He took a Stand whenever he thought something wasn’t fair or right. Gandhi was in South Africa because he couldn’t find work in India, so he traveled to South Africa to be a lawyer. While Gandhi was there he soon realized that many of South Africa’s Indian immigrants faced racial discrimination. Acts enforced by England also made him want to take a stand. He did many things to protest; he would boycott, lead marches, and gave speeches to inspire others to be an upstander as well.
Throughout history, African-Americans had been denied basic human rights. In the 1900s the black community dealt with challenges, such as segregated schools, buses, bathrooms and racial oppression based upon their skin color. In the 1950s and 60s, mass nonviolent protests were organized by major Civil Rights groups and the roadway to racial equality was underway. The March on Washington was one of the most well-known protests that occurred during the Civil Rights Movement. Organized by the NAACP and the SCLC, the March on Washington was to show the obstacles black people had to face, such as not having economic equality, segregated schools causing an unfair disability to gain an education, and to try to gain voting rights.
Unlike most individuals, gandhi did not consider the use of soul force as a cowardly action, but rather, one that requires great audacity, as it involves direct communication with the oppressor. When asked for some concrete evidence of his ideology, Gandhi stated that without soul force, the universe would cease to exist. He very cleverly went on to say that, had it not been for soul-force, the world would have perished at the hands of wars and battles a very long time ago. When asked how pertinent the ideology is to Indians, Gandhi cited the example of a village in a principality, where the villagers opposed the command issued by the prince by leaving the village. the prince was eventually forced to give in, and apologized to his
Before the founding of our nation, we were all considered human, all an individual, all connected, until affluence classified us, politics separated us, and the color of our skin spoke for us. This issue of racism, our skin color “speaking for us”, created political problems—one of them embodying voting discrimination among African Americans. To respond to voting discrimination, African Americans utilized demonstrations to rebel. In the Selma to Montgomery March of 1965, over 500 African Americans marched to demand voting rights. In response, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 granting minorities the right to vote.
For example, According to source A, the Montgomery bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama. Rosa Parks boards a bus from work, the bus gets full and the driver asks her to move seats because she is black and blacks have to sit in the back. She refuses and she is arrested and fined because Jim Crow laws in the south segregated areas for whites and blacks. Another fine example of segregation according to source C is the Plessy vs Ferguson court case in Louisiana when Homer Plessy buys a train ticket for first class, but being one eighth black is moved to a, “blacks only car”. The Jim Crow laws even segregated train cars so blacks and whites would not be next to each other.
By examining in Gandhi’s fight for India’s independence, non-violent protesting, and his moral courage costing him his life, it is clear that he was a beautiful and courageous man, that fought for what he believed in. Gandhi’s first act of moral courage was “standing up and fighting for India’s independence, despite the threats from certain groups of people that were against Gandhi’s movements and beliefs” (How did Gandhi). For example, Gandhi left his home country to try and change the perspective of the people of color instead of letting it drag him down, even though his elders did not agree with his decision (How did Gandhi). Even though Gandhi has not once been to South Africa he decides to go just to change the opinions of the people on what color means. The second reason was he felt that people that were lacking in moral courage were a danger to themselves and society.
Even after his political career ended, Gandhi acted against injustice, demonstrating that anyone can speak out against inequality. His movement inspired many people to rise against injustices, including Martin Luther King Jr., whose civil rights movement still influences American policy today. In 1920, Gandhi launched the Non-Cooperation Movement in response to the Amritsar massacre, the economic hardships felt by the local artisans, and seething resentment over the loss of Indian soldiers in World War 1.The Non-Cooperation Movement called for nonviolent protests to spread throughout
Beginning in the 1890s southern states passed a wide variety of Jim Crow laws that mandated racial segregation and separation in public facilities. Under the Jim Crow laws, blacks in southern states suffered from a system of discrimination which invaded every part of their lives. They were denied voting rights, they constantly encountered discrimination in housing and employment. When using public facilities like pools, they would have to use the colored only pools while the whites used the whites only pool. The blacks had colored bars and restaurants and the whites had their own.
1960s was a decade when ordinary citizens took to the streets in many parts of the world to protest against policies of the government and to demand a change in society. African Americans faced segregation and were treated extremely violently in mostly the southern states of America by conservative factions in society. Martin Luther King Jr. led the Birmingham Campaign in 1963 to draw attention to the on-going segregation and actions of the police. One of the protests in this campaign was the Children’s Crusade, where thousands of children took part in a non-violent protest, but were met with brutal violence from the police. At the same time, South Africa faced Apartheid, a system of racial segregation enforced through legislation.
Soon after their letters and complaints to the British government were ignored, they decided to take a more radical stand. This was the formation of the ANC, which was considered more constitutional as it consisted of South African citizens of any racial or ethnic group as they united against racial laws and segregation. The ANC although was a more persistent congress, it fought against black oppression in a