One of my friends who I work with helped me study for one of the exams. He had no idea of the subject and I studied by telling him what I knew about the course material. So, in reality it was like I was teaching him the things that we learned in class. If the conversation was taken out of context, the things that I was saying could have been in completely the wrong way. I was restated all of the goals and beliefs of white nationalist groups. When it came to explaining the essay question from the first exam I had a summary of all the main points. When I gave him an outline of what the white nationalist believed about the subject of the picture he was left sort of dumb founded. He couldn't really understand how they could get all of these really minute details from the dynamics of a race or religion. He knew of the surface racism that exists, but he didn't realize how deep the hatred reached. I felt the same exact way he did. I would never in a million years be able to dig that deep to find hateful things to say about people.
My roommate and I are in the white nationalists and ideologies class together. Although we don't participate in discussions in class we discuss things between ourselves when class has been dismissed. She was pretty heated when we started talking about racism within politics. I am not a very political person and I don't follow any current events when it comes to politics. As a class we talked about racism in the the tea party. She was telling me that she doesn't believe that just because you consider yourself a part of a political party that you are categorized as being racist. Things are not that black and white. I tried to have her explain to me why everyone is categorizing the Tea Party as racist. She told me that it is because these political people don't want President Obama in office anymore. They only focus on his race as the reason why he is not excelling as president. However, it is for many more reasons that just that. I really can't form an opinion on something I don't know much about, but I think that I agree with the fact that Obama came into office trying to fix something that not just one president could do. With this I don't think that white nationalist are as dumb as everyone is portraying them to be, they wanted America to see noted black person fail so they could get more support. I think they have succeeded in doing just that.
My boyfriend is looking to be a part of the law enforcement in Washington. I discussed with him about the topic of my blog and how he felt about it. We talked a little about the process in which he as going through in applying to be an officer. I asked him if he felt like the criminal justice system was racist. He gave the example of filling out the application for different departments. I guess they give a paragraph long disclaimer about how they do not hire people based on sex, age, religion, race, income, or personal values. Then the next sections that they asked you to fill out is your sex and race. If this issues truly didn't matter to them in the hiring process they wouldn't ask those questions at all. I completely agree. Getting hired should be solely determined on performance not what you look like. This could go both ways though. If they wanted more diversity in their department they could choose a minority over someone who was higher qualified. This could also go the other way in that they choose someone who was white but less able to do the job. If they wanted to make this application process completely fair they would take out that section.
My friend pointed out how extreme white nationalist people are. Taking this with the combination of people who are overly sensitive to racism heightens the problem with hate crimes, terrorism, and discrimination. I was telling him about the concept of lone wolves and how they work to support white nationalist groups. He told me that he thinks that white nationalist groups target mentally unstable and vulnerable people to recruit. That every group has an extreme member because they have never really felt like that were a part of something and now they are overly dedicated. I think that they are called lone wolves for a reason. They don't fit in and their are loners. So when a group takes them in they are willing to do anything for the good of the group, even if it is against the law.
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