"Do the Right Thing"

Similarities/Differences between "Do the Right Thing" and "How Bigger was Born."

One similarity between the two was that nobody could completely trust each other. Pino had told his brother to not trust Mookie because he was black and was only trying to help himself. The author of Native Son said he felt Bigger would say, "I ain't going to trust nobody. Everything is a racket and everybody is out to get what he can for himself" (page 445). Both show us that there was an issue of trust between different communities. Pino worked with Mookie but he did not trust him because of the color of his skin. Bigger was not able to trust anybody no matter what the color of their skin. The idea of Bigger not trusting people helped emphasize the problem of trust in society during this time. "Do the Right Thing" also helps portray this because Pino and Mookie work together and know each other, but they did not trust each other. They knew each other and both knew that they were good people but they were not able to trust each other. "
"How Bigger Was Born" also explained how there are different "Biggers" in society. There was a Bigger who was violent, arrested, killed, who was sent to an insane asylum, and who disobeyed the Jim Crow laws. There was a different "Bigger" represented in different characters throughout "Do the Right Thing" The Violent Bigger was the group of people who would get in fights. They would go around the neighborhood and try to cause problems. Buggin' Out was the Bigger who was arrested, and Radio Raheem was the Bigger who was killed. Then there is Smiley who had a mental disability could be looked at as the Bigger who would be sent to an asylum. No matter what type of "Bigger" a person was portrayed as they were Bigger. There are many different Biggers throughout each society and neighborhood.

Personal Response

As much as I want to believe that Mookie threw the garbage can in the window to try to distract the crowd from Sal, Pino, and Vito, I do not think this was the case. I feel like Mookie stabbed Sal in the back. Sal had always been good to Mookie and gave him a job. At one point Sal even said he thought of Mookie as a son. When Mookie throws the garbage can I take it as a sign of weakness. He can see that the crowd is getting restless and that right now he is looked at as a bad guy because he is standing with the hated group. Mookie did not want to be the one to be hated. He joined the group and threw the garbage can to show that. He did not stand by Sal eventhough Sal had done a lot for him. Mookie stabbed him in the back.
I feel like Da Mayor is the only one that realizes that people should not be violent with their actions. He may be the neighborhood drunk but he has an idea about what is happening. He tries to tell people to back off when the fight is taking place. He does not want to cause trouble. He is just trying to do the right thing. He tries to help everyone and not just himself or his own people. He tries to help all of the groups in  the neighborhood. I feel like Da Mayor is the only one that does the right thing. He is not perfect but he has an idea of what the right thing to do is.

Two Societies: Seperate and Unequal

There had been riots breaking out in Detroit and across the country. Many people were hurt and in response to this the commission submitted a final report. They said that the country "is moving toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal."This is true. Many people were hurt. They had to figure out what was happening and why it was happening. They blamed the white society for this division. They said, "What white Americans have never fully understood but what the Negro can never forget—is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it." The White society created and built the black society to what it was. The riots started because of unequal treatment  and they only get worse because people are upset about the way that they are treated. The Country was starting to divide and needed to be put back together.

On To Cicero

Many of the racial problems that occured in the South were also taking place in Chicago. People were tired of this happening and they decided to march. They marched from Chicago through Cicero. Cicero was an all white area at the time. Even Dr. King was involved in this march for part of the time. However, at one point Dr. King called off the march. But, the march still happened and people did not listen to Dr. King. For Dr. King to come to Chicago was a big deal. It was very different in Chicago. In the South many people would go to the Church to try and find an answer to segregation. However, in Chicago not everybody was dedicated to their religion. It was difficult to have somebody come in to Chicago and tell everyone to come to the Church to listen to Dr. King speak. The groups in Chicago were diverse. Linda Bryant Hall said, "In Chicago—as I said—there are people who are very diversified. And some people in Chicago didn’t even [Martin Luther King, Jr.] to come in now and ask them to come into the church and follow his movement through that mechanism, it didn’t wash so well with a lot of people" They had to use different tactics to try and bring everybody together. Even though there was racial inequality all over the country. The way that it was dealt with is different for every part of the country.