Friday, May 04, 2007

Questions about the Memphis 1968 strike

This week, after watching the videos, we learned that not only were the adults involved with the Civil Rights movement but so were the younger people too. Everyone was so into the movement that they would do anything. Some worried that MLK's non-voilent protests were out dated by the late 60s and that the younger people wouldn't be able to protest that way. In Memphis in 1968, the march soon got out of hand and many people were injured.


Questions: Why do you think that the non-violent march suddenly turned into a violent riot so quickly? Also, what would you have done if you saw other people starting to turn to violence at a rally?



Kristin M. - 6th Hour

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think the non-violent marches turned into violent riots so quickly because young people started to lose their patience with things. I think they thought that non-violent marches didn't do anything fast enough and get the kind of results they wanted as fast as they hoped for. I think they thought that if they did violent riots they would get their message across faster and get the results they wanted faster.

If I saw other people starting to turn to violence at a rally I would try to settle them down, and tell them that violence is not the answer or the solution to their problems. I would tell them that it only makes matters worse and that they need to just have patience and hope that they can get what they want.

Jonathan Klar
6th period

Anonymous said...

People really dont know how to use there non-violence towards things. all americans think that violence solves the problems better such as all the wars were in. i think that they so badly wanted to get how they felt the world should be that violence was the answer. it makes me sick that they used that to make there point.
if i saw other people starting to do violent things to one another
i would defenatley try and stop them. i would probably kinda instill fear in them by saying you know the cops are coming settle down. its terrible that they had to resort to that.


Jessica P
6th hour

Anonymous said...

I think the non-violent marches turned violent because of the ineffectiveness that people saw. The non--violent marches were a good demonstration, but they never got anything done anymore. The vilence ensued when people realized this, and wanted to do something about it.

If I saw other people turning to violence, I would probably keep non-violent because violence will get you nowhere. All violence will do is give the police a good reason to arrest protestors. There are more peaceful ways to work things out than violence.

Andy Rovinski
6th hour