Thoughts on Rosa Parks

[rturner76]

Thanks for the info...let me get this straight, some black people got murdered? For sitting in the white section of the bus?

I had heard that in south africa, where there was apartheid the same sort of thing happened. But i dont know if they had someone like Rosa Parks, it was Nelson Mandela who was put in jail...

Yes it was a very organized movements with protests, sit-ins, and bus riding all over the southern states but mostly Alabama and Mississippi where it was the worst. There were many murders, missing persons reports, burnings of houses and churches. One very famous bombing of a church where four very young girls were killed during Sunday school. http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/birmingham-church-bombing

Churches were where most of the meetings for the organization took place. In some cities the groups would have a name some they didn't depending on if they had a newspaper they were publishing or some other way they were already known in the community.

Dr Martin Luther King Jr. was at the head of the whole thing. He had his close advisers and all the church and city and county groups had their local leaders. All the press would follow Dr King and he would travel to a city where he had a big group or a few groups together. He would call them ahead of time and say we are going to protest or march or do a sit-it on this day and they would be ready and the press would cover it.

Sometimes the local police would set dogs on them,blast them with fire hoses, and beat them, and these were just kids sometimes 13-16 years old in some cases. They would fill up the jails every time they protested. This is when people started coming from the north because of what they saw on TV (the dogs and such). They were met in the south with even more hostility for being Yankees trying to tell them how to run their towns.

I could go on and on about Dr Martin Luther King Jr. President John F Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, the March on Washington, The Civil Rights Act, Bobby Kennedy, all the assassinations, Medger Evers, the Mississippi Three, Emmit Till, if you Google civil rights struggle you can find a million things I missed.

 

[Goodbook]

The church got bombed?!

 

[rturner76]

Also question, in the north part of the usa there were no african americans originally is that correct? They were all enslaved in the south?

After this happened or slavery was banned they could move north and settle?

Because north and south were originally two different countries is that right? The confederacy and ...not sure what the other one was called. And then after the civil war the two became the united states of america.

Sorry if im a bit hazy as we didnt learn about usa in history. If theres a good history website on it maybe someone can recommend me to read that would be helpful,.

It always was one country but the north outlawed slavery and the south allowed slavery.

What happened was the north got built by big industry and paid labor, automation, innovation, and factories. People worked and got paid. They spent their money on things so more things had to get built so they needed more labor so they paid people to work. Those people had money to spend and so on. The north had more people with money and a more diverse economy. Abundance of different grains and crops foe feed for cows and pigs and bread etc.

In the south it was a plantation economy. The plantation owners were extremely rich. There were shop keepers and some jobs in a few ports but not major shipping like the north. Except when it came to cotton and tobacco. It was like growing gold out of the ground for the south. Everybody in the world wanted their cotton and tobacco. Especially back in Europe where they could get a good price. People stopped wearing do much wool and were switching to cotton and couldn't get enough of it. Plus Europe was literally addicted to the tobacco coming out of tobacco row.

Th thing was,all the labor was slave labor and the plantation owners hoarded all that money.Plus the tobacco and cotton was so valuable, nobody was growing grain to make bread and feed cattle so they depended on the north for that. At the same time with no paid labor force, all that money was just sitting in the plantation owners pockets and not stimulating the economy as well. They still did ok but it was a wider gap between rich and poor.

Abolitionists were always putting pressure on the government to abolish slavery so the south's way of life was always at risk. Without slavery, the entire financial system in the south would collapse (or so they thought) The southern states were also concerned with the size of the central government and believed the states should govern themselves and the Fed should be not much more than an army to fight off enemies.

Moving this along, they felt threatened in both areas and succeeded from the union in 1861 and the Civil War would last until 1865 with the victory of the northern states or the"Union"

 

[rturner76]

The church got bombed?!

Yes I believe it was members of the Ku Klux Klan but don't quote me.

 

[Goodbook]

Yes well GWTW was one perspective of the plantation lifestyle and those owners were rich beyond belief. But the book depicted many of the white plantation owners as kind and fair and the african americans as servants not slaves...though obviously in reality it wasnt all moonlight and magnolias. Yankees are depicted as money grubbing carpet baggers.

I have read and watched GWTW several times as used to be a big windie fan although I know its fiction but based on historical events.

 

[Goodbook]

In the movie the KKK was white americans trying to protect their folk from mauruding black americans.

Actually im not sure what to call either ethnicities.

Black, white?
Negro, caucasian?
African american, european american?

 

[Goodbook]

Another book/movie about the racial divide is The Help.
Which is more recent times.

Oh also To Kill a Mockingbird.

 

[Citanul]

Thanks for the info...let me get this straight, some black people got murdered? For sitting in the white section of the bus?

I had heard that in south africa, where there was apartheid the same sort of thing happened. But i dont know if they had someone like Rosa Parks, it was Nelson Mandela who was put in jail...

I don't know that much about what happened in America, but I think the extent to which you can say that the same sort of thing happened in South Africa is that there was racial segregation with white people oppressing black people. South Africa was different in that whites were in the minority and used different tactics, such as forced removal.

 

[rturner76]

One film I highly recommend is "Mississippi Burning" It's about the FBI investigation into the disappearance and subsequent murder of three freedom riders from up north and how the local police were not cooperating (no spoilers).

GWTW was told from the perspective to the slave owners. Them, the KKK, the Confederacy were fighting for their way of life. Ultra rich plantation owners that owned whole towns. There was nothing romantic about the way they used to beat their slaves some beaten literally to death, horse whipped. The KKK would Lynch any "Negro" that got out of line. To Lynch is to beat someone then hangthen from a tree namely a black person. (Google Willie Lynch Letter) Willie Lynch is who the move is named after.

In my experience the best terms for people go like this:

"African American" is the most accepted or "politically corect" but some say "black people" for short and most African Americans don't get offended by it. What you don't want to say is "Negro" or "Colored" Definitely not the "N-word" I'm sure you know what that is.

Then you have "Caucasian" I believe is the proper word but many say "white people" Then if you are talking about a Caucasian with a specific background you would say "Irish American" or "Italian American" or whatever

Then, if you do not know their nationality the next one is "Asian" We use that for people of Southeast Asian decent. Otherwise you use their country if you know it like Korean American etc. Never say "Oriental" that's an old word they don't like. It's like saying Negro to a blackperson. Same thing with Chinaman, bad news!

Next people from Middle and South America (Not Brazil) are called "Latino" for men "Latina" for women. Besides that, every spanish speaking country has their own thing they call each other but I don't even try using those words in case I insult somebody like Mexicans are Chicanos and Puerto Ricans are Boriqua but only toeach other unless you are good friends with one and sort of have permission to call them that.It is part of their cultura.

The last one I know is the indigenous people of the USA like to be called "Native" Not Native American or AmericanIndian just Native. Some like Indigenous people but most I know prefer Native.

Everybody else is Whatever-American
East Indian American
Pakastani-American
Somali-American
etc

 

[Goodbook]

In nz white is european or caucasian. If someones from england they get called poms (kind of derogatory)
But maori call white people pakeha.
Chinese people call the, gweilo (literally, ghost, because they are pale)
I dont like being called asian, i prefer nzer or kiwi chinese. And also I am native to nz. Or just kiwi.

Polynesians are called islanders or pasifika
Its funny all these different names for people.
Like in the bible theres hebrews, jews, israelites, and ive heard them called semites. Dont know where that comes from.

 

[keith99]

In nz white is european or caucasian. If someones from england they get called poms (kind of derogatory)
But maori call white people pakeha.
Chinese people call the, gweilo (literally, ghost, because they are pale)
I dont like being called asian, i prefer nzer or kiwi chinese. And also I am native to nz. Or just kiwi.

Polynesians are called islanders or pasifika
Its funny all these different names for people.
Like in the bible theres hebrews, jews, israelites, and ive heard them called semites. Dont know where that comes from.

I was quite happy to simply be referred to as a Prop when I spent time in the land of the long white cloud.

Ka Ora!

 

[Goodbook]

How far does the generation of Rosa Parks extend? Like were her grandparents slaves or great grandparents when did slavery start and stop?

How long were they bullied for?

 

[rturner76]

How far does the generation of Rosa Parks extend? Like were her grandparents slaves or great grandparents when did slavery start and stop?

How long were they bullied for?

Slavery went from about the 1500's to 1868 I think? It would have probably been Rosa Parks Grand or Great grandparents

 

[keith99]

The church got bombed?!

More than one. Though fire is the usual. One Molotov Cocktail in the middle of the night and everything will be fully engulfed before anyone can respond.

Check the link below. Bethel Baptist got bombed as in dynamite at least twice.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attacks_against_African-American_churches

The seeming increase is probably an illusion. A shift to both full reporting because of increased communication and a lower threshold of what to include probably accounts for the trend. (It looks like the recent ones include almost any fire and I'd bet the old ones include only arson so obvious no one could deny it).

 

[Elliewaves]

Slavery and discrimination is much much more than schoolyard bullying, or a mere disagreement (which really isn't bullying if you just merely disagree with someone). IT is a profound evil. Rosa Parks is a great woman and a great American.

 

[blackribbon]

Black slavery in North America date back to the Dutch city of New Amsterdam which was in the early 1600's. New Amsterdam eventually became the English colony of New York. The northern American colonies were industrialized and didn't use slavery although they exploited the poor immigrants. The southern colonies were primarily agriculture and did use slavery to manage these huge plantations. There were black people living all over the United States and you could be free and black even in the south but chances are that you were poor and under educated no matter where you lived. All slaves were emancipated in 1865. However, the culture continued to repress blacks in the south until the Civil Rights movement became a significant movement in the 1960s when the rights previously granted were finally enforced. Rosa Parks was a brave woman & civil rights activist whose simply act of defiance changed history. That is why the bus is preserved in one of the most spectacular motor vehicle museums in the world (it also has historically significant airplanes, trains, and many many cars... and a metal house...the whole house is in the museum.

 

[MehGuy]

How far does the generation of Rosa Parks extend? Like were her grandparents slaves or great grandparents when did slavery start and stop?

How long were they bullied for?

If we're going to include Arabic conquests and enslavement of Africans I'd say around 1 thousand years. Although people were picking off Africans long before that. Lots of groups were enslave throughout history (including many whites) just seems like the idea of blacks being more slavish than other races kind of stemmed from Arabs. There are texts from them regarding Africans as more beast like and unintelligent and more fit for servitude way before Europeans ever got their hand in the African slave trade.

Sad really. I couldn't imagine what being a black person is like. Some people bullied me for reportably being "Jewish" and the hate I felt was pretty strong.

 

[Goodbook]

It must be awful to still be treated like a slave even though you are free.

 

[blackribbon]

It must be awful to still be treated like a slave even though you are free.

The problem wasn't being treated like a slave, it was that many people thought they were lesser humans because of the color of their skin. The truth is in all of mankind's history is where people treat others who are different in some way (skin color, nationality, religion, hair color, etc) as "less" than they are instead of recognizing that all humans are made in God's image.

 

[Goodbook]

The letter to Philemon comes to mind. PAul was writing that Onemisus is now more than a servant (or slave) he is now a brother.

jesus also said to his disciples I not longer call you my servants I call you my friends. The servant doesnt know what his master is doing but friends know each other.

Among the african americans and european americans it seems they didnt like each other much and werent friends because of this horrible slavery where one bullied the other all the time and it was sanctioned bullying. In nz we would call that racism.

Its outlawed here you cant do it but doesnt mean people dont still have prejdicies.