Non-Violence In The Film 'Eyes On The Prize'

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Non-Violence as the Bigger Statement

In the documentary _Eyes on the Prize_, John Lewis- an attendee of the 1960 Nashville Lunch Counter Sit-In, regales the use of nonviolence in their fight for racial equality, saying "We took our seats in a very orderly, peaceful fashion…We just sit there, and we continue to sit all day long... But for me, I 'll tell you; it was like being involved in a holy crusade. It became a badge of honor" (PBS). The Civil Rights Movement, which began in 1954, was so deeply impactful largely in part to the unusual nature of its participant 's actions against their opposition. Scarce physical tactics or retaliation was threatened against the white opposition on the black insurgent 's behalf in order to achieve what
Thus…any system contains within itself the possibility of a power strong enough to alter it" (McAdam 37). Politically, much opportunity was to be gained for black insurgents through the use of non-violent action. W.E.B. DuBois issued an example of such a possible process of advancement, saying "We need sufficient income for health and home; to supplement our education and recreation; to fight our own crime problem; and above all to finance a continued, planned and intelligent agitation for political, civil, and social equality" (B., DuBois 197). Since the black population felt so absolutely undermined as a race by the government, it would do them no good to repeat the same actions as those before them when trying to change the way things worked. McAdam discourses that "the point is that any event or broad social process that serves to undermine the calculations and assumptions on which the political establishment is structured occasions a shift in political opportunities" (McAdam 41). In other words, if someone is questioning the way the government works in the first place, already a shift has been sparked in the standards, just by drawing attention to it. To some degree, all changes involving social movement for the nation are going to imply some level of
Martin Luther King Jr. not only believed in what he preached, but practiced it in his own life. Through his consistent stand-by of nonviolence, the subsequent growth in support through organizational groups, and said group 's ability to power through the withstanding customs of white folk, nonviolence flourished. In his closing statements, McAdam reminds, "it must be remembered that the movement was able, in a matter of years, to dismantle a thoroughgoing system of caste restrictions that had remained impervious to change for some seventy-five years…These gains are hardly insignificant" (McAdam 232). Therefore, though near the end black insurgency took a turn for the worse, the influence that nonviolence caused on the nation absolutely left a lasting imprint on history.

Work Cited

B., Du Bois W. E. Dusk of Dawn. Millwood, NY: Kraus-Thomson Organization, 1975.

Print.

King, Martin Luther, Jr. "Chicago Freedom Movement Rally Speech." Courtesy

of the King Center. Atlanta, Georgia. African-American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp. September 24, 2014.

King, Martin Luther. _Letter from Birmingham Jail_. Stamford, CT: Overbrook, 1968.

Web. 24 Sept. 2014.

McAdam, Doug. Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970.

Chicago: U of Chicago, 1982.