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Examples Of Prejudice In To Kill A Mockingbird

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Prejudice beliefs
Southern trees bear strange fruit
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees. (Billie Holiday and Abel Meeropol, 1937)

Strange Fruit, written while lynching occurred, nauseates me as Billie Holiday and Abel Meeropol show the everyday horror living in the south. The poem prompts the realization of lynching that existed in our society. Hatred, expressed through violence, leaves innocent African Americans to die. The novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee withholds a related theme from a child’s perspective. The narrator, Scout and her brother Jem establish an understanding their hometown Maycomb is not perfect. They recognize the injustice of Tom Robinson, a hard-working, honest African American man. In spite of Tom’s discrimination, change from biased decisions …show more content…

Tom Robinson is nearing his trial date while being held in the county jail. Atticus is watching him because Mr. Cunningham and a group of grown men ready to lynch him. Jem, Scout and Dill look for Atticus. When they see Atticus and the men at the jail in a confrontation, Scout ran up up to Atticus to say hey. Atticus told Jem to take Scout and Dill home. Scout introduced herself to Mr. Cunningham and spoke about his son Walter Cunningham. Ignored by the men, Scout reminds Atticus ‘“that entailments are bad an’ all that, but you said not to worry, it takes a long time sometimes… that you all’d ride it out together… ‘ I was slowly drying up, wondering what idiocy I had committed. Entailments seemed all right enough for livingroom talk,” (Lee, 154). Scout stands up to a group of fully grown men without regret. She was just being honest and thought she had made a mistake. When Mr. Cunningham acknowledged Scout’s voice and her courage, he understood her innocence and withdrew from Tom’s possible

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Atticus takes a stand by standing up for Tom Robinson. He stands up for him when the mob tries to harm him. In Harper Lee's novel To Kill a Mockingbird, In Chapter 15 of To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus goes to the jail to sit guard outside the night before Tom Robinson's trial, in the hope of stopping a lynch mob coming for him. At the end of chapter 15, Atticus and the children go to the office to guard Tom Robinson. Afterward, a group of anonymous men arrives at the scene to lynch the young African American man.

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In Chapter 15 of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, Scout’s compassionate actions eliminate the tension of the lynching mob. She asks to Mr. Cunningham,” Hey, Mr. Cunningham, how’s your entailment gettin’ along?”, which shocks and brings him into an uncomfortable environment (Lee). Scout manages to alleviate the tension of the situation when she began to interrogate Mr. Cunningham about the entailment, which leads him to call off the attempted lynching of Tom Robinson. Scout’s compassion to stop the lynching was clear in the chapter, when she asked Mr. Cunningham about his son, it did not phase him, to when she mentioned how bad entailments are.

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Which ultimately leads into my next point of why the mob leaves. Scout is referring to when Mr. Cunningham paid a visit to Atticus in payment for services, giving Atticus some of his crop. I believe that when Scout mentions that statement, Mr. Cunningham becomes conscious of what he was about to do. He realizes that he was threatening the man who has helped him greatly, and he feels guilty for doing so. For that, him and the rest of the mob all listen to Scout as she finishes what she was saying.

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Scout and Atticus defuse the lynch mob, who are planning to murder Tom Robinson by allowing them to become aware that children are there (1), alerting them of the entailments (2) and intimidating them with a weapon (3). When Scout sees Atticus talking with the other strangers, she runs up to him and says, ‘H-ey, Atticus’ (Lee 167). By showing herself into the crowd, Scout shows that there are children nearby which may cause the adults to reconsider performing any violent acts and misconducts. After the crowd threatens Scout to leave, she notices Mr. Cunningham and says, ‘Hey, Mr. Cunningham. How’s your entailment gettin’ along?’

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After Tom, an innocent black man that was convicted of rape, tried, but failed, to escape from the county jail, Scout reflects, “Atticus had used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in the secret courts of men's hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed.” (Lee, FIND PAGE ##). Scout realizes that the justice system is racist against black people and how he was going to be convicted even though he was innocent. Scout loses her innocence because she finally sees that life is unfair for some people and that prejudice is more common than she thought.

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Mr. Cunningham makes the men stand down and leave. This Implies that Scout's naivety causes her to be oblivious to the violent nature of Mr. Cunningham and the rest of the mob, but because of this she has a positive influence on Tom By saving his

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Mr. Cunningham knows that it isn't right to break into a jail and kill someone. While he is surrounded by people who want to do it there is no way for him to escape the bad decision. Mr. Cunningham and his mob accosted Atticus to move out of the way. Luckily, Scout procured him about things he cared about and make him realize that he would lose all of these things if they continued to murder Tom. He tries to impress or lead these people to show them that he is capable of anything.

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Scout begins to think, ¨Atticus was right. One time he said you never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them. Just standing on the Radley porch was enough¨ (Lee 374). In the beginning of the story Scout looks down on her school teacher because she does not yet know Maycomb's customs, more specifically that a Cunningham will never borrow money from someone. Atticus tells her that her teacher is from Alabama where she had her own customs and wasn't raised in Maycomb like Scout was, suggesting that Atticus wants her to look from her teacher's point of view.

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The Prejudice of Maycomb Prejudice is an unreasonable opinion formed without enough prior knowledge to be fair and completely accurate. This happens in How To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee and it takes place during the 1930´s in Maycomb, Alabama. Prejudice is shown by the jury when Atticus gives more than enough information for Tom Robinson to be proven innocent. But the jury shows prejudice when it comes to blacks. Gender prejudice is shown when they won´t let women be a part of the jury.

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(204). Despite the tension, Scout uses a friendly greeting, showing her unawareness of the cruelty that is about to occur. Lee then uses characterization to display Scout’s attempt at a civilized conversation with Mr. Cunningham. Scout recalls a conversation with her father when she states, “Atticus had said

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Scout is reminding Mr. Cunningham that Atticus can help him with his legal affairs. Scout is only 9 years old and she became successful in sending a lynch mob back. Scout is able to think like Mr. Cunningham. She is able to remind him that he is an individual even though now he is a part of a mob. Atticus’ advice has helped Scout understand the situation better and make a

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Social prejudice is shown throughout Harper Lee’s award winning book, To Kill a Mockingbird. Harper Lee powerfully analyses the theme social prejudice, and its effect on people. Such as how the Social prejudice is discrimination based on your status in society. An example of social prejudice would be the Radley family, which consists of Boo Radley, Nathan Radley and Arthur Radley. As they haven’t been out of their house in years people are lead to believe the rumours.

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Atticus, Scout’s father, is appointed as Tom Robinson 's lawyer. This creates a conflict in the usually quiet town of Maycomb. Some angry men of Maycomb confront Atticus at night in the form of a mob. They want to kill Tom Robinson and they make it clear that they won’t let Atticus stop them. Scout runs to her father 's aid and speaks out to a familiar face she finds within the mob, “Don’t you remember me, Mr. Cunningham?

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In the 1930s, if a black man was on trial there was a ample chance he would be convicted even if evidence proved he was innocent. Throughout history humans being prejudice and bias have affected the lives of thousands of people; some ending with favorable outcomes while others weren’t so fortunate. Within the book To Kill a Mockingbird the readers learn that prejudice and bias people outnumber the understanding and kind. One decision or in this case twelve decisions decide the fate for an unfortunate man. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee reveals that people often follow their biases and prejudices rather than the truth.

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Atticus recognizes that although Scout is just a child, she is an astute one. After Jem questions that Walter Cunningham is still a friend Atticus explained, “ So it took an eight-year-old to bring ‘em to their senses, didn’t it?... You children last night made Walter Cunningham stand in my shoes a minute. That was enough” (Lee 157). Scout was wary of her father and interfered despite her not understanding the situation, she uttered three simple words, “entailments are bad”.

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