The Negro Poverty and the Economic Gap

In 1965, Lyndon B. Johnson made a speech at Howard University in which he addresses the growing economic gap between black and white Americans as well as the difference between “Negro poverty and white poverty.”

Johnson discusses how many factors contributed to the economic gap. First, he discusses how inadequate freedom has broken down very big barriers but is still not enough to close the gap. “Freedom is the right to share, share fully and equally, in American society—to vote, to hold a job, to enter a public place, to go to school...But freedom is not enough.” Giving these rights to people who do not typically have them is not solving the problem. And adding racial prejudices and discriminations on top of it really doesn’t help at all. Although it is a huge step for the Negro population to have access to these rights, it still doesn’t do all it can to improve the state of the community. It’s more a case about having the opportunity to act on these rights and changing society. Opportunities need to be made for the Negro population in order to see the economic gap start to close.

Another factor Johnson points out is how the closing of the economic gap is not one simply based on poverty. Negro poverty has many causes that will have lasting effects. Negro poverty is the result of years and years of oppression and hatred. “For the Negro they are a constant reminder of oppression. For the white they are a constant reminder of guilt.” Unfortunately, Negro poverty has no real solution because history cannot be changed or forgotten for it is deeply rooted in American culture and society. However, despite this fact, there is one place that this poverty and dismay can begin to dissipate. .. the family.

According to Johnson, “the family is the cornerstone f society.” The family structure is the most influential force in any child and individual’s life. Your family shapes your values, your point of view, and futuristic goals. If we start to treat and defeat poverty in the home, than it will gradually start to narrow the economic gap. Once the Negro family structure is reinforced and fortified, than the other factors contributing to economic gap will begin to change and improve.

The cartoon by Barry Deutsch relates highly to Johnson’s concept that, “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘you are free to compete with all the others,’ and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.” You can give the Negro community all the freedom in the world but if you don’t do anything to reinforce that principle than freedom will never be truly free. The concept of white America’s freedom towards the Negro community is basically that, “we’ve given you the rights now do something with them on your own.” Of course, this ideal backfires. This concept is the same thing as giving an army pilot a French cook book and say, “make a four course meal on your own.” Freedom must be reinforced with effort from all members of a society to make change for the greater good.

The Cheerful Robots of the 1950's

During the 1950’s, Americans were going through a lot of changes. Many of the changes had to do with lifestyle and economy. In essence, the “American Dream” was being realized once again only this time, it had more advertising, money, and conformity put in to it. Society was being molded and shaped by the idea of what freedom is. Unfortunately that idea was terribly wrong.

Towards the closing of the Cold War, Americans began attacking each other once again calling anything that wasn’t consider “normal” or “American” was unpatriotic. Fear is brought out of all this commotion and from this fear of being called un-American or unpatriotic; a person would do almost anything to be as far away from that image as possible. Thus, this would be an excellent time for the “image of freedom” to take hold.

Almost instantly, the U.S. is shown the wonders of suburbia. Houses lined up, one next to each other; the “perfect family” of a father, mother, and their 2.4 children. Americans were fed this idea that freedom was the result from having a family and a perfect suburban home along with a great paying job in the booming economy. Instead, all Americans were doing was basically conforming to an idea brought out of their own fear of being isolated from society. Americans would rather become “cheerful robots,” according to C. Wright Mills, than be their own people their own perception of what freedom is. The 1950’s demonstrates how out of fear and doubt, ignorance and conformity succeeds.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the U.S.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was assembled after World War II had ended. Many individuals felt there was a need to address human rights issues since they were countlessly abused. The declaration was drafted by a committee formed by Eleanor Roosevelt. It outlined a long list of basic human rights that are bestowed upon everyone regardless of race, gender, religion, nationality, and political point of view. Unfortunately, the United States was not so quick in ratifying it. How could they ratify a document that preserves human rights to everyone when they did not do so in their own home?

There are several policies outlined in the declaration that conflicted with U.S. practices.

In the declaration, in article 7, it state that, “all are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law.” In the U.S., many nationalities and races are discriminated against such as minorities and immigrants. For example, a black person would never be able to testify against a white person.

In article 10, it states, “Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge.” In any case, especially with minorities, only white people were served jury duty. In essence, if a black man was on trial he would most likely go to jail because he was not given a jury that was impartial. Also, the U.S. wouldn’t let minorities serve on juries so there would never be an impartial and fair jury.

In article 16, it states, “Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family.” This would very big problems in the U.S. since they did not allow races to intermarry. The issue comes in when in the case that if a black man and white woman were to marry, who would have more rights? They wouldn’t let the man have more rights because he’s black. Also, they wouldn’t let the woman have more rights because she’s a woman.

In article 23, it states, “Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment. Everyone without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.” During the war, the U.S. needed a lot of people to contribute to the workforce. This resulted in many black people start working in the war industry. When time came that black workers and white workers were going to be working together, the white population were very angry. They were so angry that they resorted to violence which caused many blacks to not even consider going to work. This continued after the war and continued be a problem for a time.

In article 26, it states, “Everyone has the right to education. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.” This one clearly creates some problems in the U.S. All schools were segregated. Black schools were not nearly as educationally adequate as white schools. Also, not many blacks had access to higher education programs such as colleges and universities.

The Declaration of Human Rights integrated many principles that are in the U.S. Constitution. Unfortunately, there were too many policies that the U.S. government was not ready to address just yet. It still needed to grow in its own way. Thankfully it did and we know live a better country than it was some 60 years ago.

The Silence of the Comfort Woman

The unfortunate case of the Comfort Women during WWII was for many years a “silent” tragedy. From Japan to Indonesia, women and girls as young as thirteen years old were unknowingly recruited to work in the military to “help” their troops during the war. Of course, when they arrived at the military sites, they were forced into being raped daily by numbers as high as thirty soldiers a day. The women were sterilized so that they could not produce children and injected with drugs that were highly addictive such as opium. If any women were to become pregnant, they would be killed. It’s estimated that only 25 percent of the comfort women in various sites actually survived. Many died of the venereal disease, multiple rapes, and the brutal beatings and physical torture by the soldiers.

For many years, comfort women, especially Korean women, were silent about the issue. At the most, some previous comfort women told some members of their family they could trust or they told no one at all. They felt that they would be as shameful women. After all, they had no proof of the treatment they endured and the government surely wouldn’t admit to anything that is considered to be a high crime of war. Also, many of the previous comfort women most likely wouldn’t have been able to get married if they would have told about their being raped in the military. For a woman, especially in Asian countries, your virginity or purity is the only worth you have. Without that, you don’t have anything else.

Between 1963-1972, Korean women formed a union telling the Japanese government that they needed to publicly apologize to the Comfort Women, tell the whole story about what really happened in the comfort stations, and to raise a memorial in honor of the comfort women that died during the WWII. Unfortunately, the Japanese government refutes all the claims of the comfort women saying that they knowingly joined the military for prostitution. These allegations keep the comfort women from achieving their goals because the public will believe their government first.

One day, I hope that these women will get the recognition that they truly deserve. The case of comfort women was a situation that could have been avoided. These young women could have been able to enjoy their lives and get married and have kids. Unfortunately, that dream for so many of them is was taken away and can never be regained.

Alain Locke's Philosophy

Alain Locke means that the days of the old African-Americans is over such as slavery and the times after that.He says this to show the African-American community and the rest of society that African-Americans have moved on from those days and it is time for them as a community to rise up and become a new people. Locke wants them to realize that there is more to the African-American population than the U.S. gives them credit for. He wants them to emerge a New Negro; a negro who didn't care to the whims and rules of the white community. This New Negro would realize his/her potential and take it upon themselves to become better than what white community expected of them. Locke wanted to show that the days of oppression and the subservient ways to the white community are long gone and that the time of black equality is here and now.

Diary Entry from a Britsh Nurse on the War Front

Dear Diary, 2nd of June 1915

Well, times haven’t been all that easy these past months. The sights I’ve seen lately grip my heart terribly and make me worry heavily. I see the wounded men around me. All I can think is that this war has just begun and it can only get worse from here. And the stories I’ve heard from back home make me worry for my family and for my fellow countrymen.

Due to the war, the British government has declared that their citizens lessen the amount of food and provisions that each family gets. But instead of doing that, the richer class is buying up all the food from the stores. Big stores have run out of food and small stores are being forced to raise their prices. Of course, this leaves barely any food for the poorer classes and some groups of people have attacked the stores that are being bought-out by the richer class. Also, the richer class is taking out all their money out of the banks to keep in their houses. The fear of the banks closing for the war is the cause of this. The war is causing people to act differently and irrationally.

Thankfully, my brother, Richard, wrote to me a couple of months ago and let me know that my family had enough to eat. I hope they can last this war. I worry enough about them possibly being attacked by those brute Germans and their allies. I would hate to think that they didn’t have enough food to eat as well.

The Germans led a raid on Great Britain using aero planes on the 19th of January. At first, I heard that it was successful and that many had died and were wounded according to the newspapers. This frightened me greatly. Fortunately, later on, I came to find that only four people were killed and sixteen were wounded. To be honest, the news raised my spirits somewhat. It didn’t really seem like the war would go on much longer with the Germans leading attacks like that and with such little affect. Unfortunately that all changed soon enough.

On the 25th of May, we received a large amount of critically wounded soldiers. I had never seen so many. They were all on the floor moaning, coughing and puking up blood. However, there was something different about a lot of the men. For some reason, most of the men were choking and gasping for air. I had never been so confused in my life. I didn’t understand why they couldn’t breathe. The men would begin grasping their chests out of excruciating pain and agony. It tore me apart that I couldn’t help the pain go away. I didn’t know what to do.

Later, after all the nurses had attended to the soldiers, I came to find that the Germans used a new weapon on the troops. They used a type of chlorine gas. It spread to the trenches the men were in and forced them to climb out of them. Unfortunately, when the troops came up to higher ground, they were immediately hit by German ammunition. The gas that they used is supposed to make it hard for you to breathe and kills the lungs slowly. Oh I couldn’t imagine enduring pain like that. I truly admire those men fighting.

It pains me that I could not relieve the men of their agony. I wish this war would end. I wish the Germans would stop their war-mongering on the countries around them. Why can’t this end? Why do our people have to suffer for the German selfishness and greed? I hope that there is a change for the better soon.

Sincerely, Elizabeth Gordon

My Walk as a Mexican-American in 1920

My name is Alonzo Vasquez and I am a Mexican immigrant. I brought my family here to escape the political turmoil and poverty that has devastated the Mexican population after the revolution. I have a wife and three children, two girls and one boy. I love my family and upon moving into this country I thought that my worries for them would drift away. Unfortunately, I have become burden by different worries. As much as I want my children to experience this new country, I want them to still hold true to our Mexican culture and traditions. I fear that my children are becoming too American and are losing touch with their Mexican heritage. And it is causing troubles in my household.

My children, I fear, are becoming more and more like Americans. They are beginning to speak English more than Spanish. They are showing independency that only adults should have that worked hard for a living. And what I think is most disgraceful is that they are making decisions and doing things without my consent. My son started seeing a young girl without asking my opinion or telling me first. One of my daughters went out and got a job working in a store down the street and didn’t consult me first. And she doesn’t help care for her family with the money. She spends on clothes and make up and for going out all the time. The other started dating a White-American man just a couple of weeks ago even though I was completely and utterly against it. My children have even engaged in American celebrations and have begun to hesitate when it comes time to celebrate ours.

All these actions have caused countless arguments in my household. My daughters are becoming more and more outspoken and disrespectful towards me. They feel like they have this right to express their feelings to me. I blame that on that whole feminist talk. My daughters have forgotten their place in the home and especially in my home. My son fights me on everything. He feels he is free to do whatever he wants without my consent. He refuses to help care for his family and is disrespectful to me. I do not like these behaviors in my household. Unfortunately, no matter how much I try to put my children in their place, the American way is overpowering me. I have begun to question if my choosing to bring my family here was wise.

I am a very proud Mexican. I believe that it is important that certain family values and traditions should be kept intact and passed on from generation to generation. This should also be the case when you are in another country. It doesn’t matter what land you stand on, your culture and yourself is still the same. As Mexicans, my family and I need to preserve our ties to Mexico even though we live somewhere else. I think that if we do not celebrate or recognize our up-bringing and where we come from, we are disrespecting our ancestors and our heritage. We are treating it like dirt. We are dishonoring our fellow Mexicans and the wars that have been fought to keep our way of life alive. My family must value and remember their homeland or else I have done them harm by taking them away from it.