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Racism In John Griffin's Black Like Me

912 Words4 Pages

The John Griffin Experience In the 1950’s, racism was at its peak in the US. In the book Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin, he puts himself into a black man’s shoes to experience an everyday life of what it is like being of darker color. He takes it upon himself to seek medical treatment to change the pigmentation of his skin from white to black. After undergoing this treatment, he sets out to New Orleans to begin his life in darker skin. Black Like Me gave me more insight on racism, taught more about the importance of identity, and the arrogance of hypocrisy. The novel opened up my eyes to how gloomy it was to be dark-skinned in the fifties, even currently in the world today. Millennials have such a widespread source of how we can retrieve news and keep up to date with the world just at the press of a button; however, commonly having that ability is not always a fantastic thing. As a society we need to be more accepting of those who are unique, race does not define someone and people should not have to think “will they treat me as who I am regardless of my skin color or will they treat me as some nameless Negro?” (Griffin 8). After acknowledging more about the circumstances of being a different skin color, comments about it can not “describe the withering horror and sadness” that is felt by those who experience such cold and spiteful words or actions (Griffin 46). If we do not make these changes together as a nation, our society will become ruined as those with

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