Social Justice?

Social Justice in Star Trek

            If we accept the definition of social justice as “justice exercised within a society, particularly as it is applied to and among the various social classes of a society,” then we must also accept that social justice looks different to every culture, ethnicity, region, and thought groups. This is what makes it a particularly difficult issue to address in terms of public education because as teachers it is part of our responsibility to make sure that students understand and appreciate their actions and the consequences of their actions in society. But how can we do this in a multicultural classroom?

            To understand how arbitrary the idea of social justice is, I would like to turn to an article called “Recognizing the Big Picture” from the text Philosophy and Star Trek. One of the main points in this article is about how something as silly as race has caused such huge divides in human history. One of the species that it examines are the people of Cheron, which are multicolored individuals. The members of the higher social class have their black skin on the left side of their body and the white on the right. Members of the lower social class have their skin tones reversed. The federation, an advanced and egalitarian society views this as barbaric, but the punishments and treatment of the lower social class are accepted by everyone on the planet Cheron. I guess the real question I am posing then, is how do you teach social justice and try to promote equality when other societies have a totally different perspective of social justice.

            I suppose this is part of our mandate as teachers, to bring a multicultural perspective and understanding into our classrooms.