Zoot Suit Riots Research Paper

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According to the WWII National Museum, “For the hundreds of predominantly Mexican American victims of what became known as the Zoot Suit Riots, a jacket and a pair of pants marked them as criminals.” (WWII National Museum). The Zoot Suit Riots were a sequence of riots located in Los Angeles in June 1943 between U.S. servicemen and Mexican American adolescents who dressed in zoot suits. The cause of these riots was tension and racial prejudice between the two groups of people. Another thing that caused these violent riots was the Sleepy Lagoon Murder Trial. This caused a lot of uneasiness because it portrayed many Mexican-American teens dressed in zoot suits to be seen as thugs and punks. So when sailors and soldiers visited the city of Los Angeles and walked through the streets, they were …show more content…

servicemen are to blame for the Zoot Suit Riots because they started the riots, they provoked zoot suiters, and they were racially prejudiced and targeted Mexican American youth. To begin, the U.S. servicemen should take the blame because they started the riots first. This is true because an article about the Zoot Suit riots states, “The first victims of the Zoot Suit riots — 12 and 13-year-old boys — were guilty of little more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Ignoring the protests of the patrons, the sailors tore the suits off their bodies and beat and clubbed the boys.”(Zinn Education Project) This shows that the sailors made the first move in the Zoot Suit Riots and beat up young teen boys just because of what they were wearing. It is also said, “On June 3, 1943, white U.S. servicemen and police officers descended upon a majority-Mexican American neighborhood in East Los Angeles, California, and harassed, beat, and detained hundreds of Mexican American youth” (Zinn Education Project) This also shows that the U.S. servicemen started the riots first. This caused anyone who wore zoot suits to become very uneasy and unsafe when walking in their own

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