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Hope & Creation

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cc&d v186

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Dark Matter:
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Employment&Independence Issues

Janet Kuypers editorial

    You know, I wasn’t going to write an editorial this month, but I saw some notes for potential editorials scotch-taped to my computer monitor. They all relate in some strange way about lookinbg for jobs in America and making it on your own, so I needed to share...

    A lot of these little snippets are from first-hand stories I have heard, so I’m sorry if I don’t back everything up with a ton of references. Think of these are grave-vine news about real life stories...

    Someone who was interviewing people, looked over resumes and said about one, that they “couldn’t tell what she was by her name.” Meaning, they couldn’t tell if the person was white, African American, Asian, Indian... And I thought it was stunning that someone was actually concerned about ethnically who this potential employee might be, and I was scared that someone might actually use that information to judge a person before they even had an interview.

    But when it comes to knowing people by first impressions, I know a story of one woman who applied for a job, was highly qualified for the position, and went to the interview in her burka. Well, I’m sure that turned heads a bit since you don’t often seeing people in burkas in your everyday life... but after the interview, she wasn’t hired. The employer’s explanation was that other coworkers may fear her by her dress. You know, even if there was no reason to fear her. Doesn’t that tell you something about the mentality of the average American, that people would be afraid to learn anything of another culture. I mean, I knew a Muslim girl by birth once, and the only thing I could infer about her was that she seemed only interested in men (she even slept with a male friend of mine while dating another male friend of mine). I knew a converted Muslim who told me that he would pray to Allah for me for my wedding, too, I mean, these people are not terrorists and are nothing to inherently fear (unless one of them might try to take a man away from his woman).

    Let’s think about high school students worrying about getting jobs as they leave school... I have heard that guidance counselors, while counseling students before college, would see their students use their cell phone to call their parents to help them answer career questions.
    Now that I’ve brought this up, and I have to go down this tangent and mention how the cell phone, on some levels, is becoming the longest umbilical cord. Parents help some students select classes; there is even in some colleges a “parental dorm,” where parents can stay for two to three weeks while their child adjusts to being on their own. Dr. Richard Mullendore, a professor of college student affairs administration at the University of Georgia, even referred to student he has seen that would call their parents avout anything from an argument with a roommate to changing the oil of their car. He was even stunned to learn that some of these students would call their parents for or five times a day.
    Now I’m sorry, but I can’t imagine my parents wanting to “help me adjust” if I went away to school; actually, I couldn’t wait to get out on my own. But if kids are too scared to go out on their own for school, how will they ever be strong enough to get a job - and be successful at it? I mean if todays students — today’s yound adults — haven’t learned howe to solve conflicts, worrying about rage and religion conflicting with job opportunities isn’t our only set of problems.

    P.S.: I want to close this with a clip from the New York Post 08/08/07 (that I found in News of the Weird 10/21/07), that shows that even when people have jobs, they might not be able to keep it: “Maritza Tamayo, principal of New York City’s Unity Center for Urban Technologies high school, was fired in August following revelations that she was so concerned about the unruly behavior of some students that she brought in a Santeria priestess in December 2006 to cleanse the building of evil spirits. The students were on holiday break, but workers found chicken blood sprinkled around the building, and Tamayo and two other women in white dresses were seen, chanting, with one balancing a silver tray on her head, holding 40 lit candles.”



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