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Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

Decent Essays

Prejudice is a negative opinion or feeling formed about someone without thought or reason, and before knowing anything about them. In To Kill a Mockingbird, the citizens of Maycomb are prejudice and cruel towards Tom Robinson and he is put on trial and convicted because he is a black man. Prejudice was also destructive to Jem, and witnessing it every day left him hurt and heartbroken. In the book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, the destructiveness of prejudice is harmful to Jem and Tom Robinson, therefore children and people of colour are the most affected by prejudice at the time the book took place in the 1930’s.
Tom Robinson is a victim of prejudice and shouldn 't have been put on trial or found guilty. Firstly, he had to defend himself against two white people. During the trial, while Bob Ewell was on the witness stand, Judge Taylor says “Mr. Ewell, did you see the defendant having sexual intercourse with your daughter?” and Mr. Ewell replies “Yes I did.” (Lee 233). In Maycomb, Bob Ewell is seen as ‘white trash’, but white, uneducated low socioeconomic status is thought to be better than being a black person, like Tom Robinson. People prejudge Tom because of his race and the Ewells took advantage of that which forced Tom Robinson to have to defend himself Mayella and Bob Ewell, two white people. Before the trial even began, Tom Robinson never really had a chance because the only thing people saw was a black man 's word versus a white man 's word. Furthermore, Tom

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