The chapter I enjoyed the most from the set of readings we had was the “Hidden Cost of Stereotypes”. In my leadership and the social sciences class, we have learned a lot about cognitive dissonance which was presented in the chapter blindspot. A lot of times our minds are presented with two differing opinions and our brain does not like this so we either find a way to conform to one opinion over the other or we come up with justifiers why each opinion might work in different scenarios. The example of the characteristics of Jews in the two studies fits under cognitive dissonance. In 1933, it wasn’t as frowned upon to be anti-Semitic because World War II hadn’t occurred yet and people were not as globally educated as they are today. Therefore, the participants in the study had no difficulty in choosing characteristics that were demeaning and stereotypical. Their brains weren’t conflicted because they didn’t know then that those were just stereotypes, they thought that those were real characteristics of Jews. However, in the 2001 study when the same characteristics were shown to participants, the responses were completely different. This isn’t because those stereotypes about Jews have gone away, because they definitely haven’t and they are displayed in many pop culture things like characters on TV shows, movies and songs. Everyone recognizes these stereotypes in our culture. However, it is very frowned upon to be anti-semitic or to display any anti-semitic sentiments. This causes conflict in a person’s brain, even if they don’t themselves believe in the stereotypes, they are aware they exist and can’t completely ignore them. This is why many of the participants used the logic that “yes, these stereotypes exist and some uneducated people believe in them, however, I am more educated and I know these are only stereotypes”.

I found myself in a struggle of cognitive dissonance during my implicit bias test. Even though I do not find myself to be biased or display any overt stereotypes on anyone, during this test I found myself trying harder than usual to go against any known stereotypes. During the clicking portion I made sure to take my time to get everything right and not fall into the test’s trap. I found myself accidentally falling into the trap anyway though. I thought the test was hard because even if we don’t overtly display bias or stereotypes in a demeaning way, we still have such slight implicit biases.

Stereotypes in the United States are problematic for an endless amount of reasons, and the case of Wen Ho Lee that was referenced in the reading was only a taste of the unexplainable challenges that minorities in America continue to face, despite the steps that the country is currently making towards social tolerance and equality. A man was put in prison for months on false charges that were entirely based on his ethnicity, and was only given financial compensation years after the events occurred. Racial stereotyping is not the only form of stereotyping that continues in America, though.

Gender stereotypes are easily some of the most prevalent in our culture. It unfortunately comes as no surprise that despite the fact that there are more women working than men, there is still a significant imbalance in terms of what is expected of a woman in the home. Even though women are equally represented in the workforce, they are still expected to carry on with homemaking and men are not subjected to these same social pressures. This of course comes from the long-standing tradition and expectation that the man of the house is the sole breadwinner and the woman is left in the home to take care of the family. Even though times have changed though, these implicit biases against women are still very prominent. The research referenced in the reading, though, found that the biases were less and less prevalent when the test subjects were younger. This means that people are not born with these biases, they are taught.

In my first semester at Richmond, I did a project about the differences in toy commercials for boys and girls for my Sociology class. I found that the commercials that were catering to boys always showed the kids in action, or the message of the ad was about “saving the world” or “getting the job done.” The toys themselves were often job or action oriented; the products included tool boxes, building blocks, etc. The girls commercials on the other hand, were mostly surrounding being in the home. The products included an EasyBake oven, a Barbie Dream House, or an at home spa kit. These commercials were much more passive, and did not depict the girls being active or achieving a real goal. These differences are essential to a child’s development, and the formation of their own worldview in terms of what is expected of men and women in society. In order to combat the stereotypes that continue to be problematic, we need to teach our children that there should be no inherent difference in terms of what is expected of men and women at home and in the workforce.

The chapter, “Where Does Morality Come From?” reminded me of the interconnectedness of morality, philosophy, law, economics, anthropology and psychology. The way humans have understood morality and ethics have changed over time based on the findings of anthropologists, psychologists, scientists and philosophers, and we often to not give these findings enough credit on changing an entire groups’ world views. Take the death penalty: when scientists found that lethal injection could be felt by the person being killed, the debate on the morality of the death penalty changed. While it might not seem like it, our moral compasses adapt based on our environment, society and our own self-interests of the time.

In order to understand the way we understand morality today we have to keep in mind the way that the understanding of morality and the changes in groups’ morals over time. As children, we weigh our decisions based on what our environment has taught us, however as we gain experience and education, we begin to take more complex ideas and other people into consideration in making moral decisions. Haidt’s discussion about how harm does not affect children’s morality as much as moral psychologists used to think it did challenged my prior beliefs. As children, we are taught the golden rule: treat others as you would like to be treated. The idea is that children will not commit the same harm that they have experienced because they hated the experience, and therefore it is wrong. However, Haidt concluded that “cultural learning or guidance must play a larger role” in forming a sense of morality than simply children’s experience with harm. In American society, many children do not face as harsh punishment as their parents and grandparents might have experienced, but their parents are still able to instill the same moral lessons without inflicting harm. This goes to show that the way we raise our children changes based on society’s morals.

In class today, many of my classmates and I were confused about how someone really could be a non-cognitivist in American society. We are surrounded by moral arguments and it seems impossible to make arguments independent of ethics. It seemed that almost every one of my ten reasons that my topic for my research paper was important were related to ethics. I tried to make a non-cognitive argument about the issue of the economic cost of alcohol-related deaths and fatalities, but it was difficult to separate economics and politics from morality. Even by making a utilitarian argument based on economic resources allocated by the government is inherently an ethical discussion about who deserves the resources. This personal struggle to separate morality from my research on the drinking age proved to me that we live in a society of cognitivists, and it seems incorrect to separate ethics from the rest of the world in many of the debates in society today.

For my last event I went to the screening of a documentary that a few girls in my sorority worked on, entitled Exit 76. The documentary was extremely interesting and it talked about the Jackson Ward area and the gentrification that is occurring. The documentary talked about how the area of Jackson Ward was split by the construction of the highway, and the one side of it is experiencing gentrification, while the other side is extremely impoverished and facing a lot of problems. One man in the documentary explained how poverty in areas of Richmond was intentional.

Jackson Ward contains one of the worst public housing units in the city, Gilpin Court, and the people living here face many struggles everyday. It was really sad to see this one mom of seven talk about living here and their situation. She described what it is like to hear gun shots on a daily basis and how her children all know just to get down at this point, even her three year old daughter. One of the things I really took away from hearing the mom’s story is how much she really cares about her children and making a better life for them. I feel like there is this perception that poor parents don’t actually care about their kids or what not, but this mom truly was trying to make a better life for her family.

The reading from the Impossible really touched home with me because it opened up with a woman talking about her own paralysis and how debilitating it can be. Before my father suffered a stroke in the fall of freshman year that left him paralyzed on the right side of his body, I never would have been able to relate to that reading in the way that I have. Before my dad’s paralysis, he was an incredibly mobile man. This was a man who drove around all day for work and would come back at 6 pm to play basketball with his kids. He was the one taught me how to dribble a basketball and got me hooked on sports. Thus, I think that you can understand the frustration that he now feels on a daily basis when he needs help to perform daily tasks that were once automatic for him.

I have noticed this idea that there is an ability for all different people to make a change that can have a major impact on another individual’s life in a different light as my family continues to journey through my dad’s disability. There are some amazing people who go out of their way to do what we may deem “little things” for my dad, but they make his day a thousand times better. He can no longer just drive aimlessly like he used to, but when someone comes to take him on a drive to the beach on a bad day, it can change his entire mood. We may have forgotten the amount of impact that these actions can have on a person, but I can tell you that it means the world to people like my dad.

Little changes really do matter. I can attest to this as I have seen people make dinners for my family when we were going back and forth between the hospital and just did not have a spare moment to cook. I have seen it when my dad finally got his license this year and drove for the first time in over a year. I have seen it on my mom’s face when one of my middle school teachers sent in gift cards this Christmas to help her out with our Christmas shopping. As one of idols John Wooden once said, “It’s the little details that are vital. Little things make big things happen.”

While reading Impossible chapters 4, 5, and 21, I was struck by how different it seemed to other articles we have read over the course of the semester, yet I really enjoyed the reading. The chapters covered a large assortment of themes that I found to be interesting and even emotional. However, I was most struck by the chapters by Howard Zinn and Tony Kushner.

Zinn’s article particularly stood out to me because it focused on how each individual can make a difference and is important. Zinn explains that power is fragile and that rebellion has the ability to destroy the power balance. He also touches on the importance of unpredictability and how historically (in instances such as Rosa Parks refusing to get up from her seat on the bus) unpredictability has lead to revolutionary occurrences.  I also liked that Zinn spoke about how everywhere he goes, he finds people wanting to make change and that they should not despair because of “long-term change.”

I also particularly liked Kushner’s chapter as he was able to get his point across in such a straightforward and blunt manner. Kushner’s whole chapter, focused on everyone’s ability to make a change, ends in a perfect way. Kushner completes his chapter with, “we’d like to declare that we have tried our best and worked hard to make a good and just and free and peaceful world, a world that is better for our having been here, at least we believe it is.”

Jessica Nadel

Discussion Questions for PHOUS ch 17 &23

1. According to Angelo Herndon, the communist party “knew no difference of race or color” (Zinn 447). Was it strategic for the communist party to include black folks or was it just part of their party values?

2. In class we have talked about whether intentions behind moral decisions impact the value of the decision. Zinn addresses how Truman’s committee on civil rights made recommendations to stop lynching, voting discrimination and other discrimination. They acknowledged that these recommendations were made because of moral reasoning but mostly they were made because of the economic cost of discrimination and the countries’ terrible reputation with the international world as violating civil rights. These recommendations were very valuable but should they seem as less valuable because of the committees’ selfish intentions?

3. Zinn describes the sit-ins at Woolworth’s lead by SNCC as one of the first active initiatives as opposed to the usual reputation of black folks as passive and accepting of their oppression. Did these sit-ins break the stereotype of the Uncle Tom that we talked about during class?

4. Is the Black Lives Matter movement possibly the manifestation of the explosion that Langston Hughes describes in his poem “Lenox Avenue Mural”?

5. The revolution that Zinn talks about in his final chapter is about representing the 99% who have a lot of commonality. He talks about breaking down the establishment that controls our nation. Was Bernie Sander’s platform and call for revolution like the revolution that Zinn was essentially calling for?

Well, we didn’t win! But that’s okay because I believe a large portion of RAINN’s mission is to spread awareness about a pressing issue, and I’m happy we were able to help do that through our project. It was very fitting that our presentation was around the time of UR’s annual Take Back the Night and April, which is Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I feel like through choosing RAINN as our organization, we were able to learn a lot more about this issue and being so proximate to it on a college campus made it hit home more. Throughout this process, I’ve tried to try out the Doing Good Better strategy of picking a charity which is able to be the most effective/make the largest impact. But, being the emotion-driven person I am, I can’t part from donating to causes which I care about. And to be quite honest, I don’t think this is a bad thing. Even if my money will be worth more at another charity, I think it is important to remind ourselves it is okay to give to things simply because we care about them.. a little something is better than nothing. I am ultimately happy with our class’s final vote as I believe the establishment of health infrastructures will help alleviate other social issues. People can’t thrive if they can’t even survive.

Zinn’s chapter helps to describe the political nature of slavery that often gets overlooked in American history books. It talks about how violent slave rebellions with the goal of ending slavery at the forefront, like that of Nat Turner, were vehemently disapproved of by society, even though Abraham Lincoln and the rest of the Union did something very similar a few years later in the name of the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln did not have any intention of ending slavery when he was first elected, which he made clear in his inaugural address. In fact, the Civil War really was not started with the hopes of ending slavery at all, but rather to advance the northern elites interests that included, “economic expansion-free land, free labor, a free market, a high protective tariff for manufacturers, a bank of the United States” (189). The Union saw slavery as a barrier in achieving that. Zinn made it seem as though the fact that the interests of the North and the interests of the African American community at the time came together on ending slavery was just a matter of good timing, and not at all an alignment on any moral grounds.

The Civil War resulted in the Emancipation Proclamation (which only freed slaves in states of the Confederacy but technically said nothing about those behind Union lines) and the 13th amendment that outlawed slavery all together, but it came at a time when much of America still did not really feel strongly about the freedom and equality of African-Americans. This chapter gave me a new perspective on a potential reason why violence towards blacks spiked after the Civil War with the emergence of groups like the Ku Klux Klan. It seems as though America was not mentally ready to move out of the slave era, but it was achieved anyway to make way for the interests of the white elite. My question is: did Abraham Lincoln really help African Americans by issuing the Emancipation Proclamation as much as the history books make it seem, and does it even matter what his moral intentions were? Do the ends justify the means in this situation? Did he unknowingly set the African American community up for a period of systematic racial oppression and violence against them that many saw as a form of slavery in its own right?

I am excited to learn about the different charities in the presentations today. As we anticipate the vote, I am unsure whether or not I will vote for my group’s charity. There was little outside evidence from auditors and independent reviewers. This concerns me, particularly given how small our charity is. A charity that demonstrates its internal evidence is corroborated by outside evidence could sway my vote.

Light for the World will probably fare well against the other charities. I look forward to how the rest of the class receives our presentation. Specifically, I think the argument connecting blindness to reduced social mobility will resonate with other charities. The economics are less convincing than the ethical and effectiveness arguments, however. I would not be surprised if our classmates disapproved of the amount of donation income that is spent on programme work relative to the charities they selected.