SOCIAL DIMENSIONS OF JUSTICE

SJD1501

7th ASSIGNMENT

2ND SEMESTER

STUDENT NUMBER :63630605

KHANYISILE CHANTELL SHABANGU

Everyone has a right to privacy, according to Chapter 2 of the Bill of Rights, Section 14. Privacy is
constantly violated in the times we live in because media is always around and ready to record
everything for content. Let’s look at the Moja love show uyajola 9/9; in this other episode, the lady was
discovered in bed with the allegedly unfaithful man; there were live cameras everywhere; the films and
photos of them were shot while they were unclothed and posted on social media; this is an invasion of
privacy. Nobody wants to be exposed in front of the entire country, and it gets worse when the rival
party’s address is mentioned by the presenter. Social media thus has a detrimental effect on one’s right
to privacy because it exposes people’s bodies to the entire country, which degrades their dignity.
Individuals also experience body/slut shaming as a result of social media.

1.2

Everyone has the right to freedom of expression, freedom of the press, and other media, states Chapter
2, Section 16 of the Bill of Rights. No one has ever objected to someone expressing their opinions and
feelings publicly because doing so is within their legal rights. The issue arises, however, when social
media platforms are used to bully others online without regard for their reputation, mental or emotional
health, or general well-being. Our fellow social media users are quick to brag about their rights while
ignoring the obligations that come with them. Social media can have a positive impact on the right to
freedom of expression, but only if its users express themselves appropriately and do not violate others’
rights in the process.

1.3

We are aware that the trauma of apartheid continues to affect our fellow South Africans; the trauma is
passed down through the generations. That, in my opinion, is one of the problems that motivates social
media users to stand against bigotry and behave appropriately. According to the Promotion of Equality
Act of 2000, someone cannot be harassed or subjected to discrimination because of their skin color. The
EFF party is frequently mentioned in posts about racism due to their quick response; There has been
many instances where social media has helped address the issue of racism, especially in work places for
domestic workers and those in the corporate environment; The entire country came together to support
the Bokkes when the Springboks, a mixed-race team, were recently playing in the semifinals in France.
Regardless of color, social media was overwhelmingly positive. This was one of the rare instances in
which I could clearly see how social media was helping to combat racism.

2.

The horrifying aspect of corruption in our country is that high profile people (politicians and ministers)
are never held accountable and their cases always vanish from the public’s view. Corruption has been
consistently making news day in and day out. These high-profile, dishonest people are given contracts to
improve impoverished or developing towns, but instead of helping the suffering areas, they squander
the state’s funds. As a result, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Communities also get diseases
like cholera and have to survive by drinking contaminated water from rivers or dams. Because our
society must endure intolerable conditions, corruption has a detrimental effect on the provision of
services.

3.
Gender based violence is an extremely common occurrence in South Africa due in large parts to the
formal systems of social inequality, Racism and patriarchy. The South African Police Services is
responsible for preventing and responding to GBV; however they have proved to be ineffective at doing
so. SAPS officers frequently dismiss gender based violence survivors based stereotypes; failure to
properly investigate cases and even commit acts of GBV themselves. Police officers must serve the
community without any form of stereotype/Discrimination regardless of the circumstances. In case
where victims complain about dissatisfaction they must be suspended immediately while being
investigated, this would send a message to every other police officer the significance of their job.

The court must put it upon themselves to alert and offer support to victims and alert them about every
steps taken in the case; positive/negative. This will avoid the instances where the abuser is now roaming
in the streets released without the victim’s knowledge. The bill of rights must be amended to “ everyone
who kills must also be killed from the right that says everyone has a right to live”. Bring back the life
sentence, the jurisdiction for everyone who kills must also be killed. South Africa is overpopulated and it
will do less with killers, this will also send a strong message to the perpetrators and in the case of police
officers involved in perpetuating GBV, they must be dismissed from ever working in the policed
department. The harsher the punishment, the better the crime can be controlled/prevented.

Our societies must be taught about the behavior of an abuser; from reverse psychology, narcissistic
behavior and how abusers ensure that you don’t leave the relationship. The sad part is that the abusers
are scared to come out and report the crime because they know the perpetrator will be released and
roaming in the streets again. The community must be allowed to take law into their own hands when the
criminal justice system fails them, if justice is not served, let the society do what will make them feel
better. In that being said, what is the point of teaching about Gender Based Violence if you won’t make
the reader aware that they are abused. Some individuals don’t consider their partner forcing them into
sex as rape, they believe that their partners can’t rape them. The significance of Education is to educate
and raise awareness to the reader.

4.

Excellent Customer Care to improve the image of a negatively perceived Criminal Justice System in SA.
The citizens of South Africa and everyone in it has been by our Justice system several times because the
officers at the fore front cannot breath Ubuntu or rather cannot practice the principle of ubuntu botho.
Respect each and every individual that you serves and treat them the very same way you’d want to be
treated. Our police officers are biased and discriminate against our very own society, including the
LGBTQI+ nation. How many times had there been reports were police officers were rude to victims of
crimes because they are dirty, gay/lesbians and etc. If our officers who are at the forefront cannot
change the narrative about our criminal justice system, then they have failed South African as a whole.

Standardizing the Publication of ALL cases as part of Transparency and Deterring of the similar/ criminal
behavior. Letting the victim aware about the process of the case is also practicing ubuntu, imagine the
victim of rape bumping into her rapist in the streets, the trauma that the victim will immediately
undergo, the fear and all sorts of emotions. This could be avoided by being transparent with the victim
and all the affected parties regarding the case, the victims being aware that the individual who abused
them will be realised means that counselling has been offered to the victim and affected parties and also
they will not be amused when bumping to their abusers in the streets. Ubuntu also means deterring the
same criminal behavior from occurring, reoccurrence of criminal behavior means that the officers and
the criminal justice system are failing at doing their job. Criminal behavior must be deterred by the
criminal justice system as they are the ones who have the upper power to deter the crime.

Publicizing Community Corrections/Community service and to avoid stigma and prepare communities
about accepting former convicts to be integrated back into communities. Black communities mostly have
created a stigma regarding individuals who have been incarcerated, I don’t blame them, they need to be
taught about the procedures/rehabilitation that the individual released underwent. This is to ease the
stigma and ensure that the society understands that they have served their sentence and hence they are
coming back to the community. The offender must go back to the very same community it wronged to
offer community services as party of the reintegration process.

The same applies to Redressing when there’s Amis regarding necessary processes that yielded
unintended consequences

Encourage Community members to hold each other accountable for team spirit and save State’s
resources

5.

My role models is Miss Yekela Masiba: My mentor, she works as a probation officer under the
department of Social Development. Miss Masiba has BA in Social work from the University of western
cape; BA HONOURS in Probationary Services; she also has NQF 5 in Substance use and Addiction
management from the University of Witwatersrand, she has other qualifications/certifications obtained
from various Universities in South Africa and abroad(Colombia),Miss Masiba uses all her qualifications as
she sees fit because they are all regulated by the same counsel (SACSSP).Miss Masiba deals with Adults
and Children in conflict with the law and her scope of work is guided by the Code of ethics, Policies,
Statutes and Professional conduct.

Ethics start from the most overlooked stage, arriving early/in time at work. Late coming is an act of being
unethical and Miss Masiba is one individual that values times and as a result in her meetings or work
place she arrives 30 minutes prior everything begins. Therefore being close to her, it has made me to be
punctual and value time. Punctuality and being ethical goes hand in hand, being punctual is embodying
ethics without you saying actually you are ethical. Completing your given task in time and doing it to
your best of ability is punctuality.

Now looking up to an individual who conducts herself professionally motivates you to also know how to
behave in your work space, conducting yourself professionally means dressing up appropriately for your
own work space taking into consideration the type of work environment you work in. You cannot show
up in shorts and crop tops in a corporate environment same way a miner cannot show up in work
wearing heels and a dress, appropriate dressing for your work space and environment is part of being
ethical.

The manner you conduct yourself in a work environment must also be ethical, if you want your stuff of
workers/team to complete tasks to their best of ability it lies within your approach. If one makes a
mistake you cannot shout them neither call them to order in the middle of their team members or
individuals you are serving, that is unethical. Miss Masiba calls individuals whom she wants to call into
order into her office both of them and they tackle their issue/dissatisfaction in private without any one
knowing that they were disciplined.
With that being said these are some of the reasons I look up to Miss Masiba and sees her as my role
model because she walks ethics, she breaths ethics, her entire and self being revolves around ethics, in
and outside work she is always an ethical individual and as a result I also learns and adopt the manner in
which she embodies ethics on her daily life. I am a very punctual, ethical, professional and ethical
individual because of being in the same space as her and her teachings.

6.

EXPERIENCES WITH ONLINE LEARNING

Online learning has been a Rollercoaster experience for me, but most of the time it was not pleasant at
all. The system of UNISA will be either down, overloaded and I’ll struggle to access the assignments or
forums to complete the assignments. I live in an informal settlement and network has always been an
issue, now you have to go to other areas that have a stable network in order for you to be able to submit
the assignment, it’s sad and it makes online learning hard. On the other hand online learning is very
convenient, you can access the learning platform at any given time without any restrictions and we are
also given data to make accessing the internet and the UNISA system for study purposes easy.

GROUP COMMUNICATION AND DISCUSSION.

Group communications were kind of helpful especially on instances where one couldn’t access the
internet and assignments questions could be shared on the group and questions could be clarified on the
group if there are any misunderstandings. Useful study materials were also shared in the group
discussions and it came in handy as this module doesn’t have any study material with the exception of
the tutorial letter. Frequent communication on groups would remind us about the assignments due
dates and we would communicate and ensure that everyone submitted.

WORKING WITH OTHER STUDENTS

Working with other student was motivating for me and kept me going, we got to share our struggles as
students and how we can overcome them while simultaneously doing good in our studies. With distance
learning there is individual us before varsity that goes through the most and has to show up for their
studies, hence working with other students was soothing. I found a sister in working with other students
and we would study together while we are both in different provinces. The disadvantage of working with
other students is that they really don’t care about their studies, and they make it clear that they won’t
go an extra mile in their studies and working with such students is draining and if not extra cautious and
vigilant you’ll end up slacking in your own studies.

CONTENTS OF THIS MODULE

Social Dimensions of Justice dwells on our criminal justice as large, From the arrests of offenders to the
court. It sheds light about criminal justice system and how the justice operates. It highlights how the
South African constitution along with it criminal justice system operates. The module give us students to
tackle issues revolving around our criminal justice system in South Africa, we offer insight concerning our
criminal justice system through assignments and forum discussions. We find ourselves as legal
practitioners, the president of South Africa, the magistrate/Judges and also get to be from our normal
societies and black communities. This module triggered as at some point because of how the criminal
justice system has failed us and through assignments we were able to take out the rage. The module
evoked versatility in us, as mentioned we found ourselves in different roles and offered insight.

DECLARATION OF OWN WORK

I KHANYISILE CHANTELL SHABANGU DECLARE THAT :

• I UNDERSTAND WHAT PLAGIARISM ENTAILS AND AM AWARE OF THE RELEVANT POLICY IN THIS
REGARD.
• THIS EXAMINATION FOR APPLIED COMMUNICATION IN POLICING (SJD1501) IS MY OWN, WHERE
SOMEONE ELSE’S WORK WAS USED, DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT WAS GIVEN ACCORDING TO THE
UNIVERSITY REQUIREMENTS.
• I DID NOT MAKE USE OF ANOTHER STUDENT’S CURRENT/PREVIOUS WORK AND SUBMITTED IT
AS MY OWN WORK.
• I DID NOT ALLOW ANYONE TO COPY MY WORK WITH THE INTENTION OF PRESENTING IT AS
HIS/HER OWN WORK.

STUDENT NUMBER :63630605

DATE : 12 November 2023