Ethnic Identity Responses

Please respond to 2 classmates posts: You must reply to other students with thoughtful and relevant comments and/or questions. 1. Damien Kaminsky posted: I already know quite a bit about most of these issues. I've taken classes and watched videos on my own time that cover how the United States pushed around and manipulated the Native Americans for their land. As well as the fact that a lot of the labor was done by immigrants and others that were barely paid for what they had done. I know that this country is made of many ethnic identities from all over the world, which in recent times can unite or divide people. Lastly I know that Freedom of Religion plays a big role in this nations history. While we may be a secular state, there are many times in history where the United States has leaned into it's protestant side while treating other faiths with more ridicule. Most recently, it has happened with Islam. I know what I know about this topic from a variety of sources. Some of these sources are news coverage, as well as my existing knowledge of American history that I have gotten from other classes. I've also watched some reliable videos on the topics in the past, so I have a good amount of previous knowledge regarding some of the Hot Button issues. These selected views are rather similar to what I know. For example, the videos about race and neo-nazi's in America. They pretty much match with what I know about the topic, and it's history. No, the differences really do not challenge my beliefs. If anything, they reinforce what I do believe about these topics, that some changes need to be made for everyone to live more united in this country then we are now. 2. Jessica Lowe posted Sep 6, 2024 3:40 PM Sorry I am late to the discussion, I registered to this class last minute. What did you already know about these issues? Land- On the topic of land I had already known that the land that our country is occupying was at first Native American land and much of it was stolen through coercion and murder. I also know that our forefathers never gave the indigenous people of America a fighting chance to keep their lands, tribes, and ethnic identities true to their ancestry. Ethnic Identity- On the topic of ethnic identity I feel that the majority of our country and world is out of touch with accepting people’s ethnicity and culture. We as humans have a hard time accepting change and differences. I have inadvertently done it myself when viewing ethnic restaurants menus or friends from different cultures traditional meals and clothing. The biggest thing here is that we are not naive about our own identity and our own prejudices as everyone has them. It is accepting them and understanding them that will help us to overcome them. Labor- On the aspect of labor there has always been an issue with the higher income part of society using the lower end as work horses. The worst of it being the slavery era here in America. Slaves came in all different types of people including African, Asian, White, and Native American. The treatment of these people was horrendous, and they are the back that our countries industries were first started on. After slavery ended, we still saw the harsh treatment being done in indentured servitude and in factory jobs of women and children especially. Today we do not have the same issues, but we still see low wages being paid for jobs that require more physical labor. In comparison to slavery, we are far better off than even but if we look at it separately there is still a lot of inequality in the workforce for women, people of color, and other groups who are not white males. Freedom of Religion- This is a whole different beast if you will. Our forefathers when putting this into effect through the constitution did not fully mean freedom of religion. Their actual thought behind this was freedom of Christian religions or religions based on “the one true God and the holy trinity”. The people that started this country had fled due to persecution from the Catholic Church and although their belief systems were rooted in the same text, they were completely different. They did not understand how they could be persecuted if they worshiped the same God and read the same text, so they wanted a freedom to worship how they saw fit but did not want to restrict others to their following as they had been restricted. If it was actually meant to be freedom of religion, we would not have seen the complete dismissal and loss of Native American religion, Arican religions, and so on. Where I learnt this information: In high school I took many advanced courses including college courses in religion and the history of many different religions, I also have studied American History extensively since I was a child as it has always fascinated me. So through my own research and the education provided to me I have learnt what I know. There are several primary documents that support the idea that the forefathers only meant Christian religions when they stated freedom of religion. I also have watched many documentaries on the history channel and PBS. The videos that we viewed for this module prove that hate runs deeply and that peoples assumptions on the countries beginnings runs even deeper. I don’t think that these views have changed my way of thinking but have made me more worried for our countries future and shows me that we have not came as far as we may think we have.