Social justice is based on the doctrine of parity, unity and understanding the basic values of human values. There are two main categories of social justice and they include distributive justice and the procedural justice.
The distributive justice entails the just allocation of resources in the society where all the people are treated equally by allocating them resource without any bias. Procedural justice is the fairness to all members of the society in the areas of resource allocation, dispute resolution and decision making.
During the Los Angeles riot of April, 1992, the Korean community was victimized by the African American.
This paper will seek to show the reasons why the Korean community was victimized by the African Americans even though both communities belonged to the minority group (Sasao & Chun 137)
Oh (42) points out that the Los Angeles riots of April, 1992 were a series of riots that lasted for six days having resulted from the acquittal of four police men in Los Angles.
The police men had been accused of beating a motorist by the name Rodney King. The riots resulted in many losses like murder, arson and looting. At the end of the riot approximately fifty three people had been killed and over one thousand five hundred injured.
During the riot many Koreans were armed with various weapons and they were all taking part in the fight. This participation of the Koreans in the riots was as a result of the Korean broadcasting stations calling upon the Koreans to volunteer in preventing the riots.
Although the police brutality n the acquittal of the accused policemen might be pointed out as the cause of the riot, other factors like the poor living condition of the non native citizens also came in to play (Kim 30).
Watts elaborates that for a very long period of time the African Americans have not been in good term with the Korean community. A number of reasons explain this hatred that exists between these two groups (230).
In 1991 an African American girl Latasha Harlins, was shot dead by Korean merchant who was a storekeeper. There were many differences between these two minority groups that are as a result of the differing communicative behavior.
Due to the difference in their culture and the social injustice that faces them these two minority groups tend to be bitter of the other group thus they become hostile towards each other. In the light of the above, it is true to point out that the issues of inequality more often entail elements of conflict in the society.
In conclusion, there have been many social injustices in the American system especially during the time of the riots. The acquittal of the police officers responsible for the brutal beating of the motorist was in itself a social injustice because the jury’s decision was not fair to the plaintiff.
The unequal distribution of the resources among the American citizens was a form of distributive injustice.
In many cases, the differences in the culture usually brings disagreements among the concerned groups and in the case of the African Americans and the Koreans, the main factor was the divergent communicative guide in the service provision that clearly represented the political nature well as the socio-historical relations that involve them.
The media coverage of the story of Latasha Harlins was racialized thus cultivating more hatred between the African Americans and the Koreans.
Works Cited
Kim, Uichol, et al. 2004. Development of Indigenous Psychologies: Understanding People in a Global Context. New York publishers; 2004: 12-48. Print
Oh, Angela. ‘An Issue of Time and Place: The Truth Behind Korean Americans’ Connection to the 1992 Los Angeles Riots.’ Asian American Policy Review; 19, 2004: 39-48. Print
Sasao, Toskiaki & Chun, Chi-an. After the Sa-i-gu (April 29) Los Angeles Riots: Correlates of Subjective Well-Being in the Korean-American Community. Journal of Community Psychology 22(20), 1994: 136–152. Print
Watts, Paul. ‘Mapping narratives: the 1992 Los Angeles riots as a case study for narrative-based geo-visualization.’ Journal of Cultural Geography; 27(2), 2010: 203-227. Print