Can you believe this was only 63yrs ago!

[Night409]

On this day 63 years ago Ruby Bridges was the first black child to attend an all white school.

The hate and deaths threats made by grown adults to a little 6 year old child is absolutely vile.

It’s hard enough to imagine these threats and hate made towards an adult but how could anyone do this to such a young child!

Many of these people are still alive today.

I’m not sure why I’m posting, I just thought I’d share.

I remember when I married my husband, an American friend of ours told us that it wasn't until 1967 that inter-racial marriages were legal in all US states, it blew my mind, I was born not many years before that! We sometimes forget (or are unaware) how close we are to 'history'.

That story was in the USA. Here there was but no prejudice like that.

You reckon? Landlords used to put notices in windows where they had rooms/flats to let - No Blacks, No Irish.

I always think of WW2 being in a completely different lifetime and it’s shocking that these things weren’t actually that long ago.

This is what I find so shocking.

It would be bad enough to treat an adult like that but a child!

Yes, unfortunately I can believe it's only 63 years ago.
As the only child with brown skin at primary school (UK) I was subjected to racism from both adults (one was a teacher) & children on a daily basis & that was only 45 years ago.

Of course it’s awful that she had to go through that, but it also shows just how far we have come in these 63 years since then.

Segregation did not exist in the UK, fortunately enough.

That is awful!

I’m so sorry you had to go through that, especially coming from an adult teacher a person who is supposed to care and be supportive of you.

That must be something that never leaves you.

It wasn't enshrined in law though.
As I said above, I'm the same age as Ruby and my first school in Harrow was very multi racial.

I’m mixed (but dark skinned) and have found the U.K. a safe haven. I live in a town that has a reputation for being a typical poor, racist town and have never had a single racist word spoken to me, and this is despite having been the only POC in my class and one of a handful in the entire school.

No matter what you think of the U.K, racism wise I reckon we’re miles ahead of both the continent and the USA.

I remember when I married my husband, an American friend of ours told us that it wasn't until 1967 that inter-racial marriages were legal in all US states

There's a great film about that case. Called Loving.
Loving (2016 film) - Wikipedia

Also a really good, if harrowing film about a young lad in southern US who was lynched. Absolutely shocking. 1955, the year I was born.

The Murder of Emmett Till (film) - Wikipedia

Yes, in UK there were.

Ruby lives in US and the school in question is in New Orleans, and this occurred during their desegregation crisis.

We never had a segregation policy in UK

I so relate to this. Growing up in a mostly white area, and my sister and I being the only people of colour at our school, I was subject to racist abuse quite often. This was from teachers, pupils and even their parents. This was only 25 years ago. My dc are mixed race and have already faced racism and they’re in primary school. Things haven’t changed as much as some people think

It wasn't enshrined in law though.

@CaptainMyCaptain
But it wasn't illegal - or nobody was bothered to enforce any law prohibiting it.

I have uncles who moved to London in the early 60s whose lives were deeply affected by the prejudice and bigotry that were woven into British society at that time.

Ruby Bridges spoke in my DCs' elementary school (in the US) about 20 years ago. She is an incredible woman.

No, there was never a legally enshrined segregation policy, but many of the same attitudes did and do exist.

Just this morning I was reading an article. They did an AI generated rental application. The white sounding ones got replies. The 'ethnic' sounding ones got emails that 'the room is already rented out.'

Yes, they don't have a 'no blacks' sign anymore, but they are still operating under that policy.

The USA has a bit of a blind spot about how unusual its state enforced racism up until the late 1960s was. The UK and other European countries had and still have a lot of racism, manifested in different ways to different degrees at different times. But what we didn't have was racial segregation and discrimination set down in law. Obviously there were individual black children in otherwise white schools in the UK from 1800. They may not have all been treated kindly, but they weren't excluded by law.

I remember a Dr Who episode where Bill, a modern black British woman, tells a group of Victorian men that she's considering training to be a police officer. They say "But you're a woman!" I heard American commentators wondering why the Victorians hadn't objected to her race - clearly not realising that there was nothing at all preventing a black man from being a Metropolitan Police officer in 1890, and a couple actually were. Mind you, I read a couple of US commentators referring to Mickey (black Londoner Dr Who character) as an African American.

It makes me so angry that people are subjected to such vile behaviour.

You would think that there would be no more racist people left.
I guess it goes down through the generations.

I'm not surprised. This is why American politics is where it is.
At roughly the same time, young Floella Benjamin was being subject to terrible racism right here. I heard her talk about it.

I'm 54 and didn't meet anyone non white until secondary school and out of over 1000 pupils one girl came from Jakarta. She was very popular we would probably be considered racist these days but we were just interested kids, in her clothes her hfair her food everything was different

Op you should read Warriors Don't Cry, brilliant book

www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/356609

There's an interview with Ruby Bridges Hall here from 2015. She talked about her experience and Norman Rockwell's famous painting, The Problem We All Live With.

https://www.tampabay.com/things-to-do/visualarts/civil-rights-icon-ruby-bridges-hall-discusses-norman-rockwells-famous/2226397/

Racism isn't about intention. It's about the impact on the person affected.

Your comment smacks of 'everyone is too sensitive these days.'

And even if every child was raised in an open, non-racist home (do you think that's true? Do you think no one parroted anything nasty to her?), Just because YOU were curious and neutral, it doesn't mean the experience was positive and neutral for HER.

Sadly, the deep southern US, where Ruby Bridges went to school, hasn’t come that far in some areas.

The fact that there are still sundown towns speaks to that. My ex-DH and I accidentally ended up in one (during the day, thank God) roughly 15 years ago (he’s half-black and I’m roughly as pale as a ghost), and the malevolence we felt from people just staring at us was like nothing I’ve felt before or since.

A great article on sundown towns, if anyone is interested:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/adeonibada/sundown-towns-racism-black-drivers-tiktok

htthttps://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/may/06/ruby-bridges-the-six-year-old-who-defied-a-mob-and-desegregated-her-