It’s probably about time for black power. It’s probably time to end racism. It’s probably time for equality in our country. When will the racism ever end? The problems in America are still here from when we were founded. Since 1607 when the first colony, Jamestown, was founded that Americans still treat people differently because of their skin color. The foundation of our county is based off of abduction of African Americans to work for the colonists and were treated in an inhumane way. Thinking that people are different just because of their skin color has created our country into what it is today. Today, Americans like to say that racism is no longer a problem, but it’s a major underlying issue. Still facing a wage gap today, we cannot say that racism is not an issue we continue to deal with. White men with a bachelor degree or higher on average make $7 more than the average black man (pewresearch.org). So Americans may try to hide the issue of racism or say that it doesn’t occur anymore, but it is still very prevalent in everyday life. Stokely Carmichael wrote Black Power and read his speech to a mostly white audience at UC Berkley in 1966. Carmichael was also a member of the Black Panther Party, which was a militant group that fought for equal rights. Carmichael and other authors write to educate us about the treatment of African Americans and show how racism is still happening every day. Being a part of the Black Panther Party, Carmichael and others want to incite change and action towards equality. Carmichael expresses how slavery and racism have led to inequality and unfair treatment of African Americans, and how Africans have fought back but racism is still prevalent. 

Racism in America was introduced when America was founded. Africans were considered inferior to the Englishmen that founded our country and this was just because of the color of their skin. Carmichael is explaining what he and other blacks experience to an audience of white men, “We are oppressed as a group because we are black, not because we are lazy, not because we are apathetic, not because we are stupid, not because we smell, not because we eat watermelon and have good rhythm. We are oppressed because we are black,” (Carmichael 317). Another type of racism is systemic or institutional racism, “Institutions can behave in ways that are overtly racist (i.e., specifically excluding people-of-color from services) or inherently racist (i.e., adopting policies that while not specifically directed at excluding people-of-color, nevertheless result in their exclusion),” (Racism.org). He is trying to convince his audience that it is not the blacks, but the whites that created and caused the stereotypes and racism that still lives today. It is them that need the laws to stop them from being racist because they cannot control themselves. George Bancroft said, “The negro race, from its introduction, was regarded with disgust,” (Vaughan 312). As Carmichael says, racism only occurred because of the color of the skin. Africans were automatically regarded as a minor in America. 

During the triangular trade, we traded our resources for African Americans. This started slavery and this was how the United States created the country. Slavery was what this country was built of off and this influenced racism. Patrick Manning explains that, “The movement of African Americans to the Americas from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries may be accounted as mankind’s second-largest transoceanic migration,” (Manning 279). Carmichael wants to explain that the use of slaves initiated the idea that African Americans were lesser than the whites that used them for free labor, “Now it is clear that when this country started to move in terms of slavery, the reason for a man being picked as a slave was one reason- because of the color of his skin,” (Carmichael 316). This thought creates the ideas that whites are superior to Africans and in our country and that this treatment of blacks by whites was justified, despite it causing racism and unfair treatment. Carmichael explains that racism started from the use of slavery by showing that racism was not a problem until these free men were used as free labor. “A man is born free. You may enslave a man after he is born free, and that is in fact what this country does,” (Carmichael 315). These men and women were born free and the United States turned them into slaves. Categorizing a man as inferior to the rest consequently creates racism. 

Many laws were created to allow Africans to have rights. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 said every man was equal and the 15th amendment which allowed African Americans to vote, were some of the laws that were enacted to give African Americans more rights as citizens in the United States. Although, the 15th amendment was revoked for almost a century. ‘Every time I tried [to vote] I was shot, killed, jailed, beaten or economically deprived. So somebody had to write a bill for white people to tell them, “When a black man comes to vote, don’t bother him,”’ (Carmichael 315). The 15th amendment gave Africans the right to vote, but the whites would use force or came up with rules as to why Africans would not be able to vote. The Grandfather Clause and the Jim Crow Laws are examples of laws whites created to prevent African Americans from voting. “The right to vote was not conferred on the Negro by the Fifteenth Amendment. It simply prohibited the States from excluding him from the right to vote on the account of color or previous condition of servitude,” (Edgington 93). Agreeably to what Carmichael said, voting was a right for Africans, but these laws were made for whites to allow them to vote. Although many of Africans rights, were taken away or abused. Carmichael wants to prove to this crowd of white men that they are the problem when it comes to Africans rights. These laws were made for the whites, not blacks. This just represents that racism was so awful that Africans barely had any rights at all even though laws were made for them to have rights. 

Integration was one step in Civil Rights that was an attempt to stop racism and give equal rights to African Americans. White men claimed to give equality and equal rights to African Americans but many of the rights that Africans were given were not actually equal. ‘…integration: “You do what I tell you to do and then we’ll let you sit at the table with us,”’ (Carmichael 317). African Americans were not given rights, whites were given laws to let Africans have the rights they already should have, whites just could not follow them. Carmichael wants to explain to the reader that African’s rights should not have been approved by whites, Africans already had those rights but it took laws to have whites to let them have those rights. Carmichael explains that a white man could easily live in the slums, as it is his right. But if an African American wants to live in a white neighborhood, a white man would have to “allow” him, even though it should be his right to live wherever he wants. “The average African American attends a school that is 67% African American and 75% poor. The average white student attends a school that is 80% white,” (Irvine 298). This shows that while segregation occurred and laws that made African’s rights separate but equal, Africans did not have everything equal like a white man. 

Riots, sit-ins, and protests were some of the few things that African Americans did in order to be heard. Their rights were worth losing their lives and fighting over. “that we were never fighting for the right to integrate, we were fighting against white supremacy,” (Carmichael 314). Carmichael wants to explain to this group of white men that it was them that did not allow for their rights, it was them that did not allow for their freedom, it was them that did not allow for their equality. Carmichael does this through explaining that he and other Africans were never the problem, the whites always were. This gives the white men guilt and they can see how Africans felt through the eyes of Stokley Carmichael. “Extreme apartheid segregation can arouse smoldering resentment in minority communities, which eventually erupts into race riots,” (Olzak 592). Whites having resentment towards Africans leads to anger and many Africans protesting this unfair treatment. Most race riots that occur are because of treatment that African Americans were receiving. “The first time a black man jumps, that white man going to shoot him. He’s going to shoot him. So police brutality is going to exist on that level because of the incapability of that white man to see black people come together and to live in the conditions,” (Carmichael 325). Rosa Parks is an example of someone that wanted equal treatment on buses. And even today there are examples of riots like Ferguson and Zimmerman. These were also because of unequal or unfair treatment of Africans. Riots and protests are ways of Africans Americans to express their feelings on racism. 

Racism is what this country is built of off and has also started riots and wars over differing views and opinions. “This country is a nation of thieves. It has stole everything it has, beginning with black people, beginning with black people,” (Carmichael 320). This country stole all the African Americans from their home for free labor. Slavery is what gave whites and founders of our country the idea that Africans are below whites. Discrimination still lives in the United States today. There are riots and wars to allow Africans to have more rights, and it is rarely successful, but you cannot force the idea of racism to leave someone’s mind. Unfortunately, there is still unequal rights for Africans to this day. Carmichael and many other scholars try to spread information about the unfair treatment. Carmichael did this by administering this speech to a crowd of white men. He makes them see what it’s like living in an Africans perspective and how it feels when all white men are against him. Carmichael expresses how slavery and racism have led to inequality and unfair treatment of African Americans, and how Africans have fought back but racism is still prevalent.
