Here are links to various parts of my Q4 history benchmark.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/646509/Q4_History_Benchmark/RFK%20Time%20Cover.pdf
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/646509/Q4_History_Benchmark/Sirhan%20New%20York%20Times.pdf
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/646509/Q4_History_Benchmark/Sirhan%20Time%20Cove...
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/646509/Q4_History_Benchmark/Sources_Q4_History_R...
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/646509/Q4_History_Benchmark/Wanted%20Poster%20-%...

Here is the link to my wikispace.

http://robertfkennedy.wikispaces.com/

Enjoy

-Harrison

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In my introduction to hate blog post, I
mentioned sex and gender as two separate
entities.

sex
|seks|

[Noun] Either of the two main categories (male and
female) into which humans and most other living things are divided on the basis
of their reproductive organs.

gender
|jendər|

[noun] Grammar
(in languages such as Latin,
Greek, Russian, and German) each of the classes (typically masculine, feminine,
common, neuter) of nouns and pronouns distinguished by the different
inflections that they have and require in words syntactically associated with
them. Grammatical gender is only very loosely associated with natural
distinctions of sex.

The difference between gender
and sex is this-

·     
Sex is a forced identification. You are born
with certain sexual organs; those are what define your sex.

·     
Gender is a chosen identification. Some who are
born male claim to be wired as females, and thus they identify as such.

“From the moment we're born, our gender identity is no
secret. We're either a boy or a girl. Gender organizes our world into pink or
blue. As we grow up, most of us naturally fit into our gender roles.

“Girls wear dresses and
play with dolls.

“For boys, it's pants
and trucks.

But for some children, what's between their legs doesn't
match what's between their ears -- they insist they were born into the wrong
body. They are transgender children, diagnosed with gender identity
disorder, and their parents insist this is not a phase.” (ABC News)

The thing is, most people believe that sex and gender are synonymous.

The first order of anti-hate education: Make the distinction.

Make sure you are using words correctly. Make sure you know from
where your words come, and make sure you agree with this source.  

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In order to educate our way out of the hole that has been
dug by hate, we must focus not on eradicating racism, but on eradication what created racism.

“Have we not come to such an impasse in the
modern world that we must love our enemies - or else? The chain reaction of
evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or else
we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.“

-Martin
Luther King Jr.

The
chain reaction of evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must
be broken.

As I
stated previously in my blog, I do not claim to want to violate anyone’s first
amendment rights. A huge part of the US is that its citizens have the ability
to speak, write, and assemble freely.

However,
the distinction must be made between expressing rights that affect you and expressing rights that affect others.

The latter is, when negative, a violation
of human rights.

Now, you would think that people must just
be insane to violate these rights, right?

Nope.

The problem here is that most people dehumanize those that they hate. Haters
do not consider their victims to be human,
thus they do not think that they have any human
rights.

·      Hitler dehumanized the Jews by making them into numbers.

·      Slave owners dehumanized slaves by putting thinking of them as animals.

·      Traditional bigots dehumanize queers by saying that they are unnatural.

The first step in educating is making those
under the scrutiny of hate human in
the eyes of their persecutors.

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Hate |hāt|

verb [ trans. ]
Feel intense or passionate dislike for (someone); despise

Obviously, based
both off of this definition and off of common life experience, there are many
different types of hate, the most common types being-

·      Hate based on race.

·      Hate based on religious beliefs.

·      Hate based on political beliefs.

·      Hate based on sex.

·      Hate based on gender.

·      Hate based on sexual orientation.

Now, there are
some roots of hate that I did not mention, such as-

·      Hate based on past events.

·      Hate based on parental bias.

·      Hate based on feeling the need to
blame.

Look at the words I
used.

Roots of hate. Types of
hate.

There is a difference. And that difference absolutely,
indubitably, exponentially makes a
difference. The way to utilize the knowledge of that difference is to appeal to
what it means.

For example,

Think of hate like a door. 

Most people deal with (excuse the
term) “haters,” by trying to bash down
the door of hate.  It generally
doesn’t break down.

The key to the door of hate is education.

My blog posts have been good informationally and personally, but not good organizationally. I have jumped around even though I have generally been focusing on one subject. I will work on that.

I think I was also doing in-text citation wrong. I was citing after not only quotes but facts, so I will correct that as well. 

Also, I have realized that I can't work with only anti-Semitism. I am broadening my topic to "Hate" instead. 

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Hours after the June 10, 2009 shooting occurred at the
Holocaust museum, President Barack Obama addressed the nation, only blocks away
from where the shooting occurred, he said, "This outrageous act reminds us that we must remain vigilant against
anti-Semitism and prejudice in all its forms.” (The
Huffington Post)

That we must. However, there are many things standing in our
way.

In 2008, there was a recorded 926 hate groups active in the
U.S. (Now
Public)

Now, these hate groups advertise
hate. The ideal thing to do would be to outlaw hate-based
congregation. 

However, the First Amendment gives citizens of the United
States freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom of press. Thus, it
is impossible to rid the world of hate using law.

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On Thursday June 11^th, 2009, a 60-year-old man
walked into the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and opened fire.

He killed one security guard

He also killed the image of lingering hope that has been
present throughout the masses that the blind hatred portrayed in the Holocaust
has been eradicated.

This atrocity was committed by a James W. Von Brunn, an avid
conspiracy theorist and hardcore white supremacist whom had done a number of
insane things over the years.

In 1981, 28 years prior to the Holocaust museum shooting,
Von Brunn walked into the Federal Reserve Board headquarters, pulled out a
shotgun, and tried to kidnap several Federal Reserve Board members due to high
interest rates. He was given a six year prison term, a punishment that he
claimed was given because of a"Negro jury, Jew/Negro attorneys" and
"a Jew judge." (CNN)

Von Brunn’s book, "Kill The Best Gentiles,"
advocated the ideals of Adolf Hitler, and it insisted that Jews had concocted
World War I as part of a scheme to sabotage Germany. (TPM)

Von Brunn ran a website called “Holy Western Empire,” which
aimed at organizing a hate group similar to the KKK.

Von Brunn was supposedly part of the “birther,” movement,
which is a congregation of conspiracy theorists who insist, with no proof, mind
you, that Barack Obama has no right to the presidency because he has not publicized
his birth cirtificate.

Sorry for the fact spam. That was just to give you a
background of this man. Of a man who fought against Germany in WWII. A man who
was an artist, a writer, and a husband. An educated man. A man who had killed.

Although there is no known reason for Von Brunn’s
actions,  it is clear that he
blamed Jews for economical upset and, more personally, his 1983 conviction.

Through this, he cultivated what is known as blind hate.
Blind hate is an unfaltering, deaf hate, generally aimed towards a specific
group of individuals by whom the hater feels harmed.

Blind, unearned hate comes to be in a number of ways:

-False education  

-Desire to blame

-Misconception

-Desire to conform

In the next couple of weeks, I will be focusing on each of
these ways. The next blog post will be about false education.

“History has shown that wherever anti-Semitism has gone unchecked,
the persecution of others has been present or not far behind. Defeating
anti-Semitism must be a cause of great importance not only for Jews,
but for all people who value humanity and justice….”

—U.S. Department of State, Contemporary Global Anti-Semitism Report, March 13, 2008

Anti-semitism, although technically directed at a religious group, has become a more racially based hate. I do not personally like thinking of Jewish people as a race.Because... do you know the first person to have classified Jewish people as a "race?" 

Adolf Hitler.

Adolf Hitler was the instagator behind the Holocust, a genocide in which an estimated 5,860,000 Jewish people were killed (Shayna and Shada). 

As far as I'm concerned, the classification of Jews as a race was just another way of alienating them and of  justifying the atrocoties committed during the Holocaust.

If the Jewish people feel the need to be identified as a community past religion, which I believe is fair as Judiasm is massively cultura, I would choose to identify them as a nation. Because, in essence, the Jewish people are a nation, united by an enduring history and a rich culture, and, obviously, an age-old religion. 

Anti-semitism stems from the idea that Jewish people are naturally different than others. Popular offensive stereotypes about Jews include: 

• Jewish people are cheap. (Tracy R. Rich)
• Jewish people have large noses. (JMT Ventures Limited)
• Jewish people are "sneaky merchants." (Cohen's Advertising Scheme)
• Jews don’t care what happens to anyone but their own
  kind. (Anti-defamation league PDF)
• Jewish people are more willing than others to use shady
  practices to get what they want. (Anti-defamation league PDF)
• Jewish people are born with a natural loyalty to Israel. (Anti-defamation league PDF)
• Jewish people have too much power in the business world. (Anti-defamation league PDF)

John Relethford, professor of physical anthropology at New York's SUNY-Oneonta says "No... Being Jewish is not a matter of biology. It’s a matter of culture," (Hasdai Westbrook) This means that Jews have as much of a chance of having a large nose as Greeks do of having six-packs.

The "Jews are cheap," stereotype came directly from Adolf Hitler himself. In Hitlers manifestography, Mein Kampf, which means "my struggle," he claimed that his enlightenment of hatefulness came from his "realization," that Jews controlled a large portion of Germanies political infrastructure. I put "realization," in quotations because it was less a realization than the fabrication of an immeasurably bitter and inculpatory man. 

Blinded by that hate, Hitler determined, and wrote in Mein Kampf, the following.

 "The Jew began by lending out money at usurious interest, which is a permanent trade of his. It was he who first introduced       the payment of interest on borrowed money. The danger which this innovation involved was not at first recognized; indeed the innovation was welcomed, because it offered momentary advantages." (James Murphy, Project Gutenberg).

Stereotypes based on Jewish peoples financial flimflamming Hitlerclaims that Jews brought the practice of interest to Germany, thus making debt existant, opening a whole slew of problems for the country. In reality, however, the idea of debt has been existant in Germany since before the 1800s, and probably even before then. Obviously, Hitler saw what he wanted to see, falsifying in his mind what was true and what was not. (Sidney Homer, Richard Eugene Sylla)

Hate is inhereted. The stereotypes and hate of Jews has been passed from idealist to idealist for generations.

With hatred motivating them, humans generally see what they want to see, whether or not whatever that may be is existant or true.

At this point, only awareness can turn around the dead-end-headed train that has been unleashed by rage and hatred. 

The word "Anti-semitism," is comprised of two parts.

The prefix "anti," denoting opposition

And "Semite," which describes a member of any of the peoples who speak or spoke a Semitic language, the word "Semetic,"  denoting a family of languages, namely Hebrew or Arabic ones.   

In contemperory society, however, the term "anti-semitism," has been transformed and adapted to signify anti-Jewish feelings or actions. 

The most antipathical demonstration of anti-semitism was the mass genocide of Jews throughout Europe by Adolf Hitler. 

 I will be examining some of the reasons that people are anti-semitic.

The poll worker that I interviewed said that he did not work the polls last year. he said that he was excited that he was finally able to work at the polls as he was very politically active and he just turned 18. He said that the best part about being a poll worker was seeing a community really come together and care about something. He said he disliked working with difficult people as they make his job tiring and they tend to condescend. All in all, it was fun talking to my poll guy. His name was Steve, and he had these crazy awesome gauges. I went in the middle of the day so the poll wasn't very packed. I can't wait until I can vote. 

This chapter focuses on a girl who dances through the wreckage of her village. Later that night, one of soldiers mock her dancing and another solder threatens him by hanging him over the edge of a well. I think this speaks a lot towards the moral standings of soldiers, and how while they kill people, they do it only because they believe that they're doing it as a community, not as an individual. That may be how most soldiers justify their killings.

In this chapter, the soldiers visit an abandoned site that looks like it might have once been a church. One of the men mention that the religious aspects of church don't attract him, but the social aspects do. I think that many people in contemporary society feel that way about religious gatherings. My family gathers on all of the major Jewish holidays, not as much because we seriously practice the religion, but more because we like being together, feeling a part of something.

In this chapter, O'Briens character fixates on the death of a young Vietnamese soldier which he caused. His mind runs through all kinds of justifications. I personally try to lead my life without justifying my misdoings. In fact, I try to embrace them. The more honest you are about your mistakes, the easier it is to accept them and move on.

In the first chapter of The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien incorporates a scene in which two of the soldiers speak about life and its relationship to death. This is something that I think about often. While the story sets a very tense tone to death, I set a more light one. I think it's more the concept of dying that people fear; not the concept of being dead itself.

Harrison Talese-Rhodes
Science Leadership Academy
Harrisons’ Choice High School

The modern high-school student can tell you how to multiply numbers, how to derive the meaning of a word based on its root, and how clouds are formed. Short of being useful information at a high school cocktail party, is any of this information relevant? I don't think so. I believe that students should be in school not to learn obscure facts in subjects that have existed for generations; rather they should be in school to learn how to learn. In short, my educational system would focus on quality rather than quantity. Students should be in school not to develop an over-stressed work ethic, one reinforced by mountains of homework and class work, rather, schools should teach students how to do the one thing it is assumed that they can already do: Think.

Due to the pressure it gives to students not to learn, but to get good grades, homework in my school would be virtually nonexistent. Homework exists for a debatable reason. The student in me sees homework as a means to an end; a necessary evil to overcome in order to achieve my goals. Mary Altamuro, a student at Science Leadership Academy argues that homework exists purely to cause excruciating pain, and maybe to give teachers something to grade. Chris Taylor, a student at The Shipley School, counters that homework is a way, "To complement your learning and to reinforce facts and concepts." In fact, most teachers would also speak from that direction. Jillian Gierke, a Foreign Language teacher at Science Leadership Academy says, "For a world language course, students are acquiring a skill (speaking another language) In order to acquire a skill, it must be practiced (often) similarly to learning a musical instrument. It makes the most sense to practice speaking in class and then continue with writing and reading practice at home when the students (most likely) do not have a Spanish-speaking partner with whom to practice with." All of these opinions are acceptable. But they all say the same thing. Homework exists not to teach, but to learn what the student knows. Therefore, homework in my education system would be rendered irrelevant and would be taken from the curriculum.

Next, the teachers. All teachers would give students at Harrisons’ Choice High School special attention. Teachers should be able to have a special relationship with their students. This is not to say that students and teachers should be the best of friends. What I propose is a close, almost mentor-mentee relationship. Teachers should be there not only to support the student academically, but also emotionally. The two go hand in hand. A close relationship with a teacher may allow a close relationship with the subject, which is a fantastic but rare occurrence with teachers and students.

Subjects. Students would not be taught the traditional subjects. Instead, there would be discussion classes, human psychology classes, world events classes, and debate classes. Students at Harrisons’ Choice High School would learn how to argue their point, be articulate, and how to understand each other, both theoretically and through direct exposure.

In the end, my vision of school is much different than the traditional view of school. It focuses on what I see to be the relevant subjects in the world, and promotes values that, again, I find relevant.

My friends and I stayed up until 3 am one night, comparing out views of the world, contemplating laughable impossibilities, and just all around chatting. I began a new segment around midnight labeled “I’m an insecure teenager, reassure me.” The tirade began: “I dunno guys… I feel like I’m just not going to be like, a desk job-er, you know, when I grow up. Like right now, I feel like I’m so different than everyone else, but I don’t want to just like, scream that to the heavens, you know, I don’t want to look like a poser. I mean, I’m not a poser, but I don’t want to look like I am. Like, I always act different about different kind of people, but I’m not trying to fit in with them, you know, I just feel like I’m more than one person.”

For our spanish benchmark, we created a podcast using garageband telling about ourselves and our family using adjectives and unspecific pronouns. Unfortunately, my podcast is lost, so all i have is my podf\cast script. it is identical except im not speaking.

For our geometry benchmark, we studied (in small groups) different important concepts and people in the history of geometry. My group studied Thales, a prominent greek figure in the history of geometry. WE studied how thales figured out the distance of a ship from land, and how he measured distances with triangles and circles.