OTM #2 - The Mistrial of Michael Slager

This week's On the Media focused in on the Black Lives Matter movement and contains portions of several interviews after several killings of police officers across the nation
They discussed that in Los Angeles, over 52% of the community's budget goes to law enforcement. They then went into the fact that they have one of the highest homeless percentages, and that more funding should be going into this, providing better foods for lower income families, better education, and so on. This frustrates a lot of people because they feel that many people in these black communities don't have a way to get out. Claiming that the schools in these communities just funnel citizens to prisons.
I'm not against the Black Lives Matter movement, and I do understand that most of the people behind this movement have good intentions. However, I would just be interested to hear more of what exactly they would like to see. I have heard a lot of conversations like this where it is suggested that we remove some of the funding from law enforcement and put it in other places. But I'm not sure I understand what exactly they are suggesting or wanting to see. I have heard that we are focusing too much on keeping police officers in these lower income communities, but I'm not sure if I agree that that will fix anything. I don't know why it is that more homes are robbed in lower income communities, and more drugs are used, but based on my personal experiences, I have seen this to be true, and I just have a hard time seeing how this is a solution. I am however, interested to hear other options and specifics of what people's plans are and what they would like to see and put money into, instead of just where we should remove it from.

Well informed 2.0 - Syria & Immigration

We had the opportunity to watch a really interesting video in our class and it was extremely eye opening to me. To be honest, I really haven’t ever thought too much about all the refugees and the lives that they have been living, so this video hit me really hard. As unbelievable as it all seems to me, at the same time it all just became real. That people are actually living lives like this! The life that the family with these two girls lives is truly just so shocking to me. I can’t imagine a life like that, living in the middle of a war, hiding out in abandoned cities and buildings, and having your dad just go out every day to fight off the enemy as his day job, and never knowing if he's going to come home or not. Learning to become so familiar with this whole scene that you can actually tell the difference between different guns and missiles. Watching this has gotten me a whole lot more interested in getting these people over to safer grounds, and made me realize how much I appreciate and love the life I live right now! I want more people to be able to experience this kind of living.

Recognizing Automatic Attitudinal Responses

How much time do we actually spend thinking about why we think the way that we do? It seems like we spend every day of our lives giving opinions and expressing our thoughts, but little time thinking about where it all comes from. When we find something we have strong feelings about, we could stand on our soapbox forever. But one thing I think that professors have been trying to nail into our minds through the last three and a half years is not just to really think about things, but to think about why we think the way we do, and open our mind to other people's thoughts and why they think the way that they do.
The way each person thinks all revolves around their implicit biases, whether they like it or not. Their brain functions by gaining knowledge, and knowledge can only be gained through experience. That being said, we all learn things differently and have different experiences throughout our lives. These experiences influence the way that we continue to learn and think. Regardless of how much we try to keep an open mind, we are always going to have a biased view. Is this a problem? I don't think the differing perspectives themselves are. These are the things that make people unique and life what it is. But the potential for problems comes when we don't keep this in mind and we get caught up focusing too much on our own perspectives. This is something that almost everyone struggles with, and we will likely work on for the rest of our lives.
In my first On the Media posting, I talked about the Chicago University letter that went out to its students about trigger warnings, coddling, and safe spaces. I have grown up experiencing life to be a lot easier in general, than it was for people 100 and 200 years ago. I know that I have been catered to and looked out for by people I don't even know, all of my life. Sometimes I feel that too much effort might be put into catering to people. Companies and organizations seem to spend a lot of time seeking ways to prevent offending people. I have grown up seeing a lot of people look for ways to be offended, and those people get upset when their every need or preference is not catered to. Because of these experiences, I have a bias that affected the way that I looked at this On the Media assignment, and it led me to share that I feel we are often a little too spoiled and easily offended. I have just grown up seeing a lot of this, so when I see people raging out about a company not catering to every single person, I can understand the frustration that the company must have. It's nearly impossible to create an advertisement or post a message that doesn't have the potential to offend at least someone.
These are just my thoughts, and my response. This response is all based on my biases, and I know that I would have different biases if I would have grown up with different experiences. Different biases create different perspectives, and that's okay! We just have to recognize where these different perspectives come from and most of all, respect them and each other.