What is Social Justice Work?


The Story of the River Babies (A Short Parable)

One summer in the village, the people in the town gathered for a picnic. As they leisurely shared food and conversation, someone noticed a baby in the river, struggling and crying. The baby was going to drown!  Someone rushed to save the baby.

Then, they noticed another screaming baby in the river, and they pulled that baby out. Soon, more babies were seen drowning in the river, and the townspeople were pulling them out as fast as they could. It took great effort, and they began to organize their activities in order to save the babies as they came down the river.

As everyone else was busy in the rescue efforts to save the babies, two of the townspeople started to run away along the shore of the river.

"Where are you going?" shouted one of the rescuers. "We need you here to help us save these babies!"

"We are going upstream to stop whoever is throwing them in!"

Saving the babies is Social Work...going up the river to stop whoever is throwing them in is Social Justice Work.

 

Robert Caldwell is the Executive Director of AnswerPoverty.org and has been a practitioner and thought leader on the issues of poverty & race for more than 25 years.  Visit AnswerPoverty.org 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Which came first the chicken or the egg?

Image
(Photo Courtesy of Pixabay.com)   After Tony (not his real name) was born, his mom left him at the hospital.  She was a crack addict and was obviously not in any condition to be a parent.  When the hospital discovered she had left, they called his maternal grandmother, who was listed as an emergency contact on the admissions form, and told her that she needed to come and pick up her daughter's child.  She did and for the next 10 years she did her best to raise him.  By the time he was nine years old he was too much for her to handle. He started running away and staying out in the streets all night.  Soon he began living in the streets, dealing drugs and sleeping wherever he could hustle a couch.  When I met Tony, he was 17 years old and his, life by all accounts, had been Hell.  He was well-built and handsome and used his charm to get women for sex, but he told me he did it mainly to make sure that he had a bed to sleep in most nights.  I don’t know if he had any children
Read more

The Christanity of this land and the Christanity of Christ

Image
The Christanity of this land and the Christanity of Christ To be a friend of the one, is of necessity to be the enemy of the other.  I love the pure, preacable, and Impartial Christianity of Christ; I therefore hate the corrupt, slave holding, woman-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Fredrick Douglass
Read more

A lesson in Privilege on Old McDonald's Farm

Image
(Image by VectorStock) Every year on Old McDonald's Farm the Cow goes to the Pigs and the Chickens with an idea to do something special for Old Farmer McDonald's Birthday.  And every year she comes to them with the same idea... "Let's make Farmer McDonald Breakfast for his Birthday!" Every year the Pigs and Chickens reluctantly asked "what do you have in mind this year?"   And every year the Cow says  "Bacon & Eggs of course! It's his favorite meal!" Well this year... the Pigs and Chickens say to the Cow "Let's do Dinner for him this year"   Excitedly the Cow says Ok...what do you have in mind?   " A Steak Dinner!" says one of the Pigs.  "He can have a Rib Eye, Porter House, Filet Mignon or even Prime Rib!"  One of the Chickens says  "He likes Milkshakes too, so we can make him a chocolate Milkshake for dessert!"  Hearing this the Cow's countenance changed. She lowered her
Read more