Slavery is a sensitive part of American history that will always remain in our minds (hopefully). Similarly to everyone else, I was also pretty surprised at the impact it had made in the north over the years. Slaves were basically responsible for all the labor and “hands-on” work, which factories and big companies would benefit from. It is interesting to see that economics played such a major role in how our nation turned out and even impacts us today in our everyday lives. Like Ashley said, there are many parallels between these two different times in history. However, the major difference between these two era’s is that slavery was the sole driving force for economic prosperity in the colonies at that time. Therefore, New York City is what it is today because of all the slave labor that went on. It is a big misconception to think otherwise although this idea is what we have been taught ever since elementary school.
It was pretty interesting to read about the great diversity that New York City had been flooded with and how they used slavery to benefit themselves. Overtime there were different laws passed to euphemize the treatment that the slaves were actually receiving. As Ashley said, laws became stricter as slaves were finding ways out of this sick system and eventually it became nearly impossible for them to escape.
Our perceptions of other “races” have greatly impacted how we view the world’s different cultures. Living in America we assume our lives are the normal way to live and what we do on a day-to-day basis is right. However we only make up a fraction of the worlds population and we really aren’t the norm. Furthermore, media also affects how we view various cultures and people all across the globe. We tend to think that we are more civilized than most of the world and this is the mentality has led to slavery and the justification commonly proposed.
Like many other people have said, slavery is a part of history that we can’t change now. It would be a whole different world if it never existed. Nevertheless if that change would be for the better or worse, we are not able to tell.
