Community Learning and Development - Essay Example

Some people set a guideline for what and how the events in their life should occur and set particular standards for themselves. Whenever there is a slight divergence from these standards, people feel gravely disappointed and create issues for themselves. However, the question that lies herein is who sets these particular standards? Who prescribes the guidelines for behavior and what is considered acceptable? C.W. Mills states, “Many personal troubles cannot be solved merely as troubles, but must be understood in terms of public issues” (Mills, pg 226, 1959).

Accordingly, in his book, Mills describes all of people’s personal problems as a manifestation of society and the standards it sets for mankind. Mills explains that without this realization of society functioning and the role of society on an individual’s life, a person cannot estimate to understand themselves, their role, or how to solve their problems. It is only when a person opens their eyes and realizes that their troubles are not merely a personal matter, but a societal issue. Many other people share the same worries and are going through the same obstacles in their lives.

Hence, instead of trying to overcome their personal troubles alone, they must combine their power and join others facing the same problem to attempt to completely eradicate the problem from society. In other words, you can also term it as ‘reshaping’ society (Mills, pg 5, 1959). As a community educator, many circumstances and examples are visible vividly within our society. When a person is facing mental anguish because he/she cannot pay the tuition fee of an expensive college for their children, it is society which has formed the perception and the necessity in the mind of this individual categorizing an expensive education as essential or acceptable.

When a rape victim is shunned and rejected in society and is unable to find a spouse or, in some circumstances, even a job; it is society which has formed this perception that rape victims are unacceptable and a social taboo in society. When people of different castes or religions are not accepted in society and are not given a proper social stature or equal opportunities, it is society’s perception that has led to such immoral and unjust behavior. Many individuals may be facing these problems and may be facing excessive turmoil at trying to solve them.

However, one individuals’ attempt to solve their own problem will not eradicate the problem completely or indefinitely. It has to be a combined effort by the public to protest against such behavior and to change this behavior permanently. There are several examples in history of people who have changed societal perceptions and treated their own personal troubles as societal issues to succeed in permanently changing society’s opinion. An ever popular example is that of Martin Luther King, who began the movement to change the attitude towards African Americans in the USA.

Martin Luther King took his own problem of being given unequal rights in the USA since he was an African American and combined his efforts with others in society to change the perception and attitude of society towards African Americans (Luther & Carson, pg 18, 2010). If he had not thought of beginning the Civil Rights Movement and had only struggled for himself, he probably would have not been able to achieve much success and the problem of unjust treatment for African Americans would have continued till today. In the