While I’m a bit unsure of whether this could be considered a social issue or not, a while ago I found myself more aware of how social media has allowed the flourishing of artists from all around the world. Recently there was a trend on twitter that was sort of started by an account called “Culture Critic” in which they tweeted “A 23 year old sculpted this. What’s your excuse?”  and under they posted an image of the Rape of Prosperina sculpture made by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Now this post would go on to receive countless replies, some pointing out the fact that this person was trying to compare very different time periods, however something interesting would eventually happen. Many artists began to retweet this same post, attaching art that they’d made themselves with the captions “I made this when I was…”. I certainly had reservations regarding this practice considering it’s focusing on the age of these artists as though they were saying they’d surpassed Bernini in some way, but it did get me to think more about art and what’s given value in our society. The literal juxtaposition of these images made it clear just how far art has come considering that while statues like the one shown are still certainly held in high regard, they’re rivaled in popularity by works produced by artists from all backgrounds illustrating how diverse the art community in America has become. Paintings like those of Kehinde Wiley and digital pieces that have been produced by people of all ages from all walks of life.

One topic that has been continuously discussed on social platforms and apps is the American educational system; the falsities like Christopher Columbus discovering America and what has been purposely omitted, like black history and its place in American history. Recently, this topic has been at the forefront of political and social conversation, due to various states banning the teaching of critical race theory, black feminism, and African American studies. In January of this year, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis officially banned an AP African American Studies class to prevent “Pushing an agenda on our kids.” (The Real Reason Florida Wants to Ban AP African-American Studies, According to an Architect of the Course). Reading and having been a part of these conversations always left me frustrated with the educational system; however, after reading the essay A Talk to Teachers by James Baldwin in my AP Language class in high school, I recognized elements of America’s educational system are not meant to teach an all-around experience for everyone. (A Talk To Teachers)

In 1963, the Saturday Review published A Talk to Teachers in the essay, Baldwin thoroughly expresses that the intended reason for education is to influence and teach a person to analyze and question the world for themselves. However, he further acknowledges the inconsistencies within the education system when it comes to teaching African American children. Baldwin confronts and criticizes his audience, stating that the system and curriculum they teach does not teach African Americans to think and live freely for themselves because they were never intended to do so in the first place. One thing Baldwin pointed out that has stuck with me is his metaphorical use of schizophrenia to describe how being black while living in America is like living in a social paradox. The American educational system teaches black children a white American lifestyle which guarantees “liberty and justice for all,” while black children grow up in a black reality that tells them their past is “a record of humiliations gladly endured.”

Words are not innocent; they have meaning and are presented for a reason. Words are the very essence of our society, and if society is not working for everyone in it, it is broken and has to be fixed. We have to rearrange and reconstruct our words, phrases, and meanings to understand and include everyone. Baldwin had a simple solution that resonated with me: teach African American children reality and not a lifestyle; educate them culturally and emotionally. Baldwin wrote his essay in 1963; we are now in 2023, sixty years later, when states have banned Baldwin’s solution to the problem within the educational system. Instead of being frustrated with the educational system I think it’s now time to question it, “Why?” “What’s the bigger picture?”

A Post-it Note. Seriously? It’s all you gave us for “validation” that you know what has happened today. But do you all really care? Or just want people to know that you put in the effort of acknowledgment. On this day we should be mourning the loss of a fellow student, but instead, we are just putting up sticky notes. No moment of silence, no offer of help or acknowledgment that it’s ok to ask for help. All you gave us were sticky notes around the school. One day passes by and; the notes are gone. It’s like we have forgotten about what happened hours ago to a friend, classmate, or group mate on a project. They are now just gone without a trace. This is one of the problems with our society. I hear time and time again to reach out for help if you need it but, when reaching out for help doesn’t work and the inevitable happens, we go silent. We tell our peers and ourselves that “it’s ok” or “I would never do that” but we soon just forget about what happened in a few short days. That’s how we get rid of our problems though right? It’s just easier to wipe our problems under the rug rather than talk through them to resolve them. This is why we aren’t ready for this conversation of actually making a difference. It is time to talk about the severity of suicide more often so that our next classmate, does not become a part of the forgotten.

I think that a time where I felt as though my perspective has changed due to literature was reading about the homelessness problem in New York. As of late, our new mayor, Eric Adams, has enacted some measures to ensure that homeless people do not actually receive the help they need. Having initially been in favor of him (I’d never voted before then, read his blurb and thought his ideas sounded great), his leadership has been pretty ineffective. Whether intentional or not, it seems as though these ideas hurt homeless people rather than “solve the problem” of them simply existing. His recent move to forcibly put homeless people into psychiatric/health clinics via police seems counterintuitive. “…If you stop and think about it, it makes sense, right? People who are disoriented or having atypical thoughts, they’re not in a position oftentimes to comply collaboratively with a police officer,” he said. “And given the fact that police officers are carrying weapons, you have sort of a recipe for bad outcomes.” (via  Ryan McBain, a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation, CNN) The truth is that the problem with homelessness in New York and in many other places, is more complex than one might think. On the surface, you look at the stats of housing in NY and realize that there’s so much free space, and yet so many people on the streets – why not just place these people into housing? That’s how I thought initially. But then you realize, a lot of these people are on the streets not only because they were kicked out of their old homes, maybe they lost a job, maybe they couldn’t afford the upkeep of rent, but also some of these people need assistance with their health. With mental health only in recent years becoming less stigmatized, it’s no wonder that people are still of the mindset that these folks are “unhelpable.” And when these people are having uncontrollable outbursts and impacting other people’s lives, it’s easy to paint them as the “bad guys,” or not treat them humanely. If you’re struggling with mental health, and the government is expecting you to pack all your belongings off the street, get a job, and take a shower to support your home, it seems almost impossible. While Adams’ intentions are in good faith, he keeps going about it the wrong way. Placing police in certain stations only and yanking people off the streets into psych wards so that New York doesn’t have to face the reality of our homeless population, hiding them away, is not the first step to solving the homelessness problem. If you want to fix the issue of homelessness in America, you need to look at it from multiple perspectives. There’s no easy fix for a big problem that has been marinating in NY for years. It’s going to be expensive, difficult, and time consuming. It’s not just mental health and housing, but those are important places to start.

This is a question that got brought up a lot in 2020. During the Covid 19 Pandemic, we had many celebrities and artists get called out for their problematic past and get “canceled” or what they really mean is wait for them to post their notes app apology and everybody forgets about it a few days later but that’s not the point of this discussion. 

After an artist gets called out, the next question that gets brought up (if they care enough) is “how do I continue to consume their art without supporting them?”. This question is not as easy to answer. Many people answer with “separate the art from the artist” but after multiple online discussions, I found that it isn’t as easy to do.

This conversation sparked up again at the start of 2020 because of one of the most famous authors of the past generations, JK Rowling. When her very transphobic tweets and her support for anti-trans companies were made apparent, many people came out to show their distaste and lack of support for it. 

Now I, like many, also read Harry Potter at a very young age. I grew up watching the Harry Potter movies. For a moment I thought “as long as I don’t buy anything that gives her money, I am good”. I can continue to enjoy this world and continue to read the books that I’ve owned for years. Until her racist and antisemitic portrayal of characters was called out. I’m not going to say that it was something new, this could’ve been called out years ago and I didn’t spot it or research it myself. But this brings up another question, “what happens when the art shows the views of the artist?”

You can’t force anyone to not buy a book, or to not watch a movie, or to not listen to this artist’s music. At the end of the day, we still have authors like Sarah J. Maas, Colleen Hoover, and JK Rowling who will continue to make money from everything with their names on it.

I have no idea if there really is a malevolent Big Brother pulling the strings of news media and political narratives but I do know that Rupert Murdoch exists. A long time ago I read a story written in the New York Times, a detailed history of Murdoch’s rise to the top of corporate media. I’m pretty sure I was in the middle of a process called “coming of age” which is when it’s time for a person to step through the door that leads from childhood to adulthood all the while you’re being dealt sturdy blows to the head and groin that come from either side of said door. It dawned on me that I would become a fully-fledged member of society soon. I’d become a voter. 

I’m pretty sure it’s a citizen’s duty to vote, so I suppose it’s their responsibility to be informed. However, as long as voting is a test with no wrong answer, becoming informed is a study session without a clear start point and no discernable end. This leaves one a lot of room when it comes to the process of learning about social issues.

Now, to become informed, we look to news outlets and journalists to give us the scoop on what senator is cheating with which campaign manager, who Dow Jones is and what it will take for him to be happy, and to keep steady count of the doomsday clock. 

There’s a lot of jungle to whack through just to figure out what issues are being decided on and what you can do to help accomplish what you want. Oh yeah! What do you want? You have some vague notion of what it is. You heard something about inflation the other day right before driving your head into the sand. As you wipe sand out of your eyes while watching CNBC you start to understand that inflation isn’t very good and that something caused it. You nod to yourself and resolve that you’ve earned a cookie. Whenever you do feel like you’ve brushed up enough on your city’s housing policies to make an informed ballot decision, you sip your coffee, unfold the newspaper and find out the goalposts were moved in the night and the opinions you’ve formed somehow spells destruction of humanity.

Both the desire to understand and the anxiety that society gives me have taught me to treat all “news” with at least some level of skepticism before I can fact-check it in one way or another. Then after that, if I can’t come to a conclusion regarding the issue, I decide it might have something to do with an old man in a control tower who owns a business and makes money the more viewers he has.

News is flawed, but we as humans are necessarily imperfect. If we weren’t we wouldn’t have social issues, and if we didn’t have those we wouldn’t need news. It’s an individual’s chore and privilege to think for themself.

You read numerous amounts of literature, scroll through thousands of posts on social media, and watch many films on what it is to be a woman. It is impossible to go through a day without coming across content that isn’t related to women. Especially for me and I bet for many other girls, I surround myself with information and stories, whether it is a new makeup product to purchase, advice from an OBGYN doctor on TikTok, or good and bad experiences people face for being a woman in society. I have been thankful to be present in an era where we can openly speak and write about the life of being a woman, but I now can’t seem to ignore what that life could’ve been for a female in the past, just how much have we progressed and what has remained the same? 

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, a classic. A book I have read three times, and not willingly. It didn’t end up being my favorite novel of Jane Austen despite it being her most famous of all for its romance and for most of all Elizabeth Bennet, a strong female character who didn’t fall into the expectations for a woman at the time. The last time I read this novel, I read it from a unique perspective with the help of my professor. Yes, it was romantic how Mr. Darcy became attracted to Elizabeth, and yes, we admire her denying societal norms her mother, Mrs. Bennet, was enforcing onto her, for her to marry. Elizabeth can be considered a feminist of her time! But when I read deeper is when I realized other aspects of her character. Elizabeth had a friend, Charlotte Lucas, who was Mr. Collins. This was a decision that Elizabeth totally disagreed with because Charlotte wasn’t marrying for romance, instead it was for stability. For all the romantics out there, I know you would agree with her, but let’s think about the time these girls are living in, England during the late 1700s-early 1800s. Women couldn’t own land, they depended on marriage in order to have a home. Although Elizabeth basically shamed Charlotte for her decision, this was her form of survival. Even though we live in 2023 and women have their necessary liberties, we still see characters like Elizabeth today. Many women sometimes need to take necessary actions to survive in this society. Of course, women are capable of so much more things in society now and we deserve the right to do so, it isn’t helpful to judge what a woman must do to survive. There’s no uncomplicated way to just live and ignore your race, your economic situation, your culture, or even your morals. Each woman has their own experience and way of living, and we shouldn’t allow privilege and judgment to shame them for it. 

Perhaps this wasn’t the way Jane Austen intended for her novel to be interpreted, but for me personally, this interpretation opened my eyes in many ways. Society, laws, and rations evolve, but some ideas remain the same, it was surprising for this to be highlighted to me through a Regency Era, a novel written by a white woman. 

I remember coming across a Tiktok post last year by a creator named @crutches_and_spice, where she expressed her frustration for how disabled people have been discarded and basically left for dead throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. She goes into detail on how non-disabled people have been too stubborn and careless with COVID-19 restrictions and protocols, like the lack of mask usage and vaccination, to the point that disabled people are the ones paying the cost. This willful ignorance on a global scale has existed long before 2020 and denotes how we live in and continue to fuel a system that persistently kills disabled people, whether intentionally or not. We can see this in how there is a lack of walkable cities around the US, less accessible buildings, more discrimination towards disabled people in job markets, and so on. The pandemic and its growing number of casualties has only drawn the curtains back and revealed the damage that we as non-disabled people have always inflicted.

My takeaway from her Tiktok and the countless other posts on her page dedicated to disability advocacy is that ableism is truly the root of all evil. Racism, misogyny, and fatphobia all derive from the notion that some bodies are less desirable than others or they possess inferior traits so therefore they must either be degraded, conquered, or ostracized. White supremacy has long instilled this concept that the white cis-gender non-disabled male body should be deemed ideal. This ideal body also informs the modern day beauty standard that, in turn, dominates our perception of attraction and relationships. All in all, that Tiktok post opened my eyes the many ways that ableism is the origin of most forms of bigotry and that we all contribute to it in some way, shape, or form. The poorly-handled pandemic is just a byproduct of that corrupt system.

Personally, after binging her content, I began to reflect on the role that I play in the grand scheme of things. Do I act ableist? Have I taken COVID-19 seriously? What can I do to prevent behaving or thinking in an ableist way? These are questions that have shaped the way I behave moving forward. I ensure that I wear my mask more regularly and get tested often if I experience symptoms. I am mindful of the elderly people in my family who are vulnerable. I try to go to as little public gatherings as possible. I make sure that my peers are aware that the pandemic is still ongoing and should also be mindful. Although the US is currently doing better in regard to COVID-19, it is still paramount that we check ourselves on our own privilege and the impact we have on the disabled community.

Literacy has the power to change your viewpoint on almost any standpoint or idea. As a young writer and novelist, fictional stories, either realistic or scientific, have helped build my awareness of social issues. Mental health is one of those social issues that has always affected people in our community. But one of the extraordinary aspects of mental health issues is how it can be viewed in different social lenses, depending on how others perceive those people struggling with mental health problems.  One of my favorite books that I continuously look back on is called The Perks Of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky.

To summarize, the book follows a high school adolescent with PTSD and depression from an abusive childhood. Throughout most of the story, all the main character Charlie tries to do is fit in and find his place in the world while battling with this mental illness that tries to isolate him from others and makes it harder for him to make friends and find love. Now this book may not affect everyone the same way, but it did change how I process social issues like mental health slightly. The reason I resonated with this book is that in some ways I could relate to this introverted yet interesting character that the author has created. 

As a person that also suffered from mental health problems, I see the world through a different lens from how other people do. These metaphorical lenses that I created caused me to lose confidence in myself. Part of me hated myself because everything anything I did, weird or abnormal, made me feel disgusted with myself. I had a hard time fitting in, and learning how to be social. But then I picked up reading a bit more. As I got older and wanted to learn more about the world, books like these just flicked a switch in my head. Seeing this kid fight for friends and the love of his life in ways that only he knew he could become inspirational. At the end of Perks of Being a Wallflower, I and Charlie both realized that the way we see the world isn’t a bad thing. It may sound cliche but being unique and seeing the world through our eyes is not just black and white. Literacy has taught me that it’s okay to be different and that the way we live doesn’t have to be conventional in the slightest.