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Why Was Slavery Worse For Women

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One of the reasons slavery was worse for women was the sexual exploitation that they were put through. Men saw slaves as their own property and they took great advantage of their power over them. They believed that they had both power over her actions and her body. Starting at very young ages some women were harassed by their masters for sex, and obeyed because of the terrible consequences of denying them. Masters were allowed to rape their slaves and didn’t get into any trouble for doing so. Masters would often justify their actions of raping their slaves because they claimed that their slaves were seducing them, so they didn’t see it as raping them. Harriet’s master had often tried to find ways to get her to have sex with him and she tried
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In many occasions, the woman house slaves were treated more cruelty than any other slaves the master owned. Reading four different stories from four different people

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This sense of allconsuming control was even more prominent for slave women due to the extra control slave owners had over their sexuality and paternity of children. Jacobs exemplifies this when she describes Linda being sexually harassed day in and day out by her master.

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If the slaves raped the women, the more time necessary allows other white men to come and put down the revolt. If they planned to revolt, after the slaves kill their owners, they would not wait for more to

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The main focus of "Out The House Of Bondage" means exactly that. Black women were no longer in "bondage" to support white women 's households that mistreated them with countless instances of disrespect. A terrible place in which they were necessary to aid its order. Thavolia Glymph argues that much of the abuse of enslaved women did not come from men slave owners, but from their

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Sally Hemings was a slave on the Monticello plantation in the late 18th century, and her experience helps us to understand that her gender aided the way she was treated versus if they went by the color of her skin (Dilkes Mullins). {Woman during this era were thought of as property, they were objectified, they were treated poorly and had no choice. Their husbands were liable for anything that they did} [Being a female during this era outweighed what one 's social status was. It did not matter what race you were, but if you were a woman, you were treated as such] (Dilkes Mullins). Ms. Hemings was a beautiful sixteen-year-old enslaved girl (Gordon-Reed, 102) who was more than just a slave on the Monticello plantation.

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However she would realize her husband would sleep with and impregnate his slaves. The wife’s of the slave owners would be very revengeful and jealous, due to the fact that their husbands would have kids with his slaves and see her kids as well as the slave women’s kids in the same household. . These women lived a fake, sad and miserable life due to the fact that their husband’s would be unfaithful with his slaves. In the passage Harriet states that women would be ashamed and not approve of what their husbands where doing, saying “‘He not only thinks it no disgrace to be the father of those little niggers, but he is not ashamed to call himself their master. I declare, such things ought not to be tolerated in any decent society!’”.

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Many would like to think that sisterhood overpowered the separation of race and class, but from the journals of slave women it is evident that this was not always the case. Again, the lack of evidence and data relating to slave women results in historians and scholars having to presume a lot about what happened during this time. In Incidents in the life of a slave girl the mistress-slave dynamic is illustrated through Mrs. Flint’s disdain towards young slave girl Harriet. “I would rather drudge out my life on a cotton plantation, till the grave opened to give me rest, than to live with an unprincipled master and a jealous mistress.” (Jacobs 29)

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By telling this story, Harriet mocks the claim that slave owners are like fathers. She shows they do not protect their slaves, and slave masters are the problem. Harassing a girl fourteen years old to have sex, is nowhere close to father like; it is barely even

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In Roots, there is scene where we can see an African American women leading her daughter to Mr. Ames’ cabin. During this scene we see that the girl, who appears to be a teenager, is very jumpy and scared. Mr. Ames comes to the door, the mother gives her over to Mr. Ames, and Mr.Ames drags her into his cabin to rape her. It was very common for young African American women to be raped by their owners or overseers. In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, we see an example of sexual abuse when Aunt Hester sneaks out to meet with a man named Ned Roberts.

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Specifically, southern white women used this period to elevate their social status so that they could climb the social tower to gain power and compare to men. Southern women wanted to get out of the ideal that women should only be housewives, so they used slaves to relieve themselves of house chores, which brought them away from just being housewives. This elevated them socially because instead of being ridden with housework, they were give leisure time and time to focus on their husbands and wives. Slaves were thought to benefit because slave owners would take care of the slaves and that they would be better off being a slave than running around Africa. Slave owners would give slaves food, shelter, and clothing, take care of their children, and teach them christianity (Jones, 102).

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In Fredrick Douglass and Harriet Jacobs narrative they show how the institution of slavery dehumanizes an individual both physically and emotionally. In Jacobs narrative she talks about how women had it worse than men did in slavery. While men suffered, women had it worse due to sexual abuse. The emotional, physical, and sexual abuse was dehumanizing for anyone.

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Harriet Jacobs, referred to in the book as Linda Brent, was a strong, caring, Native American mother of two children Benny and Ellen. She wrote a book about her life as a slave and how she earned freedom for herself and her family. Throughout her book she also reveals countless examples of the limitations slavery can have on a mother. Her novel, also provides the readers a great amount of examples of how motherhood has been corrupted by slavery.

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When it first took off in America in the 17th century, slavery was a way to degrade an entire race and also get necessary work done. Patricia Collins says in her article Prisons for our Bodies, “Slave owners relied upon an ideology of Black sexual deviance to regulate and exploit enslaved Africans.” (Ferber et al, 2013, 69). Collins then refers to the point that a key feature of American slavery was the sexual predation of African women. Slave owners partook in these actions as a power display to scare the slaves into being obedient and

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Douglass’s Message to Women Frederick Douglass gives many examples of the treatment of women like the following passage: “this is done too obviously to administer to their own lusts, and made a gratification of their wicked desires profitable as well as pleasurable; for by this cunning arrangement, the slaveholder, in cases not a few, sustains to his slaves the double relation of master and father.” (Douglass 1183) Through this passage, Douglass brings to light that enslaved women are raped by their masters because of the master’s lust and the master’s desire to produce more slaves. By looking at the passage in the context of the rest of Narrative of Life, Douglass makes it clear that women who are raped by their masters and birth a child from the rape have it worse than others because of the excess brutality they receive from the master’s wife.

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As miserable as it is to be a slave in the South, being a black women worsens the condition. The role of a black women in both the Union and the Confederacy have always been portrayed and elaborated on the orthodox that black women are meant for manual labor, for being tools and for assisting men. However, black women in the South are treated much harsher of course. Majority of black women enslaved were vulnerable to rape, physical abuse and having their families taken away. While the Confederacy took black male slaves into the camp, black women were left to care for their children themselves while managing their plantations and other labor.

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