Positive Sociology

I'll never forget my trip to Cambodia.  I was 26 or 27 and was itching to travel.  At that point, I was nearing the end of grad school and realized that I hadn't traveled many places outside of the US.  I had been to Korea to visit family, stopped over in Japan once, and been to drunken beach parties in Rosarito Beach, but none of these trips really "counted" in my mind.  I wanted something that was going to change my perspective. And so, I decided to visit Cambodia.  You might be wondering, 'why Cambodia?'  To make a long story short, I have always been interested in the capacity for human resiliency. As a young man, I read lots of stories about the Genocide.  These stories haunted me.  But, I was even more amazed at stories of people forgiving others for killing their family.  Similarly, other things I read mentioned how Khmer people were amongst the most friendly and hospitable in the world.  These things always struck a nerve wit...

I was having trouble sleeping the other night and watched Valentine Road , an HBO documentary about the murder of a cross-dressing boy named Larry King.  The documentary is sad and infuriating.  It raises painful issues about LGBT intolerance and reminded me of Boys Don't Cry . Larry King was brutally murdered for being "different." I won't give too much away, but the documentary tells the story of Larry King. King, an orphaned biracial boy, had a crush on a white classmate named Brandon McInerney.  On Valentine's day, King approached McInerney and gave him a Valentine's card.  This was humiliating to McInerney, who lost face in front of his peers.  McInerney later brought a loaded revolver with him to school and shot King twice in the back of the head.  King would later die on life support. The documentary isn't stylish, but the filmmakers portray both sides of this traumatic event.  They interviewed Larry King's friends, teachers who later te...