Stereotypes-Carter

The justifications for enslaving Africans included descriptions that revealed that black people were not physically and mentally evolved as white people, and that it was the ‘white man’s burden’ to guide and direct his subordinate counterpart for his own good, even if it was against his will. This ‘white man’s burden’ has been the justification for slavery, imperialism, and even genocide in many parts of the world. Keeping with the mind frame that African Americans are inferior to their fellow white citizens, they are portrayed to lazy, mentally simple, and childlike. During the Jim Crow era, African American men were addressed as ‘boy’, a simple way to degrade a man’s status in society. It is natural that these associations would be presented in the media because they were commonplace for so many generations. When cartoons, such as the Censored 11, portrayed African Americans as simple-minded or Uncle Tom-like figures there was no outrage like there would be today. However, the stereotypes of the past have manifested themselves into present times. African Americans are still portrayed as being lazy, and uneducated. Black men are assumed to be poor providers for their families, having the reputation that they run out on their families, or that their families are on government assistance. We have many colloquialisms to describe the stereotypes of African Americans, from the ‘N’ word, to defining their language as Ebonics. Additional blog on racism.