Why we Need to Fix Oppression in America

Although we see oppression as something wrong and unethical, the actions of millions of modern Americans have shown that for the most part we no longer care. Institutionalized oppression is an issue that has haunted the United States for centuries. We continue to treat millions of people as second-class citizens when they built this country and made it the powerhouse that it is today. How can we as Americans call ourselves the “Land of The Free” when unarmed black teenagers are getting shot because of the color of their skin? Where is the freedom in placing all of our black and Hispanic populations in government created ghettos or cutting school funding for black and Hispanic students? Most of all, where is the freedom in allowing for slavery to STILL exist in our society through the criminal justice system and prisons, continuing to profit off of black bodies as we speak. We do not live in a land of the free, we live in a land of the oppressed, and it’s time that we actually change that. Ending institutionalized oppression and systemic racism should be at the forefront of mainstream political arguments yet its barely spoken as a central issue. The assumption that we live in a post-race world where racism and oppression aren’t topics that need to be discussed anymore has allowed for discrimination to remain rooted in our institutions. Continuing to allow this atrocity and stain on our American history or even human history is unacceptable. Tackling the inequalities and racism in our existing structures is just one piece of the puzzle to end oppression in our country and the world. Housing discrimination, segregation in the education system, racism in the criminal justice system, and slavery in the prison system are all just cogs in the oppression machine. Revolution in our societal structures is necessary and inevitable but that doesn’t mean it has to be violent. My vision of the future is to imagine a world where real equality isn’t a dream but a reality, and we can do that by radically changing the foundations of the structures that oppress us. Dr. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Rosa Parks, Jo Ann Robinson, and the millions of other civil rights activists did not fight to make racism hide, they fought to make racism obsolete. Continuing to allow racism to hide in the foundations of our institutions disrespects them and the future they fought for.

Housing

Housing segregation and the disparity between white and black communities is a tricky subject in terms of finding a solution. Forcing people to move into specific communities is of course not an option, and the ever-present factor of white flight, where white residents move out of a location due to a range of factors (often attributed to race and income demographics), makes it challenging to integrate communities. Housing segregation is a clear example of a multi-dimensional problem, and the best way to fix the crisis is to attack each dimension simultaneously. In order to solve the housing crisis, we need to fix racial zoning policies, limited government investment into black communities, and a lack of protection of black homeowners by the government. Additionally, housing, in general, has become significantly more expensive, so the chance for already disenfranchised black families from attempting to move to better homes and communities is limited.

The solutions to fix this are simple, the government should subsidize and push for more affordable homes on the market. In other words, building smaller, more affordable homes. An effective way to do this is to construct more multi-unit buildings in less populated areas, while also rolling back single-family zoning laws which have historically been a means to enforce racial segregation.

Another effective solution would be establishing caps on rent and housing prices. Although this is a tricky and controversial subject, enforcing rent caps can help lower-income individuals and families afford homes in more diverse regions. To add to this, governments could even mandate that housing construction companies create affordable housing options that can support low to medium incomes when constructing new housing units.

One of the simplest solutions to this entire issue is spurring economic development into low-income communities. In Cincinnati, Ohio, the Cincinnati Project was made which led to over $100 million in federal funds and $750 million from local investors being invested into high-poverty communities. As a result of this project, integration among Cincinnati housing has skyrocketed. A 2011 study even found that 55 neighborhoods, making up half of the population of Cincinnati, were well-integrated communities.

Baltimore is another city aiming to curb housing segregation.
They are doing this through the "Thompson Voucher" program which provides lower-income families with government funds to move into more expensive housing.
Although the Trump administration has steadily rolled back Obama's housing policies, Baltimore is improving.
Another indirect way housing segregation can be solved is through ending Education segregation.

Education

The most obvious way to end racial oppression and segregation in the education system is to integrate schools. When integration was more widespread the common way to do this was through busing programs that took black or minority students and bused them to "white schools". However, this isn't the only method available to reach equality in the education system.

First and foremost, the alternatives to attempting to push for integrated school systems is to build up the existing segregated schools. Education funding has huge discrepancies between majority-white and majority-black schools. By given equal funding to majority-black schools and actually creating a proper education setting for black schools we can reduce that inequality. The issue with this is that the existing laws we have in place for the education system reward good schools with more funding and punish worse schools with less funding. Study after study shows that these laws aren't just in place to punish the schools, but actually have significant racial components in the background of them. If we invest the same amount of money into black schools, we can increase the quality of education within that school. The quality of education meaning, ample student resources, qualified teachers, and challenging academic classes, has been shown to significantly improve a child's success in the future. The higher the quality of your education, the more likely you are to attend college and the more likely you are to have a high-paying career. Improving the quality of education in this way through adequate funding and actual reforming of the quality of education in black, lower-income schools can close that disparity.

To change the system of funding we have in place, we also need to eliminate local education funding through property taxes. The current structure of education funding was designed to hurt communities of color that were intentionally placed into lower-income areas. By establishing a property-tax that funds education, the regions with higher income will receive the greatest level of funding and therefore receive the greatest level of education.

The benefits of an equal education system extend far beyond just the individual student. Education has been shown to improve social class and in turn, reduces poverty. Through investing in education you are also investing in the betterment of a community. Additionally, a higher quality of education also reduces crime and could potentially be a solution to end racist policing policies in the U.S.

Criminal Justice System

Solutions to the criminal justice system are especially challenging to address in the U.S. but can be broken up into law enforcement and actual law.
Fixing the institution of law enforcement requires building up communities that are primarily affected.
By building up the community to fight against over-policing and racism in law enforcement, we can help to reduce police brutality.
Additionally, we can further reduce oppression in law enforcement through the decriminalization of laws designed to target black communities.
We can also call to an end to the war on drugs and the over-policing of black communities.
A more recent idea is to defund the police, meaning reallocate the excessive funding of law enforcement and invest it into social welfare programs and social workers instead.

Prison

The prison system is one of the most oppressive institutions to black and minority people and this requires an exorbitant amount of change. My solutions to the prison system are based on abolitionist movements to end the prison system as a whole and design an effective method to reduce crime whilst also rehabilitating criminals instead of punishing them. The solution to the prison system is to completely abolish the system itself. Prison abolitionism calls for an end to the prison industrial complex and the mindset behind how to reform criminals.

The prison system takes a punitive stance on crime and as a result, prisoners are subjected to punishment instead of what's actually needed: rehabilitation. Although this sounds incredibly radical, prison reform has never been efficient in changing the way the system works for the better. As seen through the prison page, the institution is ineffective and has high recidivism rates. If any reforms were to be made it should be greater access to education in the prison system, greater opportunities to spur economic advancement once released from prison, giving the right to vote back to prisoners, and giving prisoners access to social welfare aid.

Alternatives to the prison system are far and wide in scope and application. Some brought forward by famed prison abolitionist Angela Davis include: "revitalization of education at all levels, a health system that provides free physical and mental care to all, and a justice system based on reparation and reconciliation". Additional alternatives to add to this are the decriminalization of drugs and higher investment into health clinics for lower-income people centered around drug abuse and mental health. More alternatives could be establishing government job programs and creating institutions that deter crime before it even happens.

Deanna Van Buren offers another alternative to the prison system in the form of restorative justice centers.
She is an architect by trade and has proposed 3 physical designs to create restorative institutions that can help to truly reform prisoners.
Restorative justice programs show data that significantly decrease recidivism in violent crimes and are effective.
Deanna Van Buren is actually opening a restorative justice center to help support prisoners and plans to open up many more centers all throughout the United States.
Van Buren also proposed another alternative called the Pop-Up Resource Village. Which aims to reduce crime before it even happens.

The solutions I have presented are by no means end all be all answers. Racism and oppression in U.S. society require not only physical policies being passed but also societal movements and changes along with them. Changing our mindsets on race, poverty, and individualism are just the beginnings of imagining a world where real change makes an impact. The oppression of black and minority groups will continue to plague our society but through recognizing them as a problem and actively calling for change we can fix it.