Karrissa Sealey                                                                                             10/12/21

                                       Where is progressivism in today’s society?

     Progressivism is something that applies to a variety of responses to the economic and social problems that were created due to industrialization being introduced to America. This period represented how the landscape of America was rapidly changing from a society whose economy is based on producing and maintaining crops and farmland(agrarian society) to an urban one that metropolises characterized modern industrial civilization with information technology as a central mechanism for business, mobilization, and communications. While those changes were a good thing, they didn’t change the fact that the US had more underlying issues. In today’s world, people believe that society is progressing but it seems like we’re going back in time. Even right now people are losing jobs and our economy is falling because of certain circumstances, further proving that’s not the case. Not only is our economy failing but people have been scared for their lives because of who they are and because of what they identify with. For example, those who are poor and don’t come from a “strong enough” background, or those who were treated so harshly just because they were born with a different skin color, or simply because they were a woman. If society were progressing why is it that we don’t see any improvements? Why is it that more and more people have to be hurt in order to just be? 

      To get a better understanding of what progressivism is you first need to know what people were fighting for. The people who stood for Progressivism also known as the progressives rejected Social Darwinism and believed that the problems society faced such as violence, poverty, greed, racism, and class warfare could be solved by providing a safe environment, good education, and an efficient workplace. As stated in the Oxford dictionary “Social Darwinism is the theory that individuals, groups, and people are subject to the same Darwinian laws of natural selection as plants and animals.” The progressives worked to protect the interests of the public. Progressives mainly resided in cities and were college-educated. They thought that the government could be a tool for change. To them, change was possible because they had a strong advocate on their side, Theodore Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt was an American statesman and writer who served as the 25th Vice President of the United States, as the 33rd Governor of New York, and after that, he soon became the 26th President of the United States(Editors of History.com). Roosevelt believed that strong corporate behavior was good for America but he also believed that corporate behavior should be watched in order to ensure that greed bred from it did not get out of hand. As the economy became more industrialized, an atmosphere of materialism and greed overwhelmed the market, which resulted in poor living conditions and long hours for working-class people. Apart from Roosevelt, there were also social reformers, like Jane Addams, and journalists, like Jacob Riis and Ida Tarbel, who were powerful voices for progressivism. The Progressive leaders pushed for an agenda of reform for the economic system that perpetrated the disenfranchisement of the working people. Progressives believed that violence, racism, and other social issues would be fixed with a good education or safe environments, but if everything could be fixed with them, why do the issues they fought for keep occurring in the places created to help and keep you safe?

   School Safety

   A place that should be safe and provide you with a sense of security and comfort doesn’t necessarily exist. As stated before, progressives stood against violence and believed that if people were in a safe environment while being provided with good education they would be fine but that isn’t the case. For example, a school should be the place where you receive a good education while feeling safe but in recent years there has been an increase in violence. In schools, there have been a lot of shootings and bullying. It’s gotten to the point where some students are afraid to even go to school because they fear for their lives. While doing my research I found an article called “  Bullies Ruined My Childhood. Then I Realized My Daughter Is One.“  by Kate Young that discussed bullying, the effects it had on her, and expressed how those with authority made it seem like she was the problem, not the bullies. “ I was kicked and tripped by students while we stood in line. Classmates threw things at me during lunch or while the teacher had his back turned. My mom contacted the school several times, and they did nothing to stop the harassment. The teachers knew what was going on, but they did nothing. One teacher suggested to me that if I wore better clothes and styled my hair differently, perhaps I wouldn’t be such a target.” Progressivism was invented to protect those who faced discrimination but as the years go by it seems as if it never existed. School should be a place where you shouldn’t be afraid to express yourself, not a place you fear. Young also states that as she got older “the teasing and harassment only got worse, and by the time I was in ninth grade, the years of verbal and emotional abuse by my classmates had taken their toll on me. I hated school and hated myself.” Young’s story is just one out of thousands, if not millions out there. If progressivism were really successful and as helpful as it’s claimed there’d be less.

   Going by the statistics of just the United States alone, “an estimated 3 million children in the US are exposed to shootings per year”(Everytown Research). While most may result in injury, others are not so lucky. Even those who don’t get hurt are left with trauma that follows them throughout the rest of their lives. The article “ After School Shootings, Children And Communities Struggle To Heal” states “Within days of the one-year anniversary of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, two students at the school died by suicide, further extending the trauma, grief, and suffering beyond the initial tragedy. Research shows that anniversaries of mass casualty incidents can trigger post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms.” Besides being scared to step foot into a building specifically made to help students further their knowledge, lives are being lost because not enough is being done to prevent it. A “good education” and a “safe environment” is not always guaranteed.

     In order to further support the claim that people don’t feel safe in school, responses were gathered from students of different age groups, and ethnicities. There were three questions asked based on safety in school/society(See Appendix A). The majority of the people interviewed believed that schools are safe but to a certain extent. If you’re “normal” or at least acted that way then you’d be fine. The majority thought that safety in school had a push and pull relationship with one another and that if students were well behaved, schools could be safe. They also believed that different schools/teachers would react differently to situations like bullying such as ones with different morals and upbringings. If they weren’t brought up in an environment that fought against discrimination, the students believed that they were less likely to care. Besides that, greed could be considered a factor as to why certain teachers may not do anything. If a student’s parent had power, some teachers would do whatever it took in order to keep their position or even climb up to a new one even if it meant looking over issues in school. These students also stated that schools do not do enough to prevent bullying which is why some students do not feel safe. Students don’t want to speak up because they think that instead of being helped the bullying would be worse. The progressives fought so hard against things like greed and discrimination but those things are still prominent in our society today.

    Racism/Discrimination

  When talking about discrimination racism is almost always mentioned. The Progressives were against racism because while being new, it was quickly becoming a pressing problem facing society at the time. However, racism is not showing any signs of decreasing, especially considering the fact that social activist groups such as Black Lives Matter are still necessary. The Black Lives Matter Global Network is a member-led organization with the mission of building local power and intervening with the violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes. The Black Lives Matter movement was created in 2013 as a response to the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s murderer, George Zimmerman. Martin and Zimmerman encountered each other in circumstances that have remained mysterious and conflicted, with someone calling out for help multiple times in a short time span. The confrontation ended with Zimmerman shooting the unarmed teenager in the chest. When an officer arrived at the scene at 7:17 p.m, he found Martin dead and Zimmerman on the ground, bleeding from wounds on the head and face. The officer then took Zimmerman into custody, who claimed he shot Martin in self-defense. Zimmerman was shortly released with no charges filed. After Zimmerman was released the whole Black Lives Matter movement officially started. The case did soon reopen as a result of the movement and Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder. Instead of people of color feeling safe or protected as per progressivism, they were instead met with oppression. Even now in the 2020s, people of color are being wrongfully accused, murdered, and assaulted/targeted. Last year in the face of a pandemic millions of people had to protest because another African American man lost his life for no reason at all. If society truly were progressing we would not have gotten to the point where people would have to leave their homes in the middle of the pandemic and risk catching the virus themselves in order to advocate for black lives.”The murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, was not new information. It was the same suffering and struggle of one-fifth of the population of the United States set against the backdrop of American life: the militarization of that life and of our police, the privatization of our prisons, the debasement of our journalism and our media, the corporatization of our professions, and the commercialization of our culture”(Micheal Fine). Even though the progressives fought against racism, their efforts did not help improve the lives of people of color. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, there has also been an increase in attacks towards the Asian community. They are being viewed as the “cause” of the pandemic and most people are using the pandemic as an excuse to be blatantly racist and xenophobic. According to clinical key ever since the pandemic began Asian hate crimes increased by 145 %, while overall hate crimes decreased by 6 % in America in 2020. As stated before, instead of “progressing” society is allowing things to stay the same and as nothing changes, it becomes worse.

Progressivism in today’s society

         Others may argue that progressivism does exist in society because there have been improvements in things like technology, minimum wage, and they can also argue that schools do in fact provide a good education for students. However, those things don’t guarantee any changes and/or improvements in things like violence, poverty, greed, racism, and class warfare. For example, with there being an increase in the minimum wage people would obviously be paid more but as minimum wage increases, so do the prices of everything else. Besides that, not everyone has the resources, requirements, or accessibility to get those jobs. As for education, students can be stressed because they have to get good grades, leading to them acting out. Even if schools do provide a good enough education it doesn’t change the fact that everyone comes from different circumstances or the fact that some people have ill intentions. Progressivism may deal with improvements in society, but is society actually improving if people are still restricted?

   If society was progressing there would be no need for social movements, and people would not have to fear for their lives or be afraid to express themselves. Based on the events that have occurred over the years, it seems like society is doing more harm than good hence moving us backward. As time goes by more people have been speaking up as they become more aware of issues that society is facing but sadly most voices go unheard. Society today is struggling with both social and economic issues which is something that progressivism was built upon. Progressivism was made to fight against these issues but it hasn’t made an appearance in a while as more issues are being created rather than being solved. Where is progressivism in today’s society?