Diary of Systemic Injustices

Showcase for Diary of Systemic Injustices

Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) Strikes and The Targeting of International Students

by

By Kimberly Johnson

In December 2019 graduate student teaching assistants at University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) went on a wildcat strike, a strike without union authorization, calling for a cost of living adjustment (COLA) to their stipend. Many of the students say they are spending 50% or more of their ~$25,000/year stipend on rent monthly, meaning they are severely rent burdened. The graduate students started with a grade strike, withholding grades from the courses they taught in the fall quarter, but they are now on a full teaching strike. The COLA strikes have spread throughout the University of California school system as well! UC Hastings’ AFSCME 3299 vote to authorize a strike with 89% support last week, representing the UC Hastings School of Law students. Graduate students at UC Los Angeles striked for one day this past Thursday. Some graduate students at UC Davis and UC Santa Barbara are striking, and graduate students at UC Berkeley have said they are strike ready upon the support of other departments. UC San Diego graduate students are set to begin a grading strike on this upcoming Monday. Thursday, March 5th there was a COLA day of action across the UC system schools during which UCSC strikers and their supporters blocked the entrances to UCSC and in-person classes were cancelled.

[Image description: a tweet from Twitter account COLA Agitation Committee that reads “SPREAD THE STRIKE” and then mentions all the COLA accounts across the University of California system. There is an attached image of UCSC strikers blocking an entrance into University of California Santa Cruz.]

During the course of the UCSC wildcat strike the university has threatened the graduate students with firings twice and followed through with this threats, firing about 54 graduate students and telling dozens more they would not be hired for the spring quarter on February 28th. This has not deterred the strikes, but it has been particularly alarming for international students. International students on student visas are not able to get non-university jobs, and without university jobs international students will be forced to pay tuition and/or living expenses out of pocket to maintain full-time student status. Without full-time student status their visas will be revoked. In early February the university reminded international students of this, a clear intimidation tactic.

 

Intimidating workers with threats to their residency/immigration status is not new or unique to the university, it is extremely pervasive in the US. It is particularly utilized in workplaces that employ undocumented workers. It is not always explicit or aggressive, often employers just rely on fear of speaking out and subsequent retaliation to get away with treating workers unjustly. Polly in The Leavers experiences this when she works at the nail salon that does not pay her for the first 3 months she was there and expects her to pay to be trained. This is clearly illegal, but her boss knew it was unlikely Polly would say anything or be able to do anything about it.

Read more:

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-03-07/graduate-student-movement-at-uc-gains-momentum-with-faculty-support-demonstrations-and-pledges-to-strike

https://labornotes.org/blogs/2020/02/university-california-intimidating-international-students-defeat-wildcat-strike

UC Santa Cruz dismisses 54 striking graduate student workers over withheld grades

UC Hastings Workers Vote Overwhelmingly to Authorize Strike

Looking Into the Gender Pay Gap

by

By Dena Hussain

One type of systemic injustice involves occupation and the pay gap between men and women. It is an empirical fact that men make more money than women for the same jobs, but there are varying reasons for this gap. Some people say that it is women who choose to work is lower-paying/skilled jobs, or choose lower-paying specializations, or it is that women who make up the majority of a job are paid less because they are women (this is outright discrimination). However, the differing choices in type of occupation by women cannot alone explain the gender pay gap; for women who are making advances in, say, a company, they often reach a level that they cannot get past – this concept is known as the “Glass Ceiling”. We usually see the Glass Ceiling in setting where a woman makes it to some sort of managerial position, and when she tries to make it to the next position beyond that, there is something systemic in her way that prevents this from happening; this can be societal and in how women are raised. Oftentimes, women who make it to the top were taught at a young age to “act like a man” – in taking risks, creating beneficial alliances that will help progress one to the next level, choose advanced occupations and/or specializations, etc. Furthermore, when looking at professions that are mainly dominated by women, it can be seen empirically that wages in these jobs are decreasing; this is systematic because originally, these jobs were higher-paid when they were occupied mainly by men – this includes real estate, lawyers, etc. So, the wage gap between gender cannot solely be explained by the fact that some women just simply choose lower-paying and less-skilled occupations and specialties because when looking at women who are not in these positions, or try to climb up the company ladder, they are paid less or prevented from advancements. In conclusion, when looking at any injustice, it is important to keep in mind a quote from Martin Luther King Jr. ; “an injustice to one is an injustice to all”.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/miriamgrobman/2019/04/01/making-sense-of-the-gender-pay-gap-in-five-graphs/#57e179861a3e

Joyce J Chen, Daniel Crown, The Gender Pay Gap in Academia: Evidence from the Ohio State University, American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Volume 101, Issue 5, October 2019, Pages 1337–1352, https://doi.org/10.1093/ajae/aaz017

The Big Problem with the Money Bail System — Aaron Kienzle

by
Image retrieved From -https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/incomejails.html

I was watching a T.V. that followed around people in jail. From participating in this course, I got to thinking about the systemic injustices that lie in our criminal justice system. I believe there are a lot. One of these would be the money bail system that we currently have in play. The money bail system is where someone gets arrested and they are given the option to either stay in jail or pay a payment so they can be released until their court date. Once they show up to the court date they get their money refunded. However, there are a lot of problems and injustices in this. First of all the presumption of innocence (where people are considered innocent until proven guilty) is completely thrown out. If you are falsely accused and could not afford bail, you would be stuck in jail until your court date. Bernadette Rabuy and Daniel Kopf in their article named Detailing the Poor stated that “34% of defendants were detained pretrial for the inability to post money bail.” This means out of 100 people charged and booked for a crime, 34 of them were offered bail and could not afford it. Innocent people sitting in jail because they cannot afford bail is definitely a problem. This is highly impactful to the lower class people who do not have a lot of money. Why is it right that a person with more money can get out of jail and a poorer person can’t? It simply is not. Upper class people are given a major advantage just for having money in their pocket. This system can be related to the theoretical work of othering we have learned in class. The system sets upper class people up as the one and lower class people as the other. All based on how much money the person has. Justice should not have a monetary value. In order for this wrong to be righted a new system must be put into play, a system that does not focus on social classes to decide if you can or cannot stay in jail. This reformed system must focus on equality among all people and fairness in the trial process. There are two articles linked below that help understand the injustices that lie in the money bail system. If you have the time, check them out!

https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/incomejails.html

https://talkpoverty.org/2016/04/27/the-many-injustices-of-the-money-bail-system/

 

Systemic Injustice Triggered by Coronavirus Virus in China (weng.156)

by

By Xixiang Weng

Recently, the new coronavirus spread around the world and make thousands of people suffer. Wuhan is the first city where this virus mass outbreak and its residents are the people who suffer most from that. Unluckily, the virus is not the only thing to make them in trouble. Their identity of Wuhan’s resident also makes them face injustices.

Due to the fear of the virus, Chinese people in other provinces tend to be away from Wuhan people. For example, if you are a Wuhan people and you go to another province. People would think that you get no sense of responsibility since you make all the people under the risk of being infected. Besides, although Chinese officials claim that they have warned against the discrimination against Wuhan people, some policy they set up, such as restrict Wuhan people’s normal use of state road, shows the discrimination to Wuhan people. Some local governments even set up road blockage in the road to Wuhan, which makes many Wuhan people who work outside can’t meet their family during the Lunar New Year.                     The Chinese government set up road blockage in the road to Wuhan

Also, in some big city, such as Shanghai and Guangzhou, the local government order the neighborhood committee to encourage people to report the Wuhan’s resident or Wuhan returnees around them, so that they can send them back to Wuhan.

When Wuhan people are suffering from the virus, as their compatriot, we are supposed to try our best to help them go through that, however, some unreasonable policy Chinese government set and discrimination some Chinese people express make Wuhan people face so much injustice. The video below is an interview with a Wuhan people living in Beijing, she narrates can make us know more about the current situation of Wuhan people I describe above.

The injustice Wuhan people are facing reminds me of the “The Story of My Body”. People think Ortiz is “dirty” since her different physical looks and Puerto Rican identity (Ortiz 436). Similarly, Wuhan people are treated as “The Other” by their compatriots while they are suffering from the virus. In some Chinese people’s sight, Wuhan’s residents are already not their compatriot, but just the virus which needs to be segregated. This circumstance not only expresses some Chinese people and government’s unreasonable attitude of facing the plague, but also the systemic injustice Wuhan people are currently facing.

 

Work Cited

Gan, Nectar. “Outcasts in Their Own Country, the People of Wuhan Are the Unwanted Faces of China’s Coronavirus Outbreak.” Albany Herald, CNN, 15 Feb. 2020, www.albanyherald.com/news/world_nation/outcasts-in-their-own-country-the-people-of-wuhan-are/article_705d3409-4819-5f69-b4f7-cfc36424bd11.html.

Our Enemy Is the Virus, Not People from Hubei or Wuhan – YouTube, South China Morning Post, www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkdPFCStA38.

 

Marijuana Arrests and Sentencing – Tatiyana Booker

by

The article speaks about the unjust treatment of people of color getting jail time compared to whites relating to weed. People of color are in jail facing many years for having sold Cannabis/weed. While whites are making stores or food filled with the same thing and getting no type of punishment for it, if anything, they are getting more business for the same reason many people of color are in jail for. This is an unfair treatment that people of color are facing 10+ years in prison for doing the same thing, but are getting strict punishment for. If one group is going to get jail time, it should be everyone getting in trouble, or people should realize this isn’t an offense if it’s going to target one group of people. A quote from the article says, “ And although surveys show that whites use drugs as much or more than blacks in the US, black people were arrested for drug-related offenses at five times the rate of whites in the late 1980s and early 1990s.” This is unfair that blacks are more likely to go to jail for a drug offense than any other race, and this is something that should be looked at because it’s putting all the blame on one group instead of looking at everyone.

The article speaks about the need for police reform to make sure that the disparity would change. Racial profiling would need to stop, just because a person is of color doesn’t mean they are doing wrong. Police need to stop coming at every person of color they see. The need for unnecessary searches needs to end unless every person will be searched and not just because a person looks suspicious.

“https://qz.com/1482349/weed-and-reparations/”>Weed and Reparations

https://qz.com/1194143/even-after-legalization-black-americans-are-arrested-much-more-often-for-marijuana-offenses/

https://norml.org/marijuana/fact-sheets/item/racial-disparity-in-marijuana-arrests

Coaching Discrimination in the NFL

by

By Nate Hiles

Throughout the semester there was one systemic injustice that stood out to me and it was one that I thought was pretty fascinating. This injustice came in the world of sports and particularity in the NFL. The NFL has had issues throughout the years of providing minorities opportunities in which they will hold a position of power, this could be ownership opportunities, GM jobs but mostly this comes in the form of Head Coaching opportunities in the NFL. The NFL has 32 franchises, and only 5 of those franchises have a minority head coach leading their franchise, that’s just 15% of NFL teams. The NFL has attempted to implement rules over the years that would put a band-aid on this issue and possibly lead to more minorities in leadership roles but it has for the most part turned into a disgrace of the rule. The Rooney Rule is a rule where an NFL team with an open coaching position must first interview a minority individual before they can officially name a new coach, which is a great rule/idea on paper, but it has been handled poorly. The current state of the rule is that NFL teams will bring in a minority individual at the start of their coaching search so they can hire their candidate whenever they choose to do so, but they almost never truly consider the minority interviewee for the position. Eric Bieniemy is the last minority in the NFL to unfortunately have to face this reality. Eric Bieniemy is the Offensive Coordinator for the Super Bowl Champion Kansas City Chiefs, and has been the leader of the best offense in the NFL for the last two seasons. But, for SOME reason he has been unable to land a head coaching position and has had to watch less qualified individuals land the positions in which he is coveting. I think this is a clear example of an systemic injustice because it is a situation where the NFL and their leaders are not allowing minorities the same opportunities of advancement that they’re providing to non-minorities. In the NFL minorities basically have no voice and no face when it comes to positions of power. Yes, the NFL is flooded with minorities who actually participate on the field, but when it comes to positions of power within the NFL minorities have virtually no voice, and no options.

If I had to compare Eric Bieniemy’s situation to content from our class I’d probably have to compare it Hegel and the Master-Slave dialectic. Eric Bieniemy’s is one of the leaders of the Kansas City Chiefs and for the Chiefs he does hold a position of power, to a certain extent. But, while he does have this position of power, and the end of the day he still is at the will of individuals who are far more powerful than he is, and he must do what they say. He is holding a position of power, while still being a minority and having to be somewhat of an inferior at the same time.

http://https://www.star-telegram.com/sports/nfl/dallas-cowboys/article239811393.html

 

Corona Virus Discrimination

by

By Emma Lykins

Currently, there are over 60 countries that have had outbreaks of the coronavirus and more than 90,000 people have been affected. Of that, 3,000 have died due to the virus, creating a global epidemic. Many countries have travel bans such as Italy, South Korea, and China. This disease is very harmful to infants and elderly people who already have weakened immune systems. There is currently no vaccine for coronavirus, however, they are trying to make one.

This past month we have been receiving lots of notices about the Corona Virus. OSU actually stopped all travel to and from China until March and they are making anyone who traveled there recently partake in a 10-day incubation to make sure they have not gotten the illness. The media and gossip make it seem as though all Asians are to blame for the spread of this disease. I had a student walk up to the front of the class and say he was not contagious because he was so afraid of what others would think of him. I think Americans are classifying Asians as the culprit for spreading the disease when in fact, diseases evolve on their own. It has been unfortunate that this virus started in Asia, but Asian’s should not be blamed for the spread of this virus because they did not intentionally spread it to be harmful to the public.

A lot of people are now saying that if you buy products from China then you will become sick with the coronavirus. This is another misconception that attacks Chinese businesses. You cannot get the coronavirus from buying a lot of international products. The virus does not stay alive for very long on services and is mainly transferred through sneezing and coughing.

The people in these countries are experiencing “Othering” as mentioned by de Beavouir. They are being alienated by society for the country having the first outbreak of the coronavirus. They are being treated differently by the world right now in order to prevent the spread of the disease, however, they shouldn’t have to be treated like an “other”. Their culture and ethnic group are being attacked for “spreading the disease” when in reality it was not their fault. Viruses are uncontrollable, the Chinese did not intend to spread it. The countries who have travel bans and Asians, in general, are being attacked for unnecessary reasons over a virus that was bound to eventually spread anyways.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00154-w

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/2019-novel-coronavirus-myth-versus-fact

How Everyday Discourse Contributes to Sex Discrimination

by

By Sarah Goulder

Although we have made great strides in creating a more inclusive and progressive world, there is still much work to be done to limit (and hopefully one day eliminate) sexism, homophobia, and overall hate.  The ways in which these injustices manifest today is much more subtle than it once was. For instance, the kind of inequality that Simone de Beauvoir references in The Second Sex is much more obvious and severe than what is seen today.  However, her ideas on othering and its consequences still apply to sexism and other areas of prejudice.  Currently, the things we say, how we act on social media, and what we see on television and film all contribute to the persistence of systemic injustice in the modern world.  Specifically, I would like to focus on sexist and homophobic discourse in everyday life and in american media, as both of these areas contribute significantly to the perpetuation of discrimination and bias.  

 

A recent encounter with a terribly unoriginal and sexist joke sparked my interest in writing about this topic.  A friend of mine recently said a version of the “make me a sandwich” joke about another woman.  My blood started to boil, but I remained silent and let it go because I knew that my friend was not an actual misogynist.  In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have. That type of “joke” is an example of why sexism and gender discrimination still exist. Casual comments rooted in prejudice (whether it’s sexism, racism, or homophobia) are indicative of a much larger issue how we reinforce everyday bias and discrimination.  Here is a link to a blog site that does a good job of explaining why this particular joke is problematic.  Going beyond sexism, the way we speak (and where we do it) have real world consequences that many people would rather not acknowledge.  This article discusses a few recent(-ish) examples of celebrities and comedians, like Stephen Colbert that have engaged in “casual homophobia” by using anti-gay tropes and language.  Despite our intentions, casual prejudicial discourse prevents us from moving forward culturally and makes it difficult to create political and legal changes to unfair policies.  

Social Media and Cultural Appropriation

by

By Kimberly Johnson

Over the past few months a dance called the Renegade has been all over social media, particularly TikTok. When the dance made the switch over to TikTok from Dubsmash, credit to the creator did not come along with it. However, over the course of the past several days the creator of the dance has gotten her due credit. Her name is Jalaiah Harmon, a Black 14-year-old girl from Atlanta, Georgia. In an interview for The New York Times she shared how frustrating it was that her dance was being shared so widely and posted largely by white TikTok users without any credit given to her.

Jalaiah Harmon’s experience fall in line with hundreds of years of Black culture being appropriated with little to no credit in the U.S. For a little girl who loves dance and attends numerous dance classes, a viral dance video could mean access to opportunities that would help her dance dreams come true. Though she is getting the credit she deserves now, many Black creators do not ever get credit for their content. Even further, their content is frequently stolen by white creators who then use it to go viral, a phenomenon that can be extremely advantageous in an increasingly social-media oriented society.

Article: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/13/style/the-original-renegade.html

Chinese School District House

by

By Haoxiang Dai

Education has become one of the most concerned topics for Chinese people, while Chinese house prices rose rapidly in the past ten years, leading to a systematic injustice overlapping these two fields.

House price in China has been unusual high for a decade or even more. For survival, people can just rent a house because rent fee is very low compared to the ridiculous house price. However, nowadays, many rules come out requiring people to buy a school district room otherwise their children cannot go to school. The rule also made requirements about the area of the room and the length of living time. It all turns out that whether children can get good educational resources has nothing to do with the children’s talent and endeavor. The only thing that matters is the wealth and social status of children’s parents. Education is already unfair for students before facing the so-called the most equitable “The national college entrance exam”. Meanwhile, the phenomenon forces all parents under the pressure of unusual high house price, extracting their hard-earned money to the pocket of real estate companies which represent a group of upper classes.

This instance reminds me of Spivak’s “Can the Subaltern Speak?”. Like Spivak points out that “the terms ‘people’ and ‘subaltern classes’ [are] used as synonymous throughout [Guha’s definition]” (page 26). The word “Subaltern” defines a group of people oppressed by power. In this case, general Chinese people are forced to afford the sky-high house price for their children’s future. Otherwise, they and their children will be considered as “Others”. As a result, there are so many Chinese families under the pressure of house loans and making money for real estate companies for decades. General people don’t have right to speak. They can only follow the rules made by authorities. However, the reason why it is systematic injustice is the government has strong relationship to these real estate companies. Through bonding sky-high house price with children’s future, Chinese families’ hard-earned money is extracted to authorities for decades. And what is worse, when these children grow up and get married, they have to face the same problem as their parents.

Link 1: https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1002882/chinese-parents-are-paying-a-high-price-for-free-education

Link 2: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/07/04/china-cost-of-education/2489899/

 

Work Cited:

Spivak’s “Can the Subaltern Speak?”. Class Material.

Ni Dandan. (2018). Chinese Parents Are Paying a High Price for Free Education. SIXTH TONE. Retrieved from https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1002882/chinese-parents-are-paying-a-high-price-for-free-education

Calum MacLeod. (2013). Sky-high house prices surround China’s top schools. USA TODAY. Retrieved from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/07/04/china-cost-of-education/2489899/