Social Worker Oppression

After viewing the first part of Legacies of Social Change: 100 Years of Professional Social Work in the United States, it seems evident that history continues to be presented from the view of those with power and does not acknowledge the downfalls of these movements. History, especially in the United States, is centered toward European and Western civilization and whatever benefits these groups. This film perpetuates this one-sided account of the history social work that worked to only help white people, while diminishing the challenges and progress people of color faced during this period. While one can argue that this film is dated, this is still occurring all throughout our history and has repercussions today. This can be seen with any

Over the years, the face of racism has taken on many forms. In present day America, racism is a very taboo subject. It a common view that racism is not a big issue anymore, given the large strides that we, as a country have made towards equality. However, the inequalities that still exist between races point to a different situation. Instead of the blatantly discriminatory acts that our nation has witnessed in the past, modern racism practices are more covert and seemingly nonracial, making this kind of discrimination seem more acceptable and politically correct. The Civil Rights Movement forced society to implement a new, subtler way to perpetuate racial inequality. In Racism Without Racists, Bonilla-Silva describes the justification

Social workers are often on the forefront in the fight against any form of oppression as against the marginalized society. These demanding but oftentimes unappreciated efforts are often addressed through the conscious use of skills and knowledge of the problems being solved against. When such oppression is however committed against them within the organization where they work, the social worker seems to be mum about the situation, or their efforts perhaps are rendered inutile. North America social workers experience this form of oppression within the social service institution. For this reason, I examine the arguments why the social workers need to be aware of the existence of this unique form of oppression. In order to eliminate oppression in the social welfare workplace, the social workers, in their pursuit of social change, must have a competent understanding of the theory around racism and oppression.

White privilege is an advantage in society that is unmerited. Though it is practiced in every day life (whether it’s subtle or not), the majority views it as “absurd” and “non-existent”. It is a taboo that creates feelings of guilt, hostility and anger, but it must be addressed and understood in order to be eradicated. It is necessary for white people to acknowledge their part in maintaining and benefiting from a society that has thrived on racial hierarchy and white supremacy for centuries. White privilege is essentially the flip side of racism; racism does not only disadvantage people of colour, but grants white people power and dominance in our so-called “post-racial” society (McKintosh, 1). In this essay, I will argue that positive and widespread representation and implied acceptance are the most important features of white privilege. Widespread representation is the most important feature of white privilege because we live in an age where the media not only reflects, but also controls our real worldviews and attitudes. The second most important feature of white privilege is adequate housing opportunities and implied acceptance and respect. It is necessary to eliminate this system that puts people in power based on their skin tone and these two aspects are crucial in order to reach that.

Adams, W. Blumenfeld, C. Castaneda, H. Hackman, M. Peters, & X. Zuniga book “Readings in diversity and social justice” chapters 6-10 (2010) they discussed in order to rid oppression it starts with recognizing our social identity and how it contributed to our socialization. In order to understand socialization you need to understand the socialization cycle. Supporting subordinate groups are privileged and target groups are disfranchised but the worse is these roles are determined without our permission. The authors argue that once individuals understand oppression and want to make a change they become frustrated with the process of liberation. Supporting that the process of liberation is a cycle that begins with empowerment of self, ends with maintain, and at the core is a serious of attributes (self-love, hope, self-esteem, balance, joy, support, security, spiritual base, and authentic love of others. In differ the authors’ further support the idea white people are compensating for the system of advantage but as high as the cost of black people. The authors back up this claim through the notion of whites benefit from racism but they don’t all benefit

Wise’s examination of the inconspicuous character of racism 2.0 dovetails fittingly with our course’s recurring theme of institutionalized racism. In class lectures we have defined institutionalized racism as the discriminatory practices that have become regularized and routinized by state agencies, organizations, industries, or anywhere else in society. Although such practices might not be intentionally racist, they end up being racist nevertheless as consequence of the systematized and unspoken biases that have become increasingly convoluted and entrenched within society over time. It also doesn’t help white people to recognize these discriminatory practices considering they have been unconsciously tailored to be consistent with white perspective and mentality. In her article, White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, Peggy McIntosh examines not only how white folks often consider themselves to be a normative figure within society, but also how they are carefully taught not to recognize the advantages they gain from the disadvantages that impair people of color. In the article, McIntosh acknowledges the reality of her own white privilege and expresses, “In my class and place, I did not see myself as a racist because I was taught to recognize racism only in individual acts of meanness by members of my group, never in invisible systems conferring unsought racial dominance on my group from birth” (McIntosh 4). In fact, even if white folks do not believe themselves to

Labelling ‘whiteness’ and white privilege and recognising how it has been institutionalised allows people to look beyond it to see how it has defined knowledge, membership and language in our society, as well as the way it makes and enforces the rules and regulations of life in our society. This allows the implicit standards against which people are measured to be revealed (Puzan, 2003). According to Puzan (2003), some whites make a conscious choice to raise their own awareness of skin privilege, but this is not considered obligatory by most whites and is not addressed through legal and social measures in the same way as the more-familiar ‘racism’ that is known by that label.

Anti-racist practice consists of being able to actively and honestly explore who you are, what you stand for and where you are situated in terms of social location, what has advantaged and disadvantaged you and how you found the strength to overcome those challenges (Heinonen and Spearman, 2010, pp. 133). To further explain, our “social location further gives us an understanding of ourselves in terms of our ethno culture, gender, age, socioeconomic, class, ability and other characteristics and critically examine how these have advantages or disadvantaged us in our needs and life chances” (Heinonen and Spearman, 2010, pp. 132). It is important to ask ourselves these questions as social workers so we can uncover any unresolved biases we have in ourselves. The anti-racist approach to social work involves how social workers deal with attitudes and practices that promote prejudice and discrimination. Thus, an anti-racist

Despite changes in the landscape for treatment of ethnic minorities in the United States over the past 200 years, issues with racism has never stopped being an issue and continues to tarnish and tatter the very fabric of our nation. There has been a history of violence against Black people that dates back 400 years, to a time when the first slave was forcefully brought here to the USA (Rogers, 2015). From that time on, people of African descent have been dehumanized and treated as second-class citizens and this has become an ongoing community issue (Diversi, 2016). Racial classification was created as a way to condone slavery and maintain the primacy of the white race (Tolliver, Hadden, Snowden, & Manning, 2016). Aymer (2016) explains that the Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a way to understand that the violence that Blacks face in America originates from the societal belief in White superiority and, when trying to understand the Black reality, centuries of racial oppression must be discussed (Aymer, 2016). CRT acknowledges that racism is primarily a problem in America and has contributed to the social disparities in the U.S. In addition, it notes other forms of oppression that are important to discuss and work through. CRT does not believe in the legal rhetoric that there is an impartial, equal way of dealing with individuals in the community that has nothing to do with color and everything to do with achievement and hard work. It also takes on an interdisciplinary

Explanations that justify the use of racism directly relates to differential treatment of minority groups and contributes to racism’s existence as an unstoppable social problem. The foundations of these explanations are based on the common misunderstanding of the definition of race. Thus, problems that tend to concentrate in one race are mistakenly judged as “race problems”. This judgement leads to the establishment of a system of inequality between a superior race and inferior races. However, the logic behind these explanations don’t account for the true reasoning behind minority individuals value status. In fact, these explanations contribute to minority individuals’ further struggle in life.

One of the most challenging professions for African American males is social work. As a social worker, I have realized that I have to work under two domains. The first one is to work under the race identity and the second one is to work as a class identity. Although I am proud of being an African American, I usually feel sorry for myself being from unprivileged social class in the American society. The identity of being an African American male has affected my social work in many aspects. This is because it has made it impossible to carry out my professional duties because of negative perspectives and discrimination in the society. African American social workers are considered to be incompetent by the rest of the society hence making it impossible to delegate duties without any form of discrimination. This paper provides my own reflections as an African American male in the field of social work and how this identity has affected my practice in community work and advocacy duties.

In Clark (2012) and Clark (2011) Article, Critical Race theory argues that, people of colour experience racism in their everyday lives and that white elites shape the race relations to serve their own self-interest. When we examine the child welfare system what was evident is that racialized workers and clients within the child welfare system was treated defiantly Clark (2012). This Theory exposed the issues that are imbedded in our system, that continually deny the existence of racism; and the bureaucratic nature of the systems that enforce racial norms (Clark, 2012; Clark, 2011). Secondly, the Anti-oppressive framework, focuses on both the process and outcome, its aim is to empower, users by reducing the negative effects of hierarchies in their immediate interactions (Gosine & Pon, 2011). These are articles were designed to help workers understand the nature of oppression and provide insight into the complexity of the

Furthermore, the researchers divide white racial consciousness into two: achieved and unachieved. A person who has achieved white racial consciousness has explored and developed some sort of belief system when it comes to racial issues. Conversely, those with unachieved white racial consciousness have not grasped their own racial identity and its link to other minority groups, which may stem from either intentionally avoiding dialogue surrounding race or depending on family members to form an ideology. In his book Faces at the Bottom of the Well, Bell argues that this relatively loose grasp of white racial identity creates an environment that serves a significant detriment to advancing racial progress in the country, as “few white people are able to identify with blacks as a group –the essential prerequisite for feeling empathy with, rather than aversion from, blacks’ self-inflicted suffering” (Bell, 4).

Critical theories of race and racism have been used by sociologists to not only describe modern societies, but also address issues of social injustice and achieve an end to racial oppression. Critical race theory is one of the most widely used for this purpose. Its utility rests upon the assumption that race is a social construct and not an inherent biological feature. In place of the concept of inherent race, critical race theory proffers the concept of racialization. The tenet that the concept of race is created and attached to particular groups of people through social processes. In tandem with this, critical race theory contends that identity is neither fixed nor unidimensional. It also places importance on the perspectives and experiences of racial minorities (Ritzer and Stepnisky, 2013:66).

After reading chapters five and six in the Sue text, I feel that minority groups understand what it means to be “White” much better than the majority of White people do. I believe this is because they have to deal with what it means to not be White on a daily basis, in a culture where whiteness equates to power and privilege. White privilege unfortunately works like that- Whites are unaware of its oppressive force, as it does not affect us- because we created it. If I am honest, I have realized that I was unaware of many aspects of my own White privilege. For the purpose of this paper, since political correctness infers that Caucasian is an outdated term (Dewan, 2013), and to answer what my race is accurately, I am White.