The Culture Of Fear Chunk #3

''The Culture Of Fear", by Barry Glassner, in its final chapters it talks about the major things Americans fear. Things like plane wrecks, martians, prejudice people, etc. He begins with the Americans fears' of black men. There are more dangers to black men than white men. ''Black men are four times more likely to be infected with the AIDS virus and twice as likely to suffer from prostate cancer and heart disease than are white men." Between 1980 and 1995 suicides went up 146% among African-American teens. White men have less problems than black men. He said that a College educated black men earn only as much as white men with high school diplomas. He goes on to talk about drugs, one of the major problems happening in this country. "Smack is Back"-the return of heroine, roofie, and other deadly drugs. These drugs are spreading especially teens and young adults. The media talked about a girl named Miki Koontz. She was a homecoming queen, cheerleader, and an above-average student who was on her way to college, that is until she inexplicably became a crackhead and lost her life. She was shot in the head with a rifle because a drug dealer thought she was snitching to the police. He said drugs are returning and killing more than ever and soon drugs will rule this country. Another thing he said Americans fear are flying; their afraid of having a wreck. To avoid plane wreck go to a trustworthy airline, stay away from small planes or a plane in bad shape. A lot of people die because of these reasons, but it is still the safest way to travel. He talks about people who try to be cheap and go to a cheap airline. That's one of major mistakes; 7 out 10 planes will crash. Other than these fears there is one fear that's just ridiculous; martians. He starts to use sarcasm on this subject. These scares come from television shows like ''War Of The Worlds" and books like ''The Invasion From Mars." His final thoughts on these subject is ''That we waste tens of billions of dollars on thing like road rage, metophorical illnesses, and other unimportant things. At election we can choose candidates that proffer programs rather that scares. Or we can go on believing in martian invaders."
Vocabulary:None
Tone:Serious, Sarcastic
Discussion Questions:What is your greatest fear? Does it relate what Barry Glassner wrote? How did this fear come to be?