Brooklyn's Finest

It has come to my horrific realization through of the Prison-Industrial complex my American Studies class had been discussing a few weeks ago, the american justice system isn't as just as it should. In summary, the PIC can be described in a quote by Salon: "Imagine living in a country where prisons are private corporations that profit from keeping their beds stocked at, or near, capacity and the governing officials scramble to meet contractual 'lockup quotas.' Imagine that taxpayers would have to pay for any empty beds should crime rates fall below that quota. Surprise! You already live there." To keep jails full, the NYPD has intervened the new "Stop and Frisk" program. This tactic allows officers to light pat down, or frisk, any individual they deem suspicious. Although it is supposed to make the city safer, all it seems to be doing is justifying racial profiling of police officers. The chart above illustrates the dominance of Black and Latino frisks compared to White or Asian New Yorkers. The NYPD continues to defend these numbers with claims that minorities are disproportionately involved in violent crime, giving justification to the overwhelming number of minorities stopped. Although, in only 10.5 percent of stops did police refer to violent crime as the reason of the stop and frisk. And only 1 out every 10 stops ended with an arrest (NY Mag). If we cherish our freedom so much in America, why is it that we lack the freedom to walk down a city sidewalk in peace? I would even make the argument that more laws are being broken because this practice was put into place. These stops are not just a hassle for minorities, they can also be abusive and criminal. A seventeen year old Harlem native, Alvin, has had his fair share of frisks. His story runs a little long, but it's worth watching. Please excuse the explicit language.

In my opinion, being a "f***king mutt" isn't isn't exactly suspicion. The entire practice is unjust and unconstitutional. When a police caption tells his officers to go out and "violate some rights," the program, as well as the entire NYPD, needs to be reconsidered. It's interesting that the ones upholding the law end up breaking more than most of the people their stopping. 

A Continued Abuse

Over the past few years, the United States has started pumping oil on our own land, and we haven't slowed down. Every year it seems that more and more states are producing more and more oil, take North Dakota for example, who now pumps over one million barrels a day (MacPherson). Now some think America's boom in oil production is for the better because it loosens our dependency on foreign oil (specifically the Middle East). Believe it or not, we are currently producing more oil than Russia or Saudi Arabia. Even though, oil prices haven't fallen. Greed much? But that isn't the only issue presented.
Let's flash back to 2010. The BP oil spill in the Gulf caused havoc for the wildlife and people living on the southern coast. As a nation, we were disgusted by the event. But the biggest reason why we were upset was because it happened on our home front. Let's be honest, if BP spilled in the Red Sea, I don't think Americans would have given the same reaction. But looking back on it, it doesn't seem like it was such a big shock. With pumping oil and handling it, spills are bound to happen. Now obviously its not usual to see them as big as BP's, but nevertheless it happens. It baffles me that we support American-based drilling when three and a half years ago we faced the very real consequence of it. And it isn't like that was a one time thing. In North Dakota nearly 300 pipeline spills have gone unreported since 2012 (MacPherson), threatening the "land and water supplies" of the people who live there. When will we learn our lesson? With many alternative energy sources popping up left and right, such as wind and solar power, why do we continue to put ourselves through the polluting and harmful effects of homeland drilling? 

Leave your opinion below.

Article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/28/pipeline-spills-north-dakota_n_4170133.html?ref=topbar

Picture: http://www.desmogblog.com/2013/10/10/20600-barrels-fracked-oil-spill-north-dakota-publicity-halted-due-government-shutdown

The Washington... what?

It's another Sunday, and the NFL is back for another round of match ups. With the Bears not playing this week, I decided to watch the Denver Broncos square off against the Washington Redskins. As the Redskins added another loss to their not-so-pretty record of now 2-5, the team is under some pressure to start turning things around in the weeks to come. But for Washington, the scrutiny doesn't stop at the team's performance. The team name, Redskins, has caused lots of controversy, primarily from the Native-American community. Now the league commissioner hasn't really expressed much of a feeling  whether or not the name should be changed, and the Redskins owner, Daniel Snyder, claims that the name "will never change." But as much as the name is embedded into the history of the team, and even if fans don't feel as if its a derogatory term, the fact remains that it still is one. Naming a team the "Redskins" is no different from cheering for the "Negros," but that name wouldn't see a second of daylight in any sport. You wouldn't go up to a Native American on the street and call them a Redskin, so why do we as fans feel that this isn't a problem? It bothers me that the franchise is allowed to trademark the name that's the same as the n-word to Native Americans, and sell jerseys for over $100 with Redskins written in bright yellow across the chest.
Hopefully we will come to realize in the near future that the name should get the boot, see the NFL take a turn for the better and ditch the racism.

Do you feel the name needs to be changed? Why or why not? Leave your opinion below.

Image: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/dc-sports-bog/wp/2013/09/22/sign-at-fedex-field-defends-redskins-name/

Insta-Ad

The other day, while scrolling through my Instagram news feed, I was horrified to come across a post from Instagram stating that ads will appear in my news feed in the near future. Just terrific. Instagram hopped on the old sell-out bandwagon, taking a first-class seat right next to Facebook. The app was already worth one billion dollars (New York Times), but apparently that wasn't enough for the people who run it. It seems sort of ironic how social media sites, whose entire purpose is to create a personal experience online are invading user's private sense of community by adding advertisements. That was the nice thing about Instagram, and that's why I started using Instagram much more frequently than Facebook. Since Facebook starting implicating advertisements, the site has slowly grown into a jumbled mess of companies shoving there products down my throat. Whereas Instagram is clean cut and really personal. It shows me what I want to see, and I'm in control. That's whats great about it. And Instagram claims to show adds that are unique to the user. But many companies have already created their own accounts, so if I ever wanted to check out a certain product it would only be a few clicks away. I'd be much more interested that way, rather than an ad jumping up on me unexpectedly. Many other users seem to be outraged as well, leaving comments on Instagram's announcement like "Ads! Omfg. I'm out, no more Instagram" or "The day this place gets ads is the day I delete my account."
It's funny because in the Social Network, the movie based off the rise of Facebook (who now owns Instagram), says "You don't want to ruin it with ads because ads aren't cool." Weird, right?

Will you continue using Instagram when it gets ads? How will they change your experience on Instagram? Feel free to leave your thoughts below.

Instagram value: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/04/09/facebook-buys-instagram-for-1-billion/

Image: http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/24/first-look-at-instagram-ads/

The New Frontier

So I recently read an article about a trip to Mars that was open for anyone across the globe to apply for. What's the catch? It's a one-way ticket. That's right, the selected and heavily trained astronauts won't be returning to our home planet, but rather trying to populate and establish a human society on Mars for thousands of years to come. 
Now a lot of people have different opinions about the Mars One mission, some saying its not a good idea. Sending a man to the moon costs 150 billion dollars, while sending someone 55 billion miles to Mars would easily cost three or four times more than that. This all being for a mission that has a decent chance of getting knocked out of orbit (no pun intended). Nay-sayers argue that the money and time should be spent here on our own planet fixing our own problems rather than just giving up on our planet. 
But I don't think that we're throwing away our future hopes for Earth with Mars One, more like expressing our curiosity and our desire to explore. How does this differ from Europeans sailing to the New World? I'm sure many people disagreed with their exploration at the time, but it turned out for the better. Mars is the new frontier of the 21st century. I don't believe we as people should cap our minds from discovery, but to continue to open ourselves to new ideas and see what the universe lays in store for us. 

Check out the article on Mars One here

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