Unexpected Racism: Blacks Take Control

As I proceed into reading this book, I have found a pattern of racism. Not only do we see, the usual black discrimination, but white as well. In fact since in the jails of Detroit there is a greater black population, the author is treated, looked at, and humiliated among many other racist acts, because he is white. Here we can see how a black guy refers to him when he gets in the prison, “Stupid ass white boy. Ain’t you seen a cockroach before?” He probably wouldn’t have said this to another black person but since he was one of the very few whites, he decided to pick on him no matter what. He found any little excuse to show his hatred and anger. Yet, the author was also racist maybe not directly, but as the book displays his thoughts are racist, “He was enormous in size, well over six feet six, and his skin was so dark it almost looked purple.” He is too scared to say any racist comment back to this guy, but He would if he could, yet he is intimidated by him.

There is a scene where they are all in prison and the author describes a fight a white man has with some blacks. Here we can see all the racism and what divides the black from whites and the majority from the minority. I have not read something with so much hate packed together, “It was used like nigger or coon, pock monkeys, and spooks, except peckerwood was blacks called whites, along with honky and rednecks, crackers and ghosts. But on that side of the bars, only blacks spoke those words aloud.” This not only shows discrimination between the two groups, but how the majority has the power and the minority the white are afraid of the blacks.