preview

Racial Discrimination : The United States

Better Essays
Racial discrimination has become a hot issue in the United States. Protests against the inequality of the court system and the young lives of black youths has sparked a racial divide. This problem has been occurring even before the establishment of this century. Racial tensions between blacks and whites goes far back to when slavery was still legal. African men, women, and children arrived to the free lands only to work their way out of slavery early on. Until the slave system became more strict, many young african american men and women could pay off their debt to their owners and marry. As the slave system became more strict, the possibility of buying your own freedom was erased. After the Civil War, many issues arose for the former slaves. The political leaders wanted to provide rights to protect the freed slaves, yet the States found loopholes to deny a free black man from being ‘free.’ History of whites treating blacks in an ill-mannered way has always been prevalent. In trying to find out how it was like to live as a black man, John Howard Griffin, author of “Black Like Me,” detailed his journey throughout the south in the midst of segregation. He recounts how people of color must use different restrooms, occupy different cafes, sleep in different hotels, have different jobs, and provide manners ridiculous in today’s standard towards whites. As a colored man, you must not look any white men nor women in their eyes, talk back more than you have to, loiter, nor
Get Access