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Hypocrisy Of American Slavery Rhetorical Analysis

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Many people take things for granted. Maybe because they have it all and dont need to worry about anything. However there are some people who have it all but still care for those who don 't. In 1852, Frederick Douglas spoke to the citizens of Rochester, New York, about slavery in his speech, “Hypocrisy of American Slavery”. In his speech, he explains to the white citizens who are celebrating freedom during the fourth of july are wrong to celebrate because half the population is enslaved. Through his use of logical appeal, ethical appeal and antithesis, he illustrates that those who are celebrating freedom must take action for the slavery of half the American population. Frederick Douglass claims that white citizens who are celebrating freedom …show more content…

“Who so stolid and selfish that would not give his voice to swell that hallelujahs of a nation 's jubilee, when the chains of servitude had been torn from his limbs?”(para 2) Fredrick Douglass is asking his audience if they would lay down their lives for someone else 's rights. When your chains have been taken off you would run but Fredrick Douglass wants to tell his audience to fight for more than just your freedom. “To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated tempel of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony.” (Para 3) Fredrick Douglas is trying to explain to his audience that they are bringing a man and his people to come and rejoice with them because they are free, but Fredrick Douglass and his people are not free, and he calls it inhuman mockery, and sacarilegious irony. In conclusion Fredrick Douglass uses logical appeal, ethical appeal and antithesis to support his claim about how white people are wrong to celebrate the Fourth of July when half the American population is still enslaved. This may leave the reader upset with how the past was hard for many black slaves who were mistreated and may leave them wanting to read more on how people solved this

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