African and Native American Slavery

Scot Ferguson
11-12-96
period 2
Essay

African and Native American Slavery

The 1500's, a time of discovery, was when the
Europeans came to dominate most of the New World. The
Europeans traveled to Africa and captured Africans to help
develop their land and satisfy their need for power. I feel
that the treatment of the Indians and Africans by the
Europeans was completely unjustifiable. While the Indians
and Africans were less technologically advanced and the
Europeans were uneducated, in this particular field, nothing
can compensate for the actions of the Europeans.
As Europeans began to settle new lands they began
their exploration of the foreign worlds. What they found
was the opposite of what they expected. They found what
they thought was a new breed of humans. In reality they
were just Native Americans. These Indians were less
technologically advanced than the Europeans. They also
worshipped different and multiple gods and ate different
foods. Europeans saw this as barbaric, so they treated them
as barbarians.
In the beginning Native Americans hadn't the faintest
idea of what the Europeans had in mind when they said
trade. They figured that when the White Man came and
showed all that hospitality they meant it. Of course, they
didn't, the Europeans captured the Indians to be used as
slaves. They were also slaughtered and raped because of
resistance to leave their land. If any Indians refused to
leave their land they would be killed. The women were raped
for sick and disgusting reasons. Europeans didn't feel that
the women, or men for that matter, were worth anything as
humans so they were beat and raped without any thought
about what they might be doing.
As we watched the movie Roots, I noticed a part in the
movie where they were on a ship and a man brings in a black
woman, who was a slave. The man offered her to the ship's
captain and referred to her as a belly warmer. That got me
to thinking what could be going on in that man's head as he
said that. When I heard that I was shocked that a man
could treat someone like that. People have feelings and
cannot be treated as objects. Maybe the Europeans didn't
realize that these people were, in fact people, and that
drove them to this awful conclusion that they could treat
people this way.
As Europeans settled their land and began to build
houses, farms and plantations, they realized that they
needed servants to assist them in their farming. So people
would travel to Africa capture blacks and then sell them to
merchants and plantation owners. They would then beat
them and put them to long, grueling work. They would treat
them as they did the Indians, and for much the same reason.
They figured that since the blacks were black and appeared
to be less advanced then they must be less significant.
People of the next generation whose parents owned
slaves and grew up thinking slaves were okay is
understandable. I just don't feel that anything could justify
treating the slaves they way they did. they had absolutely no
respect for them. They would savagely beat them to get
them to work harder than humanly possible and they would
rape the women. I don't think that I will ever know how any
one could do such a thing.
I conclusion I strongly feel that the way Europeans
treated people that were less technologically advanced is
completely and utterly wrong. It is difficult to contemplate
what was going on in their heads as they were capturing
them, killing them and even raping them. I can not believe
how they could think that the color of someone's ones skin or
religious beliefs could make them less human. I am glad I
live in a country based on the belief that all men are created
equal.