Sociology

When walking away from Sociology class I can't help reviewing everything I have learned and not feeling a little resentment for my fellow American.  Who were we to decide who was fit to be lynched, who we were to decide the fate of over 60,000 people to be involuntarily sterilized in the early 1900's.  Who were we to bring hate to other races, genders, social classes etc?  What gave us the right to judge one another, and really where did it all begin?  Is it anyone that speaks another dialect, where's different clothes, is brought up in a low income social class?  Yes, sociology places all these questions in my head that I had not had before.  I listen to the things we have done, the acts that were carried out as groups not just one.  I listen to our many faults from our past, and how wrong we were to so many people of different races, ethnic backgrounds and just to people that didn't just meet the standards of those in power.  People turned away and shunned.  We did this, not another country, but we did this.  I would never do this to someone, but I place myself in that we.  Why?  Because I am a citizen of the United States.  I am a member of this society as a whole, though learning these things makes me not want to be part of what we have done.  We have destroyed lives, taken lives, we have condemned lives and made people suffer.  Though "we" say we are number 1, we are above all others, we are the ones in power.  Are we? Really?  I look at how we condemn others, how we have slaughtered our ideals all over the media, in papers on the internet.  We have marketed ourselves as the land of the free, but what I am learning shows me a different side of America.  It shows me that yes we have grown since the early days, but we still have not gone so far as to even remotely call ourselves-"the best".  I am ashamed to learn of how we treated individuals in the lynchings.  How many people watched people suffer at the hands of others, and no one did anything to put a stop to it.  I am saddened to see those that lost their lives in the Tuskegee Experiment, and to learn of the 60,000 people that were involuntarily sterilized because they didn't meet the standards of those around them.  I see that hate crimes still exist today, and if anything they are on the rise.  I see people still kill one another just because they are another race, gender, sexual preference.  I see rash violence and people hurting one another more openly these days.  If we are supposed to learn from our mistakes, and we are to be growing and learning, why, why does there have to be so much hate?  Isn't there enough people alive, walking the earth today brave enough to take a stand and have others follow.  Cannot we stand together for the purpose of the good.  We can stand together in war, we can stand together in hate, and we can stand together to serve a purpose to raise money, to avenge our enemies.  Why is it that we cannot stand together in peace?  Why?