Do We Want Justice?

It's easy to say "I want everyone to be equal." Sure you do. You want everyone to have the same rights. You want everyone to have the same services. You want everyone to have the same chance. It's something that on a basic level, most of America has agreed on. It's why we ended segregation, and it's why marriage equality now has majority support. We don't think some people should live in a separate society from the rest of us.

That's also the easy stuff to agree on though, and as we move forward, we're finding it's much harder to reach consensus on civil rights. Do we want to pay higher taxes to fix urban schools, which are largely poor and less white? Do we want to end the practice of mass incarceration, which some data suggests has lead to a declining crime rate in America, but has clearly had a very negative impact on communities of color, compared to whites? Do we want affirmative action policies to help minorities get access to some of the same advantages that more affluent whites have had for decades? When we start getting into these corrective measures, things get much harder. Seeking justice for injustices requires more sacrifice, and more perceived "giving" by those with privilege, and that is a much harder sell.

I'm not saying that society will fail to bring about more justice, or that it should, by any means. I'm saying it's a lot harder discussion and fight to have. The truth is that many groups of people in the United States don't feel as though they are getting a good deal right now, so convincing those who are doing marginally better that helping those doing marginally worse is in their interest is going to be tough. We see this manifest in the "Trump movement" that has arisen on the right, opposing any form of social justice. The backlash from otherwise seemingly normal folks makes me wonder to myself though- does the majority of our society want justice? The answer to that question may make us feel uncomfortable.