James Baldwin's The Fire Next Time

relationship with God, and had his soul full of love by religion. But, he understood that not everyone in this country was living up to the loveable standards that the bible presents. James knew that a black person being treated equally in America was an impossible wish at the time, but he believed that the impossible could be made possible with hard work. James explained to his nephew in the introduction that he was born into a society that believed he was worthless, but infact he was anything but worthless. He tells his nephew to not blame the white people for their judgments, for they do not know better, and are not used to change. He explains to his nephew that his friends, during high school started to accept their sad fate, and gave
I think that if I was a black American during that time, I wouldn’t be as forgiving of the judgments as he was. I would find it very hard to accept my life, and I feel that I would start to give up too. I very much admire James’ drive to make his life something more than most people like him had. I can’t even imagine the physical and emotional strain that this lifestyle had on blacks. Black people at this time were constantly reminded that they were nothing and worthless. That their lives would never mean anything, and that they could never
Would I try to stand up for my fellow black Americans and try to fit in with the white people because I’m barley black but you could be a drop black and you’d be treated differently. I would like to think that I would have the courage to stand up for their rights. It makes me think about how I could possibly judge black people just because that’s how I would have been raised. Now, of course I think it was an awful thing. But, if I were alive then, would my views be different? Would I be like every other white person and make black people think they were worthless and inferior? I am sure that not all white people who were racist were bad people back then, they just didn’t have anything else to believe in that was logical to