“Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words - words that evoke structures of oppression, exploitation, and brute physical threat - can break souls” (Applah 1). It is impossible for most people today to see how the people of the past rationalized such torment and persecution toward others. Due to the Caucasian men, women were kept from following their passions if those passions were not feminine, African Americans were imprisoned and unable to live their lives or voice opinions, and Native Americans were virtually erased from history when their land was taken over and they were slaughtered. American society has lost rich culture from these groups of people due to the white man of the past enforcing and asserting his beliefs onto the Other. The morally corrupt individuals who strived for power and dominance over women, Native Americans and African Americans justified this unjust treatment in the literary writings from the past with the use of biblical references, economic benefits, and racism/sexism.
In the past, society pressured women to be more of a sidekick rather than a partner. Men and women were not seen as equals and religion re-enforced this. In “Puritan Woman”, Bradstreet stated “men would slash and shape the earth, and style to God’s…show more content… In “An Argument Upholding Slavery” Dew mentions that “When we turn to the New Testament, we find not one single passage at all calculated to disturb the conscience of an honest slave holder” (96), which provides some insight on how religion was used to alleviate the moral corruption of the slave situation. Dew goes even further to lighten the views of slavery by stating that those “who seek to destroy the contentment of the slaves... break up the deep foundations of society, and to lead on to a night of darkness and confusion!” (97), meaning that the abolitionists are the ones bringing forth the problems of