2: The Darkest Child 48-102

"See, Harvey, you just climb on them trucks and go wherever they take you. I can't do that no mo'," Sam said. "I know I make it hard for myself, but, hell, Max can tell y'all some of the things we been through. We went out wit' Mr. Butterfield one time. I asked him before I got on his truck, and he told me he needed cotton pickers at three-and-a-half cents a pound. I sweat my way through a hundred and fifty pounds of cotton. It was dark when we finished, and he gave us seventy-five cents apiece. Said we had done put rocks in our sacks."

In this excerpt from page 61, Sam, Tangy Mae's older brother, describes his frustration to a group of his friends who share this feeling. Many white people took advantage of the African Americans because the whites were more powerful than the blacks. In this case Mr. Butterfield cheats them out of their money, "It was dark when we finished and he gave us seventy-five cents apiece. Said we had done put rocks in our sacks." Some of the men, like Harvey don't want to start any trouble. Some, like Hambone want to rebel with violence. Junior, the most educated of them all would like protest peacefully without starting too much trouble. It is apparant from history that Junior was right. Protesting with violence just confirmed the white peoples beliefs that the African Americans were inferior to them. Only when they protested peacefully were the white people forced to listen to them (although they still tried not to). Although the blacks had every right to act violently they could not because it would only start more trouble.

I can relate to this passage because I often get extremely frustrated with the authorities in my school and home. Just like this situation there is really no way to resist because the authorities in my life will mostly side with each other. Teacher's and parents alike always assume that they are right and will never believe their children and students even if they are outnumbered. I recently was in a situation at tennis where my coach would not believe me and all of my teamates that we had done what he had asked. Even though we were all positive that we had not broken any rules or cut any corners he still punished us. It was very frustrating because there was nothing we could do.