Culture

This week in class we discussed culture and how we view other cultures. I think that it is extremely important for us to understand other cultures, even if we don't have the same rituals or customs that they do. As Americans, many people find our culture to be different and weird, just as we may view theirs as different. Even in America, you can see a lot of these different cultural aspects. My grandma was raised in Scotland, and even though she has been in America for over 45 years, I still see some of her Scottish culture sometimes. While it is easy to say WOW my grandma is crazy, sometimes I realize I need to take a step back and realize that for her, while she was growing up, it was acceptable to do some of the things she does. I think that while you don't necessarily have to adopt these cultures for yourself, it is extremely important to understand them. Seeing and understanding these other cultures will broaden your horizons and ultimately make you a better person.

A Bronx Tale

The aspect of a Bronx Tale that most influenced me was that racism that was shown. Even though C tried to not have racist tendencies, the influences around him showed. I think that in a way, this is true of real life. Some people truly believe that everyone is equal, no matter the race, but if they grow up in a racist environment, sometimes little things get programmed in. Fortunately for me, I have grown up in a household that has taught me no racial tendancies. In society, however, many times racism is made more prevalent. In the media today especially you can see racism. In the movie, I guess I can relate to C's struggle with an interracial relationship. I have been in a few interracial relationships and often times people do not approve of them or do not understand. I am able to ignore any of these negative comments about my relationships, but in a neighborhood like the one C was in, I could see this being much more difficult to ignore. I hope that over time this segregation and racism will fade away, but it can still be seen in many places in the US today.

Overboard

The experiment or situation we had set up in class this week really got me thinking. Why did we choose to throw off the people we did? How do we prioritize in our society today? I think that to some extent, we were very rash in our decision making. It seemed to go HEY lets vote him off, raise your hand if you agree! Everyones hands just shot up. In the end, I agreed with many of the decisions made, but to some extent I was still confused as to why we did what we did. Was there a method to the madness? I think that there are many different ways to look at it. To some extent, I think that family should have been the main factor. But does this mean I think we should have kept the old couple on the boat? Not really, they had lived a fairly full life and the others on the boat still had much more time and a higher chance of survival aboard the life raft. I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I were put in this situation in real life, I have no clue what I would do. I'm not sure I would have the guts to throw an old couple overboard... but unless we are in the situation who can say how they would react right?

Spit or Saliva?

When it is in your mouth it is saliva and therefore not disgusting, but once it exits your mouth it becomes spit and therefore repulsive. While I understand that this is caused by the views that society instills in us, and that there really is no difference, I still was disgusted by the spit on the spoon. As an American, we are taught to think certain things and find certain things disgusting. One example I have experienced besides the saliva, is the exposure of certain parts of our bodies. In America, we are told that certain parts of us are meant to be kept private. Well, in other countries this is not always so. My family vacations a lot and often times on beaches many women go topless. In the United States we view this is wrong and disgusting, but to them it is no big deal. At first it shocked me, but then I began to realize that they come from a different culture than I do and that to them it is completely normal. It has made me realize that traditions are not necessarily right or wrong, but that you should not judge a person just because of the culture they come from or their views.