Has Any Major Civil Rights Advance Ever Been Achieved by Winning Over Hardcore Bigots?

[mondo joe]

I can't think of an instance.

From Gandhi to Rosa Parks to Women's Suffrage, a small base of reasonable people were won over, and then the advance was achieved through the hands of a few.

Am I just not thinking of instances in which a long slog of outreach won the day?

Or is there a only a critical mass that needs to be reached before change can be enacted by law?

[BrklynLiberal]

1. You are right.

[Radical Activist]

2. I'm not sure what you mean.

There will always be racists but a large number of Americans changed their attitudes in a relatively short period of time. We went from not letting black people drink at the same water fountain as whites to electing a black President in the passing of one generation. That's relatively quick in the bigger picture. My baby boomer mother remembers restaurants that would only serve black people at the back door and that was in the north. Now she sees Obama in the White House. So yes, I'd say hard core racists have been won over or at least socially shamed over time.

[mondo joe]

3. I'm thinking of Proposition 8. And I can't think of another movement that achieved

its goals by popular vote.

Most have won over the most reasonable people, just enough to make feasible an a Supreme Court case, let's say, without converting enough to win a popular vote.

[Radical Activist]

4. Now I see your point.

Well, I think we have to remember that segregation didn't just naturally happen. It was imposed by the powerful on white people too, many of whom never liked it, or simply accepted what they were raised with. I don't think the 1964 civil rights act would have won a popular vote in most southern states but there are places in America where it would have won. Things can change rapidly.

But yeah, a minority getting their rights from the majority never happens easily. The power of what people like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King did was that it made "moderate" whites wake up to just how wrong segregation was. It forced them to confront the evil they turned a blind eye to. You won't win over the hard core bigots right away but you can win over a majority. Fuck the rest. Their kids will know better even if they never do.

[Radical Activist]

5. The amendment granting women the right to vote

had to be approved by 2/3 of the state legislatures in the country. That's the closest example in the US that I can think of.

[laconicsax]

8. Even then the hardcore bigots were never really won over

Mississippi didn't ratify it until 1984

[Radical Activist]

12. Some never will be.

But they don't all need to be for rights to be protected.

[Lumpsum]

6. Civil rights can't be simply left up to a popular vote.

Only the supreme court.

[jonnyblitz]

7. good question, one i never thought about but

makes me consider why I don't buy this blame the victim thing, which you have brought up , where they are blaming the "no on 8" people for inadequate outreach. the people doing the blaming are pretty NASTY about it , too, which gives me pause. TOO much virulence towards us, the victims . they way they act you would think people we have to supposedly "outreach to" where the victims and we were the bad guys who had to explain ourselves. it just seems off.

[mondo joe]

9. I was thinking, no one ever blamed Rosa Parks for not doing enough outreach to

convince racists to segregate.

At some point you have to know you've gotten through to the reasonable people, and beyond that you're just kissing the ass of bullies and bigots to get some crumbs.

[Starry Messenger]

14. It should never have come up as a voting issue.

I hope this gets resolved soon. Our state got gamed. :(

[JVS]

10. I would say that if you look at the black civil rights movement between 1940 and 1970...

what you have isn't so much an outreach to hardcore bigots as you have a gradual realignment of people who previously didn't really care too much. While some people were still hardcore bigots as late as 1970 and remain so to this day, they lost the approval of those around them.

[ruggerson]

11. Nope, in our country it has always had to be forced on people by the courts

and the legislators.

[Zhade]

13. Nope -- it's a good think MLK didn't take advice from some of the bigot-coddlers on this board.

NT!

[Hannah Bell]

15. correct. you change people's *inner selves* by changing society - not the opposite.

contrary to what most folks seem to think.

bigotry is created through law, economics & media, & is taken down the same way. The old folks die out, & young people grow up in a different world with different ideas.

[zuul9]

16. I think it can be overturned by popular vote in CA

It would be really difficult to overturn via the CA supreme court this time.