"Francis, what the hell do you mean?"
"Just what I said. Grandma says it's bad enough the lets you all run wild, but now he's turned n*****-lover we'll never be able to walk the streets of Maycomb again. He's ruinin' the family, that's what he's doin'."
As this scene played out, the only thing that I could think was 'Man, it would suck to live back then.' As someone who's always had a "diverse" group of people in the communities that I take part in, its a strange thought to me that anyone would ever find someone bad for defending a black person. Francis takes the side of a typical white person back in that time with all of his knowledge of what's right an wrong being fed to him by his grandmother and causing him to continue the out of date thinking. As JL was raised to be more liberal and not discriminate by Atticus, she disagrees strongly with his insults and tells Francis so with a swift punch in the nose. I was silently cheering JL on in this scene because finally, finally, we had a spunky, easily provoked female character who can fight for herself with fists rather than words. As much as I love a good argument, there's something so entertaining about physical violence that makes it better to read. In this day and age, people are still disagreeing about the topic of racial equality, though much less than before. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2015-03-01/racial-inequality-after-racism
If they really want to continue thinking like they're in the 20th century, they should at least follow through and live like they are too. If you want to live in modern times, you need to be able to adapt to how people in the newer generations think! I'm very happy that even in the 1930's, JL managed to achieve some sort of equal thinking, even if it did put her apart from most everyone else she knew. If only everyone else in their town educated their kids to think like Atticus and JL do, then that kind of thinking would've spread throughout the world so much earlier! If it had started earlier, maybe there would be less racial discrimination today, especially within some police units as shown by the shootings for innocent black people. We still have people who follow the 1900's thinking today and who would agree strongly with Francis and Aunt A. However, we can shut that down and educate ignorant people whenever possible. Yay for racial equality!
Until Next Time!
-Nicole
I don't feel like violence was the answer in that particular situation, although it was entertaining. While anybody raised to think like Scout would love to beat somebody like Francis up for what he said, it would not help anything to hurt them for it. In fact, it could only hurt the movement against racism. Thinking back to the Civil Rights movement, the nonviolence practiced by MLK Jr. worked far better than the methods for change by the Black Power movement. This was because violence simply caused whites to think of blacks as worse than before. Scout should not have beaten up Francis, and actually told somebody what he said, like Uncle Jake.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletei honestly agree with you in the first part were you described how it would suck and i also think that violence wasn't the answer and it was ingoing to catching the entertainment with the situation.
ReplyDeleteWhile violence probably assured he will think twice before smart mouthing to Scout again. It really never changed the way he thinks about African Americans or the situation and I think that should be the main point in any action to prevent racism. If not that measures should be taken to shield and keep racism out of society.
ReplyDelete