Direct-action protests reveal entrenched racial habits and open space to change them.
Evidence
Since the death of Trayvon Martin, young people have been doing just that. They have engaged in direct actions in which they have stopped traffic, held sit-ins in state capitols, staged die-ins in places of business, interrupted brunch among the 1 percent in New York, and directly challenged the police from Ferguson to Oakland. … These activists force us, whether we agree with them or not, to think about how we currently live our lives. In short, they shed light on our racial habits and create the conditions, however fleeting, for us to change them. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 506
Categorization
- DEFINE: Glaude describes what ‘racial habits’ mean operationally: the ingrained patterns of thought and action that direct action disrupts.
- QUESTION: Ferguson-to-Oakland direct action is framed as a field of racial habit change — worth checking how the movement’s later trajectory bears on this claim.
- XREF: connects to: Mass protest can move US majorities toward anti-racist structural politics.; Both racial groups responded to real protest activity but with divergent trajectories — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3371; Government action can reshape citizens’ racial habits and attitudes. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black: How Race Still…, 509 (+3 more)
- yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Mass protest can move US majorities toward anti-racist structural politics.; Both racial groups responded to real protest activity but with divergent trajectories — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 3371; Government action can reshape citizens’ racial habits and attitudes. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black: How Race Still…, 509 (+3 more)
Broader Connections
- Protesters reproduce familiar routines rather than adopt unfamiliar effective tactics
#complicates(0.82) — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 64