A great Article came out in SLATE this morning: http://www.slate.com/...
Take a gander at it, and then read below the fold for the comments, and see if you agree.
Why 'LIFE' never ran these, we can never be sure. These are all wonderful pictures, vignettes of a life the white community never really saw.
What I see is a collection of good, normal people, living good, normal (in their context) lives. These folks are NO different than my parents at the same time - the context was their life. Work, go to school, to church, the movies, read to the kids on the front porch. the difference is that in most of these folks cases, their lives are segregated - in the vernacular of the times, 'separate but equal', but not really equal. But normal, quiet lives nonetheless.
What I see here is NO different than what I see in the United States today - just in a different context, which I as a middle-class, small-town white boy then is considerably different than my current lower-middle-class, urban, liberal white man with nearly 70 years of life behind him.
BUT I still see the vast majority of ALL Americans, be they black, white, hispanic, asian, whatever mainly living a normal life in the context of their own normality and going through the same steps of living, just like our parents and grandparents, and asking for no more than the opportunity to do that unimpaired, freely, without a hassle from others and with a reasonable prosperity.
It is, after all, all that ANY of us, irrespective of age, ethnicity, religion, whatever metric you choose to apply, really wants in life. Make a decent living, feed and raise our families in reasonable comfort and make better lives for our kids and grandkids. A not unreasonable request or goal.
The problem here is there are a small minority, mainly white, mainly older, mainly wealthy or powerful (or bought, in the case of politics) who, for whatever reason, can't let anyone else live our normal, everyday lives. I don't understand why this is so, or what motivates so many who have some power (police, school officials, clergy) to be so utterly MEAN and intolerant; unwilling to let normal folks live normal lives. It's this bloody-minded MEANNESS, the intolerance for any person or idea that interferes with the idea the oppressor has in his or her head; the idea or dogma they have decided to not only OWN, but to force that ownership on the majority.
They do it with money and the power and influence that money buys. They do it with political lies and liars (the NRA, Carl Rove, etc) media lies an liars (Fox, etc) and religious lies and liars (the so-called Christian right) and with physical force (so many police forces) and with many, MANY years of practice and cultural conditioning. And they are getting away with it. And WE, the vast majority of ordinary, decent people who are trying to live ordinary, decent lives, WE ARE LETTING THEM DO IT TO US!
Fellow citizens of the United State of America, I, an ordinary, decent and hopefully honorable man challenge you to get out of your complacency, and do any and everything you can to change this history. It is NOT too late, it is NEVER too late! Write, e-mail call or visit EVERY elected official you can think of, at EVERY level of government and make them AWARE of the real problems, and make them PAINFULLY UNCOMFORTABLE with the fact they haven't dealt with it, and that YOU expect them to do so, NOW!
And VOTE! Every chance you have, VOTE! And help others to do so. A revolution need not be bloody or lawless, but it can be a revolution, nonetheless. And we NEED one NOW!