Racial Oppression Of African Americans

“You are a nothing little nigger” is one of the demeaning phrases African American human beings have heard over the years in an effort to keep them in a state of persecution. This paper will discuss the persecution of the African American. The following documents the struggles, gut wrenching pain, and heart ache of African American people have endured and are still suffering with today.

Following The Civil War, close to four million slaves were freed, but they were still faced with the systematic oppression of their past. Due to President Johnson’s support of state’s rights, many white southerners were able to place authority over newly freed slaves by establishing Black Codes, the KKK, and segregation. The new freedoms gained by African Americans following the civil war were insignificant because white superiority was heavily present. After the passing of the 13th amendment, which abolished slavery, Black Codes enabled white southerners to legally control blacks.

African Americans have a very long history in the United States. Many African American families have been in the United States for many generations; others recently immigrants from places like as Africa, the Caribbean, or the West Indies.

The United States’ treatment of African Americans has changed tremendously since the country’s founding up until now. African Americans were first introduced to the country in one of the harshest manners possible. They were brought over on tightly compacted slave ships and then forced into hard labor for the entirety of their lives. This went on for centuries until African Americans were finally given their freedom after the Civil War. Albeit this was much better than slavery, citizenship came with many troubles of its own. The years following the Civil War, known as the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, would prove to be, aside from slavery, some of the hardest times for African Americans in all of U.S. history.

Before the Emancipation Proclamation, the blacks were rushed to enlist for the Union during the Civil War but they are not allowed to join the army because of the Federal law dating from 1792 barred Negroes from serving for the US army. Although they already joined the war since the American Revolution and the war of 1812. After the first Emancipation Proclamation was executed, the African-American could serve the Federal Army, the first regiment was the 54th Massachusetts, though there were all black soldiers but there were no black commissioned officers-only whites. In that regiments, the blacks are not paid as equal as the whites, they were only being paid 10$ per month from which 3$ was deducted for clothing while the whites were paid 13$ and no clothing allowance was drawn.

Chapter two discusses the inequality, brutality, and disfranchisement done to African Americans. This chapter also displayed the change African Americans made when they realized enough was enough. Ella Ree Jones was a student at Alabama State Teachers College in Montgomery, AL, who acted in the same way Rosa Parks made famous 13 years later. Jones was feeling confined that day but was told to give her seat up for a white man. She refused and argued she was already halfway on the bus where blacks were assigned. The bus driver called the police and they took Jones to City Hall. When they arrived at City Hall the officers beat her with a pipe, kicked her repeatedly, one officer took her head and propelled it into a brick wall, and then pushed her into her cell. Jones was fined and was still obscure on what she had done wrong.

An article called the oppression of black people in the USA today states that the systematic oppression of black Americans is deeply embedded in the fabric of US society. In spite of the fact that prejudice burdens numerous ethnic gatherings, bigotry against dark individuals is "supported" by a racist belief system developed from bondage and the hundred year old politically-sanctioned racial segregation arrangement of Jim Crow which demands their inadequacy to whites. Despite hidden today, it supports the terrible disparity in instruction, job, housing, medicinal services, and levels of poverty dividing white and black Americans. Research has demonstrated that there is still unquestionable confirmation that the criminal equity framework is

There is a vast number of ways that one might experience power. Challenges such as race may affect individuals in very different ways, by geographic or socioeconomic status. Patricia Hill Collins main focus was applied to African-American women, but she gave insight on how domination and identity politics need continuous change in the world. But change cannot be focused on one group, it must focus on all groups for social movements to be successful.

In America, it is to no surprise that a large percentage of the African American race has and still is struggling financially. Many African-Americans are subjected to live in poorer areas where sanitation isn’t as heavily emphasized compared to more prosperous neighborhoods. Due to this blatant divide there has been many detrimental effects this has to minority communities. In specifically predominantly black communities the effects are seen heavily. Over the years the most frequent illnesses affecting African-American’s are high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, stroke, kidney failure and cancer. Racism and classism are contributing factors to this environmental crisis’ because of the where toxic waste is disposed, where pollutive industries are located, and the financial challenges African-Americans face.

The main reason for choosing the African American population for this work is because of its unique array of cultural backgrounds. African American communities across the United States are more culturally diverse now than any other time in history with increasing numbers of immigrants from African nations, the Caribbean, Central America and other countries (American Psychiatric Association, 2014). The United States is among the most ethnically diverse nations on the planet (Peterson, K., 2008). With the demographics of the United States constantly changing and as ethnic cultural diversity emerges heightening of culturally competent care is at hand. All cultures have systems of health belief to explain what cause illness, how it can be

instances of violence which directly ravage the lives of African American people still arise on an incessant basis. These extremist mistreatments of faultless human beings can undermine the freedom that individuals are entitled to and cause social anxiety and depression. Furthermore, a recent and significant hate crime incident which ensued in the United States was that:

Black voices around the country were being heard as they protested for their lives. It almost seemed like déjà vu for the black community. However, this time, unlike in the Civil Rights Movement of the 60’s, the Black Lives Matter movement had a powerful tool in their pocket: social media. The creation of the hashtag “Black Lives Matter” galvanized the movement throughout the nation, as posts from people on both sides of the spectrum spoke out on their thoughts over the current police violence against African Americans. Although the hashtag originally began on Facebook, the Black Lives Matter movement has been able to reach a wide range audience through Twitter.

For example blacks were not allowed and use the same restrooms as whites; they weren't even allowed to use the same drinking fountain. Before 1994 discrimination was legal; the blacks and whites were segregated by law. Then all the sudden the supreme court changed their minds. Then nine kids volunteered at a school assembly to to go to an all white school; Ernest Green, Elizabeth Eckford, Jefferson Thomas, Terrence Roberts, Carlotta LaNier, Minnijean Brown, and Melba Beals. They were nicknamed the Little Rock Nine. On September 4, 1957 those same nine kids tried to enter an all white school with police protection, but the governor called the National Guard to make sure

Women of color are already seen as women that are expected to take that extra step in order to been seen as part of some type of success or breakthrough. That being said, as a women of color I believe that we are strong human beings. I believe that we do have to work harder in the world we live in for two reasons; we are females and we are of color. This notion may not seem fair, which it isn’t but it’s what is displayed in our society. If there was a feminism group with a mixture of women of color placed in the mixed, I think it would have a stronger impact on many different topics, especially systems of oppression. If women of all races are seen as a common force fighting for the same thing, then absolutely it will impact an entire generation.

In the novel, 12 Years a Slave, by Solomon Northup, the African American story is told of the injustices of America. Since then, the Black community has evolved significantly. However, many must still fight for fairness in a land where equality should be a given. How, in nearly two centuries, do African Americans still struggle for justice in the “land of the free and home of the brave?”