Slavery Essay

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Slavery has been a problem in many societies throughout all of history. It is not always out of prejudice or racism, often times people of the same ethnicity and nationality enslaved each other because of debt or some other reason. However in the instance of the African slave trade, it was without just cause and an extreme display of racism. Slavery in America was a horrible thing. Blacks were subject to overworking and humiliation by white men. Although this was not the case in every slave to master relationship, owning another person as property when they owe you no debt is still degrading, no matter how you treat the person. African Americans have suffered many hardships through slavery, were set free as a result of the Civil War, fought for their rights in the civil rights movement, and are on both sides of the coin when it comes to racism in America. Slavery began with Europeans kidnapping Africans to force them into slavery, but Europeans soon realized this was far too dangerous for them to continue doing. Europeans set up forts and trading post along the coasts of Africa and made deals with African tribal leaders. The tribal warlords would take enemy tribes captive and sell them to Europeans as slaves. Although Europeans are to blame for slavery, Africans share equal blame (The Slave Trade). The ships transporting slaves were disease breeding, filthy, disgusting slops. Many slaves died on the passage from Africa to wherever their destination was at, and suicides and suicide attempts occurred daily. Suicides became so common that whenever someone died from suicide the crew would cut off the head of the slave to discourage more suicides. This let others know that if they committed suicide they were returning home headless fo... ... middle of paper ... ...resident and Congress(Sansone and Wood 312-317). President John F. Kennedy wrote the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but was assassinated before he could sign it in to law. President Johnson, who became president after his assassination, managed to convince Congress to pass the law. Finally, discrimination and racial segregation had legally been abolished thanks to the efforts of both black and white average, everyday Americans(Results of the Civil Rights Movement). People are evil and wicked and hateful for no reason at all other than the fact that someone else is just different than they are. There are whites who are trashy, racist, and have respect for other races. They act so ignorantly because they are caught up in old traditions and beliefs and cannot The Even today blacks are still treated by some as a lesser class of people but sometimes they behave that way.

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