The defining moment in my life that shifted the way I was thinking...and brought me to ubuntu.
Great question. Tough to answer.
In the sense of living and breathing and working and playing.
Last night I watched the movie Freedom Riders. We have all heard the story of Rosa Parks, who would not give up her seat to a white man on the bus. This documentary takes things much farther than that. It highlights a group of individuals, black and white, dedicated to the Civil Rights movement. They boarded buses that ran through the Deep South, and rode together in solidarity against the laws that prohibited blacks and whites from being together. As we were watching my dad said - "you'd be on those buses, wouldn't you Tamara?" And I replied, "heck yeah! Wouldn't you?!"
The protest was a non-violent one. Even when the buses were attacked, lit on fire and individuals were beat up, the Freedom Riders did not resort to violence. Again, this is the same strategy used by Gandhi & Mandela.
One interesting note was when the President at the time - Kennedy - made a speech after the Freedom Riders and Martin Luther King Jr. were surrounded in a church in Alabama by a mob that indicated that he believed all people were equal and that one day it wouldn't be a surprise if we had a black president.
That was in 1961, the year Obama was born.
To read up on the Freedom Riders, visit their foundation website here.
These dedicated individuals made a HUGE difference:
Five months after the first Freedom Rides left on their historic ride the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) in conjunction with the US Attorney General Robert Kennedy issued a tough new Federal order banning segregation at all interstate public facilities based on “race, color or creed.” The law became effective on November 1st, 1961.
I am heading down to the south tomorrow morning for a week. The road from Nashville through Manchester Tennessee is the same one traveled by the Freedom Riders on their way down to Alabama and Mississippi. I will take a moment to think about how powerful that movement was and how lucky I am to be able to travel in their path.
See you soon!
The protest was a non-violent one. Even when the buses were attacked, lit on fire and individuals were beat up, the Freedom Riders did not resort to violence. Again, this is the same strategy used by Gandhi & Mandela.
One interesting note was when the President at the time - Kennedy - made a speech after the Freedom Riders and Martin Luther King Jr. were surrounded in a church in Alabama by a mob that indicated that he believed all people were equal and that one day it wouldn't be a surprise if we had a black president.
That was in 1961, the year Obama was born.
To read up on the Freedom Riders, visit their foundation website here.
These dedicated individuals made a HUGE difference:
Five months after the first Freedom Rides left on their historic ride the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) in conjunction with the US Attorney General Robert Kennedy issued a tough new Federal order banning segregation at all interstate public facilities based on “race, color or creed.” The law became effective on November 1st, 1961.
I am heading down to the south tomorrow morning for a week. The road from Nashville through Manchester Tennessee is the same one traveled by the Freedom Riders on their way down to Alabama and Mississippi. I will take a moment to think about how powerful that movement was and how lucky I am to be able to travel in their path.
See you soon!
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