What to a Slave is the Fourth of July?

What is Douglass saying? How does he support himself through appeals to logos, ethos and/or pathos?

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Douglass is saying that all the ideals that America is built on- equality, the right to the pursuit of happiness, etc.- are hypocrisies because slavery violates all those ideals.

Logos: He says that he does not need to argue some points, such as that slaves are human, but he does, anyway. He points out that everyone already acts as if slaves are human, they just delude themselves into saying that they're not. His logic there is interesting and it makes sense. He uses lists of examples to prove his points as well. He addresses their interests, too. He says that everyone wants abolitionists to persuade people instead of accusing them. He addressed that point by saying that there is nothing to persuade- everyone knows, on some level that slavery is wrong- all he needs to do is make them guilty enough to do something about it. That would fit in with pathos as well.

Ethos: He is a slave. He speaks from experience and is more effective because of that. He also is aware of his audience's feelings and begins and ends on a note that would be taken well by them- praising in hope for America.

Pathos: He lists in graphic detail what slaves have suffered. An example: "...it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters..." He also asks people to have hope by saying the issue is fixable.

Socialization

What is the “socialization process” according to Parrillo? Do you agree that prejudices – or really any beliefs – are instilled in this way?

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According to Parillo, the socialization process is when "...individuals acquire the values, attitudes, beliefs and perceptions of their culture or subculture, including religion, nationality and social class." Later on in this article/excerpt/thing, Parillo also says that prejudice has a number of complex causes. I agree with him, there. Socialization is definitely a major factor in instilling prejudice, though. Let's take an extreme example. Children in parts of the extremist Muslim world are brought up to hate Jews. Their prejudice is caused by everybody telling them that Jews are bad all the time. Whereas here, people are not (for the most part) brought up to hate anyone in that extreme. So fewer people do. What your parents believe is definitely a major factor in determining what you believe. And then, at a point, depending on how well instilled said beliefs are, you might change your mind and disagree with what you've been brought up to believe. I think the first time you are away from your parents, college for example, would help to adjust your beliefs.

Jefferson Views

Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia show him to be a different person than what other sources have told me he is. In history classes (not just this year) and books about history, people have talked about how no one was really what they seemed. This year in history class we read about him and got a more realistic picture of him. However, apart from history class, everything and everyone seems to portray him as some great hero- writer of the Declaration of Independence and purchaser of Louisiana. I'd read that he might have supposedly fathered a child by a slave. Looking at his descendents and the general record of him, everyone or almost everyone seems to think of him as an almost perfect being who absolutely supported equality. That picture of his descendents shows white and black people, equal.

To me, that's a little silly. Most of the founding fathers and people of their generation and around it said that they were against slavery, yet did little about it. It wasn't just blacks they were prejudiced against. Indians, women, immigrants, foreigners, Northeners, Southeners, nobody liked each other. So what we read wasn't really surprising. Thomas Jefferson thought the same things, generally, as the rest of the people around him. So it is a little disturbing to see it written so clearly his thoughts on others, but it isn't unexpected.

For the Declaration of Independence, he (and the others who wrote it) weren't trying to cover every situation. They weren't trying to draft a carefully scripted record of who deserves what, for why, and the circumstances of being equal and who should be equal. They weren't trying to write the fine script. They needed a provoking, defiant speech against the British. That's all. They had to be as general as possible so that as many people as possible would help fight against the British. They couldn't outright condemn people who were different (except the British, obviously), for they needed all the fighters, black and white, they could get. They couldn't condemn racism, or slavery, or else the wealthy plantation owners would withold their aid. They couldn't do anything in fact, except state that everyone's equal and ignore the fact that no, they didn't really mean that. Jefferson wasn't racist. Even reading Notes I didn't feel that he was. He felt superior, certainly, but he reasoned through the fact. (Even if his reasoning was incredibly flawed. He based intelligence on musical ability? Well, then, I'm certainly not intelligent, then!) He didn't hate blacks.

My conclusions from all this are two: that people's real personality gets filtered out through the ages, and that Thomas Jefferson was more ordinary than anyone thinks. He was not the true advocate of absolute equality, but he wasn't a horrible person, either. You have to take him in context of his times. And whether he meant to or not, he did lead to a better America.