HOW PEOPLE STOOD UP FOR CIVIL RIGHTS Introduction People in the past had to deal with having different privileges based on their race or skin color! Many people fought for that to be changed and thought that it was time for the world to stop being unequal. People such as Rosa Parks, Sojourner Truth, Fredrick Douglas, and Carla Lemlich all stood up to fight what they thought was right and that was to fight for civil rights doing this they could make an impact in history to finally abolish slavery. How people stood up with words First, many people in the past stood up for civil rights using their words. They did this because they believed what they were fighting for was right and that it must be changed using their words. Fredrick Douglas …show more content…
This can help explain that both kinds of ways of standing up are the same, and they both can cause a lot of positive changes. These people were motivated in different ways, which explains why they used actions or words. Fredrick was motivated to abolish slavery and discovered his secret of speaking with precise reasoning. According to Fredrick Douglas Freedom's voice it says, “Fredrick was a stirring speaker, articulate and outspoken.” We can inference that he also wrote extremely well and could accomplish huge things to help ABOLISH slavery he spoke to fix it and it impacted the community by believing slavery is bad with his speaking. He was most likely hired by many people to speak for them. Sojourner Truth uses action to try and help with civil rights. She believed slavery must end. So, she physically acted and followed through by helping to abolish slavery as soon as possible because it was very popular in her time in the 1800’s. According to The Power of Words it says, “Truth traveled around the world preaching and protesting slavery.” This would be extremely tough, especially when it comes to traveling all over this shows how much motivation she had and how she stuck to her plan and played a big part in abolishing slavery. Truth is, unlike Fredrick who used his words and still convinced people to stop supporting slavery, she used her actions to make an impact. Instead of speaking, she protested. This impacted the community to progress towards equality. This can show even different ways to speak up for civil rights, which could be fighting for desegregation or abolishing slavery depending on their time period. All of these can help the same cause in the same way. If people had not done things like rosa parks we might not have abolished segregation and it could have taken much longer. Others in these people's time frames could have gotten inspired by them and could have
Throughout the course of American history, there have been many historical figures who have been responsible for, or were a part of the gradual change of our nation. In the early to mid 1900's, the United States was racially segregated, and African Americans were looked at as second class citizens. In the mid-1900's, a time period which is now known as the Civil Rights Movement, there were a number of different people who helped lead the charge to desegregate the United States. Some of the historical figures, who's names are synonymous with the Civil Rights Movement, include political activist Martin Luther King, NAACP officer Medgar Evers, Baptist minister Malcolm X, and normal citizen Rosa Parks. All of these people were a very large part of the Civil Rights Movement and attempted to recognize African Americans as equals to Whites.
After World War II, “ A wind is rising, a wind of determination by the have-nots of the world to share the benefit of the freedom and prosperity” which had been kept “exclusively from them” (Takaki, p.p. 383), and people of color in United States, especially the black people, who had been degraded and unfairly treated for centuries, had realized that they did as hard as whites did for the winning of the war, so they should receive the same treatments as whites had. Civil rights movement emerged, with thousands of activists who were willing to scarify everything for Black peoples’ civil rights, such as Rosa Parks, who refused to give her seat to a white man in a segregated bus and
through all the obstacles that keep African-Americans in an oppressed state. The Emmett Till case was important simply because it shocked the nation to the point to confront the idea of unrestricted injustices in Mississippi and as well as other states. After this case, it was much harder for whites to defend this type of behavior and lack of fairness in the south. This was a focal point used by the Civil Rights Activists to insure that blacks get the same rights as whites. It is true that we still live in an unfair society, but our forefather such as Martin Luther king, James Farmer, and Roy Wilkins, just to name a few did a wonderful job to freeing not only people of colors, but seeking equal rights for all.
When it comes to civil rights, there are two pieces of literature commonly discussed. One of these pieces is Henry David Thoreau’s persuasive lecture On the Duty of Civil Disobedience. In this work, Thoreau discusses how one must combat the government with disobedience of unjust laws and positive friction to create change. The second piece is the commonly known article Letter From a Birmingham Jail by Martin Luther King Jr. This letter covers the ways in which peaceful protest and standing up against injustice can lead to positive results. Both pieces conveyed a similar message of standing up for what is right. The strongest rhetorical methods which Thoreau uses are allusions, logos, ethos and rhetorical questions. However, King’s use of
This being said overtime, several African American’s stood up for these rights, the rights that they are entitled too, but never received. In the late 1800’s, early 1900’s Booker T. Washington continually urged for equal education for his fellow African American’s. He fought for the equal education that African American’s deserved. Overtime evolved an education plan by him that I believe didn’t truly put forth African American education as most would’ve liked, he advised blacks to stay in their place in the south (Harlan, Raymond 9). By means, his philosophy was that African Americans needed to earn the respect, and the segregation from the white folks, they can’t just demand it overnight. That they needed to make the best of the situation by working, and don’t confront the institutionalized racism in the south put forth by De Jure segregation. He wanted them to have more industrial education to achieve this. So in a way he wasn’t fighting for equality, he was urging African Americans to be educated to be better workers, to earn that respect, and to just ignore the problem. Despite the setbacks in politics, civil rights, and human rights that occurred wit...
... to existing problems for many minority groups that eventually changed of over time even if those changes may have took a long time. Many individuals whom have passed on, may have wished that they would have witnessed the day when it really doesn’t matter what your race, color or creed is would have love to be here today. However small amounts of discrimination still exist today race, color, gender , national origin, religion, creed, age, marital status, sexual orientation sad to say, but we are not all the way there as yet, everyone is entitled to equal protection under the law. No one ever believed that we would have ever have a black president (Commander and Chief of the US Military) and we have one now President Barrack Obama, Change is always good when it is for the people in regards to Equal rights and Justice for all.
Imagine living during the 1960’s when the nation was divided by segregation. The only way to express your ideas, beliefs, and thoughts during that time was through words. Famous Civil Rights activists such as, Dr.Martin Luther King Jr., inspired many with his wise words and empowering speeches. Times when many felt unheard or invisible, words were there as tranquilness and an ataraxia. Words have the power to provoke, calm, or inspire by motivating others to take action in what they believe in.
Rosa became tired of waiting for the world to change on its own, or was afraid that it will never change, so she revolted against the unfair prejudice laws and has successfully made African-Americans equal and inspired many to stand up for justice. When faced with a situation where wrong and hurtful things are being done, people should follow Rosa Park’s remarkable example and not be afraid to say or do something to stop them from happening, no matter who they are. Rosa Parks has shown marvelously, anyone can be a hero. Rosa Parks now stand for symbol of fight for equal rights and freedom.
There are people in America that make us wonder why there is a world to begin with. There are people who represent the greater good of the world, and there are others who are unfortunately not for the greater good of the world. We have to constantly deal with those whose only goal in life is to bring the lives of others down to the ground; to shatter and to break them. This is what is happening now in the world, and this most likely will never change. As a result of trying to change the ways in which we live and interact with these people, there was a movement that wanted to change the lives of African-Americans, as well as other races.
The Civil Rights Movement was full of faith, tears, pain, and racism. This movement caused an uproar that America needed for years. It took the strength of the African-American people to stand up for what was right while at the same time, being knocked down because of the color of their skin. African-Americans were, and still are, faced with the dilemma of being a different color from everyone else. Dr. King stated in his book ways the African-American could overcome this dilemma.
Most people do not realize the sacrifices and risk that civil right leaders had to make. Civil right leaders constantly risk their lives and their freedom. Civil right leaders fought for equality and freedom for African Americans. Over 70% of African Americans were experiencing segregation and discrimination during the civil right movement. African Americans only had one another for support, so during this time African Americans appreciated civil right leaders. During the civil rights movement, many leaders helped African Americans cope with changes that they were experiencing. Some African Americans looked up to civil rights leaders, because they were African American, so they knew how it felt to be mistreated by whites. African American leaders wanted a change to come. In other words, most of the civil right leaders were African Americans who wanted to stop segregation and have equal rights. Therefore, African Americans listened to civil right leaders, because their courage and knowledge helped African Americans during the civil right movement.
Truth worked with Susan B. Anthony, Amy Post, Wendell Phillips, and Lucretia Mott to help defend the rights of women (Campbell). They had some success with it, but Truth wasn’t able to vote before she died because she was a woman and she was African American. Truth resided in her home in Michigan until her death in 1883 (Washington, “Sojourner Truth’s America”). Overall, Truth touched a lot of people with her speech. Her style in her kind of describes her as a person.
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” This was a speech by Martin Luther King Jr. Even one hundred years after slavery was banned, African Americans were still being treated unfairly. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the most famous leaders of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960’s. The Civil Rights movement was a movement of African Americans who felt that they were not being treated equally. There were also many other famous leaders and inspirations during the Civil Rights Movement. This movement was very important to the freedom of African Americans.
It wasn’t easy being an African American, back then they had to fight in order to achieve where they are today, from slavery and discrimination, there was a very slim chance of hope for freedom or even citizenship. This longing for hope began to shift around the 1950’s. During the Civil Rights Movement, where discrimination still took place, it was the time when African Americans started to defend their rights and honor to become freemen like every other citizen of the United States. African Americans were beginning to gain recognition after the 14th Amendment was ratified in 1868, which declared all people born natural in the United States and included the slaves that were previously declared free. However, this didn’t prevent the people from disputing against the constitutional law, especially the people in the South who continued to retaliate against African Americans and the idea of integration in white schools....
However, these African American citizens had remarkable courage to never stop, until these un-just laws were changed and they received what they had been fighting for all along, their inalienable rights as human beings and to be equal to all other human beings. Up until this very day there are still racial issues where some people feel supreme over other people due to race. That, however, is an issue that may never end. African Americans fought until the Jim Crow laws were taken out of effect, and they received equality for all people regardless of race. Along the way, there were many controversial court cases and important leaders who helped to take a stand against racial segregation.