As a Colombian I feel that I should make a post about my countries internal problems. It is of common knowledge that Colombia has internal conflicts regarding the different guerrillas (such as FARC and ELN) and internal warfare. Last week the armed group FARC killed governmental officers. I found a very interesting article in semana.com that talks about how the ONU decided to intervene. It appears that the ONU demanded the armed group "FARC" to give the killers to the "Fiscalia General" or a governmental office that will judge the killers of the police officers. We all know the Colombian judicial system is super messed up and corrupted but at least the intervention of the ONU is a little step towards change. It is true that many of the actions the FARC does, violates human rights and its about time that other countries or at least he entity that is in charge of defending human rights throughout the world start intervening in a conflict that its clearly out of Colombia's government hands. Click here to take a look at the article.. Here is a video that appeared in RCN Noticias that proves and shows the exact demands the ONU gave to "FARC"
Confessions of an Economic Hitman is a book written by John Perkins we have been discussing about the past weeks in class. Even though I didn't have the opportunity to assist to some of this classes I investigated and learned a lot about this book. In this book we can get to see what an Economic Hit Man is and how undeveloped countries manage their economy. The author's main focus is on third world countries. In this book we can see that an economic hit man is someone who convinces third world countries to accept payment from the big countries. Actually, John Perkins describes himself as an economic hit man. It is interesting how this book explains and shows the different effects and purposes this has on other countries economies and political influences.
Here is a video I would like you to watch, it defines better what an economic hit man is in a fun way
Power and privilege are two words that are clearly associated to gender and race issues. Power and privilege are the things that some races have over others. First of all we have to understand what is power and what is privilege. Power is defined as the ability to control or coerce, and privilege is defined as "an invisible package of unearned assets" -Peggy McIntosh. Having power means having control over different social, political and economic resources, people who have power are usually male and white. This is something that should be equal for al races and genders. For example all people should have the same opportunities for getting a job. Race, ethnicity and gender should be ignored and people should be judged or taken into account by their merits, not by the power some certain characteristics give them.
According to the declaration of independence everyone should have equal rights and opportunities. This is an issue that has been addressed all through history and it something that still is an issue now a days. Now a days it is a fact that certain types of peoples have more privileges than others because of their race, while minorities keep getting ignored. Here is a video that talks about this issue regarding gender power and privilege between whites and african americans.
This issue still exists today and it is something that people shouldn't ignore. Most of the people say those kind of inequalities don't exist now a days but that isn't true. In my opinion this issue is very hard to work on because it is really difficult to change someones beliefs according to gender and races. Even though discrimination isn't legal now a days there is still a lot of prejudices in the minds of the people regarding to different races.
Last week in class we discussed about one of those issues everyone chooses to ignore because it isn't supposed to exist. We talked about race and how it has been taken as an excuse for injustice and inequality throughout the world. We saw a video that explained us that race didn't actually exist, and that the characteristics that make a race were practically invented by humans throughout history. It is unfair that race still creates some sort of discrimination to people who have certain traits that classify them as a certain race.
I missed school a few days so I didn't get to see as much of the video as I would have wanted to but it left me thinking about how race still defines people now a days. If you turn on your TV right now you can watch how media promotes all sorts of stereotypes about different races that aren't really accurate to reality. Since we are kids the media forms us to believe in the existence of different races which aren't even scientifically based. According to pbs.org race has no genetic bases, "Not one characteristic, trait, or gene distinguishes all members of one-so called race from all members to an all so called race," With this I come to the conclusion that race is defined by stereotypes that aren't even real. In my opinion the concept of race has to be erased from the planet. The existence of the concept determines which physical traits are better than others and in reality there is no such thing as that.
I was looking for proof that race defines someone's future and I found this very interesting video on youtube that talks about racial inequality in the Criminal Justice System in the US. The video informs you about actual facts and statistics. I was shocked to find out that in the US if you are young, black and male you have a higher probability of going to jail than getting married or going to college. I find this completely disturbing because up to today race shouldn't exist or influence the world, but sadly it does. Here is the video…
Click here for the ling to the PBS interactive webpage about race
During the past few weeks I have learned a lot about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that originates lots of years ago. Basically the conflict originated by the clash of two cultures which lead to war, deaths and suffering. This conflict has been going on since the arrival of fleeing jews to Palestine until today.
It appears that on 2002 Israel started building a wall that divided them from West Bank which is a territory occupied by palestine people. This wall is supposed to be twice as large as the Berlin Wall. Israeli's excuse for building the wall was protection from suicide bombers and terrorists. Here are some pictures of the wall…
Here is a short animated video that helps to understand the origins of this conflict……
I also found this very interesting webpage you should look at, it talks about the Israeli "defense" wall, the reasons why it was built and has a really interesting article that talks about how the wall violates human rights!
Finally I want to show this news article that also talks about the conflict and the building of the wall, I found it very interesting because it shows what are the two different sides doing about it.
Last week in history class I got the great opportunity to watch an amazing movie that is called: "Lemon Tree." This movie tells the story of a Palestinian woman who owns a field of lemon trees. The main plot of the movie centers in this women's fight against an Israeli minister who moves next to her and wants to chop her trees down because of security.
The movie Lemon Tree not only tells a breathtaking and inspiring story about a women who fought for what she believed in but also shows the inside of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the reality of women living by the shadow of men and the sad true about court cases and "justice."
The movie introduces the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by showing the contrast between the both groups. On one side of the fence we can observe a fancy, big house where the minister lives in with his wife. On the other side of the fence we can see a humble house and a totally different environment. We can also see the conflict in how the media reacted towards a Palestinian woman who fights a battle in court against an Israeli prime minister. It was scandalous that a widow, a woman contradicted the minister, it was even more outrageous when people saw that the prime minister's wife didn't agree with cutting down the trees.
I would like to share a quote from a review I read about this movie, it illustrates a very important part of the conflict. "it portrays the Israelis, who wield more military power, as abusive and arrogant in the way that any country with superior weapons and armies inevitably appears. The security guards on Navon’s property behave like strutting goons — only too eager to turn their guns on the first thing that moves — or clowns, like the watchtower guard nicknamed Quickie, who dozes off while on duty. "I think this is important because it sort of explains and proves the ongoing violence between two sides.
I want to end this post with a remarkable quote from the movie, " Only american movies have a happy ending." I think this quote is unique because it shows how in reality there is no justice, even though the main character of the women did everything she could to win the court case she didn't even though it was unfair.
Here is a video of the movie's trailer so you can check it out…..
I found this very interesting blog outside of class. This blog is written by a woman who was born in Yemen, in her blog she talks about different issues and gives her opinion of the conflicts going on in the Middle East and other parts of the world.
I found her blog when I was researching about how the children's rights were being violated in Egypt. She had a post about this problem that really made me think about how unfair was the situation of the children. In her post she is trying to draw people's attention to this conflict and makes reference to articles an videos. here is the link: http://notesbynoon.blogspot.com/2013/10/where-are-rights-of-egypts-most.html
While I was searching for articles about the Israel-Palestine conflict I saw the title of an article that caught my attention. The article was called: Children's rights ignored in Egypt crackdown. It caught my attention because I had no idea that children's rights were still being violated. I think this is an important issue that should be discussed because children are the future generations of the world and things like this shouldn't be happening any more.
Image Credits: Al Jazeera
After reading the article I learned a few things about Egypt's political situation. Basically the conflict started after Egypt's leader resigned and the country became divided in different groups and was taken over by the military. It appears that even children are participating in anti government protests and are being captured by the "authorities" and have to go through the Egyptian prision system.
I learned that children are held in adult jails and don't get to have representation or medical assistance. I was in shock when I read that children were being tortured in the jails. This represents major human rights violations that are being done to minors. It is unfair and it makes me angry because children aren't able to protect themselves as the adults so they become easier to catch, and they are defenseless against adults in many ways. As the article says things like this destroy Egypts future, people have to realize and be aware of how children are more vulnerable and have to be protected. Not only it is against the law that children are being exposed to danger this way but also is a violation of their rights as humans.
Here is the link to the article, it has videos that help you to have a better view of how bad children's situation is in Egypt http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2014/02/children-rights-ignored-egypt-crackdown-2014215152226400760.html
I was shocked to find about this so I looked up for more information about this and I found this video that shows the story of a children that was caught unfairly by the authorities and was beaten so that he confessed. I think you should watch it it.
It should be the governments job to ensure everyone's rights are being respected but they are doing the opposite.
Last week I learned in class about the different points of views in the Israeli-Palestine conflict. What we were studying made me realize how hard it is to define who is right and who is wrong. It is disturbing that violent conflicts like this still exist, and lots of innocent people get killed because of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I found this interesting article about a palestinian woman who was killed by the Israeli because she was walking too close to the border. http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/03/israel-shoots-dead-woman-near-gaza-border-2014319237377906.html
I chose this article because it is a great example to show one of the millions of casualties that have occurred and still occur because of this conflict. The article talks about how a palestine woman was shot because she walked too close to the wall that divides Israel and the Gaza Strip. It also states how Israel agreed a cease fire since 2012. With this article we can see how this is not completely true and how unfair it is. This conflict has lead to a lot of violence and many innocent people have died.
This kind of things make the situation worse and worse every day. I think it is time that other countries intervene in this conflict. But every country has its own interest when they do things, and its very hard for a conflict like this to become peaceful. It is very unfair that people have to live in an environment full of violence and its sad no one does anything about it.
