Fred Lookout Quotes

If his year with the ACRR left Ross disillusioned with what he considered mushy professional types, it deepened his faith in the abilities of so-called average folks—field hands, blue-collar workers, housewives—to upend the status quo. Having suffered the sting of injustice most acutely, they were more likely to put in the hard work to end it. Alienated from the dominant white culture, they more easily saw through the lies and empty rhetoric of the opposition. Without as much to lose, they refused to back down. They might have dropped out of school early. They might find it difficult to read and write. They might not be able to deliver an eloquent speech. But what these ordinary people lacked in “more conspicuous statesmanlike abilities” they more than made up for with intestinal fortitude, and they were far more likely to exhibit the type of urgency that got things done. 19 These were the people Ross would be on the lookout for.