NATIONAL

Social Change

PEACEFUL PROTEST
PROBLEMS

ts fifty years later and still racism runs rampant, white supremacy threatens the well-being of the
masses, and Ferguson serves as a tipping-point martyr for the Black Lives Matter movement and
Anti-Black or African American attitudes.

By JED CLAIR
Education. The great equalizer. And,
at the same time and on the other
hand, the founding documents tell us
that all men are already equal upon
creation. So somewhere between a
persons beginning and a few years

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W W W . F O R T E . C O M

down the road, they are weighed

against their peers and found
inequivalent.
Whether the source of that
inadequacy (or over-adequacy) is
wealth, physical condition, location,
or anything else, theres a gap.
Thats not to demerit natural
talent or hard-earned skill, but it is to

say that effected members of society

arent held equally someone ends
up more privileged.
On the surface, nonviolent
resistance seems like the most civil
path to change for those afflicted.
Mahatma Gandhi organized the salt
marches and several hunger strikes
and the public demonstrations
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during the Civil Rights Era were the
product of much forethought. Both
movements had leaders, goals, and
structure. And both, eventually, got
somewhere.
But its fifty years later and the
Black Lives Matter movement fights
the same type of racial issues, only
this time they rely on more disruptive
means of communication.
Theres something to be said for
that. If the Civil Rights Act of 1964
was achieved by peaceful protest, and
the black community, today, faces the
same discrimination as it always has,
what are the remaining options for
getting some real, lasting change,
around here?
Its no simple problem and theres
no easy answer. Segregation and
discrimination were, at one point,
black and white. Now its hard to
draw a clear line, but easy to place
misguided blame. The roots go deep
into the way that racism has been
used to write into law the wishes of
the racist, in turn affecting the way
racism can be lawfully practiced.
For many, the issue of Ferguson
served as a catalyst for activism,
resentment,
controversy,
and
thought-provoking discussion.
As Richard Rothstein points out in
his academic article for The
American Prospect, the tension in
Ferguson had been building and
building since long before the first
major civil rights era. One issue he
goes in depth about is the racism
evident
in
self-segregating
communities.
After the 1960s, racist attitudes
still existed. Even though employers
or educators couldnt legally show it,
it reared its ugly head within
neighborhoods. Rothstein recounts a
time when a certain family was one of
the first black families to move into
an all-white community. At first,
aside
from
heavy
social
discrimination, it was a better
lifestyle for the family. There was an
HOA that kept the property wellmaintained,
excellent
public
education for their children, and
better working opportunities. Then,
the white community fled.

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Its a phenomenon thats been

written into city law. White
homeowners were, at first, asked
privately to pledge loyalty to a pact;
they couldnt sell their homes to
African Americans.
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) issued mortgages in
St. Louis and its suburbs to whites
conditional on the adoption of pacts
that imposed mutual obligations on
neighbors never to sell a home to
blacks Rothstein (4).
Shortly after the family moved
into the all-white neighborhood, the
white members of the community
packed their bags and moved to
another part of town, or rather, to the
suburbs. More and more African
Americans moved in, until the
neighborhood became all-black.
Along with that, the city and
federal
governments
made
allowances
for
all-black
neighborhoods that werent made for
all-white neighborhoods. In 1916, St.
Louis pushed to prohibit black
families from living on the same
block as white families, and the
federal government turned it down.

but a challenge for those in urban

areas looking for industrial work in
the countryside. Since white people
already had the upper hand, housingwise, African Americans were at
further loss for opportunity.
And, because education is paid for
by property taxes and the county
zones were racial, disenfranchised
black communities were unable to
spend as much on school, and black
education became less luxurious than
its white counterpart.
Whites had everything going for
them: better homes, better work
situations, and better education
the great equalizer. All of these
disadvantages
sprouting
from
prejudices that go back much further
than 1916 and still exist today,
perpetuating themselves because of
the environment they have formed.
Its no wonder that the Black Lives
Matter movement is disruptive,
aimless, and even violent at times as
Blay describes in her article for the
Huffington Post. From their point of
view, they experience the same social
racism that the Rosa Parks
generation suffered through.
However, its not
always that simple.
ITS A PHENOMENON THATS
A study conducted
by UCLA found that
BEEN WRITTEN INTO CITY
racism
may
be
programmed into
LAW. WHITE HOMEOWNERS
the culture. Young
black boys are
COULDNT
SELL
THEIR
viewed
by
law
St. Louis responded by zoning
enforcement
as
older
and
less
neighborhoods on racial lines and
innocent
than
their
white
allowing
pollution
industries,
counterparts
CNNs
Marc
Hill
says.
commercial business, taverns, and
This means that the same crime or
brothels
to
be
in
all-black
act
could bring adult charges for a
communities exclusively.
black youth, but a less-severe
Perhaps one of the greatest factors
in continuous racial tension was punishment if he had been born
white. And its not just white police
discriminatory
suburbanization.
During the time period that the above officers; the study found that a black
law enforcement officer was also
practices were being formed in law,
white members of society were likely to racially profile and come to
the same conclusions.
moving away from the city and into
This means that, as a society,
the suburbs, where single-family
racial differences and stereotypes are
homes are subsidized by income
an ever-present problem not just
taxes.
something that happens in news
Additionally, suburbanization was
the reason for highways, which were media somewhere across the country.
Racist attitudes may not be as
great tools for those in the suburbs
who commute to work within the city, obvious and discriminatory as the
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Missouri housing situation, but they
have made their way from overt
racism to subconscious racism.
Marc Hill says that the United
States paradigm is to look at black
people as being more prone to
criminal
acts,
a
view
that
[reinforces]
notions
of
black
pathology through film, literature,
music, religion, and the sciences
(CNN).

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This realization defines the

difference between the Black Lives
Matter era and the Civil Rights
Movement.
In the 50s and 60s, racism
seemed easy to point out. White
people being blatantly discriminate
was a problem that could be solved
legally and peacefully. Nonviolence in
the face of violence woke the nation
up and real change happened.
Equality came and Martin Luther
King, Jr.s movement was successful.

However, since long before that,

subconscious racism had been
working its way into the nationwide
mindset. And while the CRA of 1964
made discrimination illegal, it didnt
cause everyone to now be objective.
The
United
States
has
psychologically learned to be racist
over the course of its history. It
started as being very violent,
aggressive, and obvious.

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