ENCOURAGING THE SOCIAL JUSTICE GENERATION

The world we exist in right now is a world full of social imbalances. The underlying
factors of these imbalances is what shapes our society as it is right now, and there
are those that seem to ignore these widespread social concerns. These social
imbalances are what we call social inequalities. Social inequality is defined as the
set of unequal opportunities for different social classes or statuses for various
individuals within a group or society. But, I simply define it as an alarming
imbalance of power. It is a global problem making it extremely important to raise
awareness of the topic and here I am in front and with you, to advocate you how
we are an important identity to igniting social justice towards an inequality –
poverty.

There are pockets of poverty and deprivation among the ostentatious wealth and
enormous privilege. Whenever I walk the streets of nearby cities, signs of
weakness can be discerned on the homeless people’s faces. Every man’s begging
voice – even the cry of every infant, a child who hasn’t even learnt to talk yet –
conveys this sense of oppression. According to the Philippine Statistics Authority
(PSA), poverty incidence in the Philippines rose to 18.1 percent in 2021,
equivalent to 19.99 million poor Filipinos compared to the 16.7 percent recorded
in 2018. A lot of political administrations have long wanted to achieve a solution
to this social issue, and yet lots more were also the reason for it. Who in the large
number of societies and individualities can have the possibility to address and put
action on these issues and imbalances. Do we rely on the government? Do they
still have the right balance of moral and intellectuality that our society needs?
What we need is to look for a bigger identity. And it turns out what I am facing at
right now is the social identity I am pertaining to. The youth, they are our
resource for social justice. I am actually quite impressed how people my age and
even younger are voicing out there stand and concerns on the social injustice in
our systems of justice. We could contribute to the idea of this just notion not only
in large forms of material contribution, but also with small acts of compassion and
humanity.

Poverty is like darkness; it is a great secludedness, it is an enemy, an unwavering

obstacle where one can’t easily get out of due to the lack of better chances.
Poverty is a begging hunger. Poverty is injustice. It isn’t just a matter of money; it
is a matter of the availability of opportunities in life. Fortunately, you and I are
given much better opportunities than many. These better opportunities give us
the identity, the power to alter unequal outcomes. We, the youth of this
generation, has the capacity, the time, the energy, the power to contribute to the
community, to a perspective that is hopeful. Along with rightful equal chances of
education and economic opportunity shaping us to be an intellectual individual,
we also have to instill within ourselves visions of humanity, compassion, and
justice.