C. P. Ellis & Andy Johnson Entry 1

I found C. P. Ellis's story very compelling. The signs of harsh racism in the beggining shocked and in a way disgusted me. When he says, "I didn't want to associate with 'em. Blacks, Jews, or Catholics," i figured this was going to be a harsh interview, of just hearing of the pure rasicm for other ethnicities in the early 1900's. But, that focus was quickly changed when C. P. said, "I didn't until I met a Black person and talked with him, eyeball to eyeball, and met a jewish person and talking to him, eyeball to eyeball. I found out they're people just like me. They cried, they cussed, they prayed, they had desires."  In todays world, most people see each other as equivilant human beings, as equals. Everyone is a person and is similar in many ways, yet also different. I believe that C. P. Ellis's true turning point in his life was when he saw a black man walking down the street, and the man reminded him of his father and himself as a young boy. The clothes that the man wore were beat up and raggedy, just like his own years before and like his fathers. At that very moment, C. P. Ellis realized that being in the Klan was wrong, but he stayed in the class because it made him feel important. But, this also rises the question of what was more important to Ellis, stopping problems betweens blacks and whites? Or, did he think that it was more important for himself to be known and liked as a high ranking Klan member. I think that to himself it was more important to stop the racial problems. A true Klan member would not "listen to tapes of Martin Luther King. i listen to it and tears come to my eyes 'cause I know what he's sayin' now." A man who is strongly against African Americans and everything that has to do with the race, would not cry when he listens to the most famous and powerful Civil Rights leader make a speech.
-In Andy Johnson's interview, he shows what racism was like from an immigrants stand point. the stories of the travel from Finland to America were not pleasant. But when Johnson says, "I saw the first black man in my life on the platform at the Union Station in Duluth. i couldn't figure out why his face was black. I thought he didn't wash it or something. It didn't dawn on me at that time that people were different." Andy Johnson saying this shows the diversity in entire countries in the early 1900's. He was then introduced to racism when he saw the picture of the slaves. But besides for the racial problems, Johnson tells of the problems where people were cheated of jobs, and their rights. "When you're once fired for your political views, you're automatically blackballed with the mining companies, even if you never worked for a mining company." the lower class were being gypped of their rights and opportunities because they had to abide by the rich high class who owned businesses and companies. Andy Johnson brings up the point of "If we continue this present trend, we're gonna go straight to hell, we're gonna blow ourselves right off this earth, or we'll poison ourselves off." This is an extremely good point in which i completely agree with. If the problems back then still occurred now, there would be so much fighting on between so many different groups of people, that the existence of people in America could be questioned.