There was a video circulating around the web a few weeks
ago. The topic: Harvard students take the 194 Louisiana literacy test and fail
miserably. The video shows a number of Harvard students struggling horribly
through the test, feeling defeated, and then astounded when they realized that
they had to get all of the questions correct to pass the test. Of course, no
one, not even some of the brightest students in America, could pass the test.
Of course after seeing this I was reminded of the voting test we were given
earlier this semester in class. The tests were supposedly administered to all
voters who “couldn't prove a certain level of education.” Let be honest though,
these are an obvious attempt to disenfranchise black voters. Another thing I
liked about this video was the commentary by the students. In the process of fighting
through these mind-bending questions, the students in the video demonstrate
just how unjust the electoral process was before the Voting Rights Act passed
the following year in 1965.
I found the part where the women was talking about African
American attitudes toward taking the test to be very interesting. It’s very
easy to simply say that the effect of these tests were that African Americans
were stripped of their constitutional rights during this time. However, these
tests were so much more than that. As the one young women said, these tests
served to discourage African Americans from even trying to implement change.
Knowing full well that if you for some stroke of luck happen to pass this test,
white government leaders will simply make another, even harder, test to keep
you from voting. From this, the optimists, the people who believed that true
change could happen the harder they tried, were terribly disappointed. In
response to their inability to vote, I don’t think it uncommon for those who
were disenfranchised to never try to vote again. Ironically, it is these tests
that turn to optimists, the people most likely to implement change, into people
falling to the principal of learned helplessness.
At the end of the video, a young man talks about the current
procedures in place to disenfranchise American voters. I think he brings up a
good point about voting ID laws that have been implemented in the past few
years. While it’s easy to dismiss all this as something entirely from the past,
the reality is that even today not all registered voters get to vote. New voter
ID laws have been criticized for keeping minorities from voting, because these
laws concentrate on forms of IDs minorities are known to lack. What do you guys
think about this video? Furthermore, do you think that the current voter ID
laws are comparable to the literacy tests given to African Americans before the
Voting Rights Act of 1965? Feel free to take the test. I've attached the link
below. Remember you only have 10 minutes to complete it.
Here is a copy of the test: http://www.crmvet.org/info/la-littest.pdf
After taking the attached literacy test, to say I am discouraged is an understatement. The amount of confusion and frustration I experienced at the half-way mark lead me to simply quit the test. It is very sobering to in turn understand the reality of the society in which African-Americans had to engage to elicit change. To prepare for such a rigorous test, while aware that local beaurocracy could easily discount my perfect score is devastating. I think the video effectively discounts racial prejudice that still exist today. No one was able to perfectly pass such a test in ten minutes, thus African-American strategy cannot be blamed for an inability to procure and act on their right to vote.
ReplyDeleteI took the test and also quit midway through. It simply is not a feasible test to take in ten minutes, which was undoubtedly the intention. I also think it is interesting to compare modern voting restrictions with past ones. Being from Texas, I am immensely frustrated with the unfairness of the Voter ID laws, which are prejudiced and should be unconstitutional. I am angry on behalf of those targeted by such laws, though I am sure I feel only a fraction of the anger and resentment they do, the same anger and resentment felt by blacks throughout the 20th century as their voting rights were blocked, or at least infringed upon.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the previous comments, I did not even try to take the test knowing that I was only able to answer a few questions to the one we took in class.
ReplyDeleteThese tests were made to prevent any African American citizen from voting but it is interesting to think about the psychological damages they inflicted. Both your article and the previous comments stated that taking the test resulted in a feeling of being “defeated”, “miserable” or “discouraged”. These tests served to intimidate African Americans but also to reinforce the feeling of inferiority they felt at the time.
As college students, taking the test and failing made us feel miserable but our quality of life did not change because of this, we can move on. Everything surrounding African Americans was separated and unequal at the time, reminding them their position in this segregated society. The literacy tests might have been used as another weapon to strengthen the gap between white and African Americans citizen. This was just one more way of making them feel “not good enough”.