Recently, I watched Bryan Stevenson's very moving speech on the social injustices which are prevalent in our world today. As some may know, Bryan is the founder and director of the Equal Justice Initiative, a non-profit organization based in Montgomery, Alabama as well as a lawyer. Bryan works with the incarcerated ranging from children, to people on parole, and to those waiting on death row. Bryan Stevenson raises the controversial topic of injustice, specifically pertaining to the injustices faced by those through today's justice system. In the South, there is a great deal of injustice towards people of color; their is an 11times more of a chance of conviction if the victim of the crime white and the defendant is 22 times more likely to be convicted if he or she is black. Also, in America for every nine people put on death row one person is found to be innocent after the fact and then exonerated. Using Mr. Stevenson's example, if for every nine airplanes that took off, one came crashing back down, thats just unacceptable, so why are these numbers acceptable for those being put to death?
Along with talking about injustice, Bryan also spoke on the topic of the importance and power of identity. A person who has a respectable identity has the power to make people believe in themselves, and they just have more power and meaning in what they have to say. Partially the reason as to why Bryan Stevenson's words meant so much is that he spoke through TED, a very well-known organization with a respectable identity. Due to the injustices in America, all of our identities are at risk. We tend to think that our current justice system as "not our problem" and just another political debate. The way we handle this delicate problem will define who we are as a society. We must go out of our comfort zone and not be apathetic towards the situation. As a society we cannot fully function as human beings until every single person regardless, of wealth, race or religion is treated equally with dignity and respect.
