Volume One: An Explanation of “The One Way Street”
      In our modern, rational, American society (as with most, if not all societies these days), a person is born with a set of privileges based solely on skin color, gender, nationality, sexuality, and ability.  This set, determined by chance, situates her or him on the hierarchy of hegemony.  Other privileges can be {somewhat} chosen, like economic status, political affiliation, religion, etc., but still have a place on the hierarchy.  Needless to say, the closer to the top a person is, the more privileges she or he is garnished with (deserving of them or not); the closer to the bottom, the more oppression.  Watching the news can highlight this hierarchy with precision, showing the drastic imbalance that this creates.
      “The One Way Street” was created to shed light on situations that drastically favor one particular group of privileged individuals, typically the closest to the hegemonic, dominant form.  By reversing the role of oppressor and oppressed, the imagery created will hopefully move something inside the reader.  This is not a personal piece.  It is collective.  It affects each of us every day.  Only when the institutionalization of privilege based on physiology gives way to privilege based on character will anyone in our society truly be free.
      Our first “One Way” focuses on the prevalence of domestic violence against women.  It is extremely rare to have to abuse go the other way around, but we all know that people do in fact drive the wrong way up a one way street sometimes… rarely, but sometimes it does happen.  We hope our series makes you think hard about where American normalcy seems to be.  After reading hundreds of headlines about men murdering, abusing, raping, and stalking women, it became quite apparent that this disturbing issue should be tackled.
Thank you for reading.
-Jaime and Aajay