Discussion Board Three: Blog Deep Dive on The Coming of John

The danger of a single story is you are not able to learn about other experiences other than what’s in the single story you read. If you don’t read anything else other than the stories for example ones from Britain like Chimamanande did, then you don’t learn about other things like she soon found out and discovered after finding African books. By only having a single story it’s easy to stereotype people into different categories. Her roommate easily stereotyped her as a poor African who didn’t know anything about the American ways because she had never seen or heard different stories about Africa other than the sad and charity work of Africa. “When you show people one thing and only that one thing over and over again that what they become”(Adichie). Americans have only learned about the poor people of Africa and how sad it is, so that is all they see. I will take this quote and learn to find different stories, not just one, so I can discover differences and find new information and not make a single generalization of a person, place, things or idea. 

The story about John surrounds two boys. One black boy and one white. John Jones is a back boy who is very hard working and doesn’t get anything handed to him like John Henderson does. John Henderson is a white boy who lives a very privileged life with basically everything handed to him. Whatever he wants or he is given, unlike John Jones who has to work for everything he wants.

I don’t know exactly why W.E.B. DuBois decided to make a fictional story but if I had to guess I would think it’s because of the timeline of when the story was written. Not until very recently did people start caring and putting effort into going against discrimination towards non-whites. I have a feeling during the time DiBois was publishing his story, there weren’t many real life stories talking about the differences between the two races and making the whites seem less achieving and the blacks harder workers. He probably would have gotten in more trouble if he based it off of real life and also he may not have had any real life experiences to be able to write a nonfiction story.

John Jones worked very hard for an education that didn’t come easy. He was even made fun of from his family for putting effort into getting an education and that shows that he was strong enough to forget about the words from his family and others at school and it describes what kind of person he was. He was a person who didn’t care what others said of him, the education he was working so hard to get taught him so many life lessons and guided him through an unsupported life in which he didn’t have anyone who helped him or praised him for fighting for education. It helped him find out the truth of the world and open his eyes to what really matters in his life. 

Chimamande explained the importance of more than one story. She shared that with only a single story people aren’t able to discover the truth of the world and that there are different perspectives and DuBois does just that while writing about two different perspectives of men. One white man and one black man, and he describes the life of the two explaining the work they have to do and the things that were important to them. With the two perspectives the readers are able to take in the two different lives and compare the two, creating opinions on both. They aren’t forced to think one thing, the readers can form whatever kind of opinion they want.

I feel a connection to both because I have seen what it’s like for people to be stuck with one opinion on something without knowing anything else besides the single thing. For example in highschool many teenagers in highschool it is known that they spend their free time partying with each other and it’s expected that they drink. Obviously not from parents but from other peers that have told them they had to because they never saw people who didn’t. There’s a saying that you can’t have fun without alcohol. I’ve heard this many times from different people but I still question them each time. Have they never had a fun time without having a drink? I would think they have, but they probably just thought what has been told to them by others that in order to have fun they need to have a drink. Without second opinions how are they supposed to know that it’s okay not to drink? They aren’t and that’s why it’s important people share that drinking isn’t important in order to have fun, anyone can have fun doing anything they enjoy. And I think after reading and watching both of these it has shown and proved to me that the ones who drink probably haven’t been told not to, if they were they either would understand what consequences came with it or they wouldn’t do it all the time.

A story that comes to mind is the story of George Floyd. It’s a very known story in which it was told in the New York Times that, “Mr. Floyd was unconscious and pinned beneath three police officers, showing no signs of life.” Without full reason the police officer violated many laws which ended up with Floyd dying in his hands.  This was All over a pack of cigarettes paid for by a counterfeit 20$ bill. In the end the officers were faced with charges of aiding and abetting second-degree murder. This never should have happened and it’s unimaginable to think about but this is what happens when there is discrimination. People need to learn and build knowledge on treating All fairly.