Anti-Oppressive Social Justice

This chapter focuses on anti-oppression and anti-discrimination practice. We will be looking at what is meant by these terms and the law which underpins them. We will explore the different ways people are affected by oppression and how to combat it. Evaluate society’s stereotypical images of groups of people in society and the principles of positive action and anti-oppression.

Group work is important in social work as it promotes understanding of the social contexts of people’s lives and identifies strengths of the oppressed to pursue social change (Dominelli 2008).

Social Justices engagement can be accomplished through a variety of different approaches including marches, non-violent resistance, labor unions and community organizing. Some important concepts that go with social justice are restorative justice, socialization and allyship. Social justice is possible if you have the right approach, community and if you have patience because with time society can see the truth that you see.

Oppression exists at varying levels and the way in which we choose to view it can have a significant impact on our ability to break down the barriers that continue to oppress disenfranchised groups. Much like the analogy of a caged bird facing both individual cage wires as well as the confining cage as a whole, examining the microscopic and macroscopic levels of oppression is essential in furthering our understanding of social justice. Long-term and persisting injustices towards subordinate social groups can also lead to internalized oppression, creating a complex system of disempowerment and self-loathing. As members of society committed to social change, it is important that we continue to educate ourselves on the issues of oppression and oppressed groups while ensuring we act at allies and advocates in our efforts to tackle these barriers.

In this course we learned about many different types of oppression, from the time America was first “discovered” and the discoverers began oppressing the Indians, to slavery, to the oppression of the mentally handicapped, all the way to more “modern” times in schools were students are being oppressed.

Throughout the past couple of weeks, the readings revolved around oppression. These readings have talked about oppression as being pervasive, restrictive, hierarchical, intentional, unintentional, institutionalized, and so much more. These examples show us how oppression is taking over our society, and it is going to take a lot for it to finally disappear. One way that individuals believe oppression can start to deteriorate is through the process of social justice. The end game of social justice is to make sure there is equality for everyone present in our society today. Yet, we know that having social justice present is a process that will not happen overnight. By breaking down and analyzing oppression, it could help many individuals understand

When presented with the dilemma of how should we resist oppression in the work force, there are many relevant values discussed in the guidebook. These values include planning, level headedness, who it effects and leadership. While these values are indeed important when evaluating how oppression is best resisted, there is one crucial thing left to consider: the amount of support behind the resistance. With these values in mind, we are able to resist oppression in the work force in the most ethical manner.

Within the social work that we encounter on a daily basis, anti-oppressive (AOP) practice is generally referred to as the wider term that covers various practices and approaches as structural, radical, feminist, critical, anti-racist and liberating actions. AOP is viewed as a social work practice that attempts to address the structural inequalities and social divisions that is usually experienced in the social work. The ultimate aim of AOP is to provide more appropriate and sensitive services that ensure the social status is not an impediment to them enjoying the social service. AOP is egalitarian in approach and caters for personal philosophy while suppressing the negative effects of the structural weaknesses and inequalities (McGraw, n.d). It is deemed to cater for both the process and the outcome and aimed at reduction of the negative effects of hierarchy that may be experienced in the social work.

Though the concept of social injustice is universal in nature, the experience varies with each person. Factors like a person’ race, or gender can further influence the severity of the injustice; victims caught in the overlap between discriminations often go unrecognized by the law and society. Many people recognize the names Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Tamir Rice as African Americans who were murdered by local police. But names like Michelle Cusseaux, Tanish Anderson, and Meagan Hockaday often receive less feedback even though they are also murdered African Americans. The only distinction between the sets of names is gender. Even within racial injustice, discrimination is present between genders as some cases get national

I have been exposed to social justice issues since I was young. Back in Vietnam, my father discussed with us a lot about political issues, like how people’s rights to express themselves are oppressed and that the government does not take care of its citizens and the corruption runs rampant in Vietnamese government. Throughout the time growing up, I have been familiarized with news about police brutality, unregulated toxins in food and other products that cause health implications, government’s slow reaction to natural disaster that affects people’s lives, and weak law enforcement on environment issues. These problems happen so constantly that I accepted it as a part of life and never thought any further than the fact that they exist.

“In the United States you can practice free speech and speak your opinions freely, but only if I agree with those opinions and those opinions don’t go against my thoughts”. It may seem hypocritical to call it free speech when there are limitations like the above statement says, but that is exactly how majority of social justice warriors think. They try to push their beliefs onto others and if you disagree with them or question them they attack you with slander and hate speech, labeling you all sorts of things such as racist, homophobic, sexist, and any other word they can think of to make it look like you hate them in the eyes of the media and their peers. There are many issues that are heavily affecting many people

Social Justice Warriors are a group of individuals scattered across society who take great pride in defending their causes. These “causes” can often origin from their far left wing political views, and are many times displayed to fit radical extremes. The categories of political views in which they show passion for can vary from immigration, to something as intellectual as gender inequality. One of the most known branches of Social Justice Warriors consists of feminists. This group includes both men and women who believe females are being oppressed both physically, and intellectually. The major issue with “social justice warriors” in society is that they often contradict their claims by promoting the specific issue from a different

In the reading “Small Change : Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted,” Malcolm Gladwell discusses the act of four brave college students and their act of social activism. The four freshmen from a local all black college sat down at a counter in a diner near Greensboro, North Carolina and were denied service because of their race. The students refused to leave and instead started a protest there at the restaurant. The numbers of people protesting with the four young men increased as the story spreaded across states. The story of the sit in was done without the use of any technology or social network. Gladwell discussed the effectiveness of the sit-in because of the relationship between

The notion of justice is existence of proper balance of rights and its access under the laws of land. It refers to not depriving any person from availing privileges, opportunities etc. John Rawls writes, "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override"It means that the interaction in a society must be free from any sort of discrimination such as religion, race, color, caste or sex. It ensures fair distribution of assets and equal opportunity. José P. Laurel defines Social Justice as “Social justice is neither communism, nor despotism, nor atomism, nor anarchy, but the humanization of laws and the equalization of social and economic forces by the state so that justice in its rational and objectively secular conception may at least be approximated.”

Social sciences and social justice are both based on the structure of rights. Our rights were designed to create equality for all. However, there are always outliers in our justice system and these outliers can be seen by all. My background and demographic are aggressively average growing up in a small, rural community with little diversity which has affected my views about justice. The class Social Problems and Social Injustice has aggressively opened my eyes to new statistics about society and has made some of my intuitions validated and destroyed some of my prior views. My new understanding of social justice is that is was created for all by excluding some. Justice is the structure of our institutions and society.