The Homeless in, Their Eyes

Stereotypes we may all have, toward this group of people who are living the hard, life…translated…

Passed by the busying Zhong-Xing Street after work, and saw that elderly man whom I hadn’t seen in a long while, who’d lived on the streets, having returned back to the sidewalks, sleeping on sidewalks, with the quilt covering him.  A young boy passing by saw, told his mother, “this is the first time I see a homeless person.” To which, his mother responded, “you must study hard, work to make a living, otherwise, you’ll be, homeless just like him.”  I was surprised at how this mother socialized her young son, because, studying hard, making money, and becoming homeless, are completely, nonrelational.

I’d interned in the homeless shelter during my graduate studies, during the time, the professor took us to observe the homeless community in the underground shopping strip of the Taipei Main Station, in the Zhongshan, Datong, as well as the Wanhwa Districts to observe them, my professor knew a few of these homeless individuals personally, every time we’d always sat with them to converse, and that opened my mind up to the structures of society, the understanding of the socioeconomic statuses, and using a different perspective, to interpret these problems in the, society, it’d helped reformed my prejudices toward the homeless population.

people like these…

photo from online

Everybody has a different story of life, of these homeless individuals, there were many who were once well-educated, with steady jobs, but due to the major turns of life, they’d become, homeless, waiting for their chances, to get back up again.  A lot of the homeless population have jobs, it’s just, that most of them worked in temporary posts, which can’t pay for their living needs, that was why they’d temporarily, stayed on the streets.  Some of the homeless, their families would visit them from time to time, maybe, they just wanted to, escape home for a short while, to try out a different way of living is all.  Some members, due to work injuries, they couldn’t find steady full-time jobs again, and started living meal-to-meal.  The complex causes of homelessness, can’t be easily brushed over with the prejudiced words.

If they have a home, why would they want to wander the street?  The news media shaped the homeless into nothing but negative, which in turn, caused this pair of mother and son to become, prejudiced.  This uncle was very clean in appearance, I’m thinking, that it isn’t that he doesn’t have a home, but has some difficulties, which made him live on the streets instead.  There’s different facets of the various families, and we should NOT stereotype, and label someone else.  I hope, that we will all be able to, use some empathy, toward those who are having a hard time in the world, living their, lives.

And so, this is bad socialization of the mother to the child, the mother is socializing the child to fear, to hate, to feel disgusted toward the homeless, but, like the writer stated, these members of the homeless population all have their individual stories of WHY and HOW they’d, ended up on the streets, and if you can’t take the time to get to understand the reasons of these people being homeless, and you start judging them, and what’s worse, is that you’re passing this stereotype, this prejudice to your own, young, and this is, really, bad!

Complying to the Homestay Quarantines, But Got Discriminated Against, & the Pays Cut

The experiences of an individual who was serving his at-home quarantine for MERS-CoV, mandated by the government, from the Front Page Sections, translated…

With the rises of the cases of MERS-CoV, the CDC can almost use the management techniques, to make the locals comply, and yet, the process had a ton of troubles that needed, amending. 

a live news footagewith the caption that reads: even if you’re not ill, we will, STARVE you to death!  found online

I took a flight from China, arrived back home from China at the bottom of January, before I aboard, the airline company asked everybody to get their temperatures taken and recorded.  There weren’t that many passengers, and I’d worn my surgical mask all the way, but not used the lavatories.  As I arrived, because of my work, I’d had to go to three days of work consecutively.  And yet, by the fourth day, I’d received a call, telling me that I need to quarantine myself at home, reason being one of the passengers of the flight I was on was confirmed with the diagnosis of MERS-CoV, that everybody who was onboard the planes needed to have quarantine in their homes.  As I got off work, arrived at my home, there was a man holding the papers that mandated I go into house arrest for the quarantines immediately.

It happened so suddenly, at first, my work wouldn’t allow me to take the long leave of absence, demanded that I continue to work.  But if I don’t stay at home during the quarantines, if I got caught, the first time, I’d needed to pay a $60,000N.T. fine, and the second time, the highest amount of fine goes up to $150,000N.T., my company will be fined as well.  I’d handed my manager’s number to the members of the CDC, to have them mediate the matter, while I’d, started on my fourteen days of at-home quarantine.

There are others living at my home, while I was in quarantine, they’re still, working and carrying out their usual routines, not restricted by the government.  Because the law didn’t specify the wages for the at-home quarantines, during the time I’d called 1992 multiple times to ask the Labor and the Department of Sanitations about the matter, and I got the exact same replies: the related units will help me take care of it, that I need not worry.  During which time, they’d even told me to order take outs daily!  But, because I stopped getting paid for work, and needed to have an extra expenses for my meals, it became, too burdensome for a working class like me!  During which time, I was forced, to have my cell phone GPS on file, I was getting zoomed in on, even when I was asleep, or when I went to the bathrooms, due to bad receptions, the police or the workers in the Sanitation Department would come calling me at the house, I’d walked on eggshells.

the items taht are bare necessities of the individuals’ at-home quarantine sessions, chart rom onine

To prevent the spread of the illness, I’d worked alongside the homestay quarantines of the government.  But the problem showed, that after my fourteen days of quarantine, I’d returned back to work, found my wages deducted for over half a month, and the rest of my coworkers treated me like the plague, dodged me all they could, even the owner of the company, transferred me to the outermost unit that works from outside the offices.  And some of the coworkers tattled on how I was in the at-home quarantine programs to my clients too.

As these all happened, I felt like I had contracted, the bubonic plague, I’d followed the laws here, and yet, as I returned back to work, I was, discriminated against all around.  The managers of the various units of governments who’d promised me that they’ll help me mediate the matters of my wages and everything, all evaded their responsibilities, it’d made me feel, cheated!

After I’d gone through this experience of at-home quarantine, other than confirming that I’m, healthy, I also experienced firsthand, how there are, so many, shortcomings of the system including: the placement of my family members who live in the same residence as I, the living standards of the individuals in quarantine, along with the matters of my wages during the time I’d stopped, working, the tracking down of those in quarantine is an invasion of privacy, and as those in quarantine returned back to work, they’re, discriminated against by the company, the coworkers.  What’s worst was, that the government didn’t have a specific department window set aside to answer all of our, inquiries, and afterward, the departments evading the responsibilities for the problems they promised to help us solve!  This sort of an at-home quarantine surely is, problematic!

Yes, because there’s NO SET protocol for this, and even if there were the protocols set up, people still don’t follow it, and that, is the problems of the members of the working class, being in quarantines at home for traveling to countries with MER-CoV, and I don’t think this is going to improve, anytime soon!

The Perfect Face with the Perfect Body

There’s NO such thing!

The perfect face with the perfect body, how is that defined?  Based off of one’s perception, knowledge, of what beauty entails, right?  And, do we NOT have the same definitions of what “beauty” is?  So, there’s NO way, that someone can have the perfect face, WITH the perfect body, it’s just not, humanly possible, is it?

The perfect face with the perfect body, well, let’s suppose that someone DOES have that, but, the moment s/he opens UP her/his mouth, you’d wished, that you hadn’t asked the person to talk, because the person is, quacking like a DUCK, or that the person sounds like shattering of those glass windows.

So, to be perfect, in EVERY single way, is absolutely IMPOSSIBLE, isn’t it?

The perfect face with the perfect body, if someone does have what’s been “defined” as a perfect face WITH a perfect body, does that mean, that the person will have it made for life?  That s/he is NEVER to experience ANY kind of difficulties in one’s life?  Of course not, because, as stories often has it, there’s NO such thing, as a good life, that comes with the good looks, and everything, take ALL of those fairytales of Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Beauty & the Beast, Little Mermaid, etc., etc., etc., didn’t ALL of those heroines have to go through the trials of their own lives, to finally GET what they are searching for, and, for some, even IF they’d given it all they got, they still fell short (like Little Mermaid???), so, what, does THAT tell you?  Think about it, then, you MAY, get back to me, but, it’s NOT mandatory, and, I don’t want my mailboxes to be “stuffed”…

Not Free to Love, as We Chose

We have here, uh, an ODD couple!

Not free to love, as we chose, because we’re of the same gender, and, although laws are currently being passed, to okay same-sex marriages all over the places, we’re still, SHUNNED, by the public, like when we’d gone strolling, we held hands, and, people would look at us weird, making us both uneasy.

Not free to love, as we chose, well, you know what, I NEVER chose my sexual preferences, it’s just how I was born, and, there’s NO way, I can change, what’s already, genetically prewired.

Not free to love, as we chose, sure, there are so many countries that are currently passing laws, to okay same-sex marriage, but, would we all be considered, equals?  Of course N-O-T, and, what IF me and my partner are both Catholics, and we wanted to be married, by a Catholic priest, in a Catholic church, oh no, no, I can already see their shocking faces: we’re NOT allowing GAYS or LESBIANS, to marry here, in this HOUSE of G-O-D!

Well, if God really, loved all of HIS children (there’s still SOOOOOOOOOOOOO many ways I can argue that!), then, why are we being given a hard time, in trying to marry who we love?

Attacks Compel Muslims to Reflect, by: D. D. Kirkpatrick

From The New York Times International Weekly that came with the papers today…

CAIRO—The rush of horrific attacks in the name of Islam is spurring and anguished debate among Muslims here in the heart f the Islamic world about why their religion appears cited so often as a cause for violence and bloodshed.

The majority of scholars and the faithful say Islam is no more inherently violent than other religions.  But some Muslims argue that the contemporary understanding of their religion is infected with justifications for violence, requiring the government and its official clerics to correct the teaching of Islam.

“It is unbelievable that the thought we hold holy pushed the Muslim community to be a source of worry, fear, danger, murder and destruction to all the world,” President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt lamented in a recent speech to clerics of the official religious establishment, calling for a “religious revolution.”

Others, thought, insist that the violence—such as the recent massacre of a dozen people at a French newspaper’s offices and the killings of four shoppers at a kosher grocery store in Paris—is caused by alienation and resentment, not theology.  They argue that the authoritarian rulers of Arab states—who have tried for decades to control Muslim teaching and the application of Islamic law—have set off a violent backlash expressed in religious ideas and language.  Promoted by groups like the Islamic State or Al Qaeda, that discourse echoes through Muslim communities as far away as New York or Paris, whose influence and culture still loom over much of the Muslim world.

“Some people who feel crushed or ignored will go toward extremism, and they use religion because that is what they have at hand,” said Said Ferjani, an official of Tunisia’s mainstream Islamist party, Ennahda, speaking about violence in the name of Islam.

Khaled Fahmy, an Egyptian historian, was teaching at New York University on September 11, 2001, after which American sales of the Quran spiked because readers sought religious explanations for the attack on New York.  “We try to explain that they are asking the wrong question,” he said.  Religion, he argued, was “just a veneer” for anger at the dysfunctional Arab states left behind by colonial powers and the “Orientalist” condescension many Arabs still feel from the West.

Only a very small number blame Islam itself.  “What has ISIS done that Muhammad did not do?” an outspoken atheist, Ahmed Harqan, recently asked on a talk show here, using common shorthand for the Islamic State to argue that the problem of violence is inherent to Islam.

His challenge provoked an outcry from Islamic religious broadcasters.  Salem Abdel-Gel-il, a scholar from the state-sponsored Al Azhar institute, fired back with Islamic verses about tolerance, peace and freedom.  Then he warned that the public espousal of atheism might land his opponents in jail.

Steven Fish of California, Berkley, sought to quantify the correlation between Islam and violence. In his book, “Are Muslims Distinctive?,” he found that murder rates were substantially lower in Muslim-majority countries and instances of political violence were no more frequent.

In the Muslim world, however, the debate over Islam’s connection to violence has been given new impetus in recent events: the military ouster of the Islamist elected as president of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi; the deadly crackdown on his supporters in the Muslim Brotherhood and a retaliatory campaign of attacks on security forces; and the rise of the bloodthirsty Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

Mr. Sisi, a former general, led the ouster of the Islamic president in 2013 and the suppression of the Brotherhood on charges that it was a violent “terrorist group.” (The group has denounced violence for decades.)

Intellectuals supporting him have applauded his efforts and called for the state of lead a sweeping top-down overhaul of the popular understanding of Islam.  “Religious thought, or religious discourse, is afflicted with backwardness,” Gaber Asfour, the minister of culture, declared.

Many pro-government intellectuals consider the popularity of the Muslim Brotherhood an aspect of that awkwardness and argue that all such Islamist political movements are inherently violent—even if the groups publicly disavow violence.  “Their task is not becoming modern; it is become hegemonic again, making a new world in which Islam will be on top again,” argued Sherif Younis, a historian at the Helwan University here.

“Every fundamentalist has in mind a counter-regime, even if he does not know how to use a knife,” Professor Younis said.  That includes the mainstream Islamists of the Brotherhood and the ultraconservatives known as Salafis, as well as the overtly violent jihadist groups like the Islamic States of al-Qaeda, he said.

Others argue that the state control of the Muslim religious establishment only reinforces the problems.  Some say it is also naïve to expect unaccountable governments like Egypt’s that cannot provide a healthcare or education to do a better job leading religious reform.

“In an authoritarian society, there is no room for reasoned debate, so it is not surprising that irrational religious discourse is going to flourish in certain quarters of Egypt or the Arab world,” argued Mohammad Fadel, an Egyptian-American Islamic legal scholar at the University of Toronto.  “But the answer of these governments has been to double down on repression and that is only likely to increase the extremism.”

And so, the CORE of the Islamic being viewed as violent is totally BULLSHIT!!!  There are just a few of the members from the whole pool of the public that are acting out violent, and, we, in the modern and civilized world start labeling the REST of the population as way too M***ER F***ING violent?  C’mon, where’s the TOLERANCE?  Oh yeah, I forgot, because I wasn’t the one who got ATTACKED, so, I wouldn’t KNOW how those who were attacked or know those who were attacked feels like, right???  Think again!!!  I mean, I HAVE the empathies, but, do you???

 

 

 

 

A Tightening Noose

An ongoing discrimination…

A WORRIED STUDENT

It would be a lie to say that the past week has been an easy one. It would be a lie to say that international events have not affected me. The only reason I have not posted about the issue is because at times I have an urge to pen a post and then at times I give up in despair.

I am of course referring to the events in France which I am sure you are aware of. When I read the news these days and in the aftermath of the terrible event, most of it is the same. Sometimes I find something which gives me hope, an article which does blame an entire religion for the actions of a few. At the bottom of these articles, I may find comments from ordinary people who make me smile. They allow me to hope that there are still people out…

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She’s Way Out of His League

A Q&A, translated…

Q A pair of worried parents wrote…

Their daughter who graduated college this year, all of a sudden told them, that she fell in love with a man who is nine years her senior in high school, the man was twenty-six then.  And U only graduated from middle school, comes from a single-parent family; his eldest brother is unwed, his second eldest has two children.

After U divorced, his only daughter was in the custody of his ex-wife.  And, the whole family lived off of the shows they’d performed, only U started working odds and ends, to help supply for the family’s expenses.

Their daughter is very into her boyfriend, the mother said that U wasn’t well-educated enough, that he wasn’t from a good enough family, the daughter told her, “a high degree doesn’t mean good character either; nor does it mean, that he’ll be nice to you, to take care of the family, and may not have a steady job.  The boyfriend, U, wasn’t well-educated, sure, but he’s willing to work hard, doesn’t spend carelessly.  As to why he doesn’t have any money saved up?  Because he took care of his family, is a good son, took home ALL of his pay, didn’t keep a cent to himself, would rather have it hard himself, rather than having his mother deal with the hardships of life.  And, it wasn’t his choosing, to be born in such a lousy family, how could he be blamed?”  After knowing each other for so long, U had always been kind toward her, if he didn’t have good intentions, she would totally know, so why wouldn’t the parents let go of their stereotypes, and accept him?

The parents believed, that the daughter is WAY too good for the man, that she’s way out of his league, and that they’re worried, that their daughter might get tricked or scammed by him, because his twenty-six, and she was merely a high school student back then.  Neither wanted to back down, the parents didn’t have any other thoughts, they just wanted to pull their daughter back.

A My Opinion

The reason that the parents were against this, is mostly due to their socioeconomic statuses and level of education, feared that after their daughter married, she will have a TON of hardship to bear.  The problem is, the daughter had set up her mind, “I’m old enough, have my own thoughts, and can make my own decisions.  If he’d lied to me, or treated me wrong, there’s NO way I would stay by him for so long.” My advice, is that the parents should meet the man first, to get to know one another better.  And, even IF they’d met, it still may NOT change their prejudices.  It seems, that the daughter’s persistence is like a carriage with nine horses, pulling outward, and there’s nothing that the parents CAN do, to pull her back for the time being.  And I’m really surprised, as to how come this daughter had been dating U for over seven years, and the parents didn’t know about it, and, in these seven years, they’d already lost the influence over their daughter’s choice.

Change a thought, maybe, just open up about the rules, allow them to date, for another one, to two years on end, and, whether or not she’s way out of his league, so long as your daughter is willing to bear the consequences of her decision, however hard or easy it will be for her, it’s all her choice then.

And so, these parents fell absolutely HELPLESS, over how their daughter was insistent on dating this man, whom they believed, was LOWER in the status quo, than they are.  Well, parents, who the FUCK gave you the right, to judge someone, because he came from a bad family background?  Because you’re way too worried about your own flesh-and-blood’s wellbeing?  Isn’t it more important, that your daughter’s happy with this man, that she loves him, and isn’t it also important, that he treats her kind, takes care of her, even though, he doesn’t have ANY money?  The parents’ values are the ones that needed resetting in this one.

When an Unarmed Black Man Gets Shot by a White Cop

And no, this, is still N-O-T the last time this will EVER happen!!!

When an unarmed black man gets shot by a white cop, wait a minute, did I get shipped back somewhere in time again, because it’s feeling a whole lot like déjà vu!!!

When an unarmed black man gets shot by a white cop, this happens, as we’d learned in social psych (think it was!!!), that people are MORE likely to associate a colored person (in this case, a BLACK man) who’s holding something NOT dangerous (like a pen???) to someone who’s holding a dangerous weapon, and why do you think that is?  Oh yeah, because we are all pre-wired to JUDGE people by the way they’re “presented” (by their skin colors???).

And, this had happened, so many times in the past too, like that high school grad who got SHOT after his graduation somewhere UP in the mid-western strip of the U.S., and, there are a TON of other cases like this, so, when will this SHIT stop?  Oh yeah, I know, when one day, the planet is completely RULED by D-O-G-S!!!  Then, they (the dogs) would decide whether you’re a friend or an enemy, by SNIFFING you!

 

 

 

 

 

Princesses & Dragons

If a fairytale has a princess, then there is a dragon, take all those Disney cartoons of Sleeping Beauty, and the like.  These princesses’ hearts are guarded by dragons, just like mine.  The dragons in these stories symbolize the ladies’ putting their heart on ice, and when those prince charmings come to their rescues, they would slay those dragons, and thus, open their hearts to love.  Common concepts of fairytale dissected.

I think that those ladies are actually friends with the dragons, because the dragons protected their hearts from being broken, just like the booby traps I had set around my heart, to trap all you biologically XY losers, from coming over, and you cannot get inside my skin, but I can get inside yours and make you ill, because that is my superpower.

So, ladies, start feeding your dragons better food, because they will keep on protecting your hearts, but once in a blue moon, some idiot comes by and the dragon happen to be dreaming of its dragon babies, you are sure to feel the heat of L-O-V-E, but do NOT fall for anyone who seems super nice, those are the ones that you need to be extra careful about, because the better they look on the outside, the worse they are on the inside, that is how women are “tricked”, or so I would assume, but that still doesn’t make me an A-S-S-H-O-L-E, because, once again, I derive at this conclusion base off of my super-duper sound L-O-G-I-C.  Feed those losers who try to approach you to the DRAGONS, or better yet, tell the dragons that you keep to BURN them with their fire-breathing abilities, that will show ‘em what we’re made up of…and no, I still didn’t just get dumped either, okay, kids???

Princesses & dragons, more like Queens & helpers…

I am very good at this fairytale concept dissection, aren’t I???  Yes you are, my Queen…everybody gets a day off, so start blowing on those stupid birthday goodies that makes that sound…