The Lessons to Learn and not to Learn from the Movie- 42

The movie 42 portrays the struggle of Jackie Robinson, a young African American baseball player, who was first of his skin color to join the major leagues. He encountered heinous racism both on and off the field because of he was paving the way for other African Americans to follow in his wake and the white baseball fans did not like that.

The main lesson to learn from the film is that we must constantly question our own assumptions of how the world should be. Soon after Robinson joins the Dodgers the team starts a petition to get him off the team. We see later on in the movie that these men are not necessarily evil but that they have been brought up believing that they were superior to blacks. The evidence is everywhere, from restaurants that only admit white clientele to separate drinking fountains. Then, at a game in Cincinnati, the film shows a white boy say some racist comments due to the peer pressure around him. While I do believe that racism is taught, not something that we are inherently born with, the film depicts whites as victims of their culture. Even though the society that they were born into might have been racist it does not excuse the promotion of that misunderstanding because of social doctrine.

Another lesson not to learn from 42 is the turning of the other cheek. The biggest struggle that Robinson goes through in the movie is not reacting to all of the racism directed at him and his family. This attempts to teach the viewer that the best way to combat racism is to not confront it directly. However we see many different types of resistance in our culture and sometimes attacking what is wrong directly is the right course of action. We must combat the wrongs of our society with all that is available to us, otherwise we are just refusing to commit fully to making our world the best it can be.

The importance of symbolism as a catalyst for change is perhaps the lesson most needed in the film. Robinson is told by several people around him that after he joined the club, the struggle that he was enduring was not just for him and whether he gave up or kept going would change the world around him. At the end of the movie we see the impact that he had on his teammates and baseball itself even though all he was doing was being the only black man in a white man’s league. It is through his example that we can see the power of being the first to fight back against any form of injustice in our world.