The Black and White of Slavery
Many issues in the world today can't be looked at from a black and white standard. Hardly anything we see now is either clearly wrong or clearly right. Yet, when we look back in the past, we see things that may have looked gray to people in their time, but are undoubtedly black and white now. One such example is slavery. Before the Civil War, slavery was legal and commonly used. The people that found slavery innocent were often people who'd always seen slavery as a part of their daily lives and had never come to questioning its morality. They'd always been taught that the right way to treat slaves was to physically hurt them in order to keep them in line. They were never taught any other way and believed that this was right. This often caused the slaves to lose their status as human over generations and gained the "status" of slaves.
For Frederick Douglass in 1852, slavery was a black and white issue. There was no arguing that slavery was acceptable. In his speech "The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro," Douglass addresses a white crowd and asks, "Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong." He describes to the crowd the beating, hunting, and flaying of flesh that the slaves have to endure. His speech clarifies and removes any grayness that there may have been on the subject for his audience and leaves no room for uncertainties. Throughout his speech, he refers to the slaves as human, and says that they cannot be viewed as anything else for they are capable human beings in every way possible.
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ReplyDeleteI can see what you mean when you say that what seems to be black and white today may have been gray for the people in the past. Many of those who were pro-slavery during and after the Civil war grew up with the idea that it was correct and were used to mistreating the African Americans. However, I still don't think that they should've used it as an excuse since it is only a small playing factor and they were definitely given, at one point, reasons why slavery is cruel and immoral. Many people today, in a world that where it is the general consensus that slavery should be banned, also use this excuse to defend their racism. I believe that this is similar to the pro-slavery people from the past since they were both given reason as to why slavery isn't right and still continued to be racist anyway.
-Jennifer Hu, fifth hour.
I agree that slavery is wrong and the slave-owners shouldn't have used an excuse to defend their standpoint. I apologize if I implied that that excuse was valid, I had meant to say that Southerners never thought of the morality of their ownership of slaves. I think that when they were presented with the immorality of their deeds, they had seen that their point of view on slavery was wrong, yet were afraid to admit that they had been wrong. They may have also defended their standpoint because they realized that they would have to start paying their laborers and legally hire them to work the fields or they were afraid of what change would be brought from the removal of slavery from the legal system. Again, this is no reason to validate slavery or racism, it is by no means okay to violate someone else's rights to basic human rights simply because it is more convenient for a specific person/specific group of people.
DeleteApologies again,
Ankita
It is intriguing to listen to the fact that back then, slavery was not considered wrong in the eyes of a white person, but was just how life was. The mentality was that African Americans were inferior to the white race, and it is shocking how many people believed in that. I am also surprised to hear that there were very few citizens who stood up for what they truly believed in. People were afraid of what would happen to them if they ever went against how society ran things, which I believe is immoral; sacrificing yourself for others is the only way this world is going to get closer to peace. Slavery went on for such a tremendous amount of time, so I wonder if it would have lasted as long if there were more people that allowed their voices to be heard.
ReplyDeleteIt's really interesting to think about this in the context of what decisions we struggle to make today will be black and white in the future. That was a concept I have never thought of before. However, sometimes, especially based on how the world is today and how we have Neo Nazis and Alt-Right groups, I wonder if slavery really was black and white to slave owners at the time, and the only reason De-Facto slavery came to an end was because slavery eventually became obsolete and socially unacceptable. It makes me think, if Slavery was legal and suddenly socially acceptable, would that be all it takes to reinstitute it?
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