Just Think.

Lately I have been torn. I don't really think I get to point out my opinions because it is either rude or not the right time. I do not like disrespecting someone on their own facebook let alone in person in front of their friends. I guess thats what a blog is for. But I have worked in very shallow places for the past two or three jobs I have had. I guess maybe you could call me a hypocrite. I will take that title because I do what I must to survive in this world, I work at places I don't really agree with. I live in a "wealthy" shallow country that I am sometimes embarrassed to admit I live in. I continue to work on the hypocrite situation.
Anyways, I am torn because I am bothered by how our country lives but I don't know how to handle it or change it while also surviving and getting by.
I worked at Hollister. The most shallow and judgmental store. And it is directed towards teens. I worked for two sad years at a store that told heavy people you are not good enough for our clothes, poor people that they didn't deserve our brand name, and 'ugly' people they were not beautiful enough to work there. My job title was Model. I was told how to dress, look and talk. I was told to wear tight girl clothes. I think the only time I enjoyed my job by the end is when people didn't fit into our unhealthy skinny clothes and I got to send them to American Eagle and gave AE business instead. The thing is though, every time I said I worked there people would complain about the strong smell or the darkness, and yet every shift I had people were still coming in, even during the fall of the economy, buying more shirts, shorts and jeans. People were buying $200 worth of clothing in one round of shopping for their 12 year old..and coming back in 3 months later to spend that again when they grew out of it. I wish I was a stronger christian, I wish I could say I don't judge...but I do. I live in a world..no I live in a country where people are more worried about status than they are about bills.
I went from Hollister to Starbucks, don't get me wrong, I love my job and the regulars are fun people. But the regulars are day in day out regulars. That means some people who by a 4.50 drink at least 20 days a month spend on average $1000 a year at my store.
You may ask, Allena, why is this is so passionate and harsh? Because of Time. Specifically the cover.

This girl was not burned, or in an accident. No. This girl was 'taught' a lesson by her husband and in-laws who were told by the Taliban to teach her this lesson. She ran from her In-laws and husband before this happened because they were abusive, this was her punishment..What you cannot see is her ears. If if her hair was not there, you still wouldn't be able to see them, because they brutally cut those off as well.  She was held down by her in-laws as her own husband did this. And while this was happening, I most likely was making a carmel macciato for a guest. This is our world. In one part of the world a person is fainting from pain brought onto her by her own partner, in another part a person is selling overpriced clothes to a impressionable teenager. I am worked up about more than just this. I live in a country that brags about freedom, brags that things like this, what happened to Aisha, won't happen here. But things have happened here, on our soil, that are despicable and awful. After 9/11 at least 8 or more Muslims were killed just days after the towers fell because of hate crimes, one of the murders stated "I did what every American wanted to do after Sept. 11 but didn't have the nerve to". One murder decapitated a Muslim co-worker, a policeman shot a Muslim he pulled over and on and on these stories go. But none of the those victims families got money from the 9/11 funds. None were headline stories. I don't recall a lot of people talking about the Muslims who were killed in the 9/11 attack besides the terrorists. One police cadet/ambulance driver, Salman Hamdani, who happened to be a life long Muslim went missing the day of the attack. His family was questioned to see if he was a terrorist the week of the attack, and for six months the government treated his family as if Salman was a terrorist. Six months after the attack they found his remains under the North Tower with his medic bad, Salmon died attempting to save lives, not take them. They did nothing to clear his or his families name.
This is the world we live in. A world where certain mourners have priority over others. I am torn because I am an American citizen but I feel as if I was hurt less by 9/11 than others because I am okay with the building of the Cultural Center aka Mosque in New York. I feel less American, which I shouldn't. I should feel more American, shouldn't I? I want equality and freedom, no matter the religion or race? I got lucky, being born white. I did not pick this skin or my family. I don't fear my life everyday I wake up, no wait, some times I do. But not because of my skin, no...because of my sexuality. People are spit on, stabbed, beat and killed because of who they fall in love with as well. I do not get the world we live in. But back to N. Y., my opinion is just that, an opinion. It does not have any say in what really happens, it will be read by maybe 5 or 6 people and it will end at that. I don't know the hearts of the Muslims building the Center, for all I know they could be terrorist, but hey so could you. All I know, is I was told to turn the other cheek, so that's what I'm going to do. Accept them, even when I don't always want to. I wasn't told to just turn the other cheek, I was told to love them. Love. As Christ loved the sinners who nailed him to the cross because the did not know what they were doing. Why can I turn my cheek to the Muslims? Because when I go to church, I worship in a building with people who hate my 'kind', I serve coffee to people who vote against me and Dana's legal rights, I bite my cheek when people spit on me, and more than that, I defend them. I tell gay and lesbian people who fear and hate christians or conservatives to cut them slack, because "They do not know what they are doing." I am my own enemy, my own oxymoron. I am a gay christian. Not only that but I rarely get along with extreme gay people who shove their sexual orientation on other people, but because of how I look, short hair and clothes, people feel like they are allowed to call me a dyke or butch. I hate being called that. I can only imagine how a Muslim feels when called a terrorist. I relate with some of those Muslims because they are not just their religion, they are what their citizenship says, Americans..and yet, they are feared and hated by their own kind.

I don't know why they picked the building they picked to build that center, I do know the man who owned the Burlington coat factory building had been trying to sell it for years before they bought the building and no one had wanted it. But either way, they are our fellow citizens so if we disagree, at least do it with respect, unlike some who shout vulgar and hate filled things at them.

With all this said, think about where your money is going, think about the other side of the world, think before you speak and most of all, just think.