In Chapter 8, Johnson describes the ways in which certain people are privileged and how this leads them to be oblivious to the issues surrounding them. He speaks about how people deny and minimize people so that they don’t have to deal with the issues at hand or to prove that they don’t believe there is an issue. The strategies of denying and minimizing are used in everyday settings.
Denying for example would be someone saying, “ Well there’s no one in my class that is disabled, so it’s not a problem.” Just because there isn’t a problem in your class, doesn’t mean there isn’t that problem elsewhere. People turn a blind eye to anything just so they don’t have to be involved. Minimizing is also negative. Even though you may acknowledge there’s a problem, you say it’s not a huge deal. How can someone say racism isn’t a huge deal, even in today’s society? Even worse is when people of privilege see the less dominate groups as being better off than those of privilege.
All of these practices make it even worse for the victims of these oppressions. Instead of acknowledging there’s a problem and trying to fix it, they sort of just brush it under the carpet as if it’s nothing, which makes it harder for the oppressed. This is because people aren’t really seeing the problems so the problems cant be fixed.
We all need to start acknowledging what’s happening and start to try to fix the cycle by not repeating the denial and minimization of other groups of people. We need to stand up and fight for them, use our privilege in good use to help others and not frown upon them.
What would be the best way for people to get involved in something that they don't have a direct link to? Something like -- there are no disabled people in my class...I don't personally know any disabled people....should they go to centers or get in contact with national federations?
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