What Is The Theme Of Racism In Black Boy

Children’s Development with Racism in their Backpacks
Today’s unrepresentative films and the past’s legalized segregation has no doubt affected the lives and development of minority children. Racism and discrimination shouldn’t occur at all but, the sad truth is that racism, unfortunately, happens on a daily basis. Racism occurs both on a visible and nonvisible level and, affects the way children develop physically and emotionally. Whist reading Richard Wright’s book Black Boy one goes through an emotional story about a real child who is impacted and affected dramatically by racism and discrimination. These tragic experiences that Richard faces involving racism shapes and develops him from childhood to adolescence. One can see the ways that
The lives of minority individuals tend to be much harder and difficult than those who are part of the majority especially due to things such as racism. Furthermore, It becomes imperative to see what toll this takes on those individuals who are oppressed due to the bigotry that presents itself within society. A lot of books have been written over the years exposing the neglect and discrimination that black people deal on a daily basis. The book entitled Black Boy by Richard Wright is one of those books and exposes the horrible social treatment of black people during a time of extreme racial tension. Along the progression of this story, one can see the changes that Richard goes through and his thought process as he gets older. Richard's childhood experiences greatly influence how he develops into an adult and who he becomes. While maturating at a very young age Richard’s views on society appear to make him prone to the feeling of isolation especially throughout his child, “My feelings were governed by fear and I spoke to no one about them. I had already begun to sense that my feelings varied too far from those of the people around me for me to blab about what I felt” (Wright 98). In Richard’s mind, he is fixated on
These tragic cases do not come out of thin air or coincidence but, rather of the environments and people who have made an unsafe community filled with racism and discrimination that is conducive and normalized to occur within their lives and towns. Experiencing something as scarring as racism especially when one is a child can alter the way you think and view the world. One heartbreaking story about an incident of racism that forever changed the outlook of a child, “In 1982, when I was 13 years old, I wanted to go to a comic book store in a section of Brooklyn called Canarsie. At the time Canarsie was ethnic white working class. I got off at the bus stop and started walking to the comic book store. A car stopped and a man got out and yelled at me to get out of his neighborhood. I distinctly remember him telling me, ‘If I came to your neighborhood I would be jumped.’ As I walked away I turned back to look at him going into his car to get a stick or some kind of blunt instrument. I realized then that he wanted to make sure I never came back to his neighborhood again. He chased me down the street. While running I saw an elderly white woman and her black caretaker sitting outside. I ran towards them and the man turned around and walked away” (“Your Stories of Racism” 1). This shows the reality of how even recently these