Unfair Laws

The Jim Crow laws were laws that gave African Americans disadvantages. The disadvantages were in Public Social,Economic,and School problems.

They gave white's supremacy over African Americans. This applied a lot in TKAM. This gave African Americans a hard time.

In the court Tom had no voice.This was wrong because he was being ignored. He should have had a voice to defend himself. A similar event to this in TKAM is when Adolphus Raymond married a African American. They called his child a "mixed baby"

Blog 4

During Tom Robinson's trial there were multiple things wrong. First of there was a lack of evidence which unfairly because of his race still was thought of as possible of being guilty even with no legitimate evidence. Also the all white jury was bias and certainly not in his favor. The only thing that was helpful was having Atticus as his defense attorney who would stand up for Tom more than anyone else, but sadly all that did was buy Tom a little extra time for the jury to still determine the guilty verdict. This is how most injustice in courts happen in current time there is either a lack of evidence, racial stereotypes that influence people to think negatively, or a lack or representation. All this leads up to the horrible injustice that is sometimes seen throughout our court system.  

Blog 2

"Maycomb County has recently been told that it has nothing to fear but fear itself." pg. 6

I didn't think about it very much at the time of me first reading this part of the book, but basically this quote starts off the book by showing the corruption we bring upon ourselves in towns, communities, and in society in general. Within Maycomb, EVERYONE talks about each other. When gossip gets out it gets around the town in hours. This leads townspeople to almost this fear of the slightest mess up. It's like if they do something wrong, everyone will judge them and bring shame to their family.

What should happen is that the people support each other. Instead of always spreading the bad news, why not spread the good? Instead of having tea circles where ladies all gather together and trash talk, why not gather and talk of how to improve the community and the good outcomes they've had?
If the town were to all "vibe" together on good energy and yummy tea then honestly, so many things could be so easily fixed. ;)
 

I can relate this to gossip among teens locally at DSA and probably at all high schools. It's like there's always this weird pressure to be good enough, to not do stupid things, to not embarrass yourself, to wear the right clothing, to act a certain way... When really, if we all just didn't care about this "fear" of disapproval, we could all be cool, unqiue, and individual people to our own selves.

Blog 3

Let me start off here by saying all, yes ALL, of my uncles are lawyers. I have five of them. I have huge influence from all of them, making me strongly believe in justice through the court system. Everyone who is accused of a crime should be subject to a fair trial, representation, and persecuted under CLEAR evidence.

In TKAM Tom Robinson was accused with the crime of raping Mayela Ewell. This case rested on the word of Bob Ewell, Mayella's father, along with Mayella's herself. First of all, a case like shouldn't even be able to hold weight in the first place. There's this thing called "proof," yeah, none of that here! Second, even though Heck Tate, the sheriff, was called to the stand, he gave no clear evidence to what really happened either. Since he never called a doctor to analyze Mayella's injuries directly after the events of the "crime", no one will ever be able to tell if they were actually from Robinson. 

Considering all the evidence Atticus Finch, Tom Robinson's lawyer, gave the jury, I believe that Bob Ewell beat up Mayella. It makes sense. The blows were on the right side of Mayella's face, making it virtually impossible for a crippled man to oppose these. AND, Bob just so happens to be left handed...

 

I can relate this to many cases in today's society. If you have more money in today time, or basically were just white back then, then you usually get a better representation and outcome from the case at hand. If you're not as financially gifted in today's time, or were of color back then, you're usually not going to get the best representation. This is extremely unfair and is still a growing and heated issue that needs to be brought to the attention of many and dealt with.

TKAM injustice lives on

As we all know the trial in to kill a mockingbird was pretty unfair and biased. The jury based a lot of their decisions on race and didn't look at the facts. In the end Tom ended up being shot as he tried to escape prison. To them Tom was just another black criminal that didn't matter.

Recently, there's been news about Laquan McDonald, a black teen that was shot sixteen times by a white police officer. The officer says he shot in self-defense that he was scared for his life. Yes, that can be a valid reason at times but was it necessary for him to continue shoot after McDonald was down. Officer Jason Van Dyke was put in jail on first degree murder charges but was then released on bail. Yeah, let's release the murderer it'll be fine yeah we don't do that for everyone else but let's allow him to leave jail. Anyway, there is a video from the police dash cam showing the event that took place, if you would like to watch click here. Viewer discretion is advised because it does show the shooting take place. Here's an article about it as well click here.

You might wondering how this relates to TKAM well I'm going to tell you. Yes there is the connection between Tom Robinson and Laquan McDonald both being shot many times while trying to escape. In this case tom was escaping prison while McDonald was trying to escape arrest. But there is also a connection between the law enforcement's actions with the events that occurred. The law enforcement in TKAM was very biased, believing everything Bob Ewell said and not listening to Tom at all.

With this recent case the law enforcement quickly believed officer van dyke had a perfect and valid reason to murder McDonald. This case was left in the dark for quite a while but then the video got released and people realized they shouldn't have been quick to believe officer Van Dyke.

In both cases we see white men using their privilege to get away with crimes that others wouldn't. If we had a video of the event from TKAM we could clearly see the injustice that happened but we don't. What we do have is the video from the Laquan McDonald's shooting. Officer van dyke was quick to make up a story and say he was attacked. We believed him, he was the officer right? Well then you see the video and the lies are revealed. Just the fact that this guy got released even after this video is showing that there is still corruption and injustice in our law system. Just like in TKAM we still don't have perfect and unbiased trials and law enforcement. With all this news about innocent blacks being shot and corruption in our legal systems we really can see how injustice lives on. Of course not everyone agrees with my opinions but this is my take on it. Everyone has their own thoughts and opinions especially on topics such as this.

Scottsboro Trials Blog 2

The Scottsboro Trials were a series of trials against nine African-American teenagers that were accused of raping two white women while on a train. During the case there was a lack of evidence similar to in TKAM. There were many things wrong with the trial, they were poorly represented, the jury was all white which meant they were all most certain going to be guilty, and they should've been tried in juvenile court. These were kids, people our age and they were accused of rape which is sad that society actually could believe that kids would do this. What I can't believe is reading that during one of the re-trials, one of the victims admitted to fabricating the rape story. Clearly showing their innocence, but yet the lack of justice in the court system strikes again, and when it was all over, all but one of the nine teens were convicted of rape and sentenced to death. The injustice of the court system for the Scottsboro Trials and in general is just like the trial of Tom Robinson, there was a lack of evidence, and an all white jury, that lead to an unfair, wrong verdict of being guilty just because of his race.

Hypocrites Blog 1

"Over here(America) we don't believe in persecuting anybody" - Miss Gates

While talking about Hitler persecuting Jews Miss Gates, Scout's teacher tells the class how America doesn't persecute anyone, and that were not prejudice like Hitler is to the Jews. Which is a little or more like very hypocritical to say since earlier she talked about how its time blacks were taught a lesson. Is Hitler not doing to the Jews what America is doing to people of color at the time? Persecuting a group for no legit reason, except to have an escape goat for all the problems of the depression. This is just like hypocrites today such as one of the biggest Donald Trump. He is just like Miss gates except he is hypocritical towards Mexicans."They're sending people that have lots of problems,and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists". Later in his campaign goes on to say how he loves Mexicans and their spirit. Even though Miss gates wasn't a politician she still was similar to Trump in being a hypocrite. While hers wasn't directly hypocritical to blacks like Trump is to Mexicans she still fails to realize that her hatred towards people of color is the same as how Hitler is persecuting Jews.