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Institutional Discrimination In To Kill A Mockingbird

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“Now don’t you be so confident, Mr. Jem, I ain’t ever seen any jury decide in favor of a colored man over a white man…” (Lee 179). This quote from Reverend Sykes in To Kill a Mockingbird is a sort of summary of how and why Tom Robinson was wrongly convicted guilty. It also gives a lot of insight on race relations in this time period. Unfortunately, racism has yet to leave society. Racism is still present in society today in a new form dubbed institutional racism. By definition, to institutionalize something is to establish in practice or custom. According to Wikipedia, Institutionalized discrimination refers to the unjust and discriminatory mistreatment of an individual or group of individuals by society and its institutions as a whole, through unequal selection or bias, intentional or unintentional; as opposed to individuals making a conscious choice to discriminate. Institutional racism is an issue …show more content…

This is a quote from the trial of Tom Robinson. It is said to Jem by Reverend Sykes: “Now don’t you be so confident, Mr. Jem, I ain’t ever seen any jury decide in favor of a colored man over a white man…” (Lee 179). This quote shows disparities within the court system based on race. Reverend Sykes knew that Tom would lose simply because of his being a black man being accused by a white man. Institutional discrimination as a term explores both implicit bias and systemic disparities (this is not to say “the system” is wholly at fault. This is a societal issue people of all races need to work to solve.). An example of a character who deals with implicit bias is Scout, who’s racial viewpoints are (unfortunately) not influenced solely by her father’s, but also those of her classmates and others in her town she interacts with. An example of systemic racism in the novel is the handling of Tom Robinson’s case, and how they knew he would be unable to win solely because of his

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