Dear Reader: Why I Chose To Analyze This Idea

Dear Reader,

One of Toni Morrison’s go to themes is racism; its lasting effects on an individual, the mental burden it creates, everything about it. Yet, up until God Help the Child, every single one of her stories remained firmly rooted in the past. It was extremely surprising for me to begin to read this story and see the diction Morrison feels accurately represents this time period. Perhaps to cause the emotional response which I felt, she uses words like “Nigger” and “black cunt” and describes an atrocious life for her main character - Bride. In fact, although free from slavery, Morrison seems to describe Bride in her own chains… Chains of oppression forged by people constantly abusing her. In fact, it gets to a point in the story where Bride acknowledges that she can’t even stand up for herself anymore.

It was in this description, meant to describe our modern times, that I was taken aback. I personally had never experienced anything like this, and although the news has captured the abuse of African Americans in communities like Ferguson, I always perceived those as isolated events. Because of Morrison’s message about the impacts, individuals within society can have on a person, and Bride’s demonstration of these effects, I had to know whether society today was the innately oppressionistic regime which Morrison described it to be… And if so, I needed to see how far it extended.

At first, my research was solely concentrated on the African American community. However, with case study after case study suggesting that American society, even unknowingly, demonstrates a bias against African Americans which undermines them and takes away their constitutional equality. Coming to this resolve, I was shocked that such a large population in the United States held, even subconsciously, biased opinions against African Americans. Perhaps it has just been my time in Evanston, or my families personal beliefs, but this is something extremely strange to me and I had to understand it… I wanted to see if Morrison’s ideas about oppression and the lack of equality within the United States were founded in other social groups as well. As a result, I targeted two more groups which, albeit, were extremely easy to identify, and came to similar conclusions. With a little bit more research, I tried to figure out just how many separate communities or entities claimed they felt the oppression of American society. Among the other groups that felt this way were the feminist movement, the immigrant workers movement, and many others as well. After analyzing all of these, I began to see something truly remarkable… It appeared that more than half of Americans today felt oppressed by society, and the only ones truly escaping from this societal lack of equality were white males… AKA me.

This surprised me, I understood that racism and inequality had been parts of America’s past, however I never actually considered the fact that it was alive and affecting society today. I always considered the incidents on the news to be freak occurences because one individual refused to get with the times.

Seeing this all unfold before my eyes because Toni Morrison choose to write a race related novel in the present was breathtaking. But more importantly, it made me want to write something associated with this cause. I wanted my Multi-Genre assignment to reflect the oppression within American society and the lack of equality there is for most individuals. As a result, I choose to thread [my golden thread] oppression into every single one of my pieces and transition that oppression from a racist hatred, towards acceptance and equality. It is through this transition, that I wanted to convey that we can change… I reaffirmed this idea that we can change through constantly referencing America’s past and how it has continued to make steps to overcome tragic beginning. Between each of the Multi-Genre pieces, there are headlines from newspaper articles which reflect this tragic past within America and show the transition of overcoming it. Tying the present to what has already happened… Almost as if to say that “if they can make forward progress, then so can we”.  

What resulted from this effort was, in my eyes, a completely unified Multi-Genre piece that strove to demonstrate one connected message about the importance of unity and equality within the United States. Our Founding Fathers instituted equality as the ideal this nation was intended to be founded upon and although we have not reached it to this day, we must continue to make steps towards reaching this goal. Because only then is America truly the “Land of the free, and the home of the brave”.

Sincerely,

Nutella + Tostitos

I Have the Same Dream

(Speech given on the steps of the Washington Monument for an anti-discrimination rally)

My fellow Americans, “I have a dream”... “I have a dream”

Martin Luther King ushered these words into our world 52 years ago on these very steps where I stand before you today.

He wanted, to bring an end to segregation, and to embrace the truly noble ideals which this country stands for…

“freedom and democracy”...

Now, although these principles were written into practice over 200 years ago, we remain a long way from achieving them, even today.

Do not think I have come to speak to send you false hopes... What we stand for today is an ideal which has been shared by many throughout history, yet it has never, truly, been attained…

The road ahead of us is hard and laced with thorns… but, if you believe as I do, that there is nothing more important in this world than freedom, then what are a few measly thorns?

Who cares if the road is hard? For what we strive for is greater than the sum of all of our sufferings, multiplied by 10.

FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY!

UP UNTIL THIS POINT IT HAS REMAINED AN IDEAL! NOTHING MORE! LET US BE THE FIRST TO MAKE IT A REALITY!

[crowd cheers]

I thank you for coming here today, to listen to me and my associates present. It truly means a lot that so many others feel the same way as we do.

You know, you remind me of my neighborhood block-party. Sure, this is a little bit bigger than I remember it, but it is all the same.

Why, my friends and I would skate around on bikes and skateboards, and take turns playing in a sprinkler, we would share our toys and, when everybody got hungry, we would share a special communion with our families and friends. I remember every single one of those block parties fondly, because we were truly connected in those moments. It was more than simply being neighbors with one another, we were there for one another. On a more personal level… A true community.

And a true community is what we have here tonight. Why, if I had a big enough picnic table I would gladly share a meal with all of you!

[crowd laughs]

You are the future of a united people, a people that do not isolate, or discriminate, a people where the ideals unity and equality thrive, and anger and discrimination die…

Now as we start this rally for justice and further this cause against every form of discrimination, I would like to leave you with a few words of wisdom.

A good friend of mine, Marlon Wayaan, once told me “Success is not a destination, but the road that you're on. Being successful means that you're working hard and walking your walk every day. You can only live your dream by working hard towards it. That's living your dream.”

Now, let us live our dream by embracing these ideals we strive for every day AND MAKING THEM BECOME A REALITY!

[crowd cheers] --->>> [exit podium]

Where Have Justice and Equality gone?

Help! Missing Dog!

His Name is JUSTICE EQUALITY JUNIOR!

If you see him, please bring him back to me (America)!

Reward of 100$ and, as an added bonus, two dogs! Discrimination and Superiority

Alone We Are Weak, United We Are Strong

(Too bad that didn’t happen here)

Discrimination is different. He hates everyone else. He is disgusted by equality and her silly notions, and he finds peace an abhorration because, unlike Discrimination, Peace likes everyone else. Discrimination is alone… He has no one. No one except for Superiority who, like discrimination, looks down on everyone else; even his cousin excellence.  Superiority hates excellence because Excellence worked for what he has and Superiority finds that, that makes him almost as bad as Shameful.

When Discrimination and Superiority find time to meet up, Peace, Equality, and Love all leave. They are scared of what the two of them might do. Most of the time, Discrimination and Superiority only make threats, they find that coming off of their high chairs is too much effort; but when they do come down, it is always bad.

One time apparently, Discrimination was full of spirit and rage from drinking and he came off of that high chair. Before everyone else could react, Discrimination was among them, and he grabbed wildly in the air. Discrimination, with a pungent smell of alcohol on his breath, by chance, snatched the collar of little equality with that wild grab of his and then, continued by taking Equality’s little right arm and squeezing. Everyone else had run away at first but now they looked back. Little Equality was gasping and pain flushed across his face as Discrimination dug his long nails into Equality’s skin. Peace and the others, out of sight behind a large boulder, watched in horror as Discrimination then began to take out a cigarette and a lighter, then light the cigarette, take a couple puffs, and proceed to push the burning end down toward Equality’s face. Fear and panic filled the hearts of everyone but none of them could bear to look… They couldn’t stomach it, so they all hid behind that boulder. And as they crouched there, hidden from view, all they could hear were the screams of Equality and the laughs of Superiority as Discrimination decided gleefully what torturous device he would try next on his victim.

Everyone feared Discrimination and Superiority, they feared that they would be in Equality’s spot if they spoke up, so rather than help poor little Equality, they turned their backs and walked away to his tear filled attempts at cries for help. The next they came back and Discrimination was back up there on his high horse with Superiority sitting right next to him again. But one thing had changed, Equality was gone and that was the last they would ever hear from him.

The Past: It’s not my fault

(A tribute to God Help the Child)

She said She said

The past is not my fault The past is not my fault

That black color she carries

It’s not my doing...

That’s her burden to bear That’s her burden to bear

She refused me,

She never loved me

She Ruined my life She Ruined my life

I couldn’t take her anywhere,

When she was born,

I almost wanted to killed her,

But I didn’t, I let her live

Isn’t that enough? Aren’t I enough?

Why would you never touch me?

I can’t get over that and i’m 25 now

I’m grown and successful,

but I can’t forget the past

Because of you Because of you

Because of that terrible color,

My own daughter became a stranger,

More than that, an enemy.

I hate you! I hate you!

I send you checks in the mail

Just so I don’t have to see you

You disgust me You disgust me

You made my life hard,

I could have passed for white,

I could have had a better life I could have had a better life

I could have been whole,

If you had just loved me.

If you had been a mother If you had been a mother

you would understand

It’s harder than it looks
I wanted to love you I wanted to love you
But you never could love me

You were just too different...

Land of the Oppressed and Home of the Aristocracy

Toni Morrison’s novel God Help the Child is a passionate and commanding story of a young girls heartbreak and pain. Bride, the protagonist, endures abuse throughout her entire life and knows nothing besides it. As a result, Bride develops a submissive stance in all her interactions with others, demonstrating how she has been broken by societal norms . The primary reason for this hatred and abuse is her dark black skin. Using this fact, Morrison provokes a deeply philosophical question through Bride and asks, “What do we do with someone when that person’s sins are out of their control?” Yet because God Help the Child is set in the present, this novel then becomes a reflection of what is wrong within our society. This theme Morrison implements is threatening; it suggests that the troubled past which America felt it had left behind is, in fact, still around and running rampant. Approaching this concept Morrison introduces, and taking a wider stance, it appears that Morrison is not only correct, but that she has only touched the surface; while this country was founded upon, “liberty and justice for all”, it appears that what the Founding Fathers really meant was “equality [for the rich white landholding males who practice a common place religion]”, and nothing for everybody else.

Morrison discusses the oppression of African Americans within the United States today, and hits a very sensitive subject right on the head. Look at recent headlines. Morrison is not wrong in describing society today as racist. Statistically, the percent of African American’s living in New York, according to the American Community Survey from the U.S. Census, is 25.1 percent. However, in 2014, out of the 46,235 times police implemented the “stop-and-frisk” policy (a police procedure to stop and shake down anybody they deem “suspicious”), 55 percent of the people they stopped were black. 25.1 percent of the population compared to 55 percent of total “stop-and-frisks” doesn’t correlate. Especially considering the fact that only 12 percent of people undergoing the “stop-and-frisk” were white and they represent the leading demographic for New York, with 44.6 percent of the population (NYCLU.Com). What this suggests is that, even if this is subliminal, there are perceptions based on race that remain within America. These perceptions develop a culture where African Americans, like Bride, feel crushed under society. In fact, if you take recent police brutality towards young African American males in the news alongside of these fact, it suggests that there is an extreme variation between what is just and what is occurring. Michael Brown’s killing in Ferguson is a perfect example of this. Brown received 6 gunshots to his body, and eyewitnesses have said that Brown had his hands up when he received the fatal shot (HuffingtonPost.com). This remains only one example of police brutality towards African Americans; however in a recent survey, 24 percent of young black men polled said that they had experienced unfair treatment, like Brown endured, within the last 30 days at the hands of police (Gallup Polls). What this suggests is that, to African Americans, society seems to have stacked the deck against them…  And this belief is founded in fact, based on statistical analysis of police activity. What all of this correlates to is a confirmation of Toni Morrison arguments and demonstrates that racism is alive and well in America, if only subliminally.

Yet Racism is not the only factor that inhibits equality and hurts the individuals within our society; another prominent group that is oppressed today is the LGBT community. Today, gay people are only allowed to be married in 37 states (FreedomToMarry.org), and people/businesses are legally allowed to discriminate because sexual orientation is not covered under Civil Rights (CivilRights.org).  Just like African Americans, people within the LGBT community are not given the rights promised by our constitution. Because of who they are, something they cannot change, they are the recipient of 20 percent of all violent hate crimes in the United States while only representing 3.4 percent of the population (CivilRights.org and (UCLA School of Law). Yet, while these factors demonstrate the oppression of LGBT individuals within the United States, perhaps the most brutal form of society’s oppression is the connotation of the word gay in social media. “That’s gay” and “you’re a faggot” are terms some individuals choose to use as insults and they can be seen plastered across Twitter feeds and Facebook Posts. They are intended to describe something repulsive and disgusting. And by associating these words with such horrible connotations, it associates the same image with the people the word is meant to represent. In rap music and hip hop culture, the word gay is used in a very similar way. It is negative and suggests disgust and impurity. Imagine how the people feel that have to endure this in their day-to-day lives... A word that is meant to describe who you are, used to describe the detested and the intolerable… It suggests a repulsive social view that still, to this day, has not changed completely. In his music video, Same Love, Macklemore highlights this idea with his lyrics “ah nah, here we go, America the brave still fears what we don’t know, and god loves all his children is somehow forgotten, when we paraphrase a book written 35 hundred years ago… I don’t know”. Macklemore attacks the injustice occurring within our own society under our very noses; people are abused and made to carry the same emotional burdens that Bride carried in God Help the Child. This is something that should never happen in a country that is intended to be “Land of the free, and home of the brave”.

For people of Middle Eastern descent, 9/11 created similar problems. Although Islam is a peaceful religion and preaches similar messages to Christianity and Judaism, people in America blame them consistently for 9/11. In post 9/11 America, there have been multiple attacks on Muslims and on temples. In fact, anti-Muslim hate crimes have skyrocketed nearly 1,600 percent in the years after 9/11 (USAToday30) This Anti-Muslim hatred has even spread to congress; senators have held Anti Muslim hearings (USAToday30). The people that are meant to be protecting Americans rights and their personal liberties, rallying against those they are supposed to support? This type of residual hatred suggests that for Muslims, America doesn’t offer the same opportunities simply because of what they believe. With Mosques being blocked from construction in Tennessee, and other Mosques being destroyed in Missouri, and Senators claiming that “disloyal Muslims are infiltrating our government” (USAToday30), it is no wonder that these individuals express the opinion that there is a lack of equality within American Society.

These are not the only groups who have endured discrimination in America, however they demonstrate the important idea that American society is not as it was intended to be. Toni Morrison’s Novel illustrates this idea innate racism within American society, and portrays the lasting effects oppression has on all individuals idea of racism’s effects on one individual. Applying this concept and expanding it past the African American community, it has become apparent that many people feel the lasting impressions of discrimination and hatred; perhaps even a majority. Everyone today seems to be inflicted with lasting burdens of society’s influence and it is because of this fact that social change needs to be implemented. Although the ideal of “equality” was a goal of the founders of the United States, we still have not attained it to this day. As a result, we must continue to work and build a better future; one where the emotional burdens Bride constantly endures from human cruelty no longer apply.

Works Cited

1. "Black and White Attitudes Toward Police." Gallup Review. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.gallup.com/poll/175088/gallup-review-black-white-attitudes-towardpolice.aspx>.
2. "Column: Post 9/11 Discrimination Must End." USA Today. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/story/2012-08-09/sikh-shooting-muslims-bias/56920502/1>.
3. "5 Things to Know about the Ferguson Police Department." USA Today. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2014/08/14/ferguson-police%20department-details/14064451/>.
4. "Gays and Lesbians." The Leadership Conference. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.civilrights.org/resources/civilrights101/sexualorientation.html>.
5. "LGBT Demographics of the United States." Wikipedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_demographics_of_the_United_States>.
6. "1 In 3 Black Males Will Go To Prison In Their Lifetime, Report Warns." Huffington Post. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/04/racial-disparities-criminal-justice_n_4045144.html>.
7. "States." Freedom to Marry. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.freedomtomarry.org/states>.
8. "Stop and Frisk Data." New York Civil Liberties Union. New York, n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.nyclu.org/content/stop-and-frisk-data>.
9. "21 Numbers That Will Help You Understand Why Ferguson Is About More Than Michael Brown." Huffington Post. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/22/ferguson-black-america_n_5694364.html>.
10. United States Census Bureau. U.S.A., n.d. Web. 19 May 2015. <http://www.census.gov/acs/www/>.