Analyzing Tlc's Song 'Waterfalls'

Ever since the first cases of what eventually came to be known as AIDS were diagnosed in the early 1980s, people with HIV/AIDS have been stigmatized. Over time, there have been many misconceptions about this disease. Even though there have been many discoveries, and treatments for HIV have improved over time, there are still many people who understand very little about this disease. This lack of understanding, along with fear, misinformation about how the disease is transmitted, and “moral” judgments made about the types of people who contract HIV, all have led to stigmatization of, and discrimination against, people who are living with HIV/AIDS. Understanding the stigmatization of people with HIV/AIDS is an important social justice issue because that stigmatization can result in people with HIV being insulted, rejected, gossiped about, excluded from family and social activities, fired, and even jailed. People with HIV are no different from people suffering from other chronic diseases. Instead of being alienated, they have a right to be treated with fairness, respect, and dignity.

Four years earlier he had been asked by his local hospital to come in for an Aids test. But the stigma surrounding the condition meant his family were not given a definitive picture.” - https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/jul/11/health.aids1

The dawn of the AIDS crisis in the early 1980’s prompted delayed waves of responses sweeping out across America. First impacting a scattering of gay men in San Francisco, the disease gained the stigma of being a “gay disease” that fascinated the nation as health systems and communities struggled to cope with its rapid spread. However, one man, seemingly unaffected by the mix of panic and curiosity, did not react. The Ronald Reagan administration has historically been criticized for its lack of response to the AIDS crisis. Many different aspects of society were instead forced to step up and carry the burden of slowing and responding to the crisis, in a reactionary shift. The Reagan administration’s lackluster response to the AIDS crisis of the

There may be some blacks or minorities who remain poor because of their personal characteristics, but the majority of poor blacks are not different from others in motivations and aspirations. In fact, many poor people work incredibly hard at low paying jobs in order to barely get by. The most important causes of poverty lie in the power relations of society, and not the cultural characteristics of the poor individuals. The experiences of poverty have an impact on an individual's disposition and psychological state. Poverty could cause an individual to behave in particular ways, but the main difference between the poor and the rest of society is the opportunities and circumstances the individual’s encounter. It is not their personalities, attributes or values. Blacks continue to be discriminated against in employment and housing, which only contributes to poverty. The majority of African Americans are not poor because they choose not to work, but are poor because of the continuous discrimination from the dominant white race. Poor black Americans should face the same political, economic, and housing conditions as poor white Americans, but this is not the case. Because of continuing discrimination, poor black families do not live in integrated neighborhoods with comparable white families. In addition,

People that have AIDS or HIV are more sensitive to sharing their health information than others because it could cost them their job. The people that contract these diseases are subject to scrutiny from the public. Since people automatically think that they are gay or lesbian but they are not the only ones that can get HIV or AIDS. When a person is revealed to have HIV or AIDS, he or she may be immediately discriminated against. HIV and AIDS require lifetime treatment that is very expensive to treat (HHS.gov, 2006). Unauthorized disclosure of a person’s positive HIV or AIDS status can lead to job loss; cancellation of insurance; evictions; and loss of friends and colleagues. The United States has developed a set of standards to keep a person’s HIV or AIDS status confidential as well as their other medical conditions. This is called the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. All information is kept private from anyone except that person a

Poverty leads to insufficient opportunities, especially in college education. For instance, according to U.S. Department of Education, students who do not enter college or drop out of their classes are “predominantly persons from low-income families.” In support of this argument, the article states that “only 21 percent of those with family income of less than $25,000 were highly qualified for admission at a four-year institution” compared to the 56 percent of students with family income above $75,000. Therefore, students with bad economic conditions struggle with attending university even after entering it. The problem is that the African Americans race gets the harshest disadvantage from their poor economic conditions. U.S. Department of Health & Human Services publishes that almost 40 percent of African Americans under 18 are below the national poverty line, which is three-times higher than their white counterparts. This explicitly proves that unequal economic conditions are the main reason for inequality in education; African Americans are the most disadvantaged. Furthermore, the correlation between poor economic conditions and a lack of education among African Americans creates a chain of inequality. The poor economic backgrounds of African Americans obstruct their children from attending colleges and subsequently, the lack of higher education makes

With the help of government programs such as the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) as well as multiple other methods of sociological research and social justice work, there have been shifts toward better understanding this disease, those which are living with it, and the societal impact one’s own prejudices can make toward an individual living with AIDS. However, discrepancies still exist within how to properly educate others on the disease, how to recognize it as a disability within the context of our society, and how we must reconcile stigmas that play a role in plaguing any sort of positive conversation on the topic. With well-informed citizens on the issues of HIV and AIDS patients, not only can we reduce the stigma associated with the illness, but also work toward medical advancements that assist those living with HIV in a nondiscriminatory manner.

The disparity facing African-Americans in education is cyclic in nature in that if a parent lacks the proper education required to possess a high earning power and as a result become another statistic of the lower class of the economy, hence being unable to provide their children with resources such as tutoring and other services that would help provide educational equity for them, these children are stuck lagging behind their upper-class peers that have access to these resources, leaving them with a lesser quality of education and limiting both their future earning power and their future children’s exposure to better educational resources, hence the cycle of educational disparity that plagues the African-Americans as a race.

As African-American youths, poverty is one of the challenges they struggle to overcome in their everyday life. This is a major issue that has held a great deal of them back from achieving many goals they would have loved to achieve. Their parents’ inability to provide all their needs has discouraged them from taking a few strides in the right direction.

Among the 13.4 million low-income families with children, 22 percent are African Americans (HHS, 2015). The average median household income for an African American family was $36, 515 in 2015, which was $24, 879 less than a non-Hispanic family’s income (HHS, 2015). The data from the U.S. Census Bureau indicated that there was 25.4 percent African Americans living below the poverty level, two times more than that of non-Hispanic Caucasians (HHS, 2015). A direct cause of poverty among African Americans is unemployment. By 2015, the unemployment rate for African Americans was 11.4 percent, which was twice than that of non-Hispanic Caucasians (HHS,

The younger generation of African Americans is also severely affected by poverty. 45.8% of young black children reside under the poverty line where as only 14.5% of white children do. Unfortunately, black children are at a socioeconomic disadvantage that makes them more vulnerable than any other racial groups to live in areas of highly concentrated poverty where they are at greater risks of being involved with or exposed to violence leading to psychological issues later in life. 52.1% of black children live in single parent homes as the rate of marriage among the African American demographic has seen a steep decline during the recession compared to the white population. African American children are less likely to have proper nutrition and immunization. For these children, concentration on education is often

In 1994, a girl group named TLC released a song named Waterfalls. The song served as a warning, establishing a new character in each verse, and then having them jump into some pretty serious situations, all of which ended in disaster. The song’s message, is then summed up in the first line of the chorus, which reads, “Don’t go chasing waterfalls,” a metaphor that means not to get ahead of yourself and start something just because it looks appealing, as the man in the second verse did when he decided to be unprotected and intimate with a promiscuous women. The message is both important, and very strongly argued with the given examples, but the metaphor itself, can be argued based on how you view waterfalls. Many, including TLC, see waterfalls as dangerous.

The song, “River” is by Eminem, featuring Ed Sheeran. It is about a guy who is unhappy in his relationship, and cheats on his girlfriend with another woman. The woman gets pregnant, and the guy made her abort the child, because he did not want to be with her or have that responsibility. Afterwards, he regrets his decisions and wonders what his life would be like if he did not make the woman abort their baby. The overall purpose of this song is to make people understand that the decisions they make in the present could have a significant impact on their future.

Over 71% of Euro-American children performed at a higher grade level compared to African American children; these children who tend to live in lower-income families frequently perform worse than middle-class families. This lack of performance follows an affected child throughout their education and later leads to a deficit in the number of students graduating high school and college (4). Even if a poverty-stricken child graduated, many lead the same lifestyle and remain in the same social-class that their parents lived in. However, whether the parents have limited education or a lack of wealth, they can still provide their children with the

Summer hit “Blurred Lines” is one of the radio’s most played songs currently. The song is placed at number one on America’s top 40 charts for the week of September 14th. While it is popular, the lyrics paint a story of someone who wants the singer, but is a good girl. The message of the song is blurring lines of morality. Not only is the song soliciting sexual themes, but it goes as far as using derogatory names towards the said good girl. Also, the song has strong themes of guilting someone into sex, claiming that not many can refuse T.I.’s pimping. The song