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Frederick Douglass Essay The institution of slavery was extremely dehumanizing to both whites and blacks. The book Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass proves this statement true many times throughout the narrative. The novel gives a firsthand account of the life of a slave and helps to show how dehumanizing slavery was. Frederick Douglas himself lived the extreme dehumanizing conditions that existed during this time period. The institution of slavery was extremely dehumanizing to blacks and made blacks feel inferior to whites. Dehumanization played a crucial role in the narrative by Frederick Douglass. Slavery played a major part in causing this by demoralizing, degrading and insulting African Americans. In the narrative slaves were dehumanized throughout the story. There were many instances where a slave was demoralized, degraded or abused. In chapter three Frederick Douglass shows an example of slaves being abused and demoralized. Speaking of how slaves were kept from taking fruit from the owner’s garden Frederick Douglass said “The last and most successful one was that of tarring his fence all around; after which a slave was caught with any tar upon his person, it was deemed sufficient proof that he had either been into the garden, or had tried to get in” (Douglass 59). These slaves were being malnourished and were punished upon any attempt to survive. The slaves were being neglected by the owners and were not being fed enough food to survive. The slaves were barely given enough food to survive and many slaves died due to malnourishment. Due to the dehumanizing of blacks, slaves faced physical trauma and psychological trauma. Not until nearly the end of the eighteenth century was branding and other extreme and brutal methods of punishment cease being used as ways of punishing slaves. Unfortunately slaves still continued to be dehumanized by being beaten by slave owners. These beatings cause both physical and psychological trauma. Some slaves have to watch other slaves being punished and can get psychological trauma due to witnessing these horrific acts. As well as physical injuries caused by the beating of slaves, slaves suffered from chronic conditions caused by overwork, malnourishment and insufficient clothing. Frederick Douglass recalled needing to go barefoot and poorly clothed all winter, as well as suffering from frostbite while he was a child. These slaves dealt with constant repetitive stress. Remains of former slaves which have been found in New York City show the slaves faced constant stress and around fifty percent of colonial Africans died before reaching the age of twelve. This was due to extremely poor treatment of these slaves and malnourishment at an extremely young age. These children’s bones would weaken due to the poor nutrition which they received. Slaves were also forced to carry extremely large loads which caused many injuries. Slaves were not given the basic necessities which are needed to survive. The slaves are dehumanized and treated like animals, only being given barely enough food to survive. In chapter five from Frederick Douglas detail accounts are given supporting the dehumanizing conditions that occurred on a day to day basis. During his time on the Great House Farm Frederick suffered from constant hunger and cold. He needed to steal a corn bag so that he could keep warm while sleeping on the cold damp floor. He would also go half naked year long and was fed like a pig through a trough. Feeding the slaves in such a way made them feel as if they were being treated in the same manner as the animals surrounding them. Again in chapter eight the dehumanizing of blacks is shown during an event where animals and slaves were being divided up based on their worth. After the death of Captain Anthony, Frederick Douglass needed to go back to Talbot County to be evaluated as property in order to be divided between the two slave owners. All the slaves were ranked along with the animals. Slaves were forced to abandon anyone and everything close to them in accordance to their new slave owner. Imagine the feeling of low self worth felt by the slaves. The dehumanization of whites and blacks was shown in chapter ten. During the time in which Mr. Covey, known as the slave breaker, attempted to break Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglas came to the lowest point in his life. He said he had been transformed from a slave into a brute. Frederick Douglass was dehumanized to the point which he did not want to live anymore. The constant physical and mental torture was now unbearable to survive. The institution of slavery greatly dehumanized blacks and affected those dehumanized greatly. The institution of slavery was also dehumanizing to whites. Blacks also noticed the detrimental effect of slavery on whites. The absolute power over people which the whites felt over blacks resulted in sadism. Absolute power over people led to sexual abuse. Mistresses were affected by the pain of adultery when the slave owners would rape the slave women. Slavery was a curse to blacks as well as whites. In the first chapter Frederick Douglass points out that slaveholders established a law in which children of a slave are born into the same situation as their mothers. This helped protect the owners from becoming fathers and gave them no consequences for acting upon their lusts. This dehumanized slave owners as they essentially disowned their own children. These children were treated horrible by the slave owners, and were treated worse than other slaves because they were the child of the slave owner. Frederick Douglass gives an example of how slavery is dehumanizing for slave owners in chapter six. He uses Mrs. Sophia Auld to show how slavery transforms the slave owner and changes them. He says that before becoming a slave owner she is kind and very generous, but after becoming a slave owner she changes and is robbed of all of her good qualities. Another example from the narrative is the thinking on the killing of a slave. As shown in chapter four white slave owners are dehumanized through their thoughts on the killing of a slave. Slave owners hold little regard for the life of a slave. Frederick Douglass speaks of many murders in which the perpetrator received little to no punishment for the murder of another human being. This demonstrates the dehumanization of slave owners because it shows that they think nothing of another human life. Their attitude is passed on to the younger white boys, who gain the same take on the death of slaves as the owners do. The young white boys have a common saying that it is worth a half cent to kill a slave, and a half cent to bury one. This shows how not only are the white slave owners becoming dehumanized, but it was carrying over to the next generation as well. The young white kids are also being dehumanized as they grow up to believe that the life of a black person does not matter. Slavery changed the whites who followed slavery and hardened slave owners as well as the people who were close to it. As shown in the novel Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave slavery dehumanizes both whites and blacks. Frederick Douglass’s firsthand account of his time as a slave gives many examples of this. While the effects of slavery on blacks was obviously strongly negative, the act of mistreating other people can be equally damaging to the oppressor.