Back Black Reality

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Recommended: The role of media in the formation of stereotypes

In one of his speech, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stated “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” During the time when Martin Luther King gave this renowned speech, blacks and whites were significantly differentiated. The gaps between the privileges of a black person and a white person were tremendous. Blacks did not have the rights to dine in a restaurant without sitting in a specified area, while whites can eat anywhere freely; blacks cannot sit anywhere on a bus except the back, while whites can sit anywhere they choose to. It was an impossible task for African Americans to live fairly. In the last century, many movies were created to illustrate these racial inequalities many African Americans had experienced during the time of the Jim Crow Laws. Films like “To Kill a Mockingbird”, “The Great Debaters“, “The Secret life of Bees”, and “Ghosts of Mississippi” were purposefully directed to portray racial differences during that era. “To Kill a Mockingbird” is a black and white flick set in a racially divided town in Alabama in the 1930s. With the innocently accused Tom Robinson found guilty, “To Kill a Mockingbird” emphasized that racial inequalities exist even in the room of justice. “Ghosts of Mississippi” is also a film that mirrored the racial inequalities in the courtroom. Even with sufficient physical evidences and obvious guilt traits, in “Ghosts of Mississippi” Byron De La Beckwith was found innocent of killing a civil rights activist leader Medgar Evers in his first two court cases. “The Secret Life of Bees” and “The Great Debaters” both displayed similarities in their plots and themes. In “...

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...al distinction, it lost greatly as the other cinema was based on a true story whereas “To Kill a Mockingbird” was based on true events. “The Ghost of Mississippi” was also psychologically distinct from other films, as the death of Medgar Evers displayed the monstrous racial unfairness from the era of Jim Crow Laws. In historical accuracy, “The Ghost of Mississippi” was the only flick that accomplished its task of demonstrating the theme. In summary, motions pictures should be inspect through multiple categories as how they portrayed the theme; however, they were meant to be of use for profit, one shouldn’t take it seriously in comparison. Betty White had always said “It’s your outlook on life that counts. If you take yourself lightly and don't take yourself too seriously, pretty soon you can find the humor in our everyday lives. And sometimes it can be a lifesaver.”

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