Racism And Prejudice In The New Jim Crow By Michelle Alexander

It is a well known fact that history repeats itself. This entangling cycle of repetition can be witnessed in the constant racist and prejudice state of American society. In The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander is able to bring to light the mistake people have been making through the process of repeating history, this mistake being the repeated use of racism and prejudice to successfully segregate society in order to accomplish a goal. Accordingly, during the time of slavery, a white lower class man by the name Nathaniel Bacon started a rebellion, uniting the poor whites and the blacks against the white elite. In response to this, the white elite used the repeated tactic of segregating whites from blacks and in their vulnerable state, gave

Moreover, many believed that “... the radical philosophy offered, for many African Americans, the most promise.” (Alexander 33). Accordingly, the radical party began to gain more traction and later formed the populist party and movement. The populist party worked against the party of privilege, the conservatives, and surprisingly achieved many victories. As a result, the conservatives began to impose segregation laws that formed discriminatory barriers and caused the poor and working class whites to leave the populist party. Consequently, yet again, Americans were successful in appealing to the racism, prejudice, and vulnerability of the poor and working class white people. Even in today's society we can see examples of

Additionally, in The New Jim Crow, we are able further understand this when Michelle Alexander goes in depth on the topic and explains how racism and prejudice has formed in the US and created a divide between the slaves and the poor white people. Then she tells us how this divide established due to the elite plantation owners’ search for the ideal slaves and how it ended up oppressing the black people. Furthermore, she explains how during the Reconstruction Era, white elites were still using methods, such as the vagrancy laws, the Black Codes and the Jim Crow, in attempts to control the black population. Moreover, she goes on to explain that as time goes on, this new system of slavery has continued to oppress minorities and poor whites, dividing the country. As a repercussion of this divide, people such as Donald Trump have been successful in their endeavors, consequently not learning from history, inevitably doomed to repeat it. Despite the fact that, Trump claims, “..now it’s time to get to work – to unite, to prosper, to become stronger. Together, I have no doubt we have taken the first step to Make America Great Again!” (Trump 1), the way that his campaign was forged off of racism and prejudice, tells us otherwise. There is no way we can unite and excel in getting “to