Make America Great Again!

             Donald Trump is vying for a presidential nomination from the Republican party.  One of his main campaign slogans is: "Make America Great Again"  This is a total joke to me as an African American.  What greatness is he referring to, that is the big question here???  Donald considers himself a conservative and is trying to appeal to the very left-wing of the population.  What I believe he is truly referring to is  regressing  back as a nation to a time where bigotry and racism were staples of the American social norms for Caucasians.
            Donald is playing on the fears and misguided hopes of the many of the left-wingers.  The fears I refer to are of  the eroding of the power and privilege that comes with being Caucasian in America.  American has become more and more diverse in recent times, not just in population but in division of power as well.   
The misguided hopes are based in them believing  that  if Trump becomes president, their lives will immediately change for the better.  This is totally misguided, Trump is only out for Trump.   This hope is just as misguided as those African Americans that believe that somehow everything would change for the better in their lives just as soon as Obama was elected to the presidency.  Lower class Caucasians will not suddenly become upper class if Trump is elected.  It is this ignorance though, that is a large contributor  to his momentum .

Is Donald for real?

Whats my name?

               There is a movement recently for women that marry to not take their husband's last name. This is not an entirely new concept at all.  I was listening to a radio program recently and the host was making the argument that it really doesn't matter if the bride takes the grooms name.  The main points of her argument  were: one she felt that she should not lose her individual identity just because she got married and second that she also wanted to honor her side of the family when or if there were children as a result of the marriage.  I'm certainly all for people having the right to choose whatever they want for their name.  Where I find fault in her argument is the logic of it.

                The first logical fallacy is that she somehow would lose her individual identity by taking her husband's last name.  Does she not know that her maiden name is the same as her father's not her mothers.  Further more, is is most likely her great great grandfather's and beyond last name as well. So she is still leaving out all of the maternal representation anyway.
                The second fault in the logic in my opinion is where does all of the hyphenation end with regard to the children.  After just a few generations peoples last names would have several hyphenations, that is down right silly to me and frankly becomes useless at that point.  
 

Transgender Bathrooms

There has been a debate going on as of recent times regarding restrooms and transgender people.  In the past few weeks the debate as gained intensity.  Curt Schilling, a former MLB pitcher who had moved on to do analyst work for ESPN was recently fired for a social media post  regarding transgender bathroom laws that have been passed or are working their way through different state's legislative systems.  Schilling's post depicted a very unflattering image of a transgendered person and the caption "Let him In! to the restroom with your daughter or else you are a narrow minded, judgmental, unloving, racist bigot who needs to die"  It is obvious that Schilling is against allowing transgender person to use the restroom that they most identify with.  He is not alone in thinking either.  On the other hand, there is also a large contingency of people that are in support of changes.

The portion of this story that I think is most interesting is that is shows that there has been a major shift  occurring relative to how transgender people are received in pop culture.  As little as 15 years ago the of topic of  transgender specific bathrooms  and or allowing persons to use the restroom assigned to the gender they identify with was not even open for discussion.  Fast forward to present day, many states have passed laws  requiring public places to accommodate transgendered persons with separate restrooms or allowing them to use the restroom of their choice.

In my opinion, the "debate" is really not a debate at all.  I say this because I define a debate two sides arguing on the same issue.  Sure, on the surface one could say that on the surface it is a debate on bathrooms.  I say though, that it is far deeper than bathrooms and there are major agendas at play here.

Those who argue against the restrooms are mostly the conservative  who want just keep things as they have always been, just for the sake of pushing back on change.  Or they talk about safety concerns stemming from a portion of that population that will take advantage of the laws to prey on others. Those who are arguing for it are the changes respond by saying that with every freedom we grant to the public you always run that risk.  Whether is free speech to the right to own guns.

This debate is far from being put to rest, but at least the debate keeps people thinking about what their own perception of right and wrong are and who has rights and who doesn't have rights!

 

Pushing kids to grow up too fast!

The Illusion of choice

The Illusion of choice

                It has recently come to my attention that 90% of American media content is owned by just 6 companies.  This was startling for me to hear, as I was under the impression (like many of us) that media was controlled by many different companies.  I figured that with all the different cable channels and hundreds of different news papers and magazines, there has to be a great number of different controlling interests.

                After learning this fact, I came to the realization that, I don't truly have the options that I previously believed I had when it came to my consumption of information and media.  The illusion that  these companies create is that you can find unbiased and or true counter arguments in mainstream media.  This could not be farther from the truth.  A particular media giant may have to different publications that seeming have decidedly left or right wing slants to them.  The actuality is that both are being carefully crafted to maintain the highest profits for the parent company.  Any they wouldn't dare to actually broadcast or print something that is outside that core foundation of the parent organization.  

                It is a startling realization that even the most opposed sides of media are in cahoots with one another.  It makes me lose faith in the news that is being printed and broadcast.  It makes one wonder where they can go to get truly unbiased and untainted information.  It is the ultimate manifestation of why the saying "don't believe everything you read" is used. Is it is possible to read two opposing accounts of the same happening and since both are owned by the same company neither of them be true.  The parts that are not in the best interest of the media giant will be deliberately omitted from both stories.

                Another related example of the same type of situation in the fast food industry.  McDonalds holds or has held majority stakes in both Quizno's and Chipotle.  As the public turned away from the tradition fast food of burger and fries, McDonalds, in essence just re-branded themselves. I'm sure lots of people were not in agreement with McDonalds' practises and felt they were voicing that displeasure  buy purchasing food from Chipotle and or Quizno's.  The fact is that they were still filling the pockets of the McDonalds corporation!

Who are you?

Who are you?

Creating a social media profile involves creating a persona whether you like it or not.   The personal you create may or may not be a true representation of who you really are.  There is a very wide spectrum of how closely a person's online persona matches their actual life. Some work folks take special care to insure that their online self is genuine and other take that same amount of care to appear to be something that is far from genuine.  That is the magic of social media, you can be whoever you want to be.

I think it basically boils down to three types of social media personas, you have the two extremes and the middle of the road folks.  Most of us I say fall in that middle ground.  The extremes being, the person that puts any and everything on their social media page and the person that is very selective and goes out of their way to slant who they are perceived to be.

 The everything people includes those that air all their dirty laundry and frequently post about very personal topics along with all of the mundane and insignificant things they do on a day by day minute by minute basis.  After viewing this person's page, you know exactly who they are, what their opinions are, who they like, who they don't like, where they went where, where they are going and on and on. They have no sense of privacy and I believe quite enjoy having an audience to post their lives to.  They will readily post the gory details of a relationship breakup or how much they hate their boss at work.

The other extreme consist of those users that are extremely selective in what they post. They can be categorized into two sub groups though. The first is the person that is very private and only posts very impersonal things. They are also the ones that are very bothered when someone else posts something about them or tags them in a group photo.  They are with have a very distinct line drawn between their personal life an what is broadcast on social media.  The second type encompasses the people that relish the social media attention and take great pains to portray themselves in a very specific light.  They may go so far as to totally fabricate stories or post of events they never attended, vacations they never took, post picture with people they don't really know and so on and so forth.  The people are not really happy with their true lives so they basically create an alternate version within the realm of social media. This may be for good or bad but incorrect all they same.

Lastly we have where I thing the majority of us fall, the middle of the roaders.  This is the group that is fine with posting personal things but not too personal.  We think twice before make a post  and generally don't have ulterior motives when posting.