Parenting

I believe that parents should raise their children in a way to accept everyone, and to not be selfish. Children should not make everything about themselves, they should try to hear things about other people and connect to them. Kids that are really selfish have a tough time making friends because of their attitude. Accepting everyone is also important because everyone is different. You cannot place a stereotype on someone and believe that to be 100% true because each person has different qualities that you must be willing to accept. My parents were very lenient with me as a child, mainly because I am the youngest. Although they were not strict, they set good examples for me to follow, and I hardly ever needed my parents to become more strict. This helped me become more mature at a younger age by learning from my mistakes, and having good examples to be set for me. Each one of my friends have parents that use different strategies of parenting. From what I have noticed among my friends, it seems that kids with very strict parents tend to dislike their parents and break their rules anyway. Some parents allow their kids to do basically whatever they want. Although being able to do what you want sounds cool, these kids don't learn from their mistakes and can get out of control. I want to raise my children similar to how my parents raised me. I want to let my kids have a lot of freedoms, but one thing I will do that my parents didn't do that well with me is to enforce the importance of getting good grades in school. Some rules that I will set for them are to never drink and drive. That is my major rule with my kids. Not only are they risking their lives, they are putting other drivers on the road at risk of being in a car crash. My parents did a really good job of enforcing this rule to me. I believe that my parents have done a really nice job of raising me, so I hope the methods that my parents used will still be affective when I have kids of my own. I want to be lenient, but I also want them to know that the parents are still in charge.

Race in America

Racism in the United States will forever taint our countries history. Slavery and segregation were two forms of racist acts that seem completely barbaric now, but were accept throughout history. Although stereotypes may still exist, racism has changed throughout America. People of any color or race can do anything they want. A perfect example of this would be our first African-American president, Barack Obama, being able to reach the highest authority in the country. It was only within the last 60 years when segregation ended. Until recently, many Americans would have never thought that the president of the United States would be anything other than a white male. Now people would not be surprised if a women were to win the presidential election. Stereotypes are the main form of racism in this country. People all over the country get scared when they see a Muslim person walking down the street in a turban. Ever since the attacks on September 11, 2001, people have been terrified of Muslims, and assume that they are all terrorists. Not many Americans are aware that less than one percent of Muslims are terrorists. This is a form of racism that people all over the country practice. It may not seem to be racist, but stereotypes are a form of racism. This stereotype may not seem racist, but that is because many people accept these stereotypes to be true. This is no different than slavery and segregation that people do not realize their racist acts because society accepts it. In 100 years from now, stereotypes will still exist, and society will look at the stereotypes of Muslims during this time period, and call our era racist. These are the overlooked forms of racism that still exist in America today.