Maylena Chaviano
Jennifer Viencek, Instructor
Eng. 112
5/11/2012, Final Paper

Fighting Injustice - A Paradigm Shift
Each year, nearly 2 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade. In Shanxi Province, China, one mentally disabled worker was lured with the promise of a job paying $10 per day, but was then forced to work in a brick kiln where he was beaten and prevented from escaping. It fills me up with sadness to know how much cruelty and inhumane acts happen somewhere every day and at any moment in our world. Most of these are human rights violations. In the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations states that “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” Some of these are the right to life, liberty and security of a person. Every time a right of a person is taken away, we are in the presence of injustice.
The fight against injustice has been around for a long time, but most of the time it has been ineffective. Clearly, we have to change the way we approach the battle of injustice. Policing and enforcement of rules and regulations have not produced a huge dent in the elimination of injustice. Removing the incentives of unjust acts can be a more effective approach to significantly reducing injustice. In the case of human trafficking, if the incentives for those involved are removed or significantly reduced, the practice would not make “business sense” for the violators.
Human trafficking is the process of taking a person away and then selling them as goods with the purpose of exploitation. A lot of human rights are violated constantly throughout the whole process. China is living a war against human trafficking. Without realizing it, China has opened a door that welcomes traffickers to execute this horrific practice. China’s One Child per Family Policy and the insufficient effort by the Chinese Government are creating incentives for all involved in human trafficking (except the victims). Although human trafficking is such a difficult battle to fight, China has the potential to significantly minimize this practice if the government is willing to change some of its policies.
Discussion of Justice/Injustice - Definition
Injustice is defined as “Violation of right or of the rights of another” (Webster, “Injustice”). There are different types of injustices. The most common are discrimination, social and economic injustice. Injustice is defined by each individual or groups in a society. An individual can have the opinion of whether an act or situation is unjust or not. Also a group in a society can come to a consensus on the definition of injustice and there are organizations such as the United Nations which define what is injustice. What is not a violation of a person’s rights is not injustice. A rich person not being generous to give money to people in need, is not a nice situation, but it is not injustice because the rights of people in need are not violated by the rich person.
Martin Luther King Jr. who fought against racial discrimination and for human rights, made a crucial moment in American history. Dr. King. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” He believed that we are so connected to each other, that whatever injustice is happening in one place is going to somehow affect all of us elsewhere. Not only that, he was also encouraging us to fight against what we believe is wrong whether it is happening directly to us or not. We have the choice of doing nothing, ignoring it and in essence stay out of trouble. If we do not stand up against unjust acts, injustice will continue to expand and become pervasive. That is one of the main reasons our society has been suffering from endless unjust acts for a long time. It is recommended that if you are going to do something about it, then, you should plan and execute carefully and always stay within the law. If the action taken is done incorrectly, it can cause