Resistance In Fredericks, Stephanie Camp, And Frederick Douglass

The debate between silently obeying the law and loudly resisting in the face of injustice is one that has existed since the birth of this country. Those who resist see the obedient citizens as ignorant of what goes on around them. On the other hand, those that are obedient see resistors as radicals. I believe that resistance, whether it be peaceful or violent, is justified. In this paper, I will refer to works by Frederick Douglass, Stephanie Camp, and Deborah Gray White to show that resistance is important to challenge injustices, whether it be slavery in the 1800s or inaction against racism at colleges in 2015. In Fredrick Douglass’s speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July,” Douglass proves the necessity of resistance by relating

Douglass writes, “We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and to the future” (115). Resistance was necessary not only to overthrow colonial oppression by the British, but slave oppression by their masters. Douglass makes the metaphor of oppressed slaves to the oppressed colonies to correlate the two through resistance. His main purpose behind the speech is to encourage his mostly white audience to resist slavery and join the abolitionist movement, much like the Patriots resisted the Crown and joined the revolutionary movement. Resistance was important to freeing the slaves. Douglass himself is a key example of resistance. He escapes slavery and becomes a famous figure who speaks about

Students at the University of Missouri, specifically the Concerned Student 1950 activist group, began a resistance movement to remove the university’s president, Tim Wolfe. The university saw a rise in the number of racist incidents, but the president did not take any action. Some of the racist incidents include “a swastika, drawn in excrement” and the “screaming of racial insults, including the ‘N-word” at the head of the Missouri Students Association (“Missouri”). The students began protesting by standing in front of the president’s car at a parade, but when that didn’t garner a response they began to resist in more extreme methods. Jonathan Butler, a graduate student at the University of Missouri, went on a hunger strike, refusing to eat until the president, who took little action against the racist incidents, chose to resign. Hunger strikes, much like abortions, are a form of resistance that can be categorized by inward violence. After a week without food, Tim Wolfe resigned and Butler was able to end his hunger strike (Lowery). The students at Missouri were able to use resistance successfully to create a change in their university’s leadership. Not only did they succeed in changing the leadership, but they gained the attention of the entire nation. Their actions are causing citizens all around the country to think about existing