South Dakota lawmakers interested in immigration crackdown

Published: Friday, Jan. 7, 2011 9:21 a.m. MST

By Chet Brokaw, Associated Press

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PIERRE, S.D. — South Dakota lawmakers are interested in cracking down on illegal immigration.
More than half the lawmakers who responded to a survey by The Associated Press say they would support a bill similar to an Arizona law that directs police enforcing other laws to ask about a suspect's immigration status if there's reason to believe that person is in the U.S. illegally. More than half also would support a measure to penalize people who knowingly hire or help illegal immigrants.
The proposals drew more support from Republicans than from Democrats.
Legislative leaders say the fate of the proposals will depend on the details in the bills. They also acknowledge that illegal immigration is not as big a problem in South Dakota as in other states.

I read this and thought of the video of the man who was part of the Minute Men,and how psycho he was about not helping the illegal immigrants. But I the main question I thought about was about the people who are helping these immigrants by giving them jobs. Should these people hiring illegal immigrants be penalized? For those who are hiring people, should this rule be enforced more of not hiring illegal immigrants knowingly?

Really posted by Adam Seelos

Reparations for African Americans

We had our first town meeting:

Should reparations be paid to African American slave descendents to compensate for the atrocities of slavery?

We had a lively discussion, so I figured we could continue that online. Feel free to post questions and opinions on the topic here.

Transgender Children

The video above is about a young boy who wanted to join the Girl Scouts, but was denied. The boy is clearly transgender, as he looks and acts like a girl. However, the Scout leader said that "It doesn't matter how he looks; he has boy parts, he can't be in Girl Scouts." While the interview with the boy was interesting, I found that the follow up commentary between the two news anchors and a psychologist, Dr. Worthy, were the most enlightening. I was expecting the psychologist to look down upon the transgender child and blame it on bad parenting, but instead, he gave the analogy of a child being a rock, and how parents can only smooth out the edges, and they can't completely change the "rock" without breaking it into pieces. "We determine great people by who they are...not by how they dress or the color of their skin," Dr. Worthy said. However, despite the fact that news anchors and Dr. Worthy were sympathetic and kind towards Bobby, I don't think that Dr. Worthy's statement is correct. Bobby will go through hard trials throughout his life because of his circumstance because we, as humans, are quick to make judgments without knowing all of the facts. While Dr. Worthy didn't go on about how Bobby can be "fixed" he talked about how Bobby needs to lay low and not become a target for other children, which emphasizes the fact that society is not ready to be completely accepting of everyone. I really liked what the femaile news anchor said at the end (at around the 5 minute mark), about how adults put their preconceived notions on children before they are even old enough to understand what is going on in the world. "We create our children's narrative about the world," Dr. Worthy said, and that we will not find a greater willingness to accept others for who they are until we start to change the way that we talk to our children about a touchy subject, like a transgender child.

-Monica Tillman

Risks Seen for Children of Illegal Immigrants

This was an interesting article I found as we have started to discuss illegal immigration, and see how it is a very complex issue. In the article it talks about how "an unauthorized status really extends to citizen as well as undocumented children on cognitive development, engagement in school, and the ability of to be a citizen." Also it brings up "teenagers, children without legal status face a hard awakening when they apply for jobs, driver’s licenses or financial aid for college and discover they are not legally qualified for any of them. Their paths diverge from siblings who are American citizens by birthright." It brings up the question if the U.S. extends a way for these parents to be legal will it really help remove these various risks for children found in the study?

Risks Seen for Children of Illegal Immigrants

By JULIA PRESTON

Published: September 20, 2011

Children whose parents are illegal immigrants or who lack legal status themselves face “uniformly negative” effects on their social development from early childhood until they become adults, according to a study by four researchers published Wednesday in the Harvard Educational Review.

The study concluded that more than five million children in the United States are “at risk of lower educational performance, economic stagnation, blocked mobility and ambiguous belonging” because they are growing up in immigrant families affected by illegal status.

The study is the first to pull together field research by social scientists nationwide to track the effects of a family’s illegal immigration status on children from birth until they graduate from college and start to navigate the job market. It covers immigrants from a variety of origins, including Latinos and Asians.

About 5.5 million children in this country have at least one parent who is an illegal immigrant, according to an estimate by the Pew Hispanic Center. Among them, about one million children were brought here illegally by their parents, while about 4.5 million are United States citizens because they were born here.

In all, about 9.5 million people live in “mixed status” families that include American citizen children and unauthorized immigrants, Jeffrey S. Passel, senior demographer at the Pew center, said on Tuesday.

“Unauthorized status casts a big shadow that really extends to citizen as well as undocumented children,” Marcelo Suárez-Orozco, a professor of education at New York University who is an author of the study, said on Tuesday. “It affects their cognitive development, engagement in school and their ability to be emerging citizens.”

The Harvard study reports that “fear and vigilance” guide the home lives of young children whose parents are illegal immigrants, making the parents significantly less likely to engage with teachers or be active in schools.

Parents’ fears of deportation led to lower levels of enrollment of their American children in public programs for which the children were legally eligible, including child care subsidies, public preschool and food stamps, the study found.

The other authors were Carola Suárez-Orozco and Robert T. Teranishi of New York University and Hirokazu Yoshikawa of the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Many illegal immigrant parents work long hours in low-wage jobs, sometimes more than one job. New research on very young children cited in the Harvard study showed that the undocumented parents’ difficult work conditions “contribute substantially to the lower cognitive skills of children in their families.” This was true even though the children were more likely to be in two-parent families than American children as a whole.

As teenagers, children without legal status face a hard awakening when they apply for jobs, driver’s licenses or financial aid for college and discover they are not legally qualified for any of them. Their paths diverge from siblings who are American citizens by birthright.

“In late adolescence, they start to realize their legal limitations, and their worlds turn completely upside down,” said Roberto G. Gonzales, a sociologist at the University of Chicago whose research on college-age illegal immigrants is cited in the Harvard study.

Academic achievement does little to lift the prospects of illegal immigrants who have grown up here. Out of 150 immigrants Professor Gonzales studied in depth, 31 had completed college or advanced degrees, but none were in a career that matched their educational training. Many were working low-wage jobs like their parents.

The Harvard study found that many illegal immigrant youths, facing the “reduced promise of mobility,” had dropped out of school and begun the search for work they could do without legal papers, “forced deeper and deeper into an underground work force.”

The researchers said that a generation of young illegal immigrants raised in this country was moving toward “perpetual outsider-hood.”

Narayanan Krishnan: Companion to the Forgotten

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPOilRen3Qg


“What is the purpose of my life? What am I going to do?” Narayanan Krishnan is from a Brahmin community and part of an Orthodox family. In the Indian caste system, Brahmins make up the highest social class, while the Harijans, or untouchables, are of the lowest social order. In this system, Brahmin’s are not supposed to associate at all with the lower class. However, Krishnan saw the poverty and hopelessness in these people of his community and decided to make a difference. “We feed the homeless, the mentally ill destitute, and the old people who have been left uncared, of the society.” Not only does Krishnan feed these people, which is one of the very basic necessities of life, but he also genuinely cares for their wellbeing. He bathes them, cuts their hair, massages their legs, and blesses them. “So the food will give them physical nutrition. The love and affection that you show, will give them mental nutrition.” Krishnan is able to see the potential in these people, the humanity in all of them. How often do we pass by the homeless and make general assumptions about them? What are we going to do about poverty? What is my purpose of life? “Everybody has 5.5 liters of blood. I am just a human being. To me, everybody is the same.”

Social Mobility, Happiness and Humanity

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/25/opinion/granderson-what-do-you-do/index.html

In this article, LZ Granderson expresses his views of the new ideology of life in America as “what you do” instead of “who you are”. The economical state that the country is in and has grown to in the past decades has made it so our money defines us. Granderson exhibits of how society has lost the humanity in how we talk to each other in that we focus on what we do and how we come to pay for things instead of our names, and personal characteristics. He goes on to say, “This dichotomy has slowly disconnected the American dream from the idea of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and attached it to one's ability to move up the ladder.”

In class we have talked a lot about the real opportunities the slaves have had as well as the poor to participate in the developing United States. Granderson describes this change as regarding to the past few decades, however I would like to pose the question, Is it really that new? The ability to vote in the early 1900’s was based on if you owned land. The quality of work and education was based on how much money you already possessed. The opportunities were not good, and I might suggest that they are still difficult to move up the ladder.

The suggestion of Granderson of the view of people as consumers and not as people has come and gone through different eras of time in this country. Now we see people for what they do and accomplish with discrimination of the jobs and those who fill the jobs. In the post civil war era, blacks were viewed and discriminated against just as today, though I feel it is not as racial as it used to be, rather by class. It was stated in class that politicians, those who dare get involved, try to focus on the current issue as a recent problem, however, to quote the common phrase, “history repeats itself,” this is a long standing issue and we would do well by recognizing the cycles and thought process throughout history. This will help society to maybe find the greater happiness in which the America Dream constitutes.

New Barbie-Tatoos and All

New York City Parents Find Nothing Stylish About New Tattooed ‘Barbie’ Doll

Body Ink All Over 'Tokidoki' Seen As Sending A Very Bad Message To Children

October 20, 2011 11:30 PM

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Tokidoki Barbie (Photo: CBS 2)

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — The newest Barbie doll to hit store shelves is sparking controversy.

The doll sports several tattoos, and some parents say it’s sending the wrong message to their kids, reports CBS 2’s Kathryn Brown.

Meet “Tokidoki Barbie,” the newest addition to the iconic doll collection.

She’s edgy — with pink hair, sky-high stilettos and a cactus-covered pet named “Bastardino.”

But it’s her body art that has some parents on edge.

“I don’t think it’s appropriate for little girls to be having Barbies with tattoos all over,” parent Reye Griffith said Thursday.

Tokidoki’s upper body is covered with exotic-looking tattoos, including a large flower covering her chest and a tiger curls up her neck.

“I think it sends all the wrong signals for young girls,” said Mitti Hansen, mother to a 4-year-old girl.

Tokidoki is not the first Barbie to sport tattoos. In 2009, Mattel unveiled “Totally Stylin’ Barbie,” but her tattoos were stick-on and removable.

Tokidoki’s are inked on.

“Maybe if a little girl sees that she also wants a tattoo and I think it’s not good,” parent Latifa Zyne said.

But body art is a growing trend. According to the American Academy of Dermatology, 1 in 4 Americans ages 18 to 50 now has at least one tattoo.

Tattoo artist Pablo Jimenez said Tokidoki is just a reflection of a more accepting attitude toward body ink.

“Tattoos, right now, is everywhere. It’s just about art. It’s nothing bad,” Jimenez said.

Tokidoki is considered a “collectible” and retails for $50 — much more expensive than basic Barbie dolls. Mattel said the doll is marketed more toward adult collectors than to children. Tokidoki is a limited edition doll — named after the fashion line of the same name. It is sold only on Barbie collector’s website.

“You will not find this in any toy store,” said Jim Silver, Editor-In-Chief of TimeToPlayMag.com.

Silver said Tokidoki is just the latest in a long line of high-fashion collector items meant for adults, notkids.

“These are high-priced dolls. They make dolls after big-time fashion designers like Bob Mackey, so these are dolls that kids generally don’t see,” Silver said.

Many parents said they’d like to keep it that way.

Things to consider:

It is interesting to note that although the Barbies are not being marketed towards children, they have still managed to cause such a controversy. Would it be appropriate for young girls to be able to buy this doll as a toy? What does this say about our society and the images that are portrayed to the younger generations? How different with the youngsters of today feel about products such as these that will be marketed toward their own children?

Link for original article: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/10/20/new-york-city-parents-find-nothing-stylish-about-new-tattooed-barbie-doll/

Celebrity Mormons

If you're a fan of the Killers, or even if you're not, this video is definitely worth watching.

Brandon Flowers has been the lead singer of the Killers since its beginnings. Concert tours have often taken him away from home for extended periods of time, and have led to many disagreements with his band's management. In spite of the difficulties of living a celebrity, rock-star lifestyle he has a family with kids and admits that it is very rare to see such a lifestyle at such a "young" age for a rock-star.

While on tours with the Killers, Brandon was often approached by members of the LDS church who had "outgrown" the church and thought of Brandon as a sort of brother-in-arms.

LDS celebrities have to deal with different challenges than most "run-of-the-mill" members. Even just attending a regular ward can be difficult once they are recognized for who they are.

Why do Mormons love to talk about famous Mormons? What makes them so interesting to the rest of us?

Immigrants Being Attacked in Russia

"Not for Women"

It's funny, but definitely clear about excluding women from the drink, "It's not for women!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3iuG1OpnHP8

Herman Cain's Interpretation of the Occupy Wall Street Protests

I can't stop thinking about what Herman Cain said in the following interview:



Here is the quote I am particularly fascinated by:

Don't blame the big banks. If you don't have a job and you're not rich, blame yourself.

I think this gets at the heart of our beliefs about class mobility in the United States. What are your personal thoughts on what Herman Cain said?

The Worth of a Soul

Humanity has continuously dealt with the conflict of equality. At different times and in different nations and cultures, there has been a struggle of equality... whether it be gender, race, sexual or age. In America, we have seen this happen since our forefathers came to our shores. Actions of those who segregate or discriminate can spring from a variety of reasons: fear, greed, ignorance, misunderstanding, and I think sometimes, they truly do believe they may be doing the right thing. Different levels of equality have had their time and place through history. In the early developments of America, there was the mistreatment of the Native American population. Slavery also was raging in the South, with racial discrimination happening both visibly and invisibly throughout the country. Women's suffrage soon found it's opportunity to proceed, with the Civil Rights Movement boldly marching forward. It seems that today in our nation, one of the battles of equality that has been raging for years is the question of homosexuality and where our society stands on the issue. Throughout all of history, however, one common theme seems to exist for every group seeking greater equality: their desire to show the worth of each and every individual and have that acknowledged by others.

Although each and every person has his or her own right on how they view homosexuality, I also feel that we each have a responsibility to remember that each individual on the earth is a human being. Each human being has intrinsic and unalterable worth, independent of how others view them or what they think. When we have forgotten the worth of a soul, or another human being, that is when tragedy has struck, always to be remembered and never to be fully repaired. Genocide, abuse, and even specific events such as the Holocaust, show the results of forgetting the worth of a human being and the soul of a human being.

I read an article about this topic about a high school teacher in New Jersey who is a religious woman (shown by her supervision and advisory over a prayer group) who is alleged to have called homosexuality "a perverted spirit that has existed from the beginning of creation" and a "sin" that "breeds like cancer." Even though her personal views and opinions are protected by the Constitution of the United States, it is discouraging to see people in a community who stand as role models to younger people, still forming their views and opinions about life and the world, that can influence them in a certain way. As a high school teacher, and especially as a religious woman, she should be reinforcing the ideas of understanding and tolerance of all people. Although my views and knowledge are still very limited, I feel it is important for every person to strive to understand the differences that make up the beautiful society in which we live. Below is the link to the article:

Associated Press: NJ Teacher criticized for Facebook remarks on gays

Jennie LeFevre