Story by Juli Mejia, artwork by Caoimhe Farris
Personal Experiences
A 10 year old is supposed to spend their time thinking about toys, games and anything else that might interest their curious minds. But for junior Zareefah Khan, Islamophobia was something that was added to that list of things she had to think about as a young child after Khan experienced a personal situation that has stuck with her.
“It was at the mosque, a Muslim church, and we have a parking lot where we play basketball and other random games. There were some small children and some teenagers playing. I was with two friends on the sidelines watching the boys play basketball, having fun and talking [with my friends] when a group of boys came up around the entrance of the parking lot,” Khan said.
The boys, who Khan believes were around 19 years old, were speaking incoherently--saying things 10-year-old Khan didn't understand.
“I didn’t think anything of it until one guy threw a punch at [one of the boys'] temple, and his eye was super red. We ran inside to call the adults, who tried to settle the fight. [The older boys] got intimidated when the adults came out and left,” Khan said.
She also recalls seeing one or two of them having switchblades. "[I remember] my heart was beating really fast, and I didn't really understand what was happening," Khan said.
Although Khan believes she has experienced other Islamophobic or racist encounters, she said she doesn't think she really understood that the actions were discriminatory at the time.
"Being called a terrorist at school, I mean that's the most unoriginal thing, but I didn't think it was [Islamophobic] until I grew up more," Khan said.
Khan has since joined the Junior State of America (JSA), and is currently an executive board member. JSA is a nonpartisan organization that helps educate students on politics, learn debate and helps teach students the importance of activism and volunteering.
What is Social Injustice?
Khan is not the only person who has faced discrimination because of her background, her beliefs or her looks. Many different groups face social injustices because they are i the minority. Yet, the phrase "social injustice" is not found in the dictionary, but it is certainly a phrase that has become extremely common in the last few years as there is a growing movement across the country to fight social injustice. The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines injustice as "the absence of justice: violation of right or of the rights of another or unfairness."
As the next generation, today's high schoolers responded to the question, "What does social injustice mean to you?" in the following video.
In the Community
Racial Discrimination
Rockwood's Director of Diversity and Equity Brittany Hogan is continuously trying to improve the diversity and awareness in the community. The Black Literature class was one of these attempts to bring awareness to all kinds of students on Black history.
“I think it's especially important for young [people] to find reflections of themselves in [people] who don’t look like them, and [people] who do look like them. That's why it’s so important that we continue to do this work like embedding a diverse curriculum because you will find your voice in stories that you don’t even know have your voice in them if we give you the opportunity to see yourself in a different light. That is the beautiful thing about Black Lit,” Hogan said.
Hogan, who is originally from the Chicago area, said her experience there was a different atmosphere when it comes to race than in Missouri.
"Chicago is racially segregated, but the difference is in the education," Hogan said. "Your exposure to people who look different from you is a lot greater than it is [in St. Louis] and I think that has a lot to do with the racial build up of this city."
There are many more plans to create a more diverse community, according to Hogan, but they take time to create and perfect. For now, the addition of Black Literature to the high school classrooms is an important step to a modernized future.
"James Baldwin has this quote that says, 'These are all our children. We will profit by or pay for whatever they become.' So I know as we continue to really feed into [the students], and to continue to create classes like Black Lit., and to continue to embed diverse curriculum into our schools. We are investing in [the students] on being global citizens. Regardless of what people's opinions are, they should be able to talk about all these things. Its just about expanding your view on what the world looks like," Hogan said.
A potential obstacle that minority students in Rockwood will face in the future is the termination of the Voluntary Interdistrict Choice Cooperation (VICC). The VICC program allows Black students who live in the city of St. Louis to come to schools in the suburbs. It began in 1981 and is phasing out beginning in 2024-2025. The program serves two purposes, First it gives access to better educational opportunities to students in struggling school districts and also serves to bring diversity to the country schools.
Director of Student Services and Lafayette VICC student graduate Terry Harris said he has concerns for the city of St. Louis because of the cancellation of the VICC program and the possibility of St. Louis to continue to be segregated in the future.
"The scary part is when this program goes away, not having the ability to enact with people who are different from you. If you really think about this whole concept around police and black people, although there are historical things people can talk about, its really a relationship thing. These individuals are not understanding each other. When you think about the protests, what people are really protesting is the fact that we're not necessarily seen as equal people. The only way you're going to be able to break that is to bring people together to show that [we] are more alike then not. That is the power of the VICC program more than anything," Harris said.
February is Black History Month
Since 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has been fighting for justice after being freed as slaves in 1863 by President Abraham Lincoln. The NAACP started its organization after a dangerous race riot sparked in Springfield, Illinois. Many early civil rights activists such as Ida B. Wells-Barnett, W.E.B Du Bois and Mary Church Terrell helped form the organization. According to the official NAACP website, “the NAACP’s mission was and is to ensure the political, educational, social and economic equality of minority group citizens of the United States and eliminate race prejudice. The NAACP seeks to remove all barriers of racial discrimination through democratic processes.”
In 1954, a Supreme Court case known as Brown v. Board of Education ruled that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, which overruled the Plessy v. Ferguson case in 1896 that claimed racial segregation was constitutional as long as schools were ‘equal in quality’. The Brown v. Board of Education was definitely a win for Thurgood Marshall, the chief attorney on the case, but it didn’t necessarily have much of an impact on society's mindset. When Rosa Parks refused to give her bus seat to a white man, Parks unknowingly initiated the age known as The Modern Civil Rights Movement.
It took 101 years since Lincoln pronounced enslaved African Americans the right to freedom that the Civil Rights Act was passed by President Lyndon B. Johnson, six months after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. The Civil Rights Act prohibited employment discrimination, racial segregation and unequal voter registration requirements, paving a new age for Black rights. In the next couple decades, a continuum of hate crime was preceded by riots, protests and a movement known as the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. BLM was formed in 2013, but wasn’t as well known nationally until May 2020 when George Floyd, a Black man, was killed during an arrest after a store clerk alleged he had passed a counterfeit $20 bill in Minneapolis. A white police officer knelt on Floyd's neck for a period initially reported to be 8 minutes and 46 seconds. Several other high profile cases involving Black victims of hate crimes or police action contributed to a general atmosphere of unrest throughout the country and increased focus on racial discrimination.
Racial discrimination is still prominent and a rising issue in the United States. Even with the unrest of Black people around America, the first step for many people is creating a more equitable future is by raising awareness and understanding in the future generations of America. In 1976, February was declared Black History Month by president Ford to honor the many achievements of black lives and in 1983, the third Monday of January became a federal holiday known as Martin Luther King Jr. Day to selectively celebrate the achievements of the civil rights activist.
LGBTQ+ Discrimination
During the Nov. 19, 2020 Rockwood Board of Education meeting, Harris introduced Jess Jones, educational consultant, who spoke to the board about the important work that needs to be done to help LGBTQ+ students feel accepted.
“This is a group of students who we probably have not publicly talked about as much as we needed to, so we wanted to start that conversation so that these kids and their families can understand and know that the Rockwood School District supports them, we love them and want to see them do well,” Harris said. “So what we want everyone to know is that all of our students matter, but we want to select and highlight students that we know need more attention to.”
According to an organization known as GLSN, which does research specifically on LGBTQ+ students across America, 72% of transgender students in Missouri are unable to use a bathroom that aligns with their identity. From Jones’s experience with transgender students, there is a large number of students who dehydrate themselves in order to avoid having to use the bathroom.
“I’ve seen [this] often results in medical concerns for students. This is a concerning practice,” Jones said.
Jones, who is nonbinary, understands the difficulty of being LGBTQ+ and how society has shaped a relatively closed mindset. Jones even recalls a time when they were a teacher and had gotten in trouble for allowing a student to do a project on LGBTQ+ people of color.
“Why would I tell a student he can’t do a project on his identity?” Jones said.
In a study conducted by the Human Right Campaign in 2017, Only 26% students said they feel safe in school classrooms and 5% said all of their teachers and school staff are supportive of LGBTQ+ people.
Jones said that 40% of transgender students will attempt suicide at some point in their lifetime, not accounting other difficulties such as depression or anxiety.
“I can’t tell you how many youth I’ve had look me in the eye and tell me, some youth as young as 8 years old, that they would rather die than be in this world as who they are because they are continuously receiving the [message] that they are unloved, they are unsupported, that they’re wrong. We can’t do that to our kids,” Jones said. “This is not a political issue, a religious issue, this is really the underlined value that all of our students matter and their lives matter. We can’t continue to be unsupportive or silent on this issue because of this."
Other Minorities' Experiences
America was built and established by immigrants who were looking to come to a new land for multiple reasons such as opportunity, religious freedom, refuge, etc. However, since people started immigrating to the America, they have faced discrimination.
According to the Department of Justice statistics from 2019, "16.7% of hate crimes are because of sexual orientation, 20.1% are because of religion and 57.6% are because of race, ethnicity, and ancestry."
More recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has also had a profound impact on discrimination, as 58% of Asians in America report they are more likely to be discriminated against now then pre-pandemic, according to the Pew Research Center.
Freshman Christopher Songco's parents are both from the Philippines. Although Songco hasn't dealt with any discrimination himself, he has seen friends or people on social media be discriminated because of the association of COVID-19 with Asian countries, more specifically China.
"The discrimination toward the people that I've seen makes me feel scared it's going to happen to me next, but it also saddens me that these racist feelings are being weaponized and used to hurt other people who don't deserve to be hurt. Since this can most likely be fixed through education, I would say that this is more an act of ignorance rather than fear, " Songco said.
The Future
Student Activism
On June 14, 2020 several Lafayette alumni and other members of the community came together to peacefully protest the BLM movement. Senior Sydney Berry took part in organizing the protests, and said it was a great experience.
"In the beginning we picked out a few people to spread around the line of the crowd or the protests. And we just marched a mile and a half down to Town Center. Whoever was in your area would start off by saying the chant, and then you would repeat and people that would drive would be honking by and wave and clap. It was never quiet too, the energy was always super high," Berry said.
Berry originally helped set up the protest after her older brother, Nick, and his friends had the idea to organize a local peaceful protest.
"There were a lot of speeches. My brother spoke, and a few of his friends spoke. One of my really close friends Marsean [Fisher], who was a senior, spoke. It was really just a platform for everyone to share their stories. And I mean, the amount of people that showed up was insane," Berry said.
Berry was originally born in Ethiopia and adopted by her parents at a young age. Although Berry doesn't see herself as any different from her family, she has experienced very different behaviors from different people because of her parents being White and her skin color being Black.
"I know people my whole life have looked at me differently," Berry said. "A common thing that I've grown up hearing from people of color is that I'm too white, and White people would [sometimes] say I act too Black. It's a weird topic to talk about because I'm living two lives and am part of two different cultures."
When it comes to creating a more just society, Berry believes a relatively equal society is possible, but only if humanity makes the right changes.
"The common people who are fighting for this change can't do anything, unless the people at the top are willing to change," Berry said.
In regards to activism, Berry and government teacher Carrie Guenzler-Heaney agree student activism was and is an important step towards justice.
"I think [student activism] is extremely important. It's been a game changer for our country, and looking at American activism, we wouldn't be the country we are today," Guenzler-Heaney said.
Khan, who is also a student activist, agreed student activism has an impact on society as a whole.
"So how I look at it is, the younger people are the future of the generation and once they get to a certain age, or even now, like they need to be educated so that they can make a change because, essentially, [they] are the future. Right now we're not in too much power, but with collectivity, if we all are protesting for the same stuff, we can get more people on our side as well that are not as young as us and then that can make a huge impact," Khan said.
What's Next
Hogan, who is working to make Rockwood a place of equality, believes there is a lot of work to be done as a nation. "I am hopeful. Even in the moments where things I feel like aren't going in the way I wish they would, what I know is what happens in our buildings will effect what happens in the world. [students] are our next voters," Hogan said.
Even if the future is hard to foretell, Guenzler-Heaney believes the future could be equitable for people if people today were capable of changing their mindsets.
"If the divisions in our country--whether they're racial, whether they're political---if people on both sides can say we actually want the same thing, that in the end, we actually care about the same thing--we care about Democracy, we care about human rights, we really are all pretty close together, but no one believes that anymore," she said.
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Creado con imágenes de Unknown - "quote – Eugene Eric Kim" • Jaxor84 - "rainbow london flag"