People think that the racist ways of the old Jim Crow have ended. They think that colorblindness is a thing. They think that our law enforcement, businesses, and housing owners do not pick and choose things based on the color of someone’s skin. They believe that color mindedness has ended. They think that the harsh racist ways of our country has come to an end. That is not even close to being the case. Though certain things have changed, such as how old Jim Crow was a little more upfront and open with its racism and hatred, there is still racial inequality and prejudice in our country.
With problems such as the war on drugs and police freedom/power, people of color are being treated just as unfairly as during the old Jim Crow. Alexander gave a few statistics which are perfect examples of how colorblindness does not seem to be very apparent. She writes that 55 percent of black adult males in Chicago have a criminal record. That is astonishing. That means if you see a black man in Chicago, there's a better chance that he has a criminal record than doesn't. The other eye opening statistic that she shared was that in seven different states, 80-90 percent of the drug related prisoners are black or Latino. Whites use drugs just as much as any other race, yet are so much less often incarcerated for it. This comes from a few different reasons. The first is that cops make money to put people in prison. The second is that prisons make money and give jobs to people as long as people
Another reason it important to study and understand Australian Novels such as ‘Crow Country’ is that it can help fight racism. In ‘Crow Country’, it is apparent that racism is a key theme of the book, as it has shaped many of the actions and turmoils in the book. Even the main murder in the book is because of racial prejudice, and it is something that shouldn’t be an everyday action in the world. An example of racism in the book is referenced when it was revealed that David was left nearly dead by Craig Mortlock and his posse when they had lured and beaten him up by the family lake. This happened not only because of the love issues, it was also partly caused by racial prejudice. If we had clear knowledge on the backstory and culture of Aboriginal
The topic that I chose for my research paper is the Jim Crow laws. I chose this topic because during this time period the Jim Crow laws were a huge obstacle that our country had to overcome in order to grow. The Jim Crow laws were created to separate whites and blacks in their everyday lives, allowing for no interaction between races. The Jim Crow Laws were enforced in the southern, United States. The laws existed between 1877 and the 1950’s, around the time the reconstruction period was ending and the civil rights movement was beginning.
Jim Crow laws dominated every aspect of African American life from its inception after Reconstruction up to the civil rights era and its affects can still be felt today. During this era of Jim Crow African Americans had different ways of coping with these oppressive laws. These ways of coping included these three methods, migration, agitation and accommodation. Out of these three methods the most effective at defying Jim Crow laws and fighting segregation was agitation.
The Jim Crow laws were everything but fair, and equal. Jim Crow is the name they used in the laws on separating the African Americans from the Caucasian men and women. These laws deprived African Americans from their civil rights because of the many things they were not allowed to experience due to these laws. Jim Crow laws oppressed the educational rights, voting rights, and social freedoms of American citizens, this essay will be discussing the oppression of these rights and freedoms.
Thomas Rico was a famous actor in the 1860’s, who played the character named Jim Crow, in theaters. Around the time that Jim Crow became popular, slave were being free from plantations and new laws were being made in the south. These laws were created to limit the freedom of newly freed African-Americans. White people in the south grew fond of both Jim Crow and the new laws that they started calling these laws “Jim Crow Laws”. Though the African-Americans were freed and had rights, whites would use laws so they could have power over African-Americans,
In 2009, a survey showed that blacks were arrested for drug possession more than three times as often as whites, and a survey made in 2011 showed that whites have abused drugs more than blacks (The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Data Archive). Yet, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, one out of every 3 black males can expect to go to prison in their lifetime, and 225,000 of the people who were serving time in state prisons for drug offenses in 2011, blacks made up 45 percent while whites comprised of just 30 percent. One must question, why is there a disproportionate number of African Americans in the criminal justice system? Well, the majority of Americans are unaware of this mass incarceration and outright racism in the criminal justice system. When we think of racism, we think of the 1930’s-60’s, slavery, and Jim Crow which come to mind, but what
Policing and punishment in America is hardly colorblind. It is not a coincidence that minorities serve longer sentences, have higher arrest and conviction rates, face higher bail amounts, and are more often the victims of police use of deadly force than white citizens. When it comes to criminals, many people have a preconception of what a criminal is. Usually when people think of a criminal they picture a Black or Latino face. The thought of an Asian criminal is often related to Asian gangs. Interestingly enough, White people as a group are rarely associated with the thought of crime, even though they account for 70% of arrests and 40% of the prison population each year (Russel xiv). This seems to be
“The Jim Crow era was one of struggle -- not only for the victims of violence, discrimination, and poverty, but by those who worked to challenge (or promote) segregation in the South” (“Jim Crow Stories”). It is important to know the history of this significant period where everyone was treated differently based on how they looked instead of their character. During the Jim Crow era, the lives of African Americans were severely restricted making it difficult for them to succeed in everyday life.
After the Civil War the freedman were not truly free. The definition of freedom is the power, or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraints. After the Civil War the slaves were considered free, but they were not treated accordingly. For the whites to still have power over the black's and to keep them in order the new laws started coming out so they don’t try and overpower the whites. In Alabama the new laws Governing the slaves, in Mississippi the Black Codes, and in various states the Jim Crow laws.
In “The Color of Justice” section in The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, Alexander starts off the chapter with two different stories of two African-American parents who were wrongly arrested during a drug bust. She then goes by saying the arrests ruined their “families, lifestyle, and careers” (p. 97). Alexander points out how society would react if these were white individuals, in a middle class neighborhood, being charged and losing their families and emphasising how outraged society would be because of how unjust the law enforcement system is (p. 98). She then goes on regarding the war on drugs and how African and Latino Americans are 80-90 percent more likely to be in jail for drug-related crimes while white Americans are not, although
You are driving down the highway, obeying the traffic laws. You look in the rear view mirror and you see flashing lights, cop lights, and a siren. You pull over and you are not too sure why. What is clear from research is that race is a consistent predictor of attitude toward the police. A study in Cincinnati found that black drivers had longer stops and higher search rates than white drivers. (www.nij.gov)There are 2.2 million people behind bars in the nation’s prisons and jails today. This is a 500% increase in the last 40 years, prisons are becoming overcrowded and it is only getting worse. Today, people of color make up 37% of the U.S population but make up 67% of the prison population. African American men are six times more likely to be incarcerated and hispanic males are more than twice as likely to be incarcerated than white males. Even white males commit the same crimes, and they still do not get the same amount of time as blacks and hispanics do. This raises questions, is our justice system fair? Is the criminal justice system operated to target people of color? The risk that African Americans are unfairly targeted should be a special concern for the U.S supreme court which it seems to not be. The color of someone 's skin should not be taken into consideration in the justice system, it is unfair to the person being charged, it is unjustifiable and it is
85% more times that whites. They are only 14% of the drug users in New York but they are 37% of those arrested for drug use. African americans are 2 to 11 times higher to be stopped and searched than whites (Fourteen Examples of Racism in Criminal Justice System). When it comes down to it all minorities have disadvantages when it comes to equality in our justice system?
Homeless peple are separeted by their skincolor, their religion and their past. Still in these day some people say that Jim Crow Law was a good law. Califonia law to separated black and white people. But most of the people say that it was a bad law.
The exploitation of prisoners by the U.S. is not color blind. There is a disproportionately large amount of people of color incarcerated in this country. There are more Native Americans per capita in prison than any other group (Davis). Latino people are more than twice as likely to be incarcerated than non-Hispanic whites (PrisonPolicy.org). Black men make up 60% of the prison population (McCalla). Michelle Alexander states in The New Jim Crow that there are more Black men "in prison or jail, on probation or on parole than were enslaved in 1850." This is not because of the erroneous idea of Black men naturally being delinquent. It is because the prison industrial complex was deliberately manufactured to directly replace the profit the country made through the enslavement of African-Americans.
Working from sunrise till sunset, with hardly any breaks in between, life for slaves was tumultuous Provided with the bare minimum, African Americans fought with teeth and bone in order to hold on. Slaves were one of the biggest personal assets any plantation owner could hold in the South and they were considered to be of utmost value. Families were torn apart only because of the hunger and selfishness of white slaveholders to make a profit. For generations, African Americans were expected to keep quiet and their head down as their rights, privileges, and freedom vanished before their very eyes. The Jim Crow laws were enacted by the democratic party in order to enforce racial segregation. By completely separating and isolating the two races, life was dramatically changed even after the Civil War and the abolishment of slavery. African Americans were persecuted not only socially, but also economically, and environmentally as a result of the racism and inequalities created by the Jim Crow system.