Personal Narrative Essay about Injustice

An injustice is an action that violates rights. An injustice can violate a right given to a person by their country, but it can also violate a right that was is not written on paper but should be  the right of any human being. For example, if a country does not have a law against attacking people, it does not mean that if someone is attacked that it was not an injustice.

There are many types of injustices, one of which is a perceived injustice. Perceived injustice is when a person, usually a child, perceives an action as unfair when it is not unjust. An example from my life that was a perceived injustice is: 

One day in second grade, I was sitting at my desk next to Sam while Mr. Hoffmann taught the class math. Right before the lesson ended, I felt Sam pinch me. At first, I did nothing because I did not want to get him in trouble, but after he pinched me again, I decided to pinch him back, and right when I did, Mr. Hoffmann turned around. At first, he yelled at me and told me I would have to sit on the bench for the first ten minutes of recess, and I responded, “I do not care I do not like recess anyway.” When I said this, Mr. Hoffman was infuriated and said I would have to sit on the bench for half of recess, and I said, “I still don’t care.” After that, he told me I would spend recess inside. During this whole event, I was thinking about how unfair it was that I had to stay inside while Sam did not get punished when he was the one that had pinched me first, and I was only defending myself while not blaming it on him.

In 7th grade, I realized that I had gotten in trouble because of how I responded, not what I did. This event was an example of a perceived injustice because it was not serious, and the thing that I perceived as unfair was just a fight between two eight-year-olds.

The difference between an injustice and a perceived injustice is that one is a violation of a person’s rights, while the other is just a situation that the person deemed “unfair.” At the time, a perceived injustice might seem like a big deal, but in reality, injustice is not just unfair, it is not right.