James Baldwins Going To Meet The Man Essays - Going To Meet The Man

James Baldwin's Going To Meet The Man One Never forgets What They are Taught James Baldwin, an African American author born in Harlem, was raised by his violent step-father, David. His father was a lay preacher who hated whites and felt that all whites would be judged as they deserve by a vengeful God (Klinkowitz and Pritchard, p.1999). Usually, the father's anger was directed toward his son through violence. Baldwin's history, in part, aids him in his insight of racism within the family. He understands that racists are not born, but rather racists' attitudes and behaviors are learned in the early stages of childhood. Baldwin's Going to Meet the Man is a perfect example of his capability to analyze the growth of a innocent child to a racist. Every child is born with innocence. During the flashback to Jesse's childhood, where he witnesses the mutilation and torture of a blackman, Jesse's innocence is apparent. Jesse has a black friend named Otis who he hasn't seen for a few days. When he asks his father where Otis is, the father replies, I reckon Otis's folks was afrad to let him show himself this morning(Baldwin, p. 2006). Jesse naturally responds, But Otis ain't do nothing. His father explains, We just wanna make sure Otis don't do nothing, and you tell him what your Daddy said(Baldwin, p. 2006). This statement implies that because Otis is black, he is eventually going to do something wrong. The father has subconsciously put negative thoughts inside of Jesse's head. Baldwin's own father also acted in this way when he stereotyped all whites as being bad and claimed they would be punished by a vengeful God. In the midst of all the commotion, Jesse is unable to sleep the night before the lynching. Within another flashback to that night, Jesse feels a strong need to have his mother close to him but he knew his father would not like this(Baldwin, p. 2006). He wanted to call his mother and becomes very frustrated and angry with his father because the father is the reason that he could not got to his mother. He knows that they are going to have intercourse and this bothers him. He heard his mother's moan, his father's sigh; he gritted his teeth(Baldwin, p. 2006). Sigmund Freud's Edipus Complex explains Jesse's reaction. The Edipus Complex is a son's sexual longing for his mother. Jesse becomes jealous and his father's breathing seemed to fill the world(Baldwin, p. 2006). As result of the longing for the mother, a resentment toward the father arises because the father has the mother all to himself. Jesse, in this situation, would like to replace the father so that he may experience the mother in a sexual manner. Jesse does not shake this feeling until he replaces the longing of his mother with a clossnes to the father, a common effect of the Edipus complex. Jesse's innocence disappears completely during the flashback of the day of the lynching. The father is getting Jesse excited about the violence to come as he assures him, We're going on a picnic. You won't ever forget this picnic(Baldwin, p. 2007), Jesse replies, Are we going to see the bad nigger?(Baldwin, p. 2007). He uses the adjective bad, revealing the influence of the father 's previous comments about the black man. They arrive at the lynching and Jesse's father shows concern toward how Jesse is feeling, you all right?(Baldwin, p. 2009). Then, the father reached down suddenly and sat Jesse on his shoulders, making Jesse feel like he was bonding with his father. He felt secure. They watched the relentless burning of the negro together and Jesse last thought of innocence arouse, What did the man do?(Baldwin, p. 2010). After asking himself he looked to his mother and felt, she was more beautiful than he had ever seen her before and he began to feel a joy he had never felt before(B aldwin, p. 2010). After the Negro genitals were mutilated he was left to slowly die, the father looked to Jesse with peaceful eyes and said, Well, I told you, you wasn't ever going to forget this picnic(Baldwin, p.2010). It is as this moment that Freud's Edipus complex is once again displayed.

About the U.S. Department of Labor

About the U.S. Department of Labor The United States Department of Labor is a cabinet-level department in the executive branch of the U.S. federal government headed by the U.S. Secretary of Labor as appointed by the President of the United States with the consent of the U.S. Senate. The Department of Labor is responsible for workplace safety and health, wage and hour standards, racial diversity, unemployment insurance benefits, re-employment services, and maintenance of key labor-related economic statistics. As a regulatory department, the Department of Labor has the power to create federal regulations deemed necessary to implement and enforce labor-related laws and policies enacted by Congress. Department of Labor Fast Facts The United States Department of Labor is a cabinet-level, regulatory department in the executive branch of the U.S. federal government. The Department of Labor is headed by the U.S. Secretary of Labor as appointed by the President of the United States with the approval of the Senate.The Department of Labor is primarily responsible for the implementation and enforcement of laws and regulations relating to workplace safety and health, wage and hour standards, racial diversity, unemployment benefits, and re-employment services. The purpose of the Department of Labor is to foster, promote, and develop the welfare of the wage earners of the United States, to improve their working conditions, and to advance their opportunities for profitable employment. In carrying out this mission, the Department administers a variety of federal labor laws guaranteeing workers rights to safe and healthful working conditions, a minimum hourly wage and overtime pay, freedom from employment discrimination, unemployment insurance, and workers compensation. The Department also protects workers pension rights; provides for job training programs; helps workers find jobs; works to strengthen free collective bargaining; and keeps track of changes in employment, prices, and other national economic measurements. As the Department seeks to assist all Americans who need and want to work, special efforts are made to meet the unique job market problems of older workers, youths, minority group members, women, the handicapped, and other groups. In July 2013, then Secretary of Labor Tom Perez summarized the purpose of the Department of Labor in stating, â€Å"Boiled down to its essence, the Department of Labor is the department of opportunity.† Brief History of the Department of Labor First established by Congress as the Bureau of Labor under the Department of the Interior in 1884, the Department of Labor became an independent agency in 1888. In 1903, it was reassigned as a bureau of the newly-created cabinet-level Department of Commerce and Labor. Finally, in 1913, President William Howard Taft signed a law establishing the Department of Labor and the Department of Commerce as separate cabinet-level agencies as they remain today. On March 5, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson appointed William B. Wilson as the first Secretary of Labor. In October 1919, the International Labour Organization chose Secretary Wilson to chair its first meeting, even though the United States had not yet become a member nation. On March 4, 1933, President Franklin Roosevelt appointed Frances Perkins to be Secretary of Labor. As the first female cabinet member, Perkins served for 12 years, becoming the longest-serving Secretary of Labor. Following the civil rights movement of the 1960s, the Department of Labor made the government’s first concerted effort to promote racial diversity in the hiring practices of labor unions. In 1969, Secretary of Labor George P. Shultz imposed the Philadelphia Plan requiring Pennsylvania construction unions, which had previously refused to accept black members, to admit a certain number of blacks by an enforced deadline. The move marked the first imposition of racial quotas by the U.S. federal government.