Post #4

This week, I've picked out three different news articles that exemplify the lack of concern and attention, those with special needs should be receiving. In each of these articles, we can see the unfair treatment of those with mental disabilities and the effects they have on those closest to them. 
I started off with a story about a boy named Cal who was attacked by another student with special needs on a school bus. The problem with this story is that neither the bus driver or bus aid seemed to report the incident. The reason this story made the news was because the parents found out much later than they should have of what really happened to their son. The situation was under explained and was made to sound like Cal just fell and got a cut. When watching the videos, you can clearly see it all took place right in his seat. The reporting aspect of this story was actually pretty thorough. I believe this story, while being a very brief one, gave all of the information without any bias or misuse of terminology. The two offenders didn't receive the punishment I believe that they should have.
The second story I analyzed was about two child care workers who were caught degrading a child with autism. Watching the videos attached to this article made me very angry and upset at the fact that some people don't see a problem with treating any child like they did. From my own experiences when interning for a company that hosted a day-habilitation program, I never saw anyone mock or instigate one of the individuals. For my short time there, I still had to go through a small background check, get fingerprinted, and also drug tested. I still had very little access to what i could and could not do while I was there but it was all taken very seriously. This story failed to give more information on the girls and their process of how they originally got their jobs at this facility. A lot of this story ended up focusing more on the two offenders rather than the victim of the hate crime. 
Sociologically, you can see the difference between the two stories I have just gone over and see the different punishments the offenders received. In the first, the offenders are the bus driver and aid that did not report the incident. In the second it's the two girls that fully committed the offense. I think that they each got the correct punishment of getting fired from their jobs immediately but one has to understand the racial aspects of these stories. The bus offenders were both (presumably) white while the two day care girls were both (again, presumably) black. Race is always an aspect that we have to look at while analyzing articles due to the variation in treatment between races. If the two girls were white, I wonder if the punishments would be lighter and vice versa with if the bus workers were a part of a minority group. 
The third story seems to tie all of these ideas together and it's where we see many more problems and the intersectionality really come into play. The third article I wanted to analyze is of the story of a behavioral therapist named Charles Kinsey. The first thing I want to point out is that no one but the police officers involved was armed in this situation. The police had received a call about a suicidal man walking around with a gun. This said person was a patient in a nearby center that just happened to walk out and had a toy truck in his hand.This call was completely inaccurate and ended with a very serious crime. I believe that whomever made that initial call was scared of the man with a disability and therefore called police. This information was assumed to be true so the police had the thought going in that they had to have their weapons ready. Even though Kinsey was on the ground with his hands in the air, he was shot. The police should have been concerned with the disabled man and just trying to get him home safely but they then turned to Kinsey and assumed he was dangerous. The police officer tried to use the excuse that he "was trying to fire at the autistic man, who he believed was armed". This statement shows just how quick police are in using deadly forces when there is only ASSUMED threats. 
Overall, these articles show not only the lack of focus on the victim of the situations but seem to leave out any help or therapy the victims receive after the trauma. The news coverage seemed to display the offense that happened and what happened to the offenders. 

Post #2

              For this week’s post, we looked at a variety of articles from different sociologists. Each of these articles pointed out how sociology is very underrepresented. Collins’ article pointed out mainly how sociologists are forgotten in society when it comes to new ideas. She expresses her frustration of not being able to use what she knows and what she has learned to help the rest of society as much as she should. Patterson went in a similar direction in his post by saying, if sociologists had been referred to when making new plans and programs, they could have worked a lot better. In Fabio Rojas’ article, he says that a cause for sociologists being forgotten is because we are too busy trying to learn how to do research instead of using that knowledge to make changes. He expands on his statement by saying academics and activism need to go more hand-in-hand as opposed to go to school first, then act. Karen Sternheimer also pointed out that sociology isn’t opinion based. I think that this is a huge misconception in society that it’s just “what we think”. She tells of her experiences as a sociologist that has been reached out to for some of the wrong topics. I found it funny how she said that in an interview, the interviewer said “you haven’t answered my question yet” because Karen hadn’t done research in that topic. It was better for her to not answer than to make something up, which I found very important. I think that my favorite journal was by Nathan Jurgenson. He proposed ways that sociology could come into the light of the public and how to get more people interested in it. All while saving money and gaining access to more information. I think that they all agree on the fact that sociology is misunderstood and they want to use their degrees in their field useful to the world.

                Making sociology more public is a main goal of most sociologists. How we do so is still a difficult question or task. Jurgenson gave the two main ideas of accessibility by availability and accessibility by design. I think that these two approaches are the easiest to accomplish first. Gaining access to all journals is a main key because then we can continue to expand our research in ways others might not have thought about doing before. The design of the journals, while very informational already, is lacking visual appeal. As a college student that grew up in the age of technology, I understand completely that just looking at a journal is nauseating sometimes. This is where new forms of media are very useful. Writing research on the form of tweets, posts, or blogs just like this one are a lot easier on the eyes and can be easier to understand. I think that C. Wright Mills would be impressed with all of these articles and the opinions stated in each. In terms of what he would say to the questions I was given, I feel as though he would be the one to ask them. It’s our job, just like it is for any other concentration, to expand our knowledge and expertise to the public and make more people aware of the world they are living in.

                Being the type of person that will talk to everyone I come into contact with, I think that some of the best ways to feed people information is to just talk about it. Giving examples of sociology and putting it into terms that everyone understands is an effective way of learning. Also, relating it to the person you are talking to and making it known that they are experiencing sociology all of the time makes people interested. Keeping it simplified while still being knowledgeable is my main goal when I talk to others about sociology. 

Week 1

As you can tell from my blog title, I focus on the population of people with special needs or handicaps. This focus is important to me because I see the way that people stigmatize and oppress those with disabilities and how most of the time they cannot fight for themselves. One of my main goals is to help those with handicaps in any way that I can to give them fair chances in life like everyone else has. To me, sociology is the way we observe how others use their experiences in situations and why they differentiate across situations. I also like to refer sociologists as “professional people watchers” because we’re always observing and studying peoples’ social interactions.

Sociology is an important study because it is how we can make social changes and hopefully results in a better society. When someone practices sociology, it helps question people’s social interactions and targets socially incorrect statements/ attitudes. This happens on a daily basis and across all environments. Whether we know it or not, sociology is being applied all of the time. It doesn’t have to be in an academic setting or just with other sociologist.