Today instead of meeting in class we met at the student activities center to watch a video and take a look at some things from the Jim Crow Museum. We watched the video about the Jim Crow Museum at Ferris State University for I dont know how long, probably like 30 minutes. It should some stuff that you could tell was racist and some stuff that didn’t make any sense to how it related to racism.
One thing that stuck to me as racist was a post card. The post card picture showed a large, african american man tied to a pillar or a tree being beat by a well dressed white man, in the backround of the picture was a large group of white men, and on the back of the post card someone wrote “This is how the deal with poeple down here” probably a northern tourist visiting the south. I can see how someone could take the card as racist showing only one african american man in the picture, to make it worse he is being beat, he isn’t dressed that well so an observative person would persume the man is a slave. But to someone who doesn’t pay attention to detail, and ignores some facts in the picture could see how harmless the card can be. I think the card only shows what you want it to show, someone could interpet the card as a criminal being beat, or someone can interpet it as a slave being beat and call it racist, but some may think other wise.
After the video we looked the items from the Jim Crow Museum, also caled Hatefull Things. Some items were clearly racist items, some examples of this was the metal target, and the “ten little niggers” story. The target I really can understand the racism in it, the sign said that there were point makers on it displaying low point values on any vital areas and high point values on feet. It said that the target was made i think a couple hundred years ago. So i’m guessing it was train slave hunters where to shoot slaves so that they dont die and can work again. But the sign also said that the target wasn’t used til about 2000, so now a days it could have been used as just a normal target. I target shoot and I hunt, at the range i have seen many targets that involve a human figure. I’ve seen one that actually shows a picture of a man holding a gun and there are point values on his vitals, I’ve seen one that only shows a human like picture showing no face, or color just blank. If the target in the hatefull things exibit is racist then i guess all targets involving any human form are racist right? The human figure a white man could thats a racist target because the paper on it is black or a caldean man could call the target with the man holding a gun racist because it looks like a caldean man. People onle see what they want to see. So to me i think that the target in the hateful things exibit isn’t really racist because I see it that way, but i do think the “Ten Niggers” story is racist.
In the “Ten Niggers” story, it tell of how ten young african american boys met their demise. One gets eaten by a fish, one sleeps himself to death, one gets taken by a man who looks like a judge (maybe a reference to the law, I dont know), but the most interesting one i thik is the last one, “The last one got married and then there were none.” I guess the author is saying that when you get married thats the end, it all goes down hill from there. Well in the picture for the last he didn’t look all that happy either, huh? I looked up the story when I got home and apparently there are many versions of this story, one called “Ten Little Soldiers” and one called “Ten little Indians”. Apparently in all versions of the story there ten people stuck on an island and have a deadly secret, all are killed or taken accordingly til there is one left. I wonder the beginning wasn’t shown in the exibit, just the racist part. Somethings are clearly racist others aren’t so clear, and things that are racist can be disproven to be racist, i guess it how you look at things.
One things in the exibit that i really didn’t understand why it was there was the holloween mask. I’ve seen this mask before, and in many different colors not just the brown colored one. I’ve seen in it in a white colored mask, redish colored mask, and in a black colored mask. My point is many races can call these things racist, and many can just overlook it.
When i went to the exibit I keep an open mind, but I saw things that were racist and things that didn’t make sense to their relation to racism, and somethings that could taken as racist or not. Maybe I wasnt open enough but really racism isn’t anything new we have to deal with it and i think it is annoying when people maximize things and call things racist or people racist or see a certain view as racist. In my experience sometimes the people that look for racism in others or things sometimes the ones who are the most racist, but i can be wrong, it just a point of view.
I am very impressed that you took the time to look up the “Ten Little Niggers” story and found that there are several versions including one called “Ten Little Indians.” However, not all of the versions involve people on an island.
The version on the island is a play was written by Agatha Christi. It is a wonderfully written play where 10 people are on a desert island. As the play progresses, the people are killed one at a time. Finally only two people are left. As you watch the play, you suddenly realize that each of the two remaining characters “knows” that the other one is the killer. This means that neither one is the killer; that one of the eight dead people must be the real murderer.
Agatha Christi originally called her play “Ten Little Niggers” even though it has nothing to do with individuals whose ancestry was African. When the word “nigger” was recognized as a racist term, the name of the plan was changed to “Ten Little Indian.” The plan has nothing to do with Indians either.