Something to be said for breaking down racial barriers

Well it looks like I will be writing a research paper that has something to do with the last article I wrote about here.  The thing that cemented it for me?  A letter my sister in law wrote, and sent to President Obama.  It is a beautiful, heartfelt letter that gets right to the point of my earlier post.  If you thought my topic was somewhat interesting, you will love this letter:

February 23, 2012

Dear President Obama,

I am a Kindergarten teacher at Potomac View Elementary School in Woodbridge, Virginia.  We have been studying about presidents and I just wanted to share a few insights the children had.  My class is made up of approximately 85% English Speakers of Other Language students.  Many are first generation Americans.  I have a laminated placemat with the pictures of all forty-four presidents.  I held it up and we read through all the president names from George Washington to Barack Obama.  The children were so excited to see how you “look like us” which I translated to mean that you do not have white skin.  We discussed how you are our first African American president and what a wonderful pillar of hope it is to see someone who “looks like us” on that placemat.  I then asked them what was the same about all of the presidents and we discussed how they are all men.  I asked them if a woman could be president.  Over half of the class thought that women were not allowed to be president. This, of course, led into a big discussion of its own.  I look forward to the day when there is a placemat of presidents with a woman’s face to create the same spark of “it could be me on there” as your face has with children in my class and all over the world.

After our discussions, I gave each child a paper that says, “If I am president of the United States…” They all had wonderful ideas like, “I will keep our country safe, I will make good schools, I will take care of old people, I will give everybody food, etc.”. One that stuck in my mind was from an ESOL student who wrote, “I wot abbre to have mne”.  Translated, it says, “I want everybody to have money”.  I wish your email correspondence had a way for me to send a jpeg so you could see it. She drew the most presidential looking picture of herself.  I feel her message hits to the heart of what most Americans want, money to go to the doctor, to buy food, to pay the mortgage, to pay credit card bills, money to stay afloat. 

I appreciate you taking time to hear some thoughts from a Kindergarten class in Woodbridge, Virginia.  Thank you for all you do to keep our country safe, make sure everyone has the opportunity for food, clothing shelter, education, and medical care.  We are blessed to have you as our president, and I wish you the best with your 2012 election.

Sincerely

A Kindergarten Teacher

Elections...HOORAY! (<---facetious)

Surely the most exciting time of an Americans life every 4 years is presidential election time! YAAY! Incessant indoctrination, over heated emotion and conniving, manipulative politicians.  Basically a chance for the people we decided we trust the most to put up as many blinders to critical thinking as possible, mislead people until they have their trust and attention, and then exploit it for all it's worth.  I know this is a cynical view.  Please understand that my cynicism is less about the candidates, but is squarely placed on the process of selecting a president, the Americans who select the president, and the office of the President of the United States of America itself.

I figure the nature of the job would force you to have to make impossible decisions, between 2 wrongs, or compromise and do things you don't necessarily agree with.  It's got to be tough to deal with well over 300 000 000 voices and opinions.  Surely, whatever policy you adopt is going to be over-scrutinized and dissected and turned into a perversion of the idea.  Simply, the job is hard, it has to take an incredible human to assume that responsibility and do it well by the opinion of 51% of the population.  So making an informed and intelligent choice between candidates is extremely difficult, at best.

Samuel L. Jackson revealed in an interview with Ebony magazine that he simplified all of this in '08 by deciding he would vote for Obama because he was a black candidate.  The various comment sections for the article (it was written up by several news sites) are very heavily weighted on the side of (seemingly white) people who are disgusted that anyone would have taken race into consideration when voting, and I find their thought process seems to come to a screeching halt when they consider the racial implications.  At least this is what I hope, though my instinct is that on some level they have fully processed it and their conclusion was that it was a chance to point the finger and scream AHA! black people are generally racist too!  Personally, I voted for Obama because he was black.  Not because he had better ideas, or he was a Democrat, or he is kind-of from Chicago (like I am kind-of from Chicago).  My thought process included a reflection of past elected officials and the process of electing them.  I understood that I can't really believe what they are promising, Nixon put the kybosh on that decades ago.  I understood that a vote for the party I identify with the most doesn't say much for my vote, other than that I had adopted one of the 2 choices between parties. I also understood the implications of having a "black" president.  It gave me a chance to have meaningful commentary on my beloved nation.  And to me and Sam Jackson, the exclusivity of the white boys club was the most important issue that we were 100% sure our candidate could address.  Not even directly, he didn't have to preach racial equality.  By winning the presidency he empowered millions that are a part of the minority population.  He gave a voice and a feeling of hope to an entire race, and conversely anyone who is not white, and solidified that race cannot qualify you for president.  Before Barack Obama, I would have bet my life I would never see a black president, after him, my nephew wants to be the president and everyone in his family genuinely believe and encourage him to pursue his dream.  Even further, I'm optimistic we will have a female president soon.

I'm saddened that such a historic influence would be taken at face value and be branded as racist, and stupid.  In the end, it underlines the fact that America has swept the race issues under the rug even though Jim Crow laws were on the books as recently as 50 years ago, I suppose because the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1968, and that year the highest voter turnout among blacks ever was recorded.  Until '08.  With the influx of immigrants in this nation and the feeling that The American Dream is dying, we need more people who understand that empowering the entire nation to equally present opinions will quickly help us come up with sustainable solutions, and regain the international community's opinion of us as a rational, sane, and enviable nation.  It's sad I feel like racism is simply veiled now, just as sinister for anyone in my generation as it has been for generations before us, and when reading the comments on the silly article about Sam Jackson, it doesn't make me feel any more comfortable about what my children may have to endure.  

http://news.yahoo.com/samuel-l-jacksons-racist-reason-voting-obama-because-112400362.html

What The (bleep) Do We Know?

  I never got a chance to finish the film.  But what I saw was thought provoking at least.  I appreciated the sentiment that we are capable of deciphering objects and thoughts that are alien to us.  It gives me hope for my academic career in general, and math in particular.  I did have a big problem with one specific aspect of it though.  The thought process that seems to have established that Native Americans were incapable for a time to see Columbus' ships approaching is implausible.  I will try to explain why, using the little I have learned thus far of critical thinking.

  The statement presented as fact is that indians could not see Columbus' ships because they had no concept of the ships design/appearance.  First I would accumulate info about the people and geography and come up with ideas why this may have happened.  After processing this info, try and understand the underlying principles of my ideas and the ideas of others.  Afterwards, I would create an opinion on the knowledge I accumulated and come up with an informed conclusion.  There are enough plausible alternatives to the opinion presented in the movie that make believing this conclusion impossible.  The indians were capable of distinguishing other large objects in their vision such as boulders, strange animals, land masses and such that even if they did not recognize the object their depth of vision captured the reflection of light that was the new image and that would have provoked thought.

  That said, I can't wait to see the rest of the movie.  Thanks Prof Wiseman for introducing us!