Gun Violence

Unless you have been in a cave for the past couple weeks, you have surely heard about the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Today was their first day back in class since the terrible accident and people are still trying to recover from the life changing event. In case you have no clue what I am talking about, I'll explain briefly. On February 14, 2018 a mass shooting occurred in a high school in Florida. 17 people were killed and 14 more were taken to the hospital for injuries. The shooter was Nikolas Jacob Cruz. Since then many politicians including the president have even commented about new legislation and executive action. What makes this a tough subject is that kids were the victims here. People are looking right past the lives of the kids and looking to makes changes without taking time to remember the lives of the lost. Another thing that makes this a tough issue is that we aren't even sure what the issue is here. The obvious one that jumps right out is guns, but because tips were called in 2016 and 2017 that he was going to commit a school shooting, mental illness may be an issue here. Today I want to talk about some ways politicians are coming up with ways to reduce gun violence.

The first way would be stricter background checks. At gun shows someone can walk right in and buy a gun off of a vendor. A bill that first came up after the Sandy Hook Shooting would call for requiring background checks for purchases online and at guns shows. A study shows that 22% of gun sales occur without a background check. Cutting the number down would greatly reduce the amount of people that are not suppose to have a gun in the first place. Although this bill was not passed in 2013, talks about bringing it up again are in circulation. Another background check would try to stop the selling of guns to people on the "No Fly" list.

Another one that is talked about in daily conversation is to raise the age to buy guns. Currently to buy rifles legally in the United States, you must be 18 or older. This call to raise the age plans to increase it to 21 years or older.

One that is very popular is one I personally agree with is banning semi-auto rifles and/or modifications that make a weapon fire fully automatic. Having fired all types of gun with my uncles and cousins, I am aware of how much power are in these weapons. Having to fire 20 rounds in less then 3 seconds will never be needed to protect your house. On that note, I do believe it is justifiable to have a handgun of a small caliber for personal protection. If it is possible criminals could have one, you should be able to have one too.

The one I want to focus on today is that there are talks about arming teachers in the schools. Before I continue on this topic, I want to just give you some background. My mother has been a high school teachers for longer then I have been alive. I went to that high school, had her as a teacher(not a fun experience may I add) and would not think that giving her a gun would help reduce school shootings. Lets say its not my mother directly who would have the right to be armed in school. Lets say a teacher who is experienced in all types of firearms with history in the army is allowed to. In public high schools students outnumber the teachers by a huge ratio. If the students REALLY wanted to, I believe they would be able to overtake that teacher and disarm them of their weapon and even possibly use it against them. People also make mistakes, and mistakes are really not good when weapons are involved.

I hope after reading this you have your own opinion on the subjects. I also encourage you to read about other ways we could stop gun violence especially in schools. I ask that you write a comment below and discus with others about what you believe. One final request is that I hope you are able to respect other peoples opinion and just hear them out. They are not looking for a fight, just simply trying to discuss what they believe.

What is Going on in the Workplace?

As kids we were all taught that you should not judge a book by it's cover. In some senses that may be
true, but really we judge people everyday with or without noticing. Mostly I believe we do this for our safety. For example, lets say you are walking down the street and up ahead their are two people. One is a man dressed in a suit talking on the phone. The other is a man dressed in ragged clothes with his hands in his pockets. Which person are you walking with? Most people tend to pick the man dressed in the suit, but why? Just because he is dressed nicer? People are estimated to make over 200 decisions a day. We do things without knowing because that is how are brains functions. So when does this become an issue on being judgmental? The answer to that is simply in the workplace.

Having diversity in the work place is very important. For a business to be successful, they have to know how every customers thinks, as no customer is the same. Having a diverse staff gives you that extra bonus of more likely being able to relate to a customer, and turning them into a regular. Think about it... Do you ever just go to a store because you get along with the workers over another place?
I worked at a movie theater ever since the week after I turned 16. I grew up in a melting pot of cultures, so I was I hired onto a team filled with diversity. First hand, I can say for the business this was a huge bonus as we all work really well together. Customers were always treated with respect. One of the biggest things I learned there was how to act differently depending on a person age. Young people are usually shy and want nothing but to watch the movie with their friends. Adults are usually in a hurry, getting their just in time for the movie, they didn't want to talk much. Then their is my favorite, senior citizens. They would often times show up an hour before we opened and loved to talk about anything. Changing how I acted towards each customer, gave them all different experiences. The diversity in the workplace gave customers and even better experience as many customers would come in being from a place like Puerto Rico. We would strategically have Puerto Ricans working on the floor. This would give the customer a feeling of comfort as they would have something in common.

It is not lie when you hear women are mistreated in the workforce. We all of heard of the Equal Pay protest and have chants that effectively spreads their message. Women are becoming more prominent in the workforce. Between 1984 and 2009, the number of working women has increased from 44 million to 72 million, Tracey Wilen-Daugenti says. That number is a huge increase, but if women want to really gain reputation, they must continue to increase the number of them in the workforce. The must keep attacking DC with their agenda, until something is change. In recent protest about pro-life and pro-choice, we are able to see what women are able to accomplish.

Act, which demands that women and men have equal pay for equal job content. However, even with that act, we still know their are women who are not paid fairly for their hard work. Women still work hard to try to get equal pay, they often hold

However, BusinessInsider thinks that men are responsible for this big split in wages. Being a male this is likely biased, but I do not think men are responsible for it. Males have just as much competition for jobs are women do. If you want a good paying job you are going to have to work for it. You have to put yourself out there and show to employers what makes you unique and why that could help their company. Business wants leaders who are going to work hard, not people looking to make a decent paycheck.