https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5 Kelly, Hannah, Adele en-us 2017-04-20 17:53:11 UTC 2026-01-18 14:22:20 UTC hello@padlet.com 181296 https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167343997 The McGhee family participated in the Civil Rights movement by actively being a part of SNCC.  More importantly, the McGhee family expressed their honest feelings; they did not conform to anything that they did not believe in or agree with and were not afraid to express their views. Silas went to segregated white movie theaters even though he knew he would have to face angry white mobs filled with hatred and with strong opposition to his integration ideas. Jake also participated in Silas' sit-ins and stood up to the white oppression in Greenwood. Mrs. McGhee took her participation in the Civil Rights movement to the extreme. She fought for what she believed in, even if it meant fighting with the police. She supported her sons in everything they did, and supported others by giving them somewhere to stay if they were kicked off their land for Civil Rights activism. Her land was used for rallies and as security to bail others out of jail. She did not stop fighting until the civil rights laws were properly enforced. Mrs. McGhee was a pillar in the Greenwood Civil Rights community. ]]> 2017-04-20 17:56:13 UTC https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167343997 181296 https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167345309 Guns played a large role in the southern county of Greenwood. Racist groups such as the KKK nightriders attacked African Americans and attacked the McGhee home regularly. A quote from the story, "during the particularly bad periods, she (Mrs. McGhee) slept during the day and sat up on the porch at night with her Winchester". And, "At one point, her home had been fired on so many times that Zellner and some other SNCC workers built a fence of bridge timbers in front of her house to make it harder for nightriders to see what they were shooting at". These quotes show us just the surface of what the violence of the racist south was like. Guns were the main weapon of violence after fists and feet. Most whites posed a constant threat of violence in the Greenwood County. ]]> 2017-04-20 18:00:28 UTC https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167345309 181636 https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167346864 - Why is more attention not brought to families like the McGhee family?  In history classes, we constantly learn the same stories of Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., etc., but we do not learn about ordinary people who were extremely affected by the movement and chose to take action.
- What did the McGhees think about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s ideas of nonviolent protest? Would they consider their protests as more nonviolent or more confrontational?
- Why have we not learned about the teachings of more Malcolm X and the Black Panthers? Their philosophies advocated for more violence than MLK did, but they still played a major role in the Civil Rights Movement and were also responsible for the social gains made during the movement. Isn't it important that we learn as much about the movement as possible because we can learn from all of their mistakes so that in the present when we protest other social injustices we can truly learn from the past without any pieces missing. Blocking them out of our history is disrespectful not only to them, but also in part to us because of what we can learn from them.]]> 2017-04-20 18:04:57 UTC https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167346864 1866561 https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167645003 2017-04-22 19:43:49 UTC https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167645003 1866561 https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167645082 Direct confrontation can have both positive and negative effects, as we've seen with the civil rights movement. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other advocates for nonviolent protest base their philosophies off of the idea that violence begets violence. It is true sometimes that angry and negative actions influence others to feel the same, and that peaceful and loving actions nourish positivity. The nonviolent sit-ins, boycotts, and protests took their toll on the patience of angry racists; over time, the fact that Civil Rights fighters would not fight back made the "fight" boring for whites. Segregation toppled in many places like restaurants where sit-ins were held. However, another school of thought is protesting through direct confrontation. As we saw in the story of the McGees, direct confrontation does not always mean to pick a fight with others, unlike what most people assume. In the case of the McGhees, they would protest the injustices of segregation by "trespassing" and would wait until they were challenged. If they were forced to leave they did not cause physical altercation, they would simply come back and repeat the protest all over again. The only times the McGhees participated in physical altercation was in self defense, or in Mrs. McGhees case, when she was being kept from her sons/information about Jake's arrest. She only challenged the police physically when they were threatening the well being of her children. The method of direct confrontation as the McGhee's used it had positive effects like making the white community fear and/or respect the McGhee's protests (though one could argue how good fear is, no matter what it is caused for). However, others like the nightriders were just angered by their actions. As King believed, the negativity begot negativity. This is a hard question to ponder though, one could argue that the nightriders would have been violent and would have inflicted terror anyways without provocation. Maybe it is a question of the degree to which violence was carried out on the side of the whites, but no matter the degree, violence is still violence and any opposition to the continued oppression was a step towards greater equality. ]]> 2017-04-22 19:45:25 UTC https://padlet.com/181296/tuybz8i54rd5/wish/167645082