The Colored One (An African American)

We could express our feeling or whatever in our mind through writing. In Zora Neale Hurston’s How it Feels to be Colored Me, I can know what her feeling was to be a colored one. Up to her thirteen ages, she only knew the difference between the colored and white people from their riding. The colored rode dusty horse while the white rode auto mobile. As time goes by, she finally knew that the difference not as simple as she thought. In other writing, Claude McKay’s If We Must Die, I can see how the colored one was treated in not honorable way. It tells how they really wanted to fight against the bad treatment and die in honorable way.
Comparing these two writings, I can see the different responses to be the colored. Hurston is seems to be a tolerate one in facing her position. She knew where and how her position was, but she didn’t have the sense of angry to the white. Even some times she was confused to her own self. On the other hand, McKay clearly declared his thought in suing non colored people to respect the colored one. He dared to stand against them.
In Hurston’s writing, she said “I remember the very day that I became colored”. It seems to me that that day left the great impression for her. Before that day coming, she didn’t feel any matter because of her color because she lived in a town lived by the same people. But when that day came, the day when she entered the “new world”, she began to feel the difference between her and the non colored one. It leads her to a deeper thought about this color.
Compared to the previous time, to be an African American in US today is in better condition. According to McKay’s last phrase, “but fighting back”, I think the colored has done it. Today we can see many African American have great position in several field. For the examples are Will Smith in movie industry, Rihanna in music industry, O’neal in NBA, and the greatest achievement ever is Barrack Obama as the President of United States. There are still many others who succeed in their own ways.
Even though there is still a sentiment to African American in certain area in United States, in fact they have already proved that the colored are still American too. I think today the African American are proud to their own color. They show that they are not less worthy than non-colored people with the great talents they have. Even though they are slaver descent, in Huston’s words, today they stand their own position with their own wealth. The non-colored people cannot treat them badly as they wish anymore. As McKay said, they are fighting back.