preview

Race And Racial Inequality During The Civil Rights Of Everyone Has Improved Over The Last Few Decades

Good Essays

“Racism[ˈrāˌsizəm]prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one 's own race is superior”. Race and racial inequality have strongly shaped American history from its beginning up until now . Americans like to think of the founding of the American colonies and, later, the United States, as driven by liberty and freedom .However, from the start America was founded on inequality which involved the absolute oppression for not only the Native peoples who were often attacked, relocated, and forcibly assimilated into European culture,African slaves ,and for almost every race that has called this country “home”.Although the civil rights of everyone has improved over the last …show more content…

Majority of the natives were then forced to attend residential schooling system that sought to re-educate them in white settler culture and economy. The forceful teaching of a new culture sought to undermine the natives’ culture and to form a new image of white supremacy and predominant role as the superior race.

Despite years of change in society in the United States , no matter how rich and diverse the United States population is racism and discrimination has been held onto .After an end was put to slavery in the late 1860’s the federal government started to enforce Black Codes legislation that was discriminatory to African Americans. The codes made it illegal to be homeless and unemployed which led to mass imprisonment of African Americans being that there was not much financial stability for them post slavery. Civil rights activists in the 1960’s advocated for a more fair society that was “color blind”. Martin Luther King Jr, a major figure within this movement 's, biggest goal was to have American society judge a person by character rather than by their color. President Ronald Reagan and his administration in 1982 started a war on drugs that symbolized the Jim Crow Laws targeting African Americans in an attempt to cut back their

Get Access