The Importance Of Racial Oppression In Invisible Man By Ralph Ellison

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The inability to progress in society due to racial tension is an enormous historical issue minorities faced. Not only did it leave them without jobs or houses, but also with little sense of where they fit in with those held at a higher standard. In Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison describes the struggle of obtaining equality by showing how a discriminatory society causes a nondiscriminatory society to become blind to oppression. This is made possible when the more accepting community unknowingly begins to follow the deceitful actions of the more powerful, prejudiced group. When a victim of oppression attempts to become an advocate for racial equality in a primarily white, discriminatory society, their influence becomes diminished due to the community’s …show more content…

This is due to the discriminatory community deceiving the rest of society, causing them to become blind to the injustice that oppression is bringing upon minorities. Deceit is first seen through the use of propaganda in society. By stating “win greater happiness with a whiter complexion” on a sign, advocates against equality are convincing the rest of society to believe that being anything other than white will bring displeasure in life (Ellison 262). By doing this, the discriminators successfully use scare tactics as leverage to gain supporters. Ellison also shows deceit through the Brotherhood when they become a prominent group in the fight for equality. The narrator first learns about the organization from Brother Jack, who describes the Brotherhood as a way of “working for a better world for all people” (Ellison 304). By stating this, Ellison is able to show how people will begin to assume the best of a group that seemingly wants to create a nondiscriminatory society, despite not seeing how the group’s actions might compare to their promises. However, the society later learns that the Brotherhood is only looking to better themselves as an organization. This becomes evident when Brother Hambro states, “we don’t have to worry about the aggressiveness of the Negroes... we now have to slow them down for their own good,” after the members begin to realize the true dangers of fighting for racial equality (Ellison 503). This causes the narrator to second-guess his commitment to the Brotherhood, as well as the place he was forced into having in society. Ellison creates this situation for the narrator to demonstrate how easily people were manipulated by those in leadership positions, and to show how truthful a leader has to be in order for their intentions to be fully

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