Immigration

At one point in American History, there were several immigrants of all kinds flooding into the United States. This is a good thing for us, and for the immigrants, in my opinion. The nation receives more workforce, and the immigrants get new opportunities. Immigrants look to America because America seems to be synonymous with equality and freedom, as per the United States constitution. Most likely, the immigrants faced persecution or limited opportunities in their countries. America symbolizes the ability to be given a fair chance at making good money with hard work as well, often referred to as the American Dream. While some people disliked immigration at the time, I favor it. Despite the atrocious conditions for many immigrant without adequate pay, it is always possible to move up and gain higher ranking. This is especially important for me, because I have immigrant parents, I am a first generation American. My dad could gave gotten a good job in Pakistan, but he chose to come to America to pursue a university degree and get a job here. Today, we are doing well, and we are likely better off here than living in Pakistan. In conclusion, Immigrants come to America to pursue career opportunities and certain freedoms that may not be available in their home countries.  

The End of Racism

Racism will never end. It seems that no matter what legislation is passed, it is virtually impossible to stop racism. This is because racism originates from the mind, and no amount of legislation can reform a human brain to the point that racism will cease to exist. The only thing the governments around the world can hope to do is to limit the actions taken by the racism that is rooted inside the brain. This is beneficial because it limits the violent or unequal acts that may occur as an effect of racism. I personally believe that racism will always be present in the world. This is because we may be taught to be racist as a child, or the acts of some may influence our opinion of an entire race. This is especially true in my life as I am muslim, and the muslim people are largely misunderstood due to the actions of a few individuals claiming to be following the "path of Islam." Legislation against racism is largely ignored as well, since most people do understand that racism can not exactly be controlled and influenced. Thus, I believe that racism can not be controlled or changed with legislation. 

How I would like to develop.

American studies has been quite an interesting experience. Entering the second quarter of Sophomore year, I feel like I am satisfied with the first quarter of American Studies thus far. The experience has been different from what I am used to when I think about history. In Mr. Hoffman's class, we also get to experience the unique perspective of someone who has been in the armed forces. It helps me personally gain perspective in history more clearly. I personally think that I have been doing well this year in terms of understanding what we are learning about, and how it all fits together. Going into the remainder of the school year, I would like to be able to look at things the way that other people in history saw it, how they approached the situation more clearly. This is more difficult since I almost always have an opinion on what we learn in class. Learning all of the ways that people in history looked at things helps when putting everything together to clearly understand how history works. In other words, In simpler words, I want to develop throughout the year by putting aside my opinions and thoughts for a little bit just so I can more clearly understand how other people think and what other people felt in regards to an issue or point.

How does the civil war fit into history?

The civil war has a place in history as the defining moment of the change that followed afterwards. The civil war was extremely bloody, and will forever be ingrained in our nation's history as the war that had more casualties than any other war ever, at last as of now. The civil war could be argued as unnecessary by some, and that may be correct, but I believe that we should at least respect the people that died for the cause and say that the war was indeed important in defining what the United States is today. Now we are a truly free country that will never oppress its citizens and the civil war was important in determining that fact. I personally shudder to believe what the US would be like if we had still lives with the laws of the post-civil war United States. I likely would not even be living here since I am a first generation American. My parents would have rather chosen another country to move to, or perhaps I'd still be in Pakistan. Therefore, I feel as if the civil war was important in our history since it determined a lot of the freedoms and rights that we have today. 

A Noble Battle, and an Execution Block.

On Monday, we talked about two great battles of the American Civil war, the Battle of Gettysburg and the Battle of Cold Harbor. These two battles contrasted greatly. The battle of Gettysburg was a good battle between generals that were evenly matched. The battle of Cold Harbor was a complete butchery of Union troops led by General Grant in a rather impressive defensive victory for General Robert Lee. My opinion here is that General Grant waited far too long to pull back his troops and accept defeat. For example, at one point there were over 100 casualties per minute. On top of that, there was no part in the battle where they stopped to retrieve the dead from the battlefield, they simply continued, dead bodies lay there for several years! I believe that as a general, you have responsibility of your troops, and this includes being sympathetic towards those who have died for the cause and keeping your men out of situations that cause an unnecessary loss of life. Ulysses Grant fails to do either one of these things in the Battle of Cold Harbor. 

Slavery, a great evil.

Class this week was focused around Slavery. In my opinion, slavery was an extremely hideous and terrible crime. The prospect of unwillingly capturing a human being and treating them as property just seems extremely wrong to me. It is like giving a human a life sentence to prison for doing nothing at all wrong, the soon to be slaves were just minding their own business. I also believe that it took the people of the United States far too long to abolish the practice of Slavery. It took until after the Civil War for this to happen. This means that slavery was in existence for a whole 245 years! That is about 4 or 5 generations if calculated with the average life expectancy of the time. In class we learned why slavery was important to the early economy of the United States. Slaves were the main reasons crops such as rice, tobacco, and cotton were so highly profitable. The slave masters got a high return of crops with little to none cost for labor. We learned how the balance in the Early US was kept equal, with a slave state entering the nation for every free state in the nation. South of the Mason-Dixon line was where most of the slave states were. The Civil War occurred when tensions rose and the debate spanned across party lines into a North vs South situation. This then resulted in the war, which finally brought an end to a very ugly chapter in our nation's history, slavery.

Women's Rights

A lot of the stuff that we did this week in class was centered around women's rights. For example, we read about the Lowell Mill Girls who obtained the liberty of being able to work and make a decent sum of money. It shows us how we as the United States progressed in history becoming more free and tolerant to different races, genders, etc. We also read a letter written by Mrs. Abigail Adams to her husband John Adams from their family home in Braintree, Massachusetts. At the time Mr. Adams was in the Continental Congress and Abigail Adams had sent him a letter about the rights of women. I personally believe that these two things were very influential in our nation's history, as the United States is known to be "The land of the free" so it is crucial to understand how we slowly started to truly become more free. In my opinion, class this week was extremely important.

Thomas Jefferson... A hypocrite?

This week in class, we read the Declaration of Independence as well as the Notes on the State of Virginia which were written by Thomas Jefferson. It showed us the mindset of many people in the early United States. Jefferson states that "all men are created equal" in the Declaration of Independence, which would make one believe that all people would be given the same opportunities. In the Notes on the State of Virginia. Jefferson was extremely racist towards Africans in his writing, he mentioned Africans to be “dull, tasteless, and anomalous" in imagination as well as "inferior to whites." These two statements completely contradict each other, Jefferson pledged to give equal rights to all and then writes eight years later that Africans are like a different species and inferior to whites. Did he say that all men are created equal just to give the people false hope? Merriam-Webster states the definition of a hypocrite to be "a person who claims or pretends to have certain beliefs about what is right but who behaves in a way that disagrees with those beliefs." Clearly, Jefferson is being hypocritical as he states that all are equal, although he himself is a particularly cruel slave owner. The New York Times writes, " He sometimes punished slaves by selling them away from their families and friends, a retaliation that was incomprehensibly cruel even at the time."