Example Of Essay On Black Activism

Black activism consisted of efforts by black people living in the Western World to direct, impede or promote environmental, economic, political and social change. During the period of 1968-1971, black activism was commonly met with unethical and violent responses from both federal and state law enforcement agencies. Blacks were usually opposed to what they felt was unfair treatment and violation of their rights by the government and members of other non-black communities. They continuously fought to end the decades of torture, segregation and discrimination against them. Such instances of segregation and discrimination includes cases where blacks and whites could not vote in the similar elections, attend the same schools, ride in the same buses or participate equally in all other societal issues.
As the black people fought to bring an end to these injustices, they were met with unwanted brutality and resistance, not only from the whites, but also from the federal and state law enforcement agencies. For example, in 1968, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Martin Luther King, Junior joined forces to come and help civil rights leaders in Chicago in their fight towards ending segregated housing. Their struggle was very peaceful and nonviolent. Despite this, their efforts were met with unwanted violence from the mayor’s office. In the same year, police raided a black neighborhood in Detroit, which ended up killing 43 of the blacks who lived in that neighborhood. During the same period of 1968-1971, two leaders of the Black Panther Party were unlawfully killed by police in a pre-dawn raid in Chicago. The police acted on information from an informant of the FBI.
The American president at that time, Richard Nixon, ordered that law and order be maintained. This led to the illegal arrest of many blacks who were taken to the Attica State Prison in New York. The conditions at this prison were inhuman and were only made worse by the large numbers of inmates who filled it beyond its limit. As a result of the poor conditions, the inmates protested over the inhuman conditions that they being subjected to. This led to violence that left a total of 43 people dead, 39 of which were killed by police.