9/11 Muslims Terrorists?

This week in class, we discussed views that America had on people before and after the events of 9/11. In this blog, I plan to discuss specifically who the people were and why the were stereotyped as such. In this day and age, there are many stereotypes about many people. Things like Indians only study all day, to all Mexicans are illegal immigrants. Obviously that cannot be true, because it would cause every person of the same race to be exactly the same. So why is it that there was a stereotype formed after 9/11 that highlighted Muslims as terrorists? That cannot be true at all... The Islamic way of life does not condone violence against other people. I think that it is ignorance. Not when s causes an entire religion to be ostracized based on the act of a single outlive, an outlive that is not common. One of the root of the word Islam is Salam, which means peace or well being. Is it really possible for people of a religion that means peace, to be made of terrorists? After 9/11 fears of terrorism rocketed, and fear became irrational. The irrational fears of Americans right after 9/11 caused disputes, riots, and etc. So there is a large problem in America, one that this generation can fix.

Plan

This week we started to talk about the cold war. During this war specifically, anticommunism was a big topic. The U.S even created a containment policy to help combat it. A plan they created was called the Marshall plan. It was made to help aid European countries that had not fallen under communism. The Marshall Plan provided a promise of economic and financial stability and the U, S spent approximately 13 billion dollars financing this plan.  By providing the monetary provisions for Europe, the U.S was also brining money back to itself. When money went to Europe, then they bought American goods and used American workers which help build up the U.S. economy as well. The Marshall plan also allocated the idea that the U.S would protect these countries with the army and would not hesitate to use force on any communist like actions. The main points of the Marshall plan were created to help support the containment policy and help combat communism. 

American Colonies?

This week, we focused on trade and International business. What do you suppose that Americans thought about the idea of making colonies in the Philippines? Do you think that any were against the idea due to being British colonies before the Revolutionary war? I feel that many people would have been against the idea of colonizing the Philippines because of that event. We read about the argument that Mr. Beveridge shared with the President. He mostly claimed that the Philippines could not govern themselves and I quote, "They are not capable of self-government" (2) in the section, The Filipinos Are Children. I think that he was being very racist in this comment to get the President to agree with him. I believe that most of his argument was geared towards things that would benefit him the most. Although he did include many things that would benefit the country as a whole. He used things like trading and military bases to convince the President that he should choose to colonize the Philippines. I think that after helping free the Philippines it was very odd to try to control them. I personally think that an alliance by choice would have been better. Just literally ask to form a treaty, and perhaps they would have agreed considering that America helped them. Although I do suppose that since their was a chance that they could have disagreed, they went for total control.

Prohibition

In our time working with events of the 1920’s we have been able to connect Prohibition to several factors of the era; two examples being Women’s Suffrage and Civil Rights. Based on what we have learned in class, I have come to the conclusion that Prohibition was supposed to be a “fix all” solution during the Progressive Era. People like to blame things that go wrong on other people and possessions, and during this time the chosen victim was alcohol. The idea was that alcohol brought all trouble into society, like violence and misconduct, and if alcohol were to disappear the negativity would follow.  The problem is, alcohol is not the root of all evil. Thus, abolishing its use didn't make all problems disappear. Not to say that excessive alcohol consumption didn't cause some major problems that Prohibition could have fixed. Public misconduct induced by alcohol most likely decreased, and there is possibility that drunken violence was also minimized. However, while the possibility stands that Prohibition did some good, it also majorly established other illegal acts, like bootlegging alcohol. Therefore, not only was there more illegal activity occurring in result of Prohibition, but alcohol was still available to those who wanted it. Ultimately, the “fix all” solution to the problems in society was not a solution at all, and while we wish we could blame all wrong doings on one thing, it's unrealistic for things to be so easy.