follow me into the dark

[hiimzuzalove]

[midnighttrain247]

To be a kid again

[ufo-world-tv]

UFO Sighted Over San Juan, Mexico August 22, 2018

Eye Witness States: Video recorded in closed of San Juan Tepic Nayarit Mexico during a storm.

Source: Franko Machuca

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Conclusion/References/Note to Professor

     I have learned that for individuals of a lighter complexion, the odds are in their favor. White people, or even individual’s with a lighter skin tone, are more privileged. It is sad to me that we judge people based on something so irrelevant. It just doesn’t make any sense that just because someone's skin is a little darker that they are discriminated against. How about we look at a person’s actions before we look at the color of their skin?  

     I have now taken five training sessions on cultural humility. Each week I attend an additional anti-racism training session. I also cannot express the things I have learned through my sociology class about racism. I have literally cried watching some of these documentaries that brought up historical situations I had never even heard of that have lasting effects up until the now. I say this with no want of praise. The only thing I want to express is that I am educating myself. I am shocked. I am mourning. I am in complete disbelief that human beings could be treated this badly. I am uncomfortable that I lacked this awareness of the reality of what was going on. How could I have been so blind? Racism touches every aspect of our lives in a positive or negative manner depending on the person.

                                               References

Conley, D. (2019). You May Ask Yourself (6th ed.). W.W. Norton & Company.

Irby-Shasanmi, A., & Leech, T. G. J. (2017). ‘Because I Don’t know’: uncertainty  and ambiguity   in closed-ended reports of perceived discrimination in US health care. Ethnicity & Health, 22(5), 458-479. https://doi- org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1080/13557858.2016.1244659

Turan, K. (2016, Oct. 6). Review: Ava DuVernay’s documentary ‘13th’ simmers with anger and burns with eloquence. Los Angeles Times. https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-13th-review-20161001-snap-story.html

Powell, W., Richmond, J., Mohottige, D., Yen, I., Joslyn, A., & Corbie-Smith, G. (2019). Medical Mistrust, racism, and delays in preventative health screening among African-American men. Behavioral Medicine, 45(2), 102-117. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1080/08964289.2019.1585327

Smith, J. (2012). Maintaining racial inequality through crime control: mass incarceration and residential segregation. Contemporary Justice Review, 15(4), 469-484. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1080/10282580.2012.734577 

Whitaker, T. R. (2019). Banging on a Locked Door: The Persistent Role of Racial Discrimination in the Workplace. Social Work in Public Health, 34(1), 22-27. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1080/19371918.2019.1572564

Dr. J - Thank you so much for teaching this class. I think this has been one of my most organized and interesting classes I have taken at HACC and I am close to graduation. I also really appreciated all of the videos. They were very helpful. I have learned so much from this class. Thank you for the opportunity to get creative within our final project! I really appreciate all you do. :) *Side note - I know the spacing is wrong in the references but I can’t figure out how to space it properly on Tumblr, I am aware that after the first line the others are indented, sorry about that!

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Racism in the Healthcare System

     As we just went over, it is very difficult for Black people to find good jobs due to discrimination. They are often not acquiring jobs that have benefits, such as private insurance. Private insurance, for the most part, has better care than state medical assistance. Practices that take private insurance deliver more individualized care than state insurance run facilities. Many times practices that take state insurance are flooded with patients, have long wait times, and focus on fast care. I know this because I used to work at a doctor’s office that services primarily Medicaid patients. A survey study in 2015 asked the question, “Do you feel you are treated better or worse than other races at the doctor?” One Black man replied, “They look at you like you got Medicaid anyway so [they think,] come in here, lay on the table and get out. Instead of saying, ‘How do you feel today, what are you experiencing?’ Things like that, [rather] they just bump, bump, bump” (Powell et al., 2019, p.111).

     “Discrimination has been associated with a range of disorders in African Americans, including hypertension, depression, anxiousness, sleep disturbances, fatigue, and bodily pain” (Whitaker, 2019, p.25). Black men’s life expectancy at birth is the shortest of anyone in our country. The problem is a lack of early intervention. Many illnesses that these men are passing away from are things like diabetes that are easily treatable, but unfortunately were not found in these men until it was too late. There are a few reasons why Black people do not have access to preventative care. Education is a big reason. A lot of Black people are growing up in poor areas and lack access to proper education about the importance of preventative care. Other reasons stem from feeling uncomfortable in the doctor’s office due to the color of their skin, socioeconomic barriers, lack of trust, and toxic masculinity in the case of men. Men, in general, go to the doctor less than women, but in Black men it is exceedingly so (Powell et al., 2019). I have definitely witnessed a lot of men in my life who are “too tough” to go to the doctor. 

     Medical mistrust is another big reason why many people of color are not going to the doctor. A lot of research has been done on race within the healthcare system. In just one example of discrimination, researchers have found that “Black patients receive fewer pain prescriptions than other patients with similar ailments. Racial minorities also have less access to both acute and preventive treatment for stroke, and minority patients’ post-acute trauma care and rehabilitative care is not comparable to that provided to White patients” (Irby-Shasanmi & Leech, 2017, p.459). It is little wonder why Black people feel uncomfortable going to the doctor.

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Racism in Employment

     To be both black and a “criminal” is like the scarlet letter for future stigma and prejudice. “Mass incarceration has become an institution that has tightened the labor market in the short run, but makes workers more unemployable in the long run. This effect is highly concentrated among Black males and under-skilled workers. The dramatic racial differences in future unemployment continue the institutionalized system of racialized labor market control. Interestingly, however, these effects are hidden in official joblessness statistics since incarcerated individuals are not included in calculations of unemployment. Racial disparities work to mask vast racial differences in unemployment by underestimating unemployment among incarcerated populations” (Smith, 2012, p.473). It is interesting to see how certain statistics are hidden from the public so that people feel there is no cause for concern.

     The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received 89,385 charges of employment-based discrimination in 2015. Black people also earned significantly less money than white people. They are unemployed at higher rates and are more likely to work in occupations that offer lower pay and status. Black people report higher levels of workplace discrimination in hiring and promotion as well. Another study found that even though credentials from elite universities result in more employer responses, Black candidates from these elite universities only do as well as White candidates from less selective universities. These Black graduates from elite universities are also more likely to be offered jobs for less pay and status than their white counterparts. Aside from these issues, discrimination is present based on the name of the applicant. Traditionally “White names” are much more likely to get a call back from an employer than traditionally “Black names”. Some people of color even go so far as to use a nickname on their applications, but then fear that they won’t get the job for “lying” (Whitaker, 2019). Lack of employment also leads to less than satisfactory health care.

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Racism in the Justice System

     One of the most glaring portrayals of racial inequality is our justice system. Prison has never made sense to me. Like, let’s take a bunch of people that clearly have deep-seated emotional issues, mental health concerns, and trauma and then throw them in a room together and offer them no assistance in working on these problems. It is a known fact that the prison system prizes punishment highly over reform which causes a repetitive cycle. Aside from these issues, it appears that the prison system has been used to control the black population following slavery. Why is it that Black people account for 6.5% of the population in America, but 40.2% of the prison population? 1 out of 17 White men are incarcerated. Meanwhile, 1out of 3 Black men are incarcerated (Turan, 2016). “Among men ages 25 to 29, Blacks are imprisoned 2.5 times and 6 times as often as Hispanics and Whites, respectively” (Conley, 2019, p.360).  With statistics like these it is hard to justify the statement “Black people just commit more crimes”. 

     The disproportionate arrests clearly negatively influence Black people. “Neutralization of Black Americans, both materially and symbolically, thus becomes apparent. Materially, neutralization occurs by disallowing employment, welfare benefits, and educational funding for convicted felons. Symbolically, neutralization occurs by thwarting social mobility through the reification of the stigmatization of the poor Black population as criminal and deficient” (Smith, 2012, p.472). With a felony conviction, a person is not allowed to vote while incarcerated and this also follows them after release in some states. This feels unfair since politicians have a lot of influence on the prison system. I could not imagine being in prison and not being allowed to vote on something that directly affects me. Incarceration also influences housing. Many apartment complexes will not accept a person if they have any type of mark on their record. I have experienced this myself as I have a small misdemeanor on my record from ten years ago. I have near excellent credit and a good job with stable income. That misdemeanor has knocked my housing application out of the running for certain apartment complexes. Also, renting an apartment requires income and employment is something that is affected by felonies. This leads to my next point of how racism influences employment.

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Introduction

     The topic of racism has been on the rise in our country within the past few years. It is actually surprising that it has not been more of a focus until recently. I have been putting in a ton of thought and research into this topic as of late. (Why was I not before? I don’t know either). Growing up as a White girl in a racially diverse area in New Jersey, I was not affected by racism. It had appeared to me that my friends were not as well. Interracial relationships and friendships were commonplace - no one batted an eye. In my head, racism of course happened, but that was in remote places down South that were detached from the modern world. I was so sadly mistaken. I did not realize that racism touched every facet of life. Admitting that there was a problem with racism in this country and that we all had a part to play in it was a big pill to swallow. 

     When #BlackLivesMatter was created and the protests started happening, I thought it was a bit overzealous. I didn’t realize that racism was as prevalent as it actually was.  This was being blown out of proportion, right? A creation of racism where there was none, going along with the phrase “it’s because I’m black isn’t it?” when spewed out to be dramatic. But then I started to hear. Not just hear, I really started to listen. After I listened, I wanted to learn. The following posts will give some insight into just a few of the topics I have been looking into.

[adeles]

Great Halloween, everybody! THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS (1993) dir. Henry Selick

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