Week 13

Privilege. It allows some to walk free while others have to pay with their life. It is what covers up the most intense issues happening in society. Privilege is never acknowledged because it makes people uncomfortable. No one likes to be called out, and recognizing one’s privilege can lead to guilt and shame fueling oppression. A never-ending cycle that can only be stopped by defying the status quo.

If the issue of oppression makes people uncomfortable, then how can we, as a society, tackle the problem? By removing what silences the oppressed, change can occur not only within individuals themselves but with the system itself. I see the media manipulating certain instances, involving minorities and the dominant group, to where the incident pins it on the less dominant group by minimizing the trouble, blaming the victim, calling it something else, or even overlooking it because everyone likes how things are going. By doing so, the more dominant group is portrayed as the better person, and the oppressed are being viewed negatively once again.

One thing I really liked is how Johnson addressed the ways to conquer oppression, and it was to simply get through it. He elaborated on how oppression is probably the worst kind of divisiveness, because silencing the oppressed from the truth can only lead to cutting ourselves from...ourselves. We do not get the chance to really know our true potential based on the current societal system the dominant white American male has placed upon us.

The first step ANYONE has to take before making a change is becoming aware. Being aware allows people to realize what is happening and learn more about the issues before they make any kind of change. If white people were a lot more aware, opposition would be bound to happen more. It’s all about taking the little risks and doing something, like Johnson mentioned. Make yourself be seen, because oppression thrives on silence. It can start off with minor actions such as not laughing at demeaning jokes about others and gradually progress into bigger and louder actions. Showing others that you are against the status quo will draw attention, and you can use this opportunity to inform others about the occurring problems. Whenever I go back home to Houston, I visit my friends and they ask about what I’ve learned and they pick up on my views and opinions about what is going on. There are times when we’re around other friends who are blatantly ignorant, and I call them out on it. Making people uncomfortable is another point Johnson brought up, because if we can’t even bring up the problem, there is gonna be no way to fix it. Ever since I started attending college, I have seen more discriminatory crimes take place on campus with the president hardly addressing the problems and instead focuses on other minor things. Recently, one of the frat houses on campus was vandalized with words like “rapist” and “racist”, and instead of focusing on why someone wrote them, he focused more on the actual action of vandalization. When administrators respond to the wrong issue at hand, it discourages people from coming forward and receiving help. When Fenves sent out the email saying that they were going to get to the bottom of who vandalized property, outrage broke out on Twitter. People were furious and were calling him out on his views. By doing only this though will not allow for action to take place. Nothing ever changes when everyone is ONLY peaceful and respectful towards authority. Johnson mentioned paths of least resistance and how they become more visible when people choose alternative paths. Much like how rules become more apparent when people break them, same goes for these alternative paths. It creates a tension and leads to change in the system whenever new paths are created.