‘Were the Freedom Rides in America more important than those actions taken in Australia?’
The question discussed in this essay will be ‘Were the Freedom Rides in America more important than those actions taken in Australia?’ The freedom rides were a group of American citizens which tested the segregation laws in the south and protested for equality for coloured people. The freedom riders were determined to make a difference to racial inequality and change history. Both countries had harsh laws which restricted and limited freedom within the coloured society. Jim Crow laws in America and the Assimilation policy in Australia affected coloured people in both countries. Whites felt they were more superior and had minimal rules to follow unlike the ‘coloured people’ society who lived by rules which segregated them and enslaved them (Year 10 HASS Booklet).The Assimilation policy and Jim Crow laws were very similar; they both were restrictive and denied access to public and social attractions.
Martin Luther King Jnr was inspired by Ghandi’s peace protests as a strategy to unite both races one day. Martin’s speech ‘I have A Dream’ was successful and reached media across the world on discrimination, and encouraged 30 Indigenous Australians and non-Indigenous students from Sydney, to create and Australian Freedom Ride ‘SAFA’ (Student Action for Aborigines). Charles Perkins an Indigenous Australian, and ‘Australian Aboriginal Activist’ led 30 students to rural racist towns in 1963, around Australia to highlight these major concerns for our Indigenous Australians. SAFA visited Public attractions; such as community halls, hotels, restaurants/cafes and swimming pools known for exclusion of Indigenous Australians. Charles actions were inspire...
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...ir people and their country to achieve a great deal, in hope one day we unite and abolish discrimination. Although America had a major impact on the world, Australia was just important to our Indigenous people with racial based discrimination. Both Freedom rides recognised situations and mistreatment in both countries thus making them equal within ‘importance’.
“All they wanted was the equality everyone deserved. After all they are all human and shouldn’t be discriminated against just because of skin colour” -Aiatsis, 2012.
Works Cited
http://australia.gov.au/topics/law-and-justice/civil-rights. http://americanhistory.si.edu/brown/history/1-segregated/jim-crow.html http://americanhistory.si.edu/brown/history/1-segregated/promise-of-freedom.html
http://www.naacp.org/pages/our-missionhttp://www.infoplease.com/spot/marchonwashington.html#ixzz2yHxcjBuC
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Kirk, J. (2007). Martin Luther King, Jr. and the civil rights movement: controversies and debates. Basingstoke New York: Palgrave Macmillan.