Talk:SOCI370/King

In the class on King, we discussed Canadians' lack of knowledge and education on Blacks. Many of us probably touched a little bit on this subject in our social studies classes in high school with the trans-atlantic slave trade as the main topic.

In my SOCI 310 (Canadian Society) class last year we talked about Africville (developed in the 20th C) along the Bedford Basin in Halifax which constituted of a community of black people, with many as former slaves from the United States. It essentially was an isolated, fragmented, and literal dumping ground for the rest of Halifax. Africville was a "slum" that was destroyed and left depleted by the city and the government's own policies. I am surprised that I have never heard of Africville before this class and I never knew that this community existed on the east coast of Canada. Perhaps it was my ignorance if I did study this in a social studies textbook, but I think my lack of knowledge can speak volumes about the sheer information that is selected and taught to us.

Just as news makers select and filter what news gets presented to society, so does the content we study in our academic careers. It can be argued that present news is becoming more accessible and unfiltered with the presence of social media advancements. However, what can we do about those histories of pain, sacrifice, resistance, and colonialist movements in the past? Does it suffice to pay tribute to Africville by briefly touching on it in our studies?

The first time I learned the history of “Africville”, which was also in my Canadian Society class. I agree with you that the White dominant form of knowledge production has limited our access to learn the history. The governments were not willing to spend time to discuss with the residents about compensation. They forced the Blacks to leave their community which had existed for more than a hundred years. The purpose of resettlement was for urban renewal and slum clearance in Halifax. However, the residents’ voices were ignored and silenced by the governments at the decision-making process of destruction. The Blacks had had shared values, faith, and traditions, which became invisible in this white-dominated society. I think if the state was willing to meet their need, understand the community, and respect the individual choice, it would have a better outcome. I think a public apology from the government is necessary. Although it might not instantly change the condition of the Blacks, it shows their realization of what they had done. They would hopefully put more effort into making a difference.

I think a crucial first step is recognizing that a large part of our education is taught through the colonizer's lenses, or as you said: the White dominant form of knowledge. In being able to recognize that, we can then seek out historical narratives that are written by the oppressed, rather than the oppressors. Canada is often viewed as superior to the United States regarding racial equality; there is the notion that Canada is a place where everyone lives in harmony and racism is no longer an issue. In realizing that the ways history is taught to us is flawed, I think it is our responsibility to take it upon ourselves to go out of our way and proactively learn about the oppressive nature of Canada's history. Furthermore, it is important to not only learn about stories like Africville in our studies, but to also keep these histories in mind when considering certain groups of minorities and their politics, daily experiences, communities, etc.

I think it is necessary to study cases like Africville where discrimination and oppression is evident. I too did not learn about this in my social studies classes in high school, and for a country who continuously talks about multiculturalism, there sure is a lot that is hidden or ignored in terms of racial discrimination. King talks about how the problems of Black communities and people will not be solved through running away, and I think this idea can be applied here. It won't help people to ignore the past, and in a sense run away from the issues there. I think that people need to learn about this so that we can attempt to learn from the past and prevent further discrimination and oppression.

Answering Lili's question about ways in which nonviolent actions can be more and less effective, I believe they are most effective when more people are aware of the movement. With more people that know about what people are fighting for there is a higher chance that more people would feel sympathy for the cause and start supporting. This is when media becomes important. Media will spread the message about people fighting against the power, like the government, without force. For example, when people see photos and images of demonstrators facing these armed police men lined up in a line, viewers would start questioning the coercion by force. Social media users, especially young people find out this news through their news feed etc which most of the times not all information about the issue is raised. Without being fully educated about the movement, just seeing the photos of people demonstrating against people of power would convince these young people to support those with less power.

To add to your point Kami, I think we can bring back Gramsci's two points about how hegemony unfolds. They are: the "coercive control" and the "consensual control" with the latter type being more impactful because people voluntarily submit to the state's control and this reproduces the state's dominant ideologies. However, with the awareness of the movement, people's consciousness break the "consensual force" and jeopardizes the legitimacy of the state. How Blacks Live Matters became such a large movement was through people's questioning of the coercion and in turn, this leads them to challenge and attempt to break the previously robust consensual control toward how Blacks were treated.

Although I accept nonviolent action as a very honorable way to gain equality within this context, I would like to make a comment of how Malcolm X proposed a very contrasting argument in terms of non violent protest. Both activists were fighting for the same cause, but believed in different methods. Where Martin believed it was acceptable to use nonviolent protest, Malcolm believed that it's a crime for anyone being brutalized to continue to accept that brutality without doing something to defend him or herself. Although completely contrasting views, it is evident that both of these values are exercised within groups such as the BLM movement to gain equality in the given context. However, the exact same conflict of views was evident during the 60s civil right movements as well. There were groups of nonviolent protesters and violent protesters. Perhaps this suggests that one cannot work without the other, that the two rely on each other to drive change?

That's definitely a good point and one that I agree with, but one has to consider at what cost a movement suffers when gaining public attention. Take for instance, the whole "Kony 2012" movement from 4 years ago that was spread at a viral rate on Facebook. No doubt people were aware of the issue and it was widespread on social media, but beyond violent/non-violent action, the amount of support that it received amounted to ultimately nothing – sometimes awareness is not enough to make people take any action at all. However, if we assume that people are not merely "social media activists", and actually willing to take action, then I do agree that the power of social media is needed to spread awareness.

I think it would also be important to note that by being part of social media, we are bombarded with all kinds of activism. I think many would identify themselves as participating as an activist as they "like" or "share" things, but in reality it is not really making much of a difference outside of the social media sphere. And in many instances, it may not entirely reflect their values. In my mind media can be used as a stepping stone to bring awareness to an issue and hopefully, in turn bring together a group of like minded people to bring forth physical change. Some of these groups choose to be non-violent while others use violence, but in order to actually create change, there has to be a shift in policy and I think policy changes can be brought about without the use of violence but education, cooperation and unity.

Reading through some of the discussion comments, it seems that we are coming together to support social activism online and through frames of social media but in actuality, individuals are content to stay at home. I think it might be because of an almost mob mentality where individuals start posting regarding the issue and nobody wants to see left out so they also post in support. But the extra push to get people out there is another step that has yet to be solved. Media activism is a very quick and efficient way to generate news about a growing issue but if we want actual support at say a rally or anything, one might have to pursue other methods

I personally think that non-violent can be quite effective actually, I believe that it is the non-violent movements which gain popularity and are remembered in history. You mentioned that awareness was important and how the media can be a key player in spreading awareness and how this would be especially affective in the younger generation. I would like to go a little ahead of this and say that the social media along with being a form of awareness can also be a form of non-violent action. There are many blogs where people can express their opinions and I have seen many people on social media platforms such as Facebook sharing their views and complains regarding the policies of clothing company for example which creates attention and awareness and can lead to change.

I agree that through non-violent movements, there will be minimized physical abuse in the society but also people will be able to be heard through media campaigns and change history because with being aware of the movements, they can spread and be known to everyone around the world. If there was non-violent movements there won't be as much physical tumoil and chaos. It is through what is taught and heard that spreads awareness of certain movements not through physical violence as people always says violence does not solve problems, they make problems bigger where as just being informed of campaigns and spreading awareness don't have as much harm in society.

While I think that the effectiveness of non-violent protest is context-dependent, overall I would have to agree that non-violent protest is the more effective method of promoting social change because it does not reproduce the cycle of violence that thrives on hatred. Moreover, I think that non-violent protest is more effective because it shows people's sincerity in wanting to improve society for the better compared to meaningless violence that, as King describes, "...creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers." In response to Lili's question about the intersection of social media and non-violent protest, I think that the vast array of modern social media tools at our disposal can promote non-violent action as much as it can encourage violent protest. Thus, it is important to tread with caution in using social media for social causes, as social media can provide anonymous platforms to advocate widespread acceptance or hate. This idea of social media and non-violent/violent protest can be related to the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 where Facebook played a significant role in coordinating protesters.