What We Talk About When We Talk About Guns Project Reflection
- What was your viewpoint regarding firearms, their uses and misuses, and legislation coming in to the project?
My viewpoint on firearms, is that they are not the enemy of the general population. In my opinion the “Gun Issue” in our country is an issue of gun control/gun policy, it is not an issue that everyday citizens have access to guns to hunt, and protect themselves if they so choose. The issue is, the way we our enforcing gun control in our country currently makes it easy for someone with mental health issues, or other issues to buy a gun, that shouldn't have a gun. The easy access to firearms for almost any American, can be contributed to the rise in shootings, as well as can explain the blackmarket for reselling legally purchased weapons, to those who have been flagged and should not have weapons.
- In what ways was that viewpoint challenged by our class conversations, your research, and the exhibition?
My viewpoint on firearms was sometimes challenged by our class conversations. Half of our class agreed with me on the “Gun Issue” and the other half had a more conservative viewpoint that contradicted mine. Although all the students felt the same way about the shootings; it was devastating and cruel. But they did not believe that guns were the issue in these instances. They believed it was more related to mental health and that the government may be trying to take away their guns. What I see is that gun control is not the government taking the peoples guns but rather they are trying to determine a way to make it harder for people with severe mental illnesses and a history of violence to retrieve a gun. Our opinions clashed a lot when some students decided they weren’t going to participate in the 17 minutes of silence for each student that was murdered in the Florida shooting. I thought this was disrespectful and fully immature because they considered it a protest against their right to own firearms. I believed that it was just to remember and respect the lost lives because we too are students, and are subject to possible situations similar to that one.
- What adversity did you face during this project and how did you overcome it/make your way through it?
During this project, I had the adversity, that at some points I was very unsure where this project was heading. I believed this exhibition had a large chance of being unsuccessful, so at some points I was somewhat unmotivated to be productive in class. I percevered from this adversity by logging the amount of time I spent on time, and off time, in each class, and at the end of the day I would add however many minutes I was off-task to my dedicated homework time, ensuring I was still productive even on days when my ADHD made it hard for me to focus in class.
- In what ways did you contribute to your group and the class as a whole?
I contributed to my group by helping compile the research on each countries gun policies, in order to understand the greater socio economic situation involving gun control. I also helped my group create the timeline for canada, conceive the idea to make a walk through visual timeline, and helped to build the timeline and other displays in the exhibition, overall I feel this exhibition was a success.
- What can you point to in the exhibition that is yours (e.g. something you made, researched, etc.)
The timeline, also large portions of the Australia and Canada country profiles, as well as a bunch of great project research.
My viewpoint on firearms, is that they are not the enemy of the general population. In my opinion the “Gun Issue” in our country is an issue of gun control/gun policy, it is not an issue that everyday citizens have access to guns to hunt, and protect themselves if they so choose. The issue is, the way we our enforcing gun control in our country currently makes it easy for someone with mental health issues, or other issues to buy a gun, that shouldn't have a gun. The easy access to firearms for almost any American, can be contributed to the rise in shootings, as well as can explain the blackmarket for reselling legally purchased weapons, to those who have been flagged and should not have weapons.
- In what ways was that viewpoint challenged by our class conversations, your research, and the exhibition?
My viewpoint on firearms was sometimes challenged by our class conversations. Half of our class agreed with me on the “Gun Issue” and the other half had a more conservative viewpoint that contradicted mine. Although all the students felt the same way about the shootings; it was devastating and cruel. But they did not believe that guns were the issue in these instances. They believed it was more related to mental health and that the government may be trying to take away their guns. What I see is that gun control is not the government taking the peoples guns but rather they are trying to determine a way to make it harder for people with severe mental illnesses and a history of violence to retrieve a gun. Our opinions clashed a lot when some students decided they weren’t going to participate in the 17 minutes of silence for each student that was murdered in the Florida shooting. I thought this was disrespectful and fully immature because they considered it a protest against their right to own firearms. I believed that it was just to remember and respect the lost lives because we too are students, and are subject to possible situations similar to that one.
- What adversity did you face during this project and how did you overcome it/make your way through it?
During this project, I had the adversity, that at some points I was very unsure where this project was heading. I believed this exhibition had a large chance of being unsuccessful, so at some points I was somewhat unmotivated to be productive in class. I percevered from this adversity by logging the amount of time I spent on time, and off time, in each class, and at the end of the day I would add however many minutes I was off-task to my dedicated homework time, ensuring I was still productive even on days when my ADHD made it hard for me to focus in class.
- In what ways did you contribute to your group and the class as a whole?
I contributed to my group by helping compile the research on each countries gun policies, in order to understand the greater socio economic situation involving gun control. I also helped my group create the timeline for canada, conceive the idea to make a walk through visual timeline, and helped to build the timeline and other displays in the exhibition, overall I feel this exhibition was a success.
- What can you point to in the exhibition that is yours (e.g. something you made, researched, etc.)
The timeline, also large portions of the Australia and Canada country profiles, as well as a bunch of great project research.
With Justice for all Project
Our goal in this project was to raise awareness on homelessness in our community and inform community members on the various resources, challenges, and solutions pertaining to homelessness. Also, we wanted to bring our community together to share a meal and understand the diverse perspectives on the topic.Leading into this project we spent a lot of time learning about very related topics, to help us grow in our understanding of many complex issues of justice that are going on, or have gone on within our country/world. We studied many things previous to starting this project to further/question understanding of Justice. Some of the things we studied include; Dr. King’s ideas of Civil Disobedience and his definitions of what makes a just v. unjust law, various moral and political philosophies of justice that have influenced our legal system including Deontology, Utilitarianism, John Rawls’ and Libertarianism. After doing this we went on to researching instances of injustice within our own community, we also facilitated many conversations around addiction, mental health, local economics, homelessness, and immigration; both on a national and local scale. After this we as a class decided it would be most effective if we all work on the same instance of injustice. After many long debates, forming research groups, and multiple rounds of votes, we as a class chose to take on the issue of homelessness in Durango. We then researched homelessness in our community even more in depth, hearing from various community organizations who work on the issue (Axis, Ed Aber, Food Not Bombs, Veteran Homestead Project). Finally we as a class were privileged enough to be able to get a tour of the Test Tracks, a community of people experiencing homelessness. During this trip, we spoke with many people experiencing homelessness and I feel that helped me, and our entire class really feel more connected to this issue. After this we were given a pretty free range to find a project we could connect to, or that we are passionate about. My group chose a documentary.
For our exhibition, we decided to have a dinner, provided to anyone who wanted to attend the exhibition. We invited many organizations that we worked with throughout this project, some of which participated and hosted their own educational booths at the exhibition. My group invited everyone we interviewed during our filming process. We also hosted several guest speakers, to help brief and further educate the community about the issue. My favorite part of the night was when we showed our documentary and one of the woman we interviewed told us how much she enjoyed it and how much it meant to her.
Overall I feel I pushed myself a lot in this project. Most of the things that we did during the course of creating this video are not things I am normally used to doing, so a lot of the skills we needed we had to learn along the way. I spent plenty of time out of school helping edit, film, and conduct interviews, skills that I already had some experience in, but I was very new, and it definitely took awhile to get these dialed in. I think we took the easy way a little bit because there is a bunch that our documentary does not cover, but keeping in mind that we were supposed to keep our videos rather brief/short instead of longer and more in depth I still believe that we did a good job. However, I do wish we had gotten a wider range of perspectives and also made it more educational by applying more of the content and statistics we researched in class.
I think that this project really changed me in the way that I think I am much less quick to judge, and much more open. I learned a lot about justice, and feel I have changed the way I think about what is morally right vs wrong. This project also really opened my eyes towards my own implicit biases, and evolved my perspective around homelessness; both on a local and national scale.
For our exhibition, we decided to have a dinner, provided to anyone who wanted to attend the exhibition. We invited many organizations that we worked with throughout this project, some of which participated and hosted their own educational booths at the exhibition. My group invited everyone we interviewed during our filming process. We also hosted several guest speakers, to help brief and further educate the community about the issue. My favorite part of the night was when we showed our documentary and one of the woman we interviewed told us how much she enjoyed it and how much it meant to her.
Overall I feel I pushed myself a lot in this project. Most of the things that we did during the course of creating this video are not things I am normally used to doing, so a lot of the skills we needed we had to learn along the way. I spent plenty of time out of school helping edit, film, and conduct interviews, skills that I already had some experience in, but I was very new, and it definitely took awhile to get these dialed in. I think we took the easy way a little bit because there is a bunch that our documentary does not cover, but keeping in mind that we were supposed to keep our videos rather brief/short instead of longer and more in depth I still believe that we did a good job. However, I do wish we had gotten a wider range of perspectives and also made it more educational by applying more of the content and statistics we researched in class.
I think that this project really changed me in the way that I think I am much less quick to judge, and much more open. I learned a lot about justice, and feel I have changed the way I think about what is morally right vs wrong. This project also really opened my eyes towards my own implicit biases, and evolved my perspective around homelessness; both on a local and national scale.