Sunday, June 8, 2014

To be a Global Citizen

To be a global citizen I feel like you would have to travel around your nation and the world to grasp the different cultures in different areas, you cannot simply read about it in books and see the pictures. When you go somewhere you've never been before you begin to study the people; their motions, their words, how they live, everything. The smallest weirdest stuff would grab my attention while in London, things I never would have imagined being different in another part of the world. The way the doors open is opposite of those in America, weird right? Being a global citizen means engaging in the current events of the world, to continue to keep up on the politics, to know what is going on globally. Of course growing up you learn small things here and there about different countries and parts of the world, but until you get to immerse yourself in the culture, you will never understand the lifestyle of those people. The way the land is shaped, how they build their houses, how advanced are they in the world, are they a large importer or exporter, do we trade with them? All common questions that are answered when developing your "citizenship" into the world. I will never say that one must be an expert to be a culturally sound person, but one must study the past, present, and future of the world and its many different places and large population to begin to understand why the world works the way it does. Why are all people different? No one will even be able to open their eyes and minds to others if they do not learn about who they are and why they do certain things. And without respect for others and their differences from oneself the world will continue to become this place of growing war and violence. People say they are global citizens because they watch the news and gather all the negative facts about another nation or place, and I will not defend those who have done wrong, but not every nation has a 100% population of horrible people. Global citizenship, in my eyes, is defined as when a person finally opens their mind and accepts the differences of others in an area after studying and dealing with it personally. They may not agree with the difference, but they  respect that person or those people for their choices and culture.

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