The Permanence of Racism
“Black people are the magical faces at the bottom of the well”, Derrick Bell. For as long as humans have existed, the permanence of racism, prejudicialness and separation between mankind has always been prevalent. The idea presented in “Faces at the Bottom of the Well” that, “we shall overcome”, is an excuse for people of color to sit around and wait for an adversary to come and bring them out of the compromising situation Whites has placed us in. Bell elaborates on his upbringing, mentioning how at the time, slave heritage was seen more shameful than something that should give on a sense of pride. Having slave blood was looked down upon and to this day it still is.
In this novel, Bell has showed that race has always …show more content…
In this chapter, a land, which is only congenial to African Americans is found to emerge from the Atlantic close to what is South Carolina. Professor Bell uses this chapter to provide some humor but also explain the works of people such as Marcus Garvey. Garvey, a leader in the black nationalist movement around the 1920s. Although the attempts to take Afrolantica as a place of their own, one returning settler goes on saying “It was worth it just to try looking for something better, even if we didn’t find it.” (page 46). I feel as though the attempts to make this land a place blacks’ can call their own failed due to fear. Fear of a group of people who are always deemed as inferior and to see them succeed in the eyes of white people is a very scary thing to think …show more content…
In “The Racial Preference Licensing Act”, an idea is brought forward which suggests racists to pay for their part in the dismantling of the black community. We go on to read that, “The license itself is expensive, though not prohibitively so. Once obtained, it required payment to a government commission of a tax of 3 percent of the income derived of whites employed, …” (page 48). Even though some may agree with this proposal, even the President of the “free” country agrees. He goes on to say, “It is time to bring hard-headed realism rather than well-intentioned idealism to bear on our long-standing racial problems.” (page 49). The President agreeing with this statue doesn’t necessarily mean much but it does give blacks’ some kind of
“Black people are the magical faces at the bottom of the well”, Derrick Bell. For as long as humans have existed, the permanence of racism, prejudicialness and separation between mankind has always been prevalent. The idea presented in “Faces at the Bottom of the Well” that, “we shall overcome”, is an excuse for people of color to sit around and wait for an adversary to come and bring them out of the compromising situation Whites has placed us in. Bell elaborates on his upbringing, mentioning how at the time, slave heritage was seen more shameful than something that should give on a sense of pride. Having slave blood was looked down upon and to this day it still is.
In this novel, Bell has showed that race has always …show more content…
In this chapter, a land, which is only congenial to African Americans is found to emerge from the Atlantic close to what is South Carolina. Professor Bell uses this chapter to provide some humor but also explain the works of people such as Marcus Garvey. Garvey, a leader in the black nationalist movement around the 1920s. Although the attempts to take Afrolantica as a place of their own, one returning settler goes on saying “It was worth it just to try looking for something better, even if we didn’t find it.” (page 46). I feel as though the attempts to make this land a place blacks’ can call their own failed due to fear. Fear of a group of people who are always deemed as inferior and to see them succeed in the eyes of white people is a very scary thing to think …show more content…
In “The Racial Preference Licensing Act”, an idea is brought forward which suggests racists to pay for their part in the dismantling of the black community. We go on to read that, “The license itself is expensive, though not prohibitively so. Once obtained, it required payment to a government commission of a tax of 3 percent of the income derived of whites employed, …” (page 48). Even though some may agree with this proposal, even the President of the “free” country agrees. He goes on to say, “It is time to bring hard-headed realism rather than well-intentioned idealism to bear on our long-standing racial problems.” (page 49). The President agreeing with this statue doesn’t necessarily mean much but it does give blacks’ some kind of