Examples Of Mob Mentality In To Kill A Mockingbird

Historical Paper

“After the stock market crash of October 1929, millions of americans lost their jobs and homes”. The Great Depression affected the time period in To Kill A Mockingbird greatly. Also, my three main points in this are Jim Crow laws, mob mentality, and the Scottsboro trials.

The events in To Kill A Mockingbird are directly related to Jim Crow laws. The Jim Crow laws was a way of life for white people. It was a set of anti-black laws that black people were supposed to follow putting their status below white people (Pilgrim). It was a way of life during 1877 to mid-1960’s (Pilgrim). The Jim Crow laws were created to keep whites superior to blacks, because some religions believe that whites were the chosen people (Pilgrim).

Mob mentality is unique behavior that come out of a person when they are in a large group (S.E. Smith). Usually, the behavior is negative and could potentially be destructive or harmful. People get into mob mentality for a couple reasons, one being that people see others doing destructive behavior, they might want to join in (S.E. Smith). Second, if they joined in for a peaceful protest and things escalated they may have no choice. Some behaviors of mob mentality are people could do things they normally wouldn’t do (S.E. Smith). For example, people wouldn’t usually lynch somebody or destroy businesses anyday, they do it because of masking. The reason people would lynch someone as seen in the 1900’s, is because if they are in a big group, they will probably not be caught (S.E. Smith). Some behaviors of mob mentality are lynching, looting, and murder (S.E, Smith). Mob mentality can be seen in a couple places in To Kill A Mockingbird. First, when the mob confronted Atticus at the jail, they were a mob and were going to lynch Tom Robinson (Lee 202). Also, when the jury decides the verdict in the Robinson vs. Ewell case, everyone voted that he was guilty, because of the mentality. Atticus showed physical evidence and made it clear that it was physically impossible for Tom to have raped Mayella ( Lee 271-274). The next main point is the Scottsboro

The Jim Crow laws was a way of life for white people. It was a set of anti-black laws that black people were supposed to follow putting their status below white people (Pilgrim). It was a way of life during 1877 to mid-1960’s (Pilgrim). The Jim Crow laws were created to keep whites superior to blacks, because some religions believe that whites were the chosen people (Pilgrim). They thought if they degraded blacks, whites would become dominant. To enforce these set of laws, they added some violent punishments (Pilgrim). Some punishments would result in arrest, jail time, and sometimes, lynching. Lynching was a widely used way of murdering black people for crimes they usually they didn’t commit. Usually, blacks would be lynched in a mob, because of mob mentality. Jim Crow laws can be seen throughout To Kill A Mockingbird in many places. For example, Calpurnia has to go to black people church, because blacks are not welcome in white church (Lee 157). Also, in the courtroom there were three instances. First, The jury was made up of all white males, because a black man’s word is worth nothing to a white man’s word. Second, the black people had to sit up in the balcony, because again to make whites superior and degrade the black race (Lee 219). Third, when they called on Tom Robinson, they didn’t call him Mr. Robinson, they called him Tom, because blacks don’t get courtesy titles. Another event in To Kill A