Earlier I saw a play called the Hunting Ground and was basically about rape cases on college campuses and how they are handled. It is very scary to observe and what how often this happens. The protection order system is very poor when it comes to handling these situations. In the movie, one of the scenes describes how they treated a sexual assault case as a slap on the wrist, meanwhile the victim is scared for life and has anxiety over the entire situation. This was interesting to relate to our class but I think it relates in the sense that in order for a leader to gain more followers and accomplish more towards whatever the movement is attempting to do, it is important to make sure that all followers are accepted by the leader and there is room for all walks of life. In this situation, the colleges are trying to protect their campuses look and reputation which is why they try not to give these cases attention.
Leave a CommentAuthor: Richard Connell
The article by Williamson was extremely interesting and brought to the surface some important content. The point that he made about how we must correct our past before we can move forward as country was very crucial to our day and age. The fact that racial bias is still occurring and has been practically since slavery is outrageous. Today we still have talks about racism and the topic gets circulated quite a bit but for some reason as a country we have not solved our problem and we are still having racist attitudes towards people who aren’t in deserving of it. His point really resonated with me because before I also know that you should move on from your mistakes with a lesson learned but never really thought of a bigger setting such as America. In a bigger setting, it is crucial to be able to go to the past and grab things in which need to be fixed in order to move forward in an efficient way.
All in all, from both articles, the main points made find a way to focus on the strength of a community. For example the problems exemplified in Williamson’s article are in desperate need of a leader in which McFarland portrays. For a great idea or movement to be expressed to the full capacity a great leader needs to be able to compassionately get through the followers and make room for all people with all walks of life.
5 CommentsThe play that I chose to see was “Pure Confidence”. This play consisted of a married couple with 2 slave owners in which they both have their own slave. The male slave owner would chose to bet on race horsing. His slave was a jockey and wanted nothing more than to become free. Another slave owner was also very competitive in horse racing and bought out the original slave owners slave and he won the race against his slave master and bought himself free. This is relevant to the leadership class because in my opinion, all of the class has been on how basically all of our source of media and leadership is not fair by any means. The fact that history has been racist and not fair goes back to a point that was earlier made in the course that everyone is going to always have an upper hand on everything. This is why bias has such a large impact on news.
Leave a CommentThe reading of “Ingroups and Outgroups,” there are different categories that analyzed and place us in a ingroup or outgroup scenarios. I was able to notice how imperative language is and how it is the most defining category. I think it is really interesting how easy language can influence our lives and how much they can connect people together. Speaking language that is primary to where you live is very important to distinguishing how you grew up and what part of the world you grew up.
I find it really interesting how when I came to college, language has been a very important part of how people distinguish between each other. People from the south have a very different type of way in which they communicate and create groups with each other. There is a friend of mine from Colorado and we speak very similarly but there is a difference between us in the sense that he grew up in the city and I grew up in the mountains and our ingroup/outgroup status is impacted based off of this.
9 CommentsThis past week I had attended a talk about race. Race is something that, unfortunately, still affects our society today. There is an organization in which there are post cards sent out and participants will send them back with a story that they would like to share in a short six words. Some of the stories shared were; “Married a white girl. Now what?”, “No where are you actually from?”. The idea of these stories were to bring a voice to a silent topic. Racism is thought to be something that was abolished many years ago but the matter of the fact is that it still exists today and is still heavily prevalent. This relates to our class Leaders today are still judged by their skin color. There was an Italian man, Rudy Giuliani who was ranked first in his class at Columbia and wanted to run for presidency but was hesitant and ended up not running due to the color of his skin and his association with the mob. Although he was not affiliated with the mafia in any way at all, the fact that he was Italian made him automatically affiliated with that stigma negatively. The value of listening and coming to venues like these is to hear other peoples stories and what it is like to live in different skin.
Leave a CommentAn important statement in the first documentary was said when one lady was mentioning her time during freshmen year in college. It stated that women were given the right to vote and at first I did not see anything wrong with this statement but then she began to explain how women fought for their rights and by doing so they earned the right to vote. Also during the documentary, it mentions 2 famous women, Anthony and Stanton, and they were in London to advocate for the slavery movement but weren’t granted an entrance. The reason for not being allowed in was the fact that they were women, and this kick started the Women Rights Movement.
There is a big argument that strikes my attention and that is how would our world be different if women lead instead of men. I think our world wouldn’t be much different. In my opinion I think that things would be more restrictive and laws would be a lot more implemented because thats how women perform jobs. I also think that whatever they would tell their followers would for the most part get accomplished and there would be as much finagling. Men today definitely try to find loopholes in the system and are able to get past certain rules.
2 CommentsDuring the course of this article it talks and preaches the idea that most of us are not leaders in fact majority of our population is followers. In the article it expresses an opinion saying, “So followership dominates our love and organizations, but not our thinking, because our preoccupation with leadership keeps us from considering the nature and the importance of the follower.” This brought me to the Idea of “groupthink” a little bit because we are all filled with an idea or an opinion of the leader whether that be negative or positive. So in return we are all opinionated on how to lead and most people will sit back and reflect on how much better that leader could be doing meanwhile they aren’t doing anything about the situation but criticizing.
The article more stresses on the component of how to be a good follower. TO be a good follower one must be intelligent, in order to attain the information from the follower, and enthusiastic, and reliant for participation. Otherwise, the leader gets no reaction on how good or bad they are performing. Also in the artcicle it mentions how even when we are in a leadership position we are still following because for every committee we chair, there are several other members.
3 CommentsI thought this podcast was extremely interesting. It delves into jones town and Jim Jones as a leader. A very interesting point that was made was that Jones was a very good charismatic person and had really encouraged his followers to make an impact on racial inequality. Being able to learn and take in what he had accomplished before the peoples temple had gone crazy out of control and that’s what caught my attention during the podcast. I thought it was extremely interesting how people would join the church not for religious reasons but instead for Jones thoughts. This explicitly shows his charisma and how he could really command his followers.
It was really sad to hear about how Jones was turned negatively with all of his great ideas and charisma. He was going in a really solid direction and then went south very quickly and was very interesting to see how that spiraled down.
4 CommentsThis groupthink article really delved into the idea of how a group can be affected in numerous ways. I think this article had really focused on how groupthink is described as a form of communication within a group and the fact that it really disturbs the concise thought process. It is more imperative in “groupthink” for member to agree amongst each other and recognize that. To me it is very interesting that this thought process is seen as a negative action.
In the article it states vividly that people in “groupthink” are almost too nice and avoid the thoughts of being “too critical”. This thought process can be extremely inefficient for a group. This is because the progress that is needed for a group to be successful is for it to have people sharing their own personal idea s and thought and occurrences. which then leads to a consensus. With groupthink the group is seemingly only intervening with each other to finish the task it seems like and only want to get to the next issue just to “finish”.
5 CommentsAfter examining these articles, the meaning and types of leadership have been integrated more thoroughly. I am under the impression that transactional leadership is something that comes along with a confusing connotation. In the article it states that a charismatic leader is different from a transformational type of leader. In my opinion, I think that these type of leaders must show some signs of charisma. This is because if you are in a high position of leading then you are, in some way, exibiting charisma as you must have to command the group of followers and command them to do what you wish. If you are making them do what you wish them to do then you are making your followers experience charisma.
This article really made me side towards transformational leadership. This is because, in the article it stated something along the lines of transactional leaders not rewarding personal gains in personality. This is not a positive trait to attain in leadership because followers want to be rewarded with positive deeds that they commit.
3 CommentsI strongly agree with the notion that the best leaders start off as a servant or under a leaders wing. It is extremely rare that we see people go straight into a leadership position without learning the roles and renditions of a good leader. The type of servant to lead is more natural and attains the qualities of a great role model. These servant leaders are better leaders in the sense that they are able to relate and connect with their followers due to the simple fact that they were once in the shoes of their followers. To begin with a humble outlook on your position, the role comes much easier. Humility is attained a lot easier and with less effort and is pertained better.
In Hesse’s story, Journey to the East, this fictional story obtains the idea of Leo as a servant joining them. When their “journey” begins to go in a different direction than expected he is there and ready for the fall. This is because of his energy and overall charisma that he brings. He has an energetic stigma attached to him in a positive manner that makes him show signs of potentially being a good leader in the near future.
3 CommentsIn this article the question in my opinion that is begged is whether or not a leader of any sort strive for being feared or loved. In the ideal world the obvious answer would be both but if you can’t afford both then it is better to be feared. If you are just loved then people may look at you as just a peer and the folders may not listen to you. In order to be fully effective as a leader one must strive to be feared. When you are feared, you must attempt to have the followers be “fearful” of you which in return will make you most effective when getting messages across or trying to assemble things for your followers.
Previously in our class, a question that has been begged is whether or not leaders are born or made. If we take a look at some previous leaders in history who have been extremely prevalent in even todays society it is important to seek out MLK. He was someone who without being born into a religious family and his father being the “leader” at a chapel or being born during desegregation era then his role might not have been as important and he might not be able to make as big of an impact as he had done.
6 CommentsThis podcast had really opened my eyes as to how back in those days, the women of the time had really not been recognized for their hard work and the great doing that they had successfully achieved. This is sort of astonishing because we have extremely import role models that are women, like Rosa Parks, that have achieved excellence for our world and for them to not be recognized because they aren’t males is extremely passive.
In the podcast it had also brought up the point of only being recognized for intelligence or making an act of doing so. Also, being recognized especially if you were a make and had done something astonishing for your country or for the overall greatness of our world. Being a man comes with a lot of responsibility and I agree that if a male role model has done something great, then he deserves to be recognized in the correct manner. On that same not this podcast really opened my mind to how sexist our country really was back in those years and how acts of greatness was only achieved through fitting the “spectrum” of being a “countries good look”.
4 CommentsIn my opinion, there are good leaders that stand for good causes and do everything in their power to have a movement that involves the greater good. Good leaders are the ones who ask the public for their opinions and does their absolute best to satisfy their needs/wants. A bad leader is someone who does things for their own satisfactory needs. They are usually people who, during the election, would lie to the public and tell them what they want to hear and what would get them into office. There are a lot of good and bad of things that all presidents obtain but the best leader are the ones who the overall good feels good about getting behind their movement.
In the article, the idea that leaders who are intimidating and have a scary appearance are not extremely liked. This is the case because, as we discussed in the last class, a charismatic leader who is attractive are liked more and have a higher chance of people getting behind their movement. Most likely, if a leader is a charismatic caring individual, more likely than not, the leader will do more for the greater good.
Leave a CommentIt is clear throughout these excerpts, and background knowledge that I had going into these readings, that Martin Luther King Jr. is someone who is a very charismatic human who had leadership qualities that were exercised during his campaign. He had been presented with a very major topic that is still prevalent, though not as harsh, in our society today. He was born at a time to make a difference and he stepped up to answer that call. In the readings it states that he was not looking for but rather received a lifestyle in which he was born into. Growing up in a religious family in Atlanta with his father being a minister at a church, he was able to recognize things first hand and grasp real world topics at ease. Through being exposed to such a lifestyle he had begged for guidance from ahead and with the civil rights movement, Martin Luther King blasted into full effect with all of his characteristics flashing to make a difference.
Journalists state that King did not want to be remembered for all of his achievements or prizes, like Nobel Peace Prize, he received for all of the miraculous work that he achieved in his lifetime but rather him giving his life for all of man kind. He tried to sacrifice his life for others to have the chance to live and be stress free. Nothing compares to his efforts and the way he went about living his life through a very abnormal way for others, an extremely selfless human being that sticks out like a sore thumb in todays history.
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