In both of these articles, the author provided a chronological account of the black struggle for equality. In the first Chapter, Slavery without Submission, Emancipation without Freedom, we learned about the political and cultural implications of the Emancipation of 1863, and the events leading up to it and its aftermath. I think its interesting how white abolitionists recieved far more attention and publicity than blacks during the push for emancipation. In a nation where whites dominated the media, the economy, and politics (in a formal institutional sense at least), the author proves how whites had the last say on every matter, and if societal change was going to happen, it could only be done on the terms set by white men. In the following chapter, we look at a much more recent history of the struggle for equality in the 1960s and 70s with the civil rights movement, comparing ideologies of Malcolm X and MLK, and the different cultural practices that were used to express the African American experience through poetry and music. Both of these chapters gave a fundamental outline of leadership tatics and ideologies among black leaders who have been elevated to the icon status such as Du Bois, Tubman, MLK, Malcolm X, and Frederick Douglass.
Leadership and politics has long been institutionalized to systematically discriminate people of color. This is old news and unfortunately is such a complicated problem that it likely can’t be solved in one lifetime or generation. One of the issues that I have read a lot about that the second chapter did not discuss was Nixon’s War on Drugs. I was particularly disturbed when I read that John Ehrlichman, one of Nixon’s top domestic policy advisers, stepped forward and admitted the War on Drugs was an attempt to reverse legislative progress made by the Civil Rights Movement. Heavy decriminalization of heroine and crack cocaine- not the refined powder cocaine that is snorted and is typically more expensive and found in wealthier communities- made the incarceration rate of African Americans sky rocket in the 1970s and broke up families, communities, and neighborhoods. This distinction for the punishment between crack cocaine and powder cocaine is extremely important since one form of the drug was heavily criminalized while police did not arrest many for using the other. This high incarceration rate, many argue, is part of using prison labor as black slave labor, since the 13th amendment does not abolish slave labor for prisoners. FDR’s beginning of the redlining practices, Nixon’s War on Drugs, Clinton’s 1994 Crime Bill are all just some examples of how the effects of the slave culture and the desire to profit off of black labor and misfortune has carried into 20th and 21st century politics. Leadership has a big impact on the politics behind these events, and its safe to say we have been missing the effective followers we need in bureaucracy and congress that will begin to fight this system of inequality.
Be First to Comment