Frederick Douglass Essay Are humans inherently good or evil? This is a question that many have asked over the years. This question can be answered by looking at time periods and places where racial tensions were prevalent in society. Racial tensions are prevalent in Frederick Douglass’s self written, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. While some may argue that humans are inherently evil, the reality of the situation is that people become the way that they are due to circumstances in their life. Some believe that humans are born evil. They say this can be seen in big populations of people who may treat certain races differently than their own. Some argue that because children of slave owners portray dislike towards their
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One example of this can be seen in chapter 6 of Frederick Douglass’s narrative. “At first Mrs, Auld appears to be a woman with feelings and a loving heart.”(Douglass) At this point of time, she is not cruel to her slaves. This is because she came from the city and had not owned any previous slaves. Another example of this is when Douglass is teaching himself to read, One of his methods of doing so was to take “lessons” from little white children in his neighbourhood. He would trade food for these lessons. Douglass says to some of these boys “You will be free as soon as you are twenty-one, but I am a slave for life! Have not I as good a right to be free as you have?” (Douglass) The little boys agreed with him. This proves that these children have no inherent hate or dislike towards the African Americans, but are taught by their parents or society to be that way. Another piece of evidence that contributes to the idea that children are not born racist comes from a picture I saw on the internet not too long ago. In this picture there is a child touching the riot shield of an African American police officer at a kkk rally. This child at the time was dressed in a KKK robe and I consider this to be strong proof that humans are not born
One example of this can be seen in chapter 6 of Frederick Douglass’s narrative. “At first Mrs, Auld appears to be a woman with feelings and a loving heart.”(Douglass) At this point of time, she is not cruel to her slaves. This is because she came from the city and had not owned any previous slaves. Another example of this is when Douglass is teaching himself to read, One of his methods of doing so was to take “lessons” from little white children in his neighbourhood. He would trade food for these lessons. Douglass says to some of these boys “You will be free as soon as you are twenty-one, but I am a slave for life! Have not I as good a right to be free as you have?” (Douglass) The little boys agreed with him. This proves that these children have no inherent hate or dislike towards the African Americans, but are taught by their parents or society to be that way. Another piece of evidence that contributes to the idea that children are not born racist comes from a picture I saw on the internet not too long ago. In this picture there is a child touching the riot shield of an African American police officer at a kkk rally. This child at the time was dressed in a KKK robe and I consider this to be strong proof that humans are not born