My Project
1087 words by rjoseph
This pass week has been very long. So many things have been going through my mind I thought I was going crazy. I have so much I need to get done over the couple of days that I don’t know if I’m going to survive it. My weekend wasn’t too enjoyable because of this. I had mostly school work on my mind the whole time. I had almost forgotten about this blog. This semester is just crazy. I’m slowly understanding why procrastination isn’t good. I have a whole bunch of things that I need to read and many essays to start writing. I also have quizzes coming up this week that I need to study for. With Mardi Gras coming up, I want to get as much of my work done beforehand so I can enjoy it a little more. Right when I get back to school I have my first essay for this class due and I also have my first Chemistry test coming up. This will be a long and stressful week for me. Anyway, it took me a second to figure exactly what you wanted to write about this time. It took a few minutes for me to think about what I was going to write but I figured it out.
The problem that I decided to address from last week was discrimination. My focus was on this country alone. Discrimination is problem in our country that people have to deal with everyday. It could also be associated with the many problems we have anyway. I didn’t want to do world poverty because it has already been addressed by many different organizations. Every time I turn on the television there are commercials on about organizations trying to get people to donate ten cents a day to feed twenty kids. So I feel that is kind of played out. I didn’t want to do racism because I feel that has been done enough and it could be covered under discrimination. Greed is going to always be a problem so that is hard to work out. There is no way you could get people to give money when they don’t have to.
The first thing I would do to get my project up and running is to start a starting campaign. I would use it as a way to get endorsements and funding to push my projects. Also, it would be a big help in getting people to help me get all the work done. Once I would I get all the backing I need I would start making commercials like the truth movement. I would have different races and genders in them going through the different things that they experience everyday and at the end of them I would have the words “What’s the Problem” over a black background. That seems like it would be a good catch phrase. Your job as a promoter, which is basically what I would be doing, is making something that would be catchy and I think that phrase would be very catchy. Along with the commercials I would have billboards made with different scenes of discrimination being showed with my catch phrase above it. Hopefully I would get a “vote or die” started again.
Sticking with the Truth type of campaigning, I start pointing out companies who are seemingly having problems with discrimination. I would their employees who are experiencing it to appear in some commercials and on different talk shows. I would get different people to speak about what they have gone through, or have “experts” dropping facts about the problems of discrimination. Oprah would be my first choice of a talk show to go on since it’s so popular to one of the biggest groups of discriminated people, women. This wouldn’t be likely because she retired this past week. Anyway, hopefully the companies would feel the pressure and change. Employees of other companies would start speaking up and start bringing about changes at others jobs. It would take that type of unified effort in order to bring about the change. Since jobs places aren’t the only source of discrimination I would get people who were harassed by police officers, people who were not allowed to participate in different sport because of their gender, and people who were turned down by banks for loans because of their sex or race (It does happen).The next thing that I would do is get some major companies to do some of the commercials showing them with minority and female workers in high positions. Other companies would begin to start hiring more minorities because they would see how successful it would be. Also, the major companies would get a lot of praise which would mean more business, which small companies would also want. I would then do the same with people who were harassed by police officers. I would try to obtain tapes of it happening and put those departments on blast. To deal with the sport problem I would have the ideal athlete for that sport being beaten by an unlikely, or passed over, opponent.
Honestly, the most important thing for me to do is to get someone that is good a public speaking and has some prestige. The reason is because it would be hard for me to go about a lot of these things myself because truthfully, I don’t have much power in society. People would listen to someone like Bill Clinton or Barack Obama more than they would listen to me. Also, their political backing would actually help in bringing about some change in the government. They would be more credible spokespersons because I don’t anyone would really want to someone like Al Sharpton all the time. Anyway, I would get my speakers to speak not only about why we need the change, but what the individual could do to bring about the change and put themselves in better positions. People always forget that unfortunately you are classified by appearance before you ever speak a word. I would get speakers to talk about how you should dress properly and present yourself better to employers and others. You will always be treated the same if you don’t change yourself. If my plan works discrimination wouldn’t be a big problem anymore.
I like the idea you have about using a night watch crew. In Detroit, around Halloween, there are alot of arsonist. And we have to have a night before Halloween called Angels Night, where volunteers patrol the area to make sure that there are not any fires going on. This is very similar to your plan of using the G.A. and skilled anit-violence members to patrol the area. Trust me that will definately work. But, what would happen if those skilled members were caught in a gun fire, would you still implement the same volunteer service again?
February 1st, 2005 at 12:57 pm
Hi Ryan!
The truth campaign and the ads sound good. Just because you feel that you don’t have enough credentials to have an impact on somebody doesn’t mean you can’t start. This idea would give you the edge you need. In any situation, it’s all what you want and how bad do you want it. Great ideas.
February 2nd, 2005 at 7:40 pm
I think your ad would be a good idea, and if you put people on the spotlight about their wrongdoings they are more likely to make a change so i think thats good.
February 2nd, 2005 at 9:34 pm
What’s The Problem?….I like it. You certainly have big ideas. Your plan sounds wonderful, but just think about how much money that would cost. Maybe you could address greed, make people feel guilty, and get your discrimination ads going as well. The sky is the limit, so fly.
February 3rd, 2005 at 9:53 am
Hey Ryan. This is Chloe Frye. I think your project would be very successful in making people more aware of discrimination. Hopefully, through this type of awareness, things will change. Do you think that your campaign will take the back seat to the truth campaign? What type of situations will you present to the public that haven’t already been presented in black history films or talk shows? Your phrase “what’s the problem” is very nice too. Would you get random people from the street such as the truth campaign and pay them to be in the commercial or just volunteers? I’m sure you could get volunteers. When I was in Washington D.C., they were filming the truth commercial with all the body bags and my friends and I were walking past the site looking just like you see the people do in the commercial. There was a girl who was in charge of grabbing random people of all races and ethnic backgrounds to walk past and look. They had to sign contracts stating that it would be okay for them to be on t.v. and they were paid $2. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to come back and be in the commercial. It was a good experience to see it being made though. Would you only speak out on discrimination amongst one racial group, or will it be a more general scope of discrimination? Whichever you choose to do, I would suggest that you incorporate all races in your commercials and ads so that the public knows that all races, not just the one or ones you will be focusing one, are in the fight against racism. Great idea!!
February 3rd, 2005 at 4:37 pm
Hi Ryan,
Discrimination is a very good topic. I think your plan may actually work if you go though with it. I also think people would listen to someone like you because you are somebody and if you stand up, others in your community that feel the same way will also. Also, you said that alot of organizations try to help raise money for poverty and it’s getting played out but I think that most of those informercial address the issue of poverty in other countries and we need to stop the poverty in our own country. I also always wondered if all the money is really going towards the cause or is 15 cent going into the organizations profit. Example: employess pay etc. Well, thats just something to think about. Overall, your project is good. Good Luck!
February 4th, 2005 at 11:35 pm
I agree discrimination is a major problem in the world. When will we be able to look past color, sex, nationality, and sexual orientation? When will notice that we are all the same? We are all the same race….Human. You project sounds great. If you are able to get national politicians to address the problem of discrimination, that would be great. I love the commercial idea. That will get everyone thinking about their own prejudices and maybe open the door for jobs and opportunities to people who previously didn’t have a chance. Good Luck.
February 6th, 2005 at 4:07 pm
Discrimination is a huge issue in this country. You have a lot of good ideas of how to fix the discrimination problem. Getting political and financial backing is essential to your project. I believe you have a great plan, and once you get some backing you will be able to fix the problem.
February 11th, 2005 at 4:10 pm
Financial support that you really need right now. I really like your idea about the truth campaign, you should really work on it.
February 22nd, 2005 at 1:58 pm
I like your ideas about how we can battle didcrimination.Geting a well known public speaker will truely change peoples attitudes about discrimination. Do you have other resources to obtain the neccesay funds for your project?
February 26th, 2005 at 3:35 pm
I believe that your idea on the ads and commercials are great. I really like the Truth commercials, they get right in the face of those who are endorsing tobacco and thats the way to do it. I believe if you take an approach like them you will make a big impact.
March 4th, 2005 at 1:09 pm
Good topic, keep us posted in your blog about how your project works out. I also think discrimination is a big problem.
March 7th, 2005 at 9:40 pm
Hello, my name is Alexis and I thought that your project was very interesting and it is something that our country needs to address. It is a fact that behind every campaign there needs to be some type of funding taking place.
April 17th, 2005 at 2:46 pm
Hi Ryan, how are you? My name is Chavell Scott, you know, your fellow classmate. Anyway, I read your blog. You have a very unique problem. DISCRIMINATION. I like your approach in how you plan to handel this problem. Not to be too finicky, but racisim is always pertained to blacks. As a black woman myself, I see that there are alot of problems with my race, but what people fail to realise is that what goes around comes around. If there are white people being mistreated by blacks then when that same white person comes into contact with a black person that he or she feels can be taken advantage of, then that white person will act out what has been acted out on him. the same will go for Vietnamese, Jews, Muslims, Chinaese, Japanese, or over the seas people. But, I was disturbed by one thing that I read in your blog, I was loving everything but this comment, “Anyway, I would get my speakers to speak not only about why we need the change, but what the individual could do to bring about the change and put themselves in better positions. People always forget that unfortunately you are classified by appearance before you ever speak a word. I would get speakers to talk about how you should dress properly and present yourself better to employers and others. You will always be treated the same if you dont change yourself.” I felt that this was not a good comment to use to help your project, to me it made it seem like you were for discriminaton, even thoough there may have been some other intent. Blog me back and tell me please about this, or holla at me in class.