Race & Ethnicity: Childhood

Race & Ethnicity-childhood As I was growing up, I noticed that my brother spent most of his time with the same friend. His friend was dark skinned and I always noticed that. But I began to notice it less and less as he was at our house a lot. He was always funny and nice to me. We even had our own handshake for whenever he would come over. He would talk to me about lacrosse and about my friends and all three of us would play lacrosse outside together. He was always fun to be around and even though he was black, it didn’t matter to me the color of his skin. What mattered to me was that he was a good guy who was nice to his friends little sister which was not easy to come by. He came along with us on several vacations and we treated him like
he was family. He and my brother called each other brother and he was like a second brother to me. It didn’t matter that he was not the same color as me and my family, it just mattered that he was a good person. I’ve been on many adventures with him and my brother and they were all unforgettable. He always made things fun and was always there to cheer me up when I was down. He is one of the people I looked up to when I was young. I realized he was different colored but to me, he seemed like he really was part of the family no matter what color his skin was. This taught me not to judge someone based on their skin color.

Race & Ethnicity- Media I heard on the news that there has been some police brutality towards blacks. I’ve heard that they use violence on the blacks when they were not resisting. They have shot and tasered blacks. There was a lot of debate about that and whether or not the police officers were right in doing those things. Blacks are still being falsely accused of crimes or immediately suspects because they are black. My take away from what I learned from the news is that race is still a problem in our country. There is still not equality between blacks and whites. Our country still needs to work on race equality and stop discrimination of blacks.

Gender & Sexuality- Adolescents I knew this woman ever since I was little. She is a beautiful woman with a great sense of fashion, funny, good cook and kind person. As I was growing up, she was always telling me how beautiful I was and praising me on my choices of clothing, hairstyle and dance moves. Little by little as I got older I started hearing conversations about this woman. As I digested the information, I began to look at her in a different way. I looked for signs of a different person inside and not necessarily outside. Her nails were always perfect and her hair was always well done. As I got a little older, I heard her defending women’s rights more than the other woman in my family. At that point I still didn’t know what was going on. I only got too understanding when she talked about her surgery to fix her voice. I always thought that her voice was low but I didn’t pay much attention to it because I was only in sixth grade. Her voice bothered her so she changed it. At that point I asked my parents and they explained to me that our close family friend used to be a male.
I began to withdraw from being close to her but eventually realized she was still the same person she used to be. This taught me that it doesn’t matter what her gender is or was. It only matters who she was to me and our relationship. This introduced me to the idea of changing genders. It also taught me to me that you should reserve judgement until you actually get to know a person.

Gender & Sexuality- High School
In the summer of my sophomore year, I worked at a pool as a lifeguard. It was my first year and I didn’t know many people there. A lot of the people who worked there had come back from a previous year of working there and they seemed like they all knew each other. I was a little nervous, but really excited to meet some new people over the summer. As expected, I did meet many new people. One of the people I met was a guy and he was so funny. We instantly became friends and shared many inside jokes over the course of the summer. He was the first gay friend I had and I didn’t talk to him much when we first met because I wasn’t sure how. However, once we did start talking, I got to really get to know him and we became really close. He was always one of the most fun people to have during a shift because he was always talkative and kind and so funny. He was also very open about him being gay and was really comfortable in his own skin. Meeting him that summer allowed me to get to know a great person who I am happy I met. He showed me through his personality and actions that being gay isn’t something to be ashamed of and that it doesn’t make you any different from anyone else. I got to see him interact with all our lifeguards, not being shy or afraid of how people react to him. He showed me not to be afraid of what other people think and that there are people who do appreciate you for you no matter what gender you are attracted to. He was truly an amazing person to meet who is one of the best people I’ve met.

Disability- Media
I read an inspirational story on facebook about a young soldier, 24 years old who refused to let his lost arm keep him out of combat. He had just finished military training and a few weeks later, he was wounded in combat. His left, dominant arm was ripped from his body during the combat. That wound should have ended his military career, but it didn’t. Six months after his injury, he began training to become a sniper, using his right arm. He insisted that he was just “an average joe.” He proved that disability doesn’t mean inability.
This man is an inspiration to many people. He taught us not to let anything limit us from fighting for what we believe in and for the country. This article I read on facebook impacted me because I have two cousins in Israel who are in the army. This story taught me that you can overcome limitations if you have a disability if you really believe you can. It also showed me that there are people who have disabilities who overcame them. .

Disability- High School
In the summer of my eighth grade year into the beginning of ninth grade, I had surgery on my right foot.
I was wearing a leg brace for several month. I was on crutches because I couldn’t walk on that foot. I needed help doing many things I didn’t need help doing before my surgery. I needed help going up the stairs. The surgery was planned a while ago but it was a hard surgery and I knew that I would need a good amount of time to recover. I decided to do it during the summer so that it wouldn’t interfere with school. When I got the surgery, my foot slowly healed as school rolled around but wasn’t completely healed and I was still told to try to stay off my foot as much as possible although my brace was off. Since my leg hadn’t fully healed, I couldn’t join the swim team freshman year.
This gave me a glimpse into what having a physical disability is like, even for a short period of time. Because of my temporary disability, I was restricted from everyday activities. I was upset that I had to miss out on the swim team that year. A couple of my friends were doing swimming but because I was physically restricted, I could not swim. That led me to be behind one year on the swim team and negatively impacted my swimming career. Having a physical disability can really restrict you from what you want to
do.

Religion- High School A year or so ago, I learned that a jewish group was taking a trip to Israel. I had family living in Israel but i’ve never been. Half of my family was Jewish, my mom’s side and the other half, my dad’s side was Catholic. I had heard about the trip from my friend who was planning on taking it. She told me that I should join the jewish group for the trip, given the fact that I am half jewish. So I went on their website and read about the guide lines for going on this trip. It was a long list that included many different scenarios. I had to apply to certain scenarios in order to be eligible to go on the trip. As I read through and noticed that I didn’t quite apply to be include in this trip. I also acknowledged that I wasn’t going to temple or anything, I was just jewish by my family. From this experience, I learned that what matters is what religion you consider yourself. It. takes more than just being on a certain side of the family to establish a religion it’s about what you believe in. Even though I might have passed and been able to attend the trip, I decided not to because it was not the religion I really was. I was jewish by default. It was not the religion I believed in.

Religion- Media I read a news article in which muslim parents did not want their girl participating in swimming with boys at school for religious reasons.
The court said that school overrides religious obligations. The court believes this is disrespecting school rules and wants to fine the family for pulling their kids out of swimming after the court refused to do anything about it. I disagree with the court. My take away from this is, viewing religion in a different way. I didn’t think it was still an issue. I also never thought that religion could overrule something like school, however, in this case I do believe that it was that parents’ rights to restrict their child due to religion. It made me see religion in a whole new way and how loyal some people are to their religion. I believe that they should not have to compromise that.

SES- adolescence
In middle school, I met a girl who I became great friends with. We were bestfriends for a long time. I noticed that when she came to school she came in poor clothing. Her shirts were ripped and she wore flip flops often even though it wasn’t summer anymore. When I came over to her house for the first time, it was a small house that was crammed with lots of things. There were only three bedrooms and they were all together the size of what one bedroom with more space and furniture was. When my shoes began to get too small, my mom would pack a bag for me to bring to my friend because her feet were always a size smaller than mine.
When I talked to my mom about my friend, she finally explained to me that her family was very poor and couldn’t get jobs. My take away from being friends with this girl was that poverty is a big issue. It opened my eyes to it and the fact that there could be people living near me who are going through money troubles and I wouldn’t even know it. It also taught me that getting a job isn’t always easy and sometimes, things in your life prevent you from being able to get a job.

SES- Friends and Family My mom’s side of the family lives in New York City. My cousin is ten years old and goes to school in Brooklyn. She is very smart and hard working for someone with such a young age. She is currently finishing elementary school and going into middle school. There are not many good school around where she lives that provide a top notch educatio. However, her parents want her to get into a good school and because the school costs a lot. The only way she can get in if she meets certain expectations such as grades and extracurriculars. She is trying very hard in school this year to get good grades and do good on the state tests so the school will accept her tuition free, similar to a scholarship but for middle school. From this, I took away that how much money parents make does have an effect on where the child can go to school. Not in all areas but specifically in New York City, where there aren’t that many options to give kids great educations, parents have to pay money for higher education. Socioeconomic society does matter when it comes to certain aspects of life.