Christopher Columbus Racism

With different views, cultures, and ethnicities comes many problems. As humans, we are all quick to judge and discriminate against those that are not like us. While it may seem as though it is recent or only happens pretty currently, this is not the case. When people began coming over to America, and even long before it was claimed as America, minorities have been neglected and abused both physically and mentally. Racism was alive and well back in the day as much as it is now. This is a topic that was prominent in the writings of the past, and is very prominent in the news today. With violent killings, both past and present, it is easy to see that racism is a huge problem. When Christopher Columbus first landed on what is now America, he …show more content…
To many, African Americans were not even seen as people. They were seen as animals, disposable, and property; something that you can buy, sell, and trade. One specific example of slavery is Olaudah Equiano’s story. At the age of 11, Equiano and his sister were taken and traded into slavery. Unlike many stories we have heard about slavery, he spent most of his time on British ships working for the military. While his master on the ship, Henry Pascal, was not a bad slave owner, he was still below the white man by being a slave. Equiano’s narrative went into great detail on the things that he endured while in slavery, at least for a few of the years. One specific encounter was one in Savannah, Georgia. This is what Equiano described as the “worse fate than ever attended me” (383). This is a brutal part of his story where he describes an attack. Upon stepping one foot in this man’s yard, he and his woman attacked Equiano, with no other reason than the fact that he was African American. The man and woman beat him so badly that Equiano stated “they beat and mangled me in a shameful manner, leaving me near dead” …show more content…
However, the current generations have not learned from the past. If we all focused on what when right when change started to emerge in our world, we could work together to find a solution. The violence and hate have driven our communities further apart, making it harder to recover the distance already created. The precedents left behind for us to grow on have been swept away and forgotten about. While there are a handful of people who try and convince everyone to drive out the hate and bond together to make a change, the hatred always overpowers the love and