Romeo and Juliet Reflection

What I learned from reading the play about myself and society in general is that in society today, there isn’t that stigma between being in love or associating yourselves with people of a lower class. In Romeo and Juliet, their love was forbidden, it was shameful that a Capulet and a Montague were in love, they were not allowed to associate themselves together, with each other, in their town of Verona. Romeo was a Montague, of the poorer class, and Juliet a Capulet, of the upper rich class. Their different classes separated their ability to be truly together, to live ‘happily ever after.’ Even though Romeo and Juliet were in love and wanted to be together, they had to sneak around and keep their relationship a secret from the public because if anyone found out they were seeing each other, a penalty or consequence would occur. In society now, there is not that stigma or the rule of different classes of people associating with each other or being in love. Today, there is so much more freedom to be yourself or being with whoever, you want. Money is not such a factor, and lesser worries about society status and discrimination.
In reflecting back on the play, I feel Shakespeare wanted us to learn that love can take people to extreme levels, perform unexpected actions. Romeo and Juliet were madly in love, a romantic love, it became even more extreme when Romeo got banished from Verona, Juliet then became so distraught, not wanting to live anymore, wanting to kill herself. Ultimately at the end of the play, both Romeo and Juliet killed themselves because of their distraught emotions of losing each other, and the inability to be together. Their actions showed how connected they were as well as the sadness that encompassed them both knowing they could not be together, all which lead to the self-inflicted death of Romeo and Juliet.
One should never have to ever go to this level for love; people in love should be allowed to show emotions and be together. This is how society is today, vastly different from Shakespearean times, which is a good thing!
Overall, the play of Romeo and Juliet taught us about the discrimination between classes back then versus now in society. The play also taught us many lessons and many of these lessons were about love. The feeling of love is a warm and joyous feeling every person wants to feel and experience in their lifetime with another human. In no way should it be taken to the extreme that one’s feeling of love is so high that one would take their life for the other.

Racism within Canada with regard to To Kill a Mockingbird

In Canadian society today, racism is seen in how people are divided, judged, and treated differently based on their race and ethnicity. I believe no one person should be treated and viewed differently based on race and ethnicity. All people should be treated and viewed equally because there is nothing different about people internally. People have different skin color, different beliefs, cultures, people do look different externally, but all people, humankind are the same, and all people should be treated as such. In reading the book ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ my overall thoughts on racism were not changed from believing all equal whether they are from a different race or of ethnicity. In the book, racism was demonstrated multiple times throughout the story, sadly, in the way in which we are seeing in present time today. Back in the day, as described in the literature, the white people were harsher with the hateful ‘N-word’ towards African Americans. When reading the book, I was appalled with the casualness and usage of that insufferable word. In today’s world, that word is not stated verbally, nor heard much anymore because it is hateful and discriminating. After reading the book ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ my thoughts about racism may have only grown stronger, conceivably angrier. Racism is anact of discrimination that should not exist, it is saddening and leads to dividing people into a hierarchy of power based solely on their race or ethnicity. Such human discrimination results in labelling human beings who then are treated poorly, no one deserves or should be treated in this diminishing manner. In the past, and still in the present, society, people have created the stereotype that African Americans are dangerous and a threat to people, society. This was seen demonstrated in the United States in 2020 when Geoge Floyd was arrested in a not so typical way. Police officers saw him as a threat because he was a tall African American man, they challenged him to the ground and put their knee on his neck closing his airway which resulted in him not being able to breath and sadly lead to his death. This illustrated racism because no person based on their color of skin, race should be arrested in such a violent manner. If George Floyd had been a white person, the officers would have not seen him as a threat and would have arrested them in a safe and formal way, the way police officers are trained to arrest a person. We need to stop this type of stereotyping because people of colour are the same as every other human being on this earth. Yes, there are some people of colour that are dangerous and a threat to others, but this does not mean that every African American represents a dangerous person and resulting in unequal treatment, judgement, and hate. Equally as important, we as humans have been guilty of joking or mocking other humans of other races based on their colour of skin. This type of action was seen with our own Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, when in his younger years he was seen to have coloured his face black to present himself as Aladdin in a Halloween costume. His costume, this action, especially today in the fight against racism, resulted in our Prime Minister receiving tons of backlash. He was deemed “Black Face” from the Black community and many others saw this as an act of racism because humans have no right to mock or play other races even if it is for a costume, game, or a play production. And finally, another form of racism that has been seen is the hate crimes against races simply because of the country they represent. This was seen in Vancouver over the past two years with hate crimes and actions towards the Chinese people. With the Corona Virus originating in China, the global pandemic with all the restrictions implemented, people took hate actions out on innocent Asian people and their businesses, blaming the pandemic on the Asian people and telling these Asian Canadians, immigrants to ‘go back home, not welcome.’ We as a community need to work together as one and stop these hate crimes if we want to see growth and positivity and equalness in our communities. Racism within Canadian society needs to stop, no race, human being should be treated differently. Throughout Canada, government, and society in general is trying to remove the thought and actions of racism through education, awareness, and acknowledgment. There is a desperate need of a shift towards an equal, human right, and inclusiveness of human race and colour in society. We are seeing this through protests, movements and education, a move in the right direction but a lot more work to be done. From my examples and opinions illustrated, has clearly indicated that racism is a huge problem within Canadian society and around the world. Us as a humans need to work together to protect, stop and bring the acts of racism out of our society and bring in peace and positivity.