Emily Roman

ERWC P.3

Ms. Frederick

Writing Sample #2

Issue Research

Why does skin color or the language someone speaks determine where they live or what

they can and cant achieve? How is it that a group of people look down on the person someone

looks up to? The person they know will support them no matter what. The person who raised

them. The person who would risk their life for theirs. The person they aspire to be as strong as

one day. Questions like these run through young minds daily and one can never seem to find

the answer to them. The world isnt perfect. No one is perfect. However, how beautiful would it

be if everyone could accept one another? Racism has been around in the United States since

the colonial era. It's been over a hundred years and it continues to follow us.

Recently a specific topic that has really pulled me in is racism leading to deportations of

immigrants. I get it, it isnt fair for someone to begin living in a new country and get the same

benefits as someone who worked for those benefits. However, what about those who came to

this country 20+ years ago? This may be mind blowing but not every illegal immigrant comes to

the United States to bring drugs or gangs. Most of them come to make money for their families

who cant travel or to live a better life. Society is always pushing self love and self awareness

yet it isnt seen when it comes to immigrants.

Imagine if there is a murder and they are of white skin color or caucasian, how long

would this news be news? Now, if this murder were to be someone who came to America from a

different country, mainly hispanic, would it be news longer? The fact that if an illegal immigrant

or someone who isnt white were to commit a violent crime, you hear the media say that it's

because they are illegal or because they are from a certain country or a certain race. The truth
is skin color nor race have nothing to do with that person committing a crime, it's what's inside

the brain and personal experiences.

I have done research on the brain of a criminal or psychopaths and what I found didnt

surprise me. The amygdala is the integrative center for emotions in the brain. We always

wonder why and how someone can physically hurt someone and possibly take the life of them.

Psychopaths lack emotion. They lack empathy, remorse, and guilt. states Adriane Raine, chair

Department of Criminology at the University of Pennsylvania. A study from Raine showed brain

scans of psychopaths that show a deformation in the amygdala. Do these brain scans tell us if

any of the people in these scans were of color? Would it matter? Unfortunately to some people

it would.

There are so many people working 12+ hours a day to be able to live somewhere and

feed those who are under their roof. Are these jobs the ones that Americans complain that

immigrants are taking from them? Cleaning houses, offices, stores, gardening? Is that really a

job you want? My mom goes to work from 8-9:30 most of the time. I am only able to see her for

around three to four hours on the days that she works which is usually monday through

saturday. However, I dont complain because I know she does it for me and for herself. She is

working to keep us healthy not just physically but emotionally. Is that a crime? How can

someone find the person I love the most so threatening?

Ive heard someone say that its so easy for immigrants to leave their family in their

country and come live here yet they cry when they need to leave their family in the U.S. This

makes no sense to me because the reason why they left in the first place was to have a better

environment. They would be going back to the place where they know they cant succeed as

much as they would in America. Also, its a choice to migrate to the U.S. but to go back to their

country is the act of being forced. There is a difference.

There may never be answers to these questions I have and to the ones that I keep to

myself. However, I pray and I have faith that enough people will be able to see the hard work
that immigrants have done to stay alive in a country they are so foreign to. I have faith that one

day, whether it be 10 years from now or 100, the good can outweigh the bad. Until then I leave

you with this question. Would you take a childs parent away from them?
 Works Cited
Moskowitz, Clara. "Criminal Minds Are Different From Yours, Brain Scans
Reveal."LiveScience. Purch, 04 Mar. 2011. Web. 24 May 2017.