Redskins

So this starts with a semi-related story. In music theory class the other day, we were talking about pentatonic scales. In many traditional Asian styles of music, the pentatonic scale is used quite often. In the media, there is a riff that is associated with Asian stereotypes, but it didn't actually come from Asia.

Follow the link to here the riff, I promise you'll know what I'm talking about. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Asian_Riff_Accurate.mid

Anyway, my teacher goes on to describe things like this. Among his most despised is the Washington Redskins and the "Tomahawk Chop". I believe that this both of these are culturally insensitive and straight up rude. I want to do a series of blogs about this because there is a ton to look at. 

The Washington Redskins name is among the most offensive and it seems that the managers of the team avoid the offensive reality of their name. "Redskin" is a racial epithet. There is no debate that "redskin" is an r-word for Native Americans similar to the n-word for Black people. I try to imagine if a football team was called the "rabbis" and their mascot was exaggerated Jewish stereotypes. I don't think the Jewish community would be too happy about that. 

If you read this, please comment. I want to hear other opinions.

Drew Peterson

"I did not kill Kathleen!" yelled Drew Peterson at his trial. Drew Peterson has been in the media since 2007 for killing his wife. Drew Peterson had a 30-year career as a police officer with the Bolingbrook Police Department. Peterson has had four different wives. His first wife he divorced. His second wife he divorced. His third wife he supposedly killed. And his fourth wife disappeared.
After his third wife, Kathleen Savio, was found dead in a waterless bathtub, nobody thought he was guilty. In 2007, his fourth wife, Stacy Peterson disappeared.
The families of both Stacy Peterson and Kathleen Savio pushed for further investigation. Eventually, in 2009 Peterson was indicted by the Will County Grand Jury and arrested for Savio's murder. On September 6th, 2012, Peterson was found guilty of the premeditated murder of Kathleen Savio. Yesterday, Peterson was sentenced to 38 years in prison.
I am grateful that the Drew Peterson case is over. The issue with his case was the media. The media made a celebrity of Peterson. He was absolutely heartless on camera. Cracking jokes about his dead wives. It makes me sick.

Sexual Assault

This week we dove into the issue of sexual assault. With issues such as this, there are so many things that can be explored. Therefore, I am going to need to dismiss many things while I form an arguement. I've noticed in class that it is a double sided: if it can happen to a girl, it can happen to a guy. I have to dismiss this issue temporarily.
I have some commentary about motives for rape on campus. There are a few reasons that arise in our discussions about why rape occurrs. 1) Guys are drunk and don't understand that "no" means "NO!" 2)Guys are uninformed of what qualifies as rape. 3) Guys are just looking to hook-up.
I think that in general, most of these are true.
While I don't know the exact percent of rape on campus that involve drugs, I imagine it is high. The common situation seems to be that a girl goes to a party and is dressed promiscuously. A guy is wanting to get some action, and makes his move. Unfortunately, he pushes too far and the girl wants him to leave her alone. His judgement is flawed by the alcohol and he eventually forces himself on her.
In our discussions, this is the cookie-cutter situation. This is what the conversations revolve around. While I think that this is a common situation, I think that there are more varying situations.
My arguments are unfocused. I need to do more research about sexual assault. I also think that our discussions in class focus too much on the hypothetical.