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The Justice Project

 I am an environmentally concerned senior from Animas high school (a small charter school in Durango that focuses on project-based learning and community connection). The senior curriculum for this semester is based around the idea and principle of justice, we looked into the bear's ears debate, the baize philosophies of justice, "True Justice" a documentary focused on our prison system, and the standing rock debate. This topic gave us an overview of justice and encompassed environmental, social, political, and racial justice within today's society. As a class, we spend a few months learning about different philosophies of justice, and how they appear in our society today. Once students have gained a strong understanding of these different justice philosophies, they break into groups to create a project of their own. This project seeks to bring about awareness and change concerning one of these philosophies. Our group is composed of students who like me are deeply concerned about environmental justice and climate change. We desired to create something beneficial for the community, that will help bring awareness to the detrimental effects of wildfires on recreational land, and in turn, lowering air quality. We started a GoFoundMe with the generated funds going to planting trees in the Durango Co area to replace trees that were decimated by fires, as well as to the Conservation Colorado, charity to create a healthier environment. This charity focuses on generating clean air for the Colorado community. Along with a local charity, our group is also donating funds to a national environmental group, NRDC, focused on working toward limiting existing air pollution. The pressing need for society’s awareness and action has never been more prevalent or necessary, than during the current pandemic and climate crisis.  

Justice Monolog 1

John Rawls, the great Harvard political philosopher whose theory of justice makes clear his belief that justice is the paramount virtue is in direct contrast with Libertarianism, which states that it is in fact freedom that is the paramount value. But who is correct, and what is the difference?

 Freedom is defined as the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint. 

Justice is defined as just behavior or treatment,  being Just is defined as behaving according to what is morally right and fair, and according to the Rasmussen Reports, national telephone, and an online survey, 73% of adults in America would die for freedom of speech. America’s tendency to value freedom over justice is also seen in the dispute of the FBI’s right to have Apple engineers help unlock the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino shooters. The courts ruled that Apple’s freedom to keep the phone locked in accordance with their privacy policy superseded the FBI’s need to obtain information needed to bring the culprits to justice. Leading to the quote, “public life should incorporate a great deal of freedom … but you cannot trump justice with liberty” I believe that the reason for the American people’s trend in valuing freedom beyond justice is the common correlation between justice and punishment. Even when researching justice the first five results that appeared were in regards to our criminal justice system. 

As we saw in the movie “True Justice” the freedoms of certain individuals are more regularly taken from them due to our criminal justice system. A phenomenon that is also pointed out in Howerd Zins book “Law and Justice” where he tells the story of O’Brian who “claimed in court that his act, though in violation of the draft law, was protected by the free speech provision of the Constitution.” even so “the Supreme Court decided that the governments need to regulate the draft overcame his right to free expression.” given the association with the criminal “justice” system we have in place and its ability to strip us of our beloved freedom it's no wonder that Americans tend to value freedom more. However, we often forget that justice is not just punishment.

 As stated by Howard Zinn, “There is also justice, meaning the fair treatment of all human beings, the equal right of all people to freedom and prosperity” meaning that justice is the provider of freedom. More importantly, it is the provider of just freedom, giving us autonomy while maintaining the morals we have as humans that keep us from divulging into chaos. 

So in conclusion I am inclined to believe that John Rawls, the great Harvard political philosopher, got it right. That justice is the paramount virtue. For without justice there is no freedom.

Justice Monolog 2

Project Defence

For my justice project, I focused on the injustice of climate change. I approached this by creating a blog and spreading awareness about the importance of climate change with the general public. This would be to raise money for climate-focused charities that had a strong awareness of air pollution. I worked with one peer on this project. Together we created a go found researched charities and made the first blog post. However, I was individually responsible for the second blog post's content. To make sure that I was able to create a captivating blog, I printed out five pages of research detailing effective blog writing. I referenced these notes while writing to ensure that it was going in a good direction and would be a compelling body of writing.  I reached out to the other two environmental groups so that I could update the blog with their progress research and images. Wrote half of our first blog post, and found one of our charities. This project reflected my personal philosophy of justice because I approached it from the lens of wanting to educate people. “Ethics are a necessity to have and must be held by a group.” This is a quote that I took away from our justice unit, it helped to shape my perception of justice. I was also influenced by the conviction of the natives, their view of the environment as there, “church.” really showed me how much some people lean on and need the land. It inspired me to share my own love. This project used the mix of both understandings reaching out to the community to teach them about climate change while also showing them the love that we as young people hold for the environment. 

From the words of my peer Riley Douglas “What justice is there for the air we breathe and water we drink, what justice is there for the trees. The reason this is a just way of approaching the issue of environmental justice is that it addresses these factors. Giving support back to the natural world that we rely on. This project addresses the environmental dilemma, “what if people make the conscious decision to preserve the land.” By turning this into a go fund me we are challenging the public to choose the environment over their own convenience. It's justice because it gives back to the resources that we so often take for granted. 

Project Reflection

So far I have been successful in reaching the goals that I set for myself. This is mainly since I was passionate about the work that I was doing and truly felt as though I was helping to make a difference. I was also motivated by having a partner. I wanted to do good work and carry my weight so that I wouldn't let them down to complete the project on their own. I wanted to be able to look back at this and be proud of myself. As well as knowing that this would be seen by anyone I wanted to represent myself and the school that I love in the best light possible. 

I was unsuccessful in posting as much about the tree planting group because of communication difficulties. I had struggles in reaching out to them and do not think that it was clear as I could have been about wanting to receive updates on the research that they were doing. To ensure that the trees would be planted in a sustainable way that would be beneficial to the surrounding environment. I overcame this obstacle by reaching out to multiple members of their group multiple times to ensure that we were staying up to date and in the loop so that I could make posts that best reflected their work. 

I would say that I showed up to this project very committed to making a difference. I thought about it constantly reaching out to professionals who write blog posts for their own businesses and working on it on days that I didn't even have class. I reached out to my family members to get their input and better understand what they found captivating. For this project, I put my all into it since I do love the environment and see the passion that my peers also hold for it. Another thing that helped me to strive for my best work was that you could see the results of the work that we would do. It was quantifiable which pushed me to stove for my best work. I was able to follow the process and watch the success of our project.

This project showed me the importance of being passionate about your area of study. This will help me not only in the senior project but in college as well. I gained the realization that it was the material that I was studying that pushed me to do my best work more than anything else. I would not have been nearly this motivated or intrigued by the project if I hadn't had the pre-existing love for the environment. It also showed me the importance of reaching out to others that have experience. I learned so much about what blog writing is due to a chance encounter that I had with a professional blog writer. He was able to give me great ideas and a foundation that inspired my research into blog writing. He showed me that there are always things that we don't understand and that professionals bring insight and understanding that we don't have to the table. They give you a new and refined perspective. Even if you don't end up using their advice it's always useful to have outsider perspectives.

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