How Far We've Come, How Far We Still Have to Go

Earlier this week marked an anniversary. Although it was not a typical milestone,  I believe that it is something worth looking back upon, so that perhaps the future can shine brighter. Fifty-six years ago in Greensboro, a city not far from the University I attend, four young African American men took the seats they deserved at the whites-only lunch counter. The act created a wave of peaceful protests in the form of sit-ins across the South. Joseph McNeil, Franklin McCain, Billy Smith and Clarence Henderson, known as Greensboro Four, were simply four students who one day decided to be civil rights heroes. They would be proud of how far the United States has come on this momentous issue.  However, we still have much farther to go.

We live in a society where a substantial amount of people still posses stereotypical views of danger and inferiority when they see African Americans. Laws may have changed, but ignorance still remains. This has been displayed by numerous occasions, such as the University of Missouri protests and the numerous killings of unarmed African Americans by law enforcement in 2015 alone. In order to truly become the kind of country that the Greensboro Four wanted, instances like those stated before need to stop occurring, mindsets need to evolve and grow.

In 2016, we should be to the point where everyone is not "judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Fifty-three years ago those words rang strong and true out of the mouth of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. But until every American believes that statement as much as Dr. King did, we have further to go in the battle for equality.