The idea of racism is a weird thing. Its an idea of hatred, of showing that because someone is a different color, they are somehow superior or inferior. Since the 1600s when African Americans came to America they are have been treated differently, and up until the 1900s, they were still treated as inferior. Now it is 2016, and segregation is illegal, slavery is illegal, and black people share all the rights of a white person. But just because it is illegal to enslave another human does not mean that some people wish it wasn’t. In the play A Raisin in the Sun a family of black people experience hard times because of their skin color, not that they were forced to do work, but that because of their skin color they were given less and treated differently. Since this play, obviously through the law, racism has changed, but what about feelings of racism? By looking at racism in the past, and racism now, some would say not much has changed, people just hide it better. We have evolved as a people, throwing away our prejudiced ideas. By looking at recent news, and comparing it to old problems of racism in Chicago, of “racist acts” it is seemingly obvious that some still wish slavery was never illegalized. In the 1950s African Americans were still considered different. There was still segregation, there was still racism, and there were still people fighting to end it. Jim crow laws made segregation legal. The case of Plessy vs. Ferguson made segregation justifiable, stating the “separate but equal facilities” were legal, everyone knew that equal was just a term though, everyone knew that the African Americans would still be treated lesser than the white man (Plessy v. Ferguson, 2009). But in 1954 the case of Brown v. Board of Education decided that the “separate but educational facilities” were profusely unequal. This ruling was the “the first nail in Jim Crow’s coffin” (“The Civil Rights Movement”, 2010). This showed that people who were “higher up”, people who had more say, were finally starting to feel that racism and segregation was wrong, and that something needed to change. During the 1960s and 70s “disturbances” occurred that resulted in many death, injuries, and property damage, primarily of black people.
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Some of the most fatal riots were in Detroit, Los Angeles, Newark, and Washington, measured by deaths of officers, and citizens (NBER, 2016). In Montgomery, Alabama the bus drivers had the job of creating segregation on busses, although they did not have the right to remove anyone from their seat, no matter their skin color. In 1955 Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. This stimulated the Montgomery Bus Boycott. This boycott began when E. D. Nixon heard of Parks arrest, and he began posting signs instigating a shunning of Montgomery busses. African Americans were asked to stay off of busses the day of Parks trial, December 5, 1955. While Parks was charged with violating a city ordinance, the boycott was extremely successful (Rosa Parks Biography, n/a). These boycotts and riots showed that while white people were not changing their mind about segregation, African Americans were changing their mind about accepting it. In the play A Raisin In The Sun, which was written in 1959, racism is very much still obvious. In a part of the movie Walter Younger is working as a chauffeur for a rich white man. While his car is parked right in front of another black man’s car, a police officer gives the black man’s car a ticket, while the white man’s car does not get a ticket, obviously because he is white. This shows unmissable favoritism for the white man, even though it was without a doubt illegal. Not much racism, but segregation and inferiorism, is shown by where the Youngers live. There little apartment is on the Southside of Chicago. In this house there is a very worn down living room, that also shares as dining room, and a kitchen. To the left there is a door that leads to the bedroom of Mama and Beneatha, and opposite of that is the room of Walter and Ruth, while their son, Travis, slept on the couch. The whole family shares a bathroom with the rest of the apartment’s families. (Hansberry, pg. 4). The condition of
Some of the most fatal riots were in Detroit, Los Angeles, Newark, and Washington, measured by deaths of officers, and citizens (NBER, 2016). In Montgomery, Alabama the bus drivers had the job of creating segregation on busses, although they did not have the right to remove anyone from their seat, no matter their skin color. In 1955 Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. This stimulated the Montgomery Bus Boycott. This boycott began when E. D. Nixon heard of Parks arrest, and he began posting signs instigating a shunning of Montgomery busses. African Americans were asked to stay off of busses the day of Parks trial, December 5, 1955. While Parks was charged with violating a city ordinance, the boycott was extremely successful (Rosa Parks Biography, n/a). These boycotts and riots showed that while white people were not changing their mind about segregation, African Americans were changing their mind about accepting it. In the play A Raisin In The Sun, which was written in 1959, racism is very much still obvious. In a part of the movie Walter Younger is working as a chauffeur for a rich white man. While his car is parked right in front of another black man’s car, a police officer gives the black man’s car a ticket, while the white man’s car does not get a ticket, obviously because he is white. This shows unmissable favoritism for the white man, even though it was without a doubt illegal. Not much racism, but segregation and inferiorism, is shown by where the Youngers live. There little apartment is on the Southside of Chicago. In this house there is a very worn down living room, that also shares as dining room, and a kitchen. To the left there is a door that leads to the bedroom of Mama and Beneatha, and opposite of that is the room of Walter and Ruth, while their son, Travis, slept on the couch. The whole family shares a bathroom with the rest of the apartment’s families. (Hansberry, pg. 4). The condition of