Racism In Baltimore

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Racism drives the cultures of Baltimore and the Igbo in Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe into a downward spiral causing the destruction of the status quo. Recently in Baltimore a black man recently died in the hands of police custody. This set off a chain reaction of riots and looting in the streets of Baltimore it was chaos all around. Baltimore has a serious racial history with now the African American population size in the upper 60 percent, whenever something like this goes down the people get really furious. The Newyorker.com states, “the issues in Baltimore extend far beyond the parameters of race, but race is the narrative most easily seized upon.” Baltimore has many more issues than police brutality and racial profiling. Baltimore…show more content…
With them being the most populated race it can make them prime to police brutality and poverty since there are so many of them in Baltimore. But with police brutality going on in other areas of the country doesn’t make it ok for it to occur in the city of Baltimore. The New York Times describes how Baltimore was doomed since the beginning and the African Americans never had a chance to succeed. The article states “Baltimore is perhaps the worst large city in the country when measured by a child’s chances of escaping poverty.” Meaning that the children in Baltimore don’t have a change to make a mark on society the system is engineered that they fail and end up poor. The African Americans have no chance of getting the higher paying jobs which means they cant provide for their kids and when the kids grow up they cant get the higher paying jobs…show more content…
The culture that is succeeding in Baltimore needs to try to get the African American people out of the hole they cant get out of. In Things Fall Apart “the white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart.” The white people took apart the traditional culture they had and replaced it with their own by the time they realized the citizens felt like there was nothing they could do. Chinua Achebe also states in Things Fall Apart that “you do not know what it is to speak with one voice. And what is the result? An abominable religion has settled among you. A man can now leave his father and his brothers. He can curse gods of his fathers and his ancestors, like a hunter’s dog that suddenly goes mad and turns on his

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