How Does It Feel to Be a Problem. Blog 3

The next chapter that I read in Moustafa Bayoumi's story was the story of Yasmin's life.  She is also from New York and lives with her parents in Fort Hamilton in the Bay Ridge area.  Her neighborhood contains a lot of Greek, Arab, and Italian populations. 
Her father always wanted her to be a succesful doctor and so she tried her best to be successful in her academics.
When she started as a freshman in high school, she went to Leadership class and it was a required class for student officers and is an elective class for students who are interested in student government.  This sparked Yasmin's interest for student government.
And so she decides to run for school secretary.  She understood that it was a long shot due to the fact that the other candidates were a lot smarter and far more superior than her.  Yasmin campaigned for secretary because she had the desire to help out the school so they can get their needs.  She also received a lot of support from her Muslim friends during election day.  She won the most votes and became the school secretary.  She was filled with joy and she felt overwhelmed by the results.  But it soon turned to a dark route.
The school was hosting a dance and that everyone with a school government are required to attend the event.  Yasmin had to tell the Coordinator of School Affairs or COSA that she was not allowed to go to school because her dad and her religion forbade her to join to any dance event.  COSA gave her the option to either stay in the basement or formally resign from her position as school secretary.  Even though she fought back about resigning and the options given to her, she was pinned down about how she is wrong about her responses.  She called her father for help and called COSA about her situation but it did not resolve anything.  So her father contacted the sheikh for assistance and explained to COSA that Yasmin could not attend the dance because music had sexual content, fraternity between boys and girls, and underage drinking.  But the COSA broke him with tough questions and it was never resolved.  Yasin eventually resigned and gave a statement to the Principal.
The culture of Muslim women was that they had no rights and they are weak and can never win.  They are also looked down upon by men.  Their is 100% sexism for all Muslim women.
After her resignation, she would closed the door of her bedroom and began to cry.  "She felt powerless, defeated, and angry."(93).  Crying cannot do anything to stop this so she ahd to take action for what was right.  They only cared for themselves.  Not the students.
Yasmin did not want to go down that easily.  So she decided to act like a lawyer and embarked on a journey that takes heart and soul. Especially highs and lows.
In her room for the next several months, she began researching laws for students.  Her interest in the concept rights became a hobby and eventually an obsession.
She later got copies of the application and the clauses were targeted for her.     
Later on, her father mentioned about a Muslim civil- liberties organization called Council on American Islamic Relations or CAIR.  She gave a lengthy e- mail about her situation.  CAIR's civil- rights coordinator called the school one day about Yasmin.  the coordinator's response to the principal was an "insult" in the principal's perspective.
Yasmin and her father eventually got to talk with the attorney of CAIR about her case by showing her evidence.  The attorney was offering them to help oonly if they paid the attorney 20,000 dollars.  It was a lot of money and her father decided against it because of his low incomed job and saving his money for Yasmin's medical school future.  Also for providing the needs for her siblings.  She had no choice but to respect his wishes.
The next day she watche the movie, I am Sam.   Michelle Pfeiffer's role was to play the "pro bono" lawyer for Sean Penn.  Pro bono meant that attorneys offer at least 50 hours of service for the good of the people and that it contained new lawyers fresh out of college according to her father.  This sparked a light for her case so she went on to the computer and found the website of Advocates for Children, a new York organization with the goal of protecting students in academics.  She immediately faxed her situation to the organization immediately and finally received a call from Jerry Yan, a member of the organization.
She got to meet Yan who was a staff of the organizaion.  yasmin showed all her evidence and her story and Yan got angry about the school for doing something like this.  He asked her to sign to take the case and that Yan did not care about the budget and he would take care of it.
Yan said that "most of the racism happens to the most vulnerable members in our public schools."(109).  Yan also found the school's argument unconvincing with the offer of staying in the basement because it was difficult to understand how it can express school spirit.  Also there has been a history of excuses for students with positions like Jewish students were excused for their religious obligations and Greeks were excused from another Student Organization because of Orthodox Easter.  With a memo and legal precedent, Yan called the school for using its policy unconstitutionally.  Yan also said that their was a discrimination complaint from the internal  discrimination procedures of the Department of Education.  The school finally learned its lesson and Yan's job was done.  It was a sigh of relief for Yasmin.
Yasmin eventually ran for school President and won by a revote and won by 7 votes of the election.  She and COSA remained friends and Yan became the general counsel to Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer.  Yasmin remained close with COSA because they put the past behind them and developed mutual respect for each other.
Yasmin decided to go against her father's wishes to go to Medical school and become a doctor.  She decided to attend law school.
Yasmin may have been a Muslim woman but she beat the odds.

Bullying

In the 21st century, Bullying is now a problem in the American society.  The world of Bullying is old but its strain is entirely new.  For example, because of technology being evolved everyday, Cyberbullying was created.  Cyberbullying is posting nasty and mean rumors and things on a certain individual causing their feelings to be hurt and have low self- esteem.  When the stages of the Cyberbully victim takes effect, the victim would eventually be depressed and lead to suicide.
Bullies exist in this world because not only do they think that they can be invincible do anything they want, but because they want to make themselves feel better.  Because cyberbullying and bullies in general exist, it makes America and the whole world more imperfect by the minute.
In class, we talked a lot about cases of bullying and the bullies.  Most bullies would be tall, strong, and well built and will make friends easily with people who have agressive behavior.  Usually bullies would mature to be good citizens and apologize for their mistakes back in their youth.  But I was surprised that it was not the case.  A survey that I participated in revealed that most bullies who grow up will live a life of crime and get in exponential consequences in life.  It was interesting to find out how bullies could still act like a criminal even as adults. 
But the case of bullying that struck me the was the case of Phoebe Prince from South Hadley, Massachussets.  She was an immigarnt from Ireland ready to come to high school.  Phoebe was friendly and energetic but it all came to a stop when she got picked on and called with inapprorpiate names from a group of mean girls.  She was harassed because she dated the star football player of the high school.  Just because of jealousy they had to push her to her breaking point.  Phoebe and her mom asked help from the school and the school kept that promise.  But they did not do anything.
Phoebe's breaking point occured when she was walkig home to school and the bullies threw a can of red bull from the car they rode on.  They eventually drove off.  When Phoebe came home, she hanged herself.
Now the perepetrators were taken in to custody for harassment, racial slurs, physical and verbal abuse, and statutory rape from the football player and another guy bully.
Her death gave an outcry across the country and it made me angry personally because I am not an American nor an immigrant.  I am a Visa holder and it can happen to me as well or to anyone.
Phoebe was ready to taste the American Dream but the dream was taken away from her all because she was dating a football player.
Now in South Hadley, anti- bullying laws were being requested to the Massachusetts legislation and were accepted on May 3, 2010.  Massachussets set up the state anti- bullying task force to combat bullying in schools particularly South Hadley.  I believe that these actions of justice will give a huge impact to South Hadley and America.  These actions will reduce bullying and make South Hadley a better place.  I hope that the rest of America can adopt anti- bullying laws and a state anti- bullying task force to make America bully free for students so they can get the privilege for a better education.
DHS has no problems of bullying but it still has to detect signs of bullying and prevent it from happening. 
Solutions to prevent the chaos are: Attending assemblies of anti- bullying  that can help the school prevent the problem, offering personal experiences to tell about bulling, or better yet use Challenge day as a tool to break the cycle of bullying.

How Does It Feel to Be a Problem. Blog 2

Reading the next couple of chapters in Moustafa Bayoumi's work, I read stories of characters with different perspectives and lives that I also found interesting.
The first of the two that I read was from a Muslim American named Sami.  Sami came from Brooklyn with a large population of multi ethnicities, especially Muslim.  After high school, he never had any idea what to do so he decided to join the Marines without his parent's consent.  His experience with his application was that the recruitong officer convinced him that the Marines will make him a hero amnd well respected.  Especially for retirement and the near future. Those are true but the experience will not be for others.  The marines and the military in general were well known to manipulate people to join the armed forces in order increase their size of soldiers on duty.
After his completion of training, Sami heard the news about the 9/11 attack.  In his eyes, he could not believe that his own native country would do such an outrageous massacre on American soil.
This gave him the anger towards his own roots and decided to join the war in Afghanistan.  But it also gave him the anxiety that the soldiers in his unit will be shocked that they have a Muslim in the team.   But thankfully he was treated with the same amount of respect the same way he respected his soldiers.  Also he was proven useful for his knowledge of speaking Arabic for translations during operations.
But during his time in Afghanistan, he saw one of his soldiers physically threatening an innocentt Middle East citizen with his assault rifle.  It made Sami angry at the fact that the citizen was treated unfairly and falsely accused for the attack at the World Trade Center.  Sami talked with his soldier furiously and let the person go.
Then on base, he and the soldiers had an argument that all Muslims are terrorist because it was their first time watching the attack on video.  But the arguments died down.  Later, Samia nd his unit were told that the war was over, but it was a lie and so he decided to be honorably discharged. 
During his process of being discharged from the marines, his younger brother decided to join as well.  So Sami decided against it and told him the consequences of enlisting like being manipulated to join because it is a good expereince and a lot of soldiers would do nasty against innocent Muslims in Afghanistan.  And his brother understood him and decided not to join.
Sami was eventually happy to come back to Brooklyn not only because his parents live there, but also because it was better to stay at home than see soldiers looking down on Muslims and doing unethical things to them.  Also he came back because he fell in love with his culture and native roots after being on tour in Afghanistan where he got to embrace his ethnicity as a Muslim American.  

Recent Drug Testing Article

The article I read was a recent case called Burlison v. Springfield.  A lawsuit was filed on a Missouri school district for putting on a lockdown on the school with mass suspicionless searches and seizures because it violated the Constitution of both the state of Missouri and America. 
In the school, the Burlison siblings were a part of it.  The principal announced the lockdown and that all students should leave their belongings behind.  Then a K-9 unit came in to check out the students' bag and when the siblings came back to get their belongings, they were opened and searched.  They told their parents and they filed the suit. 
In my opinion, its ok to have a lockdown with searches but do cops still have to go through the trouble of searching through bags while all the k-9 dogs snift through the bags with the result of no drugs being found?  If I were one of the cops, if the dog gets the scent of drugs, I would open up that student's bag that has drugs.

Drug Testing Resolution

After debating whether us students support or oppose drug testing in schools, I am in favor for the drug testing.  For once, I do not do drugs and nor will I make the unwise decision to take drugs ever in my life.  Drugs have been a big problem in American High schools for several years and it changed the American society forever.  With surprisingly exponential numbers of drug incidents in high schools in the US, this is a better time than any other time to use drug testing on high schools of the 21st century.  We need to put drug testing on schools not only to get drug users off the schools, but to keep every student safe from drugs and make the high schools a better place to be educated.
I support drug testing and the right of fourth amendment because in N.J. vs TLO, students are supposed to bring things for their academics, lunch, keys for the car and home, and supplies for hygiene and grooming.  Also the school officials represent the state, not merely as surrogates for the parents, and they cannot claim the parents immunity from the 4th Amendment. 
There is probable cause and reasonable suspicion to keep the school and its students safe from drugs. 

How Does It Feel to Be a Problem. Blog 1

For Issues, I had to read "How Does It feel to Be a Problem?" by Moustafa Bayoumi.  The first chapter of the book made me want to cry because I took pity on the family who ahve been through a lot after 9/11.  The story scared me about when they were treated unethically.  The first story talks about Rasha, a Muslim, about her interpretation about her family and her life story about being a problem in America.
It all happened early in the morning during their sleep on February of 2002 , lights were flashing on their house and she and her whole family were being handcuffed by the INS, US Marshalls, and the FBI.  The leader of the team told her thatshe and her family are being investigated for any terrorist connections from the 9/11 attack a year before.  She realized that this was no any accidental arrest because the team knew about their status and identifications.  Then the whole family was separated and they were taken in to different prison facilities.
Rash, her sister, and mom had to be stripped search, wore converse shoes and beige jumpsuits, and they were taken in to prison cells that were not in good conditions just like every other prison cell in America.  They were barred with other citizens of the Middle East who were also falsely accused of terrorism.  Rasha feared that her family will get separated forever.  Even worse would be getting deported back to the Middle East.
Thankfully in the end, they were free to go and they were reunited with their loved ones.
Rasha and her family had a good life until this incident occured.  When she was in prison with her family, she had no right to speech and she faced prejudice and racial slurs by US officials guarding her.  Because of her experience, she decide to study Foreign realtions in college so no one would go through the same treatment that she and her family went through.  In her eyes, Americans believe that Mulims are a piece of dirt in this country and they should be wiped out of America.  Ever since 9/11, Muslim American were all kept watch all because a minority of their country created the greatest massacre of the 21st century in America's History.  Rasha found support from friends and lawyers to help her and her family get out of prison.  There were also investigations that the INS would do unethical things to the falsely accused Arabic like physical abuse, steripped searching, expressing racial slurs, and if deported, they will be deported without any clothing whatsoever.  That happened to Rasha and her family.
In prison, she had no right to express her beliefs and now she ha become strong in expressing it.  When she saw the American in the restaurant after her release, she went up to him and got mad at him for making her mother cry back in prison.  It did not change anything, but in her heart it felt like relief.  No one should go through her experience ever.