Michael Dennis

Michael Dennis

The New Jim Crow

Professor Young

1/25/17

 

            Although I liked many of the posters that I viewed from the list, there was one poster that stood out to me. For that reason, I chose this poster for the topic of discussion. You can see the symbolism of the ongoing, never-ending battle between dark and lights forces or love and hate within the Ying and Yang type background layout of the poster. You can see the symbolism of the female super hero rising above madness in her purple and gold church like color schemed costume. The church has always played a big role in the lives of African Americans since slavery times. The first thing that stood out to me about this poster was the quote by Dr. Martin Luther King. It is ironic because I posted this same quote on my Facebook page today. To me this quotes is saying that while the struggle may continue on, we cannot try to overcome the darkness of negative forces and negative energy with more darkness and negativity; we must rise above the madness, we must turn the other cheek, and we most spread peace and love even in the face of negativity and hate. We see this ongoing battle in our world today. As Americans we often are quick to make assumptions and categorize people based of the actions of others who are similar or part of their race, religion, or social group. For instance, when a police officer shoots and kills someone in the black community you often see these communities come together in sadness and anger and often many of these people develop a lack of trust and disconnect from all officers because of the actions of one or a few. While often there are peaceful protest that follow, in some cases, riots start and in the end all that gets accomplished is the destruction of a city. In this sense fighting darkness with darkness or hate with hate did not help them rise above or achieve anything but rather brought them down a bit. Instead when faced with adversary, we must think rationally and respond appropriately such as a peaceful protest. We cannot fight violence with violence. We must love our enemy. Dr. Martin Luther King once said that “Another reason why we must love our enemies is that hate scars the soul and distorts the personality”.