Personal Essay: Liberty City

Gun violence is a major problem in Chicago. There has been an estimate of nearly six hundred shooting victims in a matter of three months into the New Year. It is very sad how so many innocent people lose their lives due to such violence. Even the safest neighborhoods have become dangerous because of ignorant gang members who settle their problems with rival gangs by shooting each other. It is hard to feel safe in a community where you fear being at the wrong place at the wrong time.

In 1965 a group of students from Sydney University formed a group, called Student Action for Aborigines, that’s purpose was to draw attention to the inequality between white and indigenous Australia based in New South Wales. It also hoped to decrease the social discrimination between white Australia and indigenous Australia as well as give support to aboriginals to withstand the discrimination they face daily.

Colonial Williamsburg was founded as the Capitol of the Virginia Colony in 1699. The city was preserved by Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin and now shows an accurate representation of what life was like back then. It is used to educate our generation about how people in the early 1700s got along with their daily life. For example the blacksmiths, the guide explains how apprenticeship worked and the difficulties of their task. There are many other ways they preserve the city, along with the food, transportation, and much more. Colonial Williamsburg was a learning experience that adults and children both learn from.

Los Angeles, the “gang capital” of the nation. Over than 450 gangs in the city, some have been in existence since the 1950’s. All of these gangs combined have an individual total of about 45,000. Gang affiliation has taken a big role in the city of Los Angeles, in the last 3 years there has been a total of about 16,000 crimes, 491 of them were homicides. Gang affiliation has taken a big role in the lives of many young people, falling into drugs, and maybe in the course of committing murder or other crimes.

Active shooter statistics released by the F.B.I. reveal a total of 219 incidents that occurred between the years 2000-2016 in which forty-three could be considered an inner city by definition (“2000”). Research compiled by James Alan Fox shows that the number of mass shootings has averaged twenty per year for the previous thirty years (Domenech). Fox is a criminologist at Northeastern University in Boston. This means that less than twenty percent of all mass shootings occur within inner cities based on the faintest of definitions. Additionally, large cities experience an overwhelming majority of gang violence and criminal activity (Doak). It is estimated that more than half of all homicides in major cities are considered gang related (Whittaker). If you factor out gang activity from mass shootings, the numbers fall even further. Inner cities experience heightened criminal activity in general due to concentrated areas of higher population, but statistical evidence shows that mass shootings occur more frequently in rural and suburban areas.

Chicago has been known to be the gang capital of the United States. In 2016 Chicago

In the early twentieth century, East Liberty was a flourishing business district with affordable housing for its residents. Decades later, this neighborhood’s prosperity declined as residents began fleeing to other areas and businesses were forced to shut down. This left East Liberty in diminished conditions, like the conditions depicted in John Edgar Wideman’s story of Homewood in Our Time. Urban renewal efforts were quickly adopted for East Liberty, but these efforts failed. Today, the area is in a state of continuous revitalization, which is beneficial for the economy and some citizens, but African Americans don’t always benefit from these changes. Chris Ivy explores this division in his documentary Easy of Liberty. Failed urban renewal efforts of the sixties and continuing gentrification have transformed East Liberty’s booming business district into a racially divided neighborhood.

Los Angeles dubbed the City of Gangs has earned its reputation. Gangs which were organized as a form of community protection between black males evolved to criminal

Chicago has always been known as a city full of crime and hate and more recently it has gotten even worse. In 2016, Chicago had 762 homicides this is more than what New York and Los Angles have combined, mind you two of the largest cities in the nation have had less homicides in their cities than Chicago has had. Chicago not only had 762 homicides, but also had 1,100 more shootings than they had previously in 2015. In comparison New York, which is the largest city in the nation, had only 334 homicides in 2016 and Los angles following behind with only 294.With all the homicides and shootings it has made the issue of gun violence a huge topic when pertaining to this city. In only the past year, police have retrieved 8,300 illegal guns. Another topic that has been brought into societies eyes is with the severe increase of violence is the areas where gangs are most typically active, these areas being areas with low-income families and predominantly black areas.

America is commonly called the “Land of the Free”, but the abundance of liberties, and liberties for all, has not always been the case. The Puritans were some of the first to settle in the New World, but they were self-interested and did not come with the purpose of creating a free state for all. As time progressed, so did their believes, and by the time Tocqueville arrived from France, liberty was an important aspect of American life. So important that people would fight and die for it. Tocqueville, while impressed at the amount liberty and freedoms that citizens had, believed that America had a long way to go before it could call itself a truly free country. Fast forward over a hundred years later, and John Rawls lived in a time were the

Being the first female patrol sergeant in my agency left me facing many obstacles I did not see coming. What should have been a blessing in my career was almost a curse. Experiencing different levels of discrimination was not something that I would have predicted. I thought everyone would welcome me with open arms. I had no idea the road ahead of me was paved with that kind of evil. Perhaps I was too naive to realize that existed, after all it was the 90’s. Overcoming these obstacles during my 22 years in law enforcement has made me stronger not just as a woman, but as a person.

Every time I hear this song it makes me long to leave all of my responsibilities and head off to the city of dreams. A trip to New York has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl. I have always wanted to visit the place of tall buildings, history, and where culture is intertwined with its people. I have wanted to live the fast pace life of a New Yorker, where I could stand outside and see, smell, and taste all of the experiences that this city has to offer. I have been building and building this ideal image in my mind for so long. If I ever get to New York, will I be disappointed by the city that never sleeps? The city that is a part of almost every movie I watch. Can New York live up to the expectations I have

Ever since the founding of Police Departments, women have comprised only a small percentage. Back then, women accounted for about 2% of sworn police personnel. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, women today represent about “13% of police agencies nationwide”. Despite legislation laws to integrate more women into policing, they are still under represented in law enforcement agencies. Although things seem to be improving for women, gender equality and full assimilation into policing is still being fought by these women who wish to break into this male dominated profession. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the obstacles women in policing still face and to point out the many strides women in policing have made since their

          The city I propose as a perfect city, would be as close to an ecocity as possible, although have some differences. For example, for electrical needs, I would suggest the city have a solar power plant, but on those desperate times, energy would be bought from other electrical plants from nearby towns or states.

     The perception of liberty has been an issue that has bewildered the human race for a long time. It seems with every aspiring leader comes a new definition of liberty, some more realistic than others. We have seen, though, that some tend to have a grasp of what true liberty is. One of these scholars was the English philosopher and economist J.S. Mill. Mill's On Liberty provided a great example of what, in his opinion, liberty is and how it is to be protected. In this essay we will examine Mill's ideals concerning liberty and point out a few things he may not have been realistic about.