Reflection on My Friend Michelle, an Alcoholic

In the story My Friend Michelle, and Alcoholic, Bridgid Stone talks about her college roommate, Michelle, who was a problem drinker throughout college. As Bridgid describes Michelle’s drinking addition, she also explains her reasoning behind the effects of drinking. Bridgid also describes the ongoing problem of statistics showing the increasing number of college students who give in to alcohol. This increase in drinking during school has become a problem not only for the grades that students are receiving but also for dedication that students put into their studies. Drinking in colleges have become a “must do” in the social atmosphere in college, but this social habit can become addicting creating problems in the academic part of college as well as when creating a professional appearance needed for finding a job after college. Drinking in college is can be harmful when making decisions about our future.
Drinking is a real problem in colleges today. According to Fraternities and Sororities on Contemporary College Campuses, “73 percent of fraternity advisers believe that alcohol is a problem in fraternities.” As if that is not evidence enough that there is a ongoing alcohol problem in colleges, it is reported in Alcohol and Youth that “more that 80 percent of all college students surveyed had been drinking in the previous month.” As large as this number is, it did not come as a big surprise to me. It amazes me that students spend such a large amount of money going to college, but then waste their money by skipping classes due to carelessness’ such as getting drunk. I would also like to point out that students go to colleges to learn about a specific work field so that they can go and be professionals in their workplaces. Would you be comforted going into a surgery knowing that the doctor that is going to do your surgery spent his years of schooling going to parties and skipping classes? I would hope not!
In the story Michelle tells Bridgid that she only drinks “to loosen up; she is much more fun if she has been drinking.” Based on this explanation of why Michelle drinks it seems to me she drinks because it is the “right” thing to do socially. Also due to Michelle’s drinking addiction, she makes poor decisions such as choosing not to attend her morning classes. These poor decisions compound leading into much larger consequences. Drinking is just one example of how one things leads to one thing right after another. Matthew 6:34 says “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” I love this verse because it reminds us that we need to be smart about our everyday decisions and that decisions that we make today will effect who we will become in the future.

The "scary and frightening" Lion King

Anyone who is going to read my blog today is a bored computer nerd.. oh there I go again stereotyping again. Well at least I am in good company. Both Disney, makers of the Lion King, and Margaret Lazarus, the author of All’s Not Well in Land of “The Lion King” make broad stereotypes about the characters in Disney film The Lion King. The Lion King, a story of a young lion prince who is deceived and threatened by his jealous uncle, the second in line for the throne, is an exciting story that has become a favorite movie that many kids remember loving. This story, though it has much some action, is not a threat to kids. In Margaret Lazarus’ evaluation of the movie, she claims that there is racism hinted at within the characters. I would like to argue that unless you are searching for something to be wrong with the movie this “racism” is not easily detected. For example, in a class discussion of Margaret Lazarus’ essay, where both black and white students where represented, the whole class agreed that Margaret was making a big deal out of nothing. While trying to get her point across about the different people represented by the character’s voices in the film The Lion King, Margaret is creates harsh stereotypes that make me wonder her ability to evaluate the movie fairly from an unbiased perspective.
Margaret Lazarus’ All’s Not Well in Land of “The Lion King” critiques The Lion King harshly. She accuses Disney of associating the characters in the film to people groups. “The hyenas are dark – mostly back – and they are nasty…one of their voices is done by Whoopie Goldberg, in a clearly inner-city dialect.” She goes on later to say similar bold statements about Scar, the bad lion who is trying to take over the thrown. “Scar has a black mane, and speaks in an effeminate, limp-pawed, British style.” Scar throughout the whole movie is trying to take away the kingdom from the lion price. Disney needed a distinctive voice that would represent “the bad guy” to the audience and Disney needed someone to do it. Although I disagree with her statement that Scar spoke in an effeminate and limp-pawed form, this proves the fact that Margaret is using very broad racist stereotypes. In an effort to try to get her readers to think about implied racial tension behind the movie, Margaret Lazarus simply makes many critical stereotypes that are racist herself.
While creating kids movies such as The Lion King, was it really Disney’s intension to have an inner city ghetto feel about them? Who are we to claim that Disney had racial discrepancy hidden within their movies? I think it is really important that we take into account the age of the directed audience that this film was originally created for. When a little kid is watching The Lion King -- a movie about a lion king and his cub, who is being threatened by a bad hyena -- I doubt that this prescribed kid is thinking about the racial meaning behind the voices. Let’s be wild and say that we come across a little kid who is thinking about the voices, what little kid is going to connect Scar’s British accent with being gay? Margaret Lazarus, though she has a right to be concerned that her son might be “scared and frightened”, has gone over the top in her critique of The Lion King by making the movie about racial discrepancy, when she has no proof that the movie was originally intended for that purpose. It can just as easily be argued that the voices that Disney used in The Lion King simply portray a vivid distinction between the “good guys” and the “bad guys”.

Showing God's Love to People in Need

In the journal entry Raid Leaves Families Fractured, by Bruce Finley, it talks about the damaging results that occur after the Immigration and Customs Enforcement conduct a raid. This particular story tells how the raids affected Isabel Ramirez and her family. The ICE detained Isabel Ramirez’s husband, Juan, leaving her with their eighteen-month-old daughter, Brenda, their three-year-old son Juanito, and their seven-year-old daughter, Laura. “He was the only one working. He paid for everything, the bills, rent.” Along with the financial crises, which the broken families now have to deal with, there is also a lot of shame involved. The Ramirez family was not the only family affected in that area, though. As if this financial crisis is not enough to process, “the raids left more than one hundred children with no parents present” according to the church officials and community organizers. The financial crisis, shame, and orphaned children are all effects of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, whose goal is to find and deport illegal immigrants living in America. This leaves the families and communities broken and unable to support themselves.
In Matthew 25, it tells us that we are to take care of those in need. This past year in my Spanish class, we went on a field trip about immigration. We spent a great deal of time in a church that has set up an outreach to help illegal immigrants get American citizenship and to help those who do have citizenship get and keep jobs. After talking to a family who came over illegally, I acquired a great deal of sympathy for Mexicans here in America. The “hoops” that the U.S. government makes Mexicans go through in order to become American citizens is outrageous. Although I do not think that it is right to go against the law generally, there are times that it is necessary to do so. God’s law trumps man’s law. In the Bible God requires us to fulfill his law by meeting the needs of those less fortunate. Mexicans who manage to come to America are humans just like all those who were fortunate enough to be born in the States. We need to be careful to treat everyone just as we would want to be treated. I feel it is my duty to love and do what I can for those around me.
The effects of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, to find illegal immigrants in America, leave the families and communities devastated. What a perfect opportunity to help people in need. We need to be ready to let Christ live through our actions.

My response to "The Struggle to Be an All-American Girl"

The essay "The Struggle to Be an All-American Girl", by Elizabeth Wong, is the story of a Chinese girl who was born and raised in the U.S. but still had many Chinese customs expected of her. Throughout the story, the young Chinese writer talks about her struggle to fit in with the American culture. Although the girl works very hard in her American studies, she is forced to attend a Chinese school as well where she learns the Chinese customs of her ancestors. It is important to the girl to do well in the American culture. It is also important to her and her brother that their mom learn the culture as well. Her excellence in learning and using the American culture is so obvious that even the surrounding Chinese community members notice. "Even the people in my culture would cluck and say that I'd do well in life." As the girl works to be an “all-American girl” she is also being forced to learn the Chinese culture. In this story, the author is showing the difficulty of being able to adjust to new surroundings.

I cannot relate to the struggles that the young girl and her family faced daily. The culture shock that her mom went through, coming from a Chinese background to America, must have been a challenge. Also difficult would be the girl’s dilemma, since she was born and raised in the U.S. After reading this story, it seems that both the girl and the mom have good reasons for their attitudes toward the Chinese culture. Although I see the reasoning behind both of their attitudes, both of their actions seem extreme to me. The mom forcing the girl to go to a Chinese school, outside of her consent, seems to be hard on the girl. She did not enjoy learning the Chinese costumes or culture. Thus being forced to attend the Chinese school only seemed to make matters worse. As hard as it was for the girl, she could have been more understanding toward her mom. That is how she was raised, so that is how she knew to raise her own daughter. In this case, a compromise of the two different wills would have been beneficial to both the girl and the mom. This can be a life lesson to help us open our eyes to the struggles and needs of others. You may not know the reasoning behind their motives, but we can always be more understanding of those around us.