Social Justice And The Issues Of Race, Class, And Gender
Race, class, and gender have made a huge impact in our everyday lives and up to this day these three topics still do. Throughout the semester we have learned a lot as a class on these three topics by reading articles, watching films, and writing papers. Race, class and gender each have their own meaning with their own understanding of different inequality situations, the root cause of why each of these topics have underlying issues, how they affect a community, and of course, how to get justice in these situations, if that’s even possible. Even though these three topics have been around in our lives for a while now, I feel as if issues get worse and worse as time goes by.
In class we covered the word, Race. Race is what makes someone have the physical characteristics that they have. For example, hair color, eye color, hair type, skin color, and so on. Race involves a group of people in whom someone belongs in because of their physical characteristics and through their ancestry. Race has a lot to do with a person through culture and even history. Race is something that describes a person and makes that person. In other words, race is someone’s ethnicity and/or background.
Just like any other topic, race, also has a current underlying issue that is considered to touch the inequality argument. Many can argue that race is inequality because many people are placed under certain issues just because of the color of their skin and their ethnicity. A topic that I find to be unequal throughout race would be just how certain people are not treated equally as others. An example for this would be what we are living in right now such as not being wanted to stay at a country only because that person wasn’t born there or because they don’t speak the native language that is being used there. To me, out of race, class and gender, I feel as if race is the topic with the strongest issues because racism has never left our lives. If anything, it has only gotten worse.
Of course, each argument about inequality for these three topics has a root cause. The root cause on why race is considered to be inequality is because of close-minded people who don’t care about diversity and let other people like them feed on to the negative things being said about specific races, such as stereotypes. My understanding of this issue in this topic is by realizing that many opportunities are being shut down towards people because of their ethnicity.
Race inequality not only affects my community but it affects me directly because I see people from my own race not being liked at times because of their ethnicity and because of others seeing my race as a minority when in reality people from my own race are just like any other people and are equal to them as well.
Because race and/or racism is a sensitive topic and probably the strongest I feel like getting justice would be very hard. Not only in race but also in gender and class. The reason why I say this is because I feel like people would have to do major changes within themselves and would have to go through some sort of understanding which will require a lot of time.
In class we covered the word, class. Class is that word that categorizes people and puts them in a group by depicting them based on what they have and what they don’t have. There are three types of classes, which are, the low class, the working class, and the higher class. People belong to each of these classes depending on their economic or social status.
One example of a current issue that’s involving inequality with class would be just categorizing people itself. I feel as if because of your race and where your family comes from if you’re seen as a minority you are automatically placed in a certain class group, which sometimes you don’t belong in. All of this just tie back to race inequality as well by also having the stereotypes of races present. Issues involving class would also mean having to see people miss out on opportunities because of where they are categorized under as, which is also my understanding of the root cause in class inequality.
Class inequality affects the community by people not receiving the right funds to take care of their families and even only themselves. Class inequality is affecting them because they are being placed in a category that everyone else thinks those people belong in depending if they’re seen as a minority or not. Class inequality as mentioned above is affecting them by people missing out on great opportunities. Getting justice in class inequality can be possible and I feel like people can get justice by proving people wrong and by showing that lower class people can work twice as hard as the other classes, if not, even better. People just need opportunities.
The last and final topic, which we covered in class, was gender. To me this topic was the most interesting one and the one that obtained that most information because there are many ways you can describe gender. Gender has so many definitions for different people depending on how that person identifies himself or herself. Gender is a sex of being either a male or female, but then again, gender also depicts identities that don’t necessarily biologically belong to a female or male.
There are many underlying issues going on with the topic gender. People can literally go on and on bringing up arguments and issues that make gender inequality since this topic has been very sensitive lately as well. An example of a current issue with gender inequality would be not having the same access to things such as jobs, or having any say to decision-making situations; in other words, females not being accepted into doing a male job and vice versa. Another underlying issue would be someone who identifies himself or herself as the opposite sex in which they were biologically born in. Issues for them are much more sensitive and much more harder because they have to learn how to be accepted and have to go through so much more judgment, such as, restroom situations, job opportunities and so on. Which is also my understanding of the root cause in gender inequality.
This issue affects them personally because not only is their own community going against them, but their own families as well. I feel like it is not right to judge someone based on how or what they identify themselves as. It is not right because what’s it to the people that are judging? It is not their life, so why should it matter? To me, everyone is equal and they each deserve the right to be treated equally because despite on how they choose to identify themselves they are still human beings, just like everybody else. Getting justice to these situations would be by protesting but then again it’s almost impossible to try getting justice with any issues about these topics now a days.
Race, class and gender will continue to play a huge impact on people’s lives because people will always agree to disagree. I do feel like by people getting exposed to these topics and learning more about the inequality issues that each of these carry they will grasp on to the important information and will see everything that needs to be changed in order to turn inequality into equality. The issues of these three topics will continue to get worse and worse but I feel like with time and with practice of justice little by little the issues will be easier to understand. Race, class and gender will forever be sensitive topics, but the most interesting.
