Recently in Skin Tone Category

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/36714961#36739929

This is an interview that was done with Latino Civil Rights leader Janet Murguia regarding the recent immigration bill that was passed in Arizona. She talks about some of the negative consequences of this bill on the Latino population of Arizona. She argues that the passing of this bill will essentially legalize racial profiling in that if anyone is at all suspected of being in the country illegally, authorities will have the right to search their homes and/or personal possessions. It sounds that if one is of Latino decent, that is all the proof authorities need to, basically, remove your constitutional rights. I'm not all that familiar with this story, but it definitely sounds unconstitutional to me.

What do you guys think? Does it seem to you that racial profiling is inevitable through the passing of this bill? Does the bill need to be changed to better protect the rights of the Latino population in Arizona? If you have not already heard about the passing of this bill, I would imagine that it will be hard to avoid as it snowballs in the uproar it is causing.


Here are a couple more news clips regarding some of the details of this bill - They make it sound that people can be identified as "possible illegals" based on appearance only, including the type of SHOES a person wears.....Are you kidding me?! Is our country going backwards away from civil rights legislation? What the hell....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/36714961#36735699

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/36714961#36726296

Something tells me this bill will not be around for too long....

Paul Mooney is one of the Kings of comedy. He has written stand up comedy for Richard Pryor, Redd Foxx, Saturday night live and many other venues. He is mainly known for his active stance in confronting racism in America through Stand up Comedy and going on different talk shows to address these issues faced by society today. Paul has a strait forward or blunt approach he takes which makes most White people uncomfortable and upset. There are a lot of good youtube videos that go into greater detail with his views. Do you think by him being direct about these issues help or harm the message he is trying to portray?

This is an article from NBC Sports about comments Torii Hunter made:

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2010/03/torii-hunter-black-dominican-players-are-imposters.html.php

Here's one of the main quotes that Torii Hunter said from the article:

"People see dark faces out there, and the perception is that they're African American," Los Angeles Angels center fielder Torii Hunter says. "They're not us. They're impostors.

The racial categorization going on here is pretty clear, especially from the "us" comment. But to call these players "imposters??" Hunter is getting some bad press from these comments, as well. Some of the other comments he made in this article are pretty outrageous too. What are everyone's thoughts on this?

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/05/28/2009-05-28_black_cop_killed_by_white_officer.html

This is a strong problem that we face in today's society. What do you think can be done to make police more aware and cautious about these things?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIVgMvuCM_k&feature=PlayList&p=A9A0505376CBCE35&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=5

20/20 experiment; the are two groups of actors (White/ Black) vandalizing and trying to break into a car in a suburban neighbor hood. Why did? or, Why did not? both groups get treated the same way?

http://www.innocenceproject.org/

I know this is delving into my psych and law roots a little bit, but this is the link to the Innocence Project's website. The Innocence Project is an organization devoted to exonerating the wrongly convicted through the use of DNA evidence or identifying flaws in the judicial system. Many of those who have been exonerated were put in prison in the first place because of faulty eyewitness testimony. This is relevant to us because a lot of these eyewitness ids were made by a person of a different race than the wrongly accused. We will inevitably be discussing the cross-race effect in this class, so I thought this website would help provide some evidence of how much of an issue the CRE is. There are a lot of interesting stories on here, and they have also recently updated the site with some of their greatest accomplishments of the decade.  

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5055391

Scientists say they've found a gene that seems to partially control skin color. And they say that a small change in the gene could explain why people with European ancestry tend to have different coloring than people of African or Asian descent.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100057939

And that color, the one you have now, says Jablonski, is very probably not the color your ancient ancestors had -- even if you think your family has been the same color for a long, long time.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120691088

A new study suggests that people's political views may affect how they perceive President Obama's skin tone, with liberals tending to "lighten" his skin and conservatives tending to "darken" it.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120340646

For decades, the cosmetics industry in India has made millions selling skin-whitening products to women. Now, it's making more money by convincing Indian men that they should be lighter.

Check out Madhulika Sikka's piece on the value of fair skin in India.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120322659

Among Indians, skin color is an issue. I mean Indians like me -- the kind from the subcontinent of South Asia. I tend to refer to my people as "brown people" because, by and large, that's the color of our skin. But, as we all know, there are many shades of one color.