To+Kill+A+Mockingbird

You may never have understood how bad racial discrimination and prejudice were back in the past. But you can get a small taste of how it was like through Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird." In this book, it’s all about a court case of a man accused of rape, and it may sound ordinary to you, but he was a negro man. And back in this time period, it may seem as even being a peek of racial discrimination, it was never ok for a negro man to lay his hands on any way on a white woman. As you may see in this essay, I’m going to explain many events in this essay that show how discriminatory and prejudice people were back then. The black man accused of rape, goes by the name of Tom Robinson. Because he was negro, everybody in Maycomb had the assumption through judgment that he was no good, and no different than any other negro. Through their eyes anybody who is negro, is not a good person they are all no good. What nobody realized though is that Tom was a good man like any other person in Maycomb. He would help a girl, (Mayella Ewell) almost every day with small jobs for no pay out of the good in his heart. But that didn't matter because he was negro, and automatically was assumed and judged to be bad. For example, "You gotta make me first!" he yelled. "My folks said your daddy was a disgrace an' that nigger oughta hang from a water tank."(page 76.) yelled Cecil Jacobs at a scene of Scout about to fight him for saying things about her dad. This quote portrays that even kids have been taught to be discriminatory about negro's, or in this case a man defending a negro in his court case. The people of Maycomb almost all treat negro's the same. Mayella Ewell, accused Tom Robinson of raping her, and Atticus Finch (Scouts dad) was appointed to be his lawyer. Many looked at Atticus in a different way now but some saw him as a better man. In the court case everyone knew that Atticus had proved Tom innocent with all of his facts about the accusation, but because he was negro, and only for that reason, the verdict was guilty. Everyone in the court room including the judge and jury, knew he was innocent, but he was negro, and they had to say guilty because that’s just how it was. No matter how discriminatory, and unjust everything was, that’s just how it was back then.

Bob Ewell, the father of Mayella Ewell, was shown to be a liar at the court case because of Atticus, and he was very irritated about that. And you could tell he wanted revenge. It seemed as if Maycomb was a small, friendly area, and everybody knew each other. Scout and Jem (Atticus's children) were highly interested in one of their neighbors. Boo Radley. They had heard many stories of him and many think he is a crazy man. "Boo was about six and a half feet tall, judging from his tracks; he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that is why his hands were blood-stained." Found on page 13, this shows how many people viewed what Boo looked like. Since he never left his house, he was made up to be some kind of mad man. But, one night he proved who he really was. While walking home from a play, Jem and Scout started hearing strange noises. Next they knew they were being attacked. It was a raged Bob Ewell. When Scout finally got up, she saw Jem hurriedly being carried home by someone. Later they found out that it was Boo who had saved their lives, and carried an injured Jem home. When Boo appeared behind a door, Scout saw how Boo actually looked. This appearance was nothing like how people said he looked. And by his act of saving their lives that night, he wasn’t a crazy man either. Scout had always had an interest in Boo Radley and finally found out who he really was. All of Maycombs assumptions were wrong about him, and that was found out that night.

If you were a witness to that court case, young or old, how would you feel about the verdict? It’s almost as if children are more sensitive and seseptible to what is right and wrong, just and unjust. "I don't care one speck. It ain't right, somehow it ain't right to do 'em that way. Hasn't anybody got business talking like that. It just makes me sick." Found on page 199, those were the words of Dill during the court case. It basically was saying how it isn't right for people to talk that way to a negro, and for them to treat him that way. But with the verdict of the court, Scout, Jem, and Dill were upset. They knew that Tom was innocent and found it unjust and discriminatory for him to be found guilty of a crime he did not do. All of the adults however just brushed it off like nothing serious happened. They all knew the truth, and that it was wrong, but didn't seem to mind. It’s almost like kids would be better fit for that kind of job. They havent been completely corrupted with the thought that just because someone’s negro, their bad. Kids are more sensitive and almost opinionated about things like that court case.

It seems like almost any assumption that was made in this novel, was wrong and just a judgmental stereotypical kind of thought. The racial discrimination and terrible injustice in this book were widely shown of how the past was. Just because someone is negro doesn't mean they are any different or any worse than someone who is white. People did not realize this point in their period of time. Nothing back then was fair, or easy to deal with, but some of the few in Maycomb saw the better of people no matter how they looked.