Ever since I’ve moved to new york, I’ve seen a lot of things, some things that have amazed me and some things that have shocked me. New York is a beautiful city when one looks at it from the outside, but as we go deeper, we can see the people around us and how loud, crowded and dangerous the city is. But this is what I think so far because I still haven’t gotten a chance to know the city that well. The one thing that I’ve noticed a lot amongst this chaos was the homeless people around me. The weird thing about this was, that some of them looked homeless, but didn’t act like they were, or maybe some acted like they were homeless but didn’t look like one. I remember walking down 8th avenue and seeing a bunch of people just sleeping on the sides of the road, some were near times square, and all I could think about is, “why don’t they just get jobs?”. I found that very interesting because these people looked intelligent, they were smart enough to make a tiny tent for themselves in the corner of a block. It was clear that they could read and write, as they had signboards next to them. I even think I saw a lady with a laptop under all her clothes. that’s when it struck me, that some of these people are just here, because bankruptcy led them there, and now that they don’t have a place to live they can’t do simple things like sending out job applications, because you obviously need a mailing address and a mailbox for that. Many employers wouldn’t even consider homeless people for job openings. they have the same misconceptions about them as everyone else does. Addiction may play a part here, most people think that addiction prevents homeless people from looking for work. Not all homeless people are addicted to drugs, but most people think that they are, including employers. Most people think this is the major reason homeless people don’t get jobs, and it may be true for many chronically homeless people. I think the main context about this topic is homelessness in general, and the exigence would be why can’t they get jobs. The main audience who are most likely to react to this analysis would be the employers, who choose not to hire these people for jobs. and I am looking forward to getting to know more about this topic.

Something I feel passionate about is the issue of youth mental health awareness in the US and talking about/ normalizing youth mental health awareness. Mental health awareness is an issue that affects everyone and is very difficult for youth to address and properly manage. Mental health disorders can also be commonly rooted in other daily social issues that people face and struggle with. Youth are more likely to be long term impacted by mental health because it affects developmental aspects of life such as social life, academic life and proper  In today’s society, mental health is frequently overlooked and has a large negative stigma around, especially for youth in this country with an environment of “boys don’t cry” and “when I was a kid we didn’t care about this stuff” as just some toxic examples of stigma around mental health. Along with the daily pressure of school, athletics, extracurriculars, social time, and the presence of social media, standards of living can be hard to achieve and live up to, mental health becomes increasingly difficult to take care of. This issue interests me because I know lots of people who are affected by mental health and suicide, and I believe very strongly with the idea that it is vital to end the stigma around mental health. The issue of youth mental health in this country is not something that will be solved in a day, but that is why working to end the stigma is vital to this social issue.