Sinatra in it. He made this cake that looked like a silhouette of Sinatra with little dots on it to make it look like his face. This show is really cool, and I watched this other episode where he had to make an authentic Italian tiramisu cake for this Italian customer who said he had relatives coming from Italy for a visit. It was making me crave that dessert right then and there. But overall, I'm growing tired of hearing about all these reality shows. Not too long ago, I started watching this show on TV called Glee. It's not too bad, I'm starting to kind of like it, I'm starting to get a little addicted to watching it. Believe me, it's amazing what I'll sometimes watch. Like if it's on, I'll watch the First 48, or if it's on, I'll watch CSI:NY or Law and Order:SVU. I absolutely love that show! But then again, I guess I'm the kind that will watch all those police drama shows. For some odd reason, police work fascinates me, I love wathing those shows and seeing them work in crime labs and all that stuff. I guess I'm sort of a nerd when it comes to that, but I don't care. I am who I am, if no one likes it, sorry about your luck. I won't change being who I am to satisfy someone else, that happened too much in high school, people would change who they were just to fit in. I'm not like that, that probably explains why I wasn't popular in high school, I wouldn't give in to liking rap music, saying things like "Yo, what up dog?" or "How's my homie?" Can you honestly believe that white kids are talking like that? This one friend of my dad's, she is a real nice black lady, I've known her since I was little, her name is Harriet and I love being around her, she don't talk like that, no one I know of that is black talks like that! I don't get what the idea of saying things like that is, it's way beyond me! I personally think it is bad to talk like that when no one else talks like that! And other things my fellow graduates did that I didn't approve of was getting their parents to buy everything for them! I'm the kind of person that if I want something, I go out, get a job, and pay for it myself! I just can't bring myself to understand how parents can let their kids walk all over them like a welcome rug. What happened to the golden rule repsect your parents? I guess it doesn't exist anymore! I hear about kids making their parents buy them expensive iPod Nanos, Shuffles, Touches, Blackberry Phones, phones for texting, it's ridiculous! If I tried any of the crap these kids nowadays pull, I'd be dead, pushin' up daisies because my parents would kill me. I just don't understand what's wrong with the world today!