In English, we researched race in America by reading articles and poems, watching interviews, and ready Ta-Nehisi Coates book “Between the World and Me” Learning about the chaos of race in America did not surprise me; I knew most of the information already. Though I was aware of the problem, I did not realize how big it was and how much people were oblivious to it Watching interviews of an eX-cop admitting to the racist behavior in the police force, reading about how vulnerable black people feel from the perspective of Tani-hasi Cotes, and reading articles and interviews of Malcolm X spreading his beliefs and strong methods to get rid of racism are just a few of the references that I have used to learn more about race in America.
When I thought about why people think that racism is over or why some are oblivious to the whole matter, I tried to look at where people may have started to believe it was over. In 1954 the civil right movement started. There were many protests and events building up to this movement, and many people knew it was coming. Martin Luther King Jr., most famous for his “I Have a Dream” speech, spoke in Memphis, Tennessee delivering another famous speech: “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop,” In this speech King talked about the civil rights movement, stating, “in the human rights revolution, if something isn’t done, and done in a hurry, to bring the colored peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed” (King) King believed that there needed to be a race revolution, but his method was that the movement would only work with nonviolence, and, as he clearly states in the same speech, “Men, for years now, have been talking about war and peace.
But now, no longer can they just talk about it, It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it‘s nonviolence or nonexistence. That is where we are today”, he even goes as far to say that violence is not only the wrong answer but will make things worse. Whether he is right or wrong in his method, I cannot say now when trying to find out why people may believe that racism is gone, I asked myself did the civil rights movement do what it was supposed to do? i came to realize that maybe there was so much pressure from the public and people like Martin Luther were saying that this movement would be the end to racism that after it happened people just expected it to be over and thought because everything seemed to be leading up to this the problem was solved.
