Examples Of Cruelty In Beloved

Over sixty million African American slaves have suffered at the hands of the whites. Infact Toni Morrison dedicated a novel to the millions lost during the cruel times of slavery. What is cruelty? What does it mean to be cruel, or to commit a cruel act? Well, Cruel is defined as someone hurting others, and feeling no remorse for their actions. Throughout Morrison’s novel Beloved cruelty is used as a major theme to depict the immoral ways of the institution of slavery and its impact on the African American slaves. Through the actions of the white people such as the School Teacher, cruelty played a great role within Sethe’s life affecting her in a negative manner which caused the white people to appear animalistic. Within the novel Sethe faced

It was hard for the African Americans to take a stand for their rights considering no one would care enough to listen to what they had to say. Instead they were treated as animals constantly dehumanized by their superiors. Throughout the novel, Morrison uses a repetitive motif of animals correlating with African Americans. Sethe believes she is the animal they sought her out to be. “Down in the grass, like the snake she believed she was, Sethe opened her mouth, and instead of fangs and a split tongue, out shot the truth (32).” It is ironic to see that none of the white people are compared to animals since they are the ones dehumanizing the African American’s, by “Picking them off like buzzards or netting them like rabbits (159).” Sooner or later the white man's actions took a great affect your on Sethe’s life by dehumanizing her as a person. She became a monster willing to kill her child, someone with no future and only to live to survive. Thus explaining how the Whites created the animals they claimed the African Americans as, “It wasn’t the jungle Blacks brought with them to this place from the other place. It was the jungle white folks planted in them (208).” The diction Morrison uses within this quotation has a negative connotation by using “planted” as if the Blacks are an object that can be subjected to anything the whites have to offer. Overall the Whites make up the problem in the institution of slavery, their greed for power and money drive them to dehumanize the African Americans leaving them with no future but a caged