Opinion | Don’t forget about the real issues

Guest column by Tahra Wilkins, sophomore sociology major.

It’s 11 a.m. on a Tuesday. I’m sitting in a sociology class, sipping on some green tea and having a discussion about rape, or about racism, or sexism or homelessness.

I look around my class, and even though I don’t know all of them, I love everyone. I love that they get out of bed everyday and come to class to talk about these huge, monumentally heavy issues. They close their laptops and turn of their iPhones and participate in the learning experience that we sacrifice so much money and time to be a part of.

I love that they care.

Is it just me or does caring about things seem to have gone out of style? I remember around the time of the election, my Facebook feed was blowing up with peoples’ opinions and thoughts on each candidate. And equally common, it was swamped with people complaining about people having opinions.

Really? We’re willing to spend hours scrolling through an endless feed of mirror selfies and #firstworldproblems, but can’t stand for a few weeks of our peers using social media to express meaningful thought? Regardless of whether or not I agreed with someone’s political view, it was so great to see people getting excited about issues that affect their lives.

With so many television shows and apps and entertainment right at our fingertips, it’s so easy to forget about real issues. I think it’s something we all do, myself included. Media and entertainment aren’t bad things at all, but they can be pretty powerful distractions. Why read about the pervasive poverty in our very own Orange County when you could watch the new episode of “Modern Family” instead? Why pay attention to your professor’s lecture on social inequality when you could buy some new shoes online? It’s so fuzzy and warm inside the nice bubble we create to shield us from the outside world and all of its problems.

The issue with that bubble is that when we don’t acknowledge problems, we can’t help to fix them. And whether we acknowledge them or not, these problems will continue to exist and to affect each of us, in one way or another.

The good news, however, is that the world outside this bubble isn’t as scary as it seems. When you start to educate yourself about social issues, you see the world in a whole new way. You see yourself as a part of something much larger than your individual bubble – a part of something larger than Chapman and Orange County and California. You start to understand that yes, horrible problems exist in the world, but that you can be a part of the solution. You realize that positive change is made by individuals who gather together under a common cause and simply refuse to let injustice continue.

Suddenly, Justin Bieber’s life choices don’t seem as important because you have something more meaningful to care about. And caring is pretty damn cool.