Significance Of Racism In To Kill A Mockingbird

Racism, it’s the pure ignorance of humans who think that their race is superior to another’s. In “To Kill A MockingBird” by Harper Lee, racism plays a big role in the plot of the story and in the characters lives. This essay will talk about three of the most significant moments in the novel that deal with racism. This novel is about the lives of two innocent children who in growing up have to face the cruel racism of their their town, because their father is defending a black man who was charged with raping a white woman. The first significant moment that racism is seen in this novel is when Scout heard Cecil Jacobs say that her daddy defended niggers. This is very significant because this is the first time that racism is shown in the novel. Since Cecil is a young child we can conclude that he heard it from his parents or another adult who obviously doesn’t like Atticus. Because of this Atticus has to face the fact that his daughter now knows that he is defending a black man and has to explain why. …show more content…
He stayed there to protect Tom from the mob of people who were after him. When they approached Atticus they told him to stand aside because they didn’t want to hurt him because they only wanted Tom, but Atticus refused to let them by. When Scout bursted through the mob of people and went up to Atticus only to see his face full of fear. Doing this angered the mob of people before them. Atticus commanded Jem to take Scout and Dill home, but he refused. When Scout recognized Mr. Cunningham from the group of people and tries to talk with him he realizes that what he is doing is wrong and the mob of people leave. The racism shown here is the ignorance of people who just want to kill instead of giving the man a fair chance to be tried in