The Tangible & Intangible Oppressions of Black People
In the Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass argues that Black people, specifically Black men, deserve to be seen as American citizens just as much as the White person. That their labor they were brutally forced to give, should give them true freedom, access, and opportunity. Some slave people are free, and yet they are still suffering from the evil that has hindered their progress and contribution to and in America. Critical Race Theory is the study of systemic racism, a social construct embedded in every form of society. In this analytical framework, we examine how racism continues to influence and mold the legal system, capitalism, as well as social structures. Though legal slavery has ended, the Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass demonstrates how racial oppression continues to show up through social attitudes and structural barriers. His perspective highlights what Critical Race Theory is about, that racism is a permanent and deeply seeded construct of American society and culture that has continued to limit Black people in their humanity and place in society. That with all of the disadvantages Black people have prevailed through, they will have to relentlessly continue to fight to be seen as worthy citizens.
During the time of the Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass, enslaved people were now considered free people after the Civil War ended but were still facing huge disadvantages and setbacks. White people pushed back against the abolition of slavery and the promise of granting these free people citizenship by continuing to incite violence, deny them rights, and livable wages. It was evident that freedom did not equate to equality. Many white people thought free enslaved people should be grateful for their freedom while placing restrictions on these freedoms. They were still excluded socially and economically and were unable to pull themselves up by the bootstraps with no financial or resourceful advantages. It was nearly impossible for them to progress in a society that built invisible walls and pretended they did not belong in a society they literally fought for with their blood and their bodies.
It’s ironic this speech is given after the emancipation of slavery because the free Black man is “asked to forget his color and forgive that which everybody remembers” (Douglass, Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass) in a time where skin color was the basis of how well or unwell you were to be treated. When someone says they don’t see skin color, they may think they are being progressive and inclusive, when in actuality they are erasing the Black experience in America. It continues to push the racial barriers set up against us to keep us inferior to the white man. To forget our color is a delusion and presents a privilege that only White people have in that they can exist anywhere without the stress or burden of what it feels and looks like to be hated and disenfranchised solely because of the pigment of your skin. The colorblindness that society tries to enforce then and now, keeps racism in a warm bed by denying the impact of racial inequality and injustice. Kimberlé Crenshaw, one of the founders of Critical Race Theory, argues that refusing to acknowledge racial inequalities, colorblindness fails to acknowledge multiple systems of oppression. In order for Black people to feel like they are rightful citizens in this country, we have to address the disparities in treatment against them and acknowledge that it is because of the systems that have been set in place from many centuries ago that keep them one step behind white people. That white people will always feel that Black people are inferior to them due to historical and indoctrinated teachings from their racist White ancestors.
It is dismissive and insensitive to be asked to forget our skin color when Trayvon Martin will never be able to celebrate a birthday or attend college, or make an impact in this world. White people are professionals at reminding us that our skin color makes them feel hatred towards us when we are only trying to exist like everyone else. White people are the painful reminders that being Black in America means to be reminded of a past that we did not initiate, that we did not create. A past and present that continues to haunt every generation of Blackness and as Frederick Douglass once said, freedom does not equate to equality and to ignore your Blackness is the opposite of freedom. It’s an emotional and psychological hinderance. There are those who choose not to acknowledge their Blackness and that may be due to wanting to be accepted in a society that creates stipulations on what it means to be a Black citizen in America. In the Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass, forgetting the color of your skin is an impossible act when there is no escape from the immediate disrespect and evil that is inflicted the moment your face is visible to the White man’s eye. This is also a form of cultural violence where White people impose their perspective by making their norms appear natural. To “forget color” means to deny Black language, aesthetics, and traditions to favor those created by white society. Without the right to remember your Blackness, Black people lose the ability to define and defend themselves.
In declaring that the Black man “is no longer subject to be bought and sold, but still surrounded by an adverse sentiment which fetters all his movements,” (Douglass, Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass) Frederick Douglass exposes the persistence of racial oppression after emancipation. Though slavery has ended, he understands that the logic of enslavement lives on through institutions, culture, and society. White people continued to oppress and humiliate the free Black man by placing policies that went against the emancipation of slavery, that went against the amendment and their civil rights. The restrictions of where they could go, the jobs they can hold, there sense of belonging, the intimidation tactics, and the continued brutality were all ways in which the white man tore down their integrity and humanity. The free Black man’s movements were highly monitored and criticized, so although they were free from physical shackles and chains, they were still enslaved through racially charged social acts.
The “adverse sentiment” Frederick Douglass describes operates as an invisible chain, one that limits access to opportunity, mobility, and belonging. White people continued to enforce inequality by enforcing discriminatory laws, segregating schools, unfair labor markets, and the exclusion of government affairs. Frederick Douglass anticipated this logic when he observed that white society, though publicly celebrating emancipation, still maintained an emotional and structural investment in Black subordination. From a psychological perspective, his “adverse sentiment” also captures the atmosphere of surveillance and suspicion surrounding Black life. To live “surrounded” by this sentiment is to move through a world that questions one’s competence, humanity, and belonging at every step. This constant scrutiny becomes a social fetter—one that restricts not just physical movement but emotional and intellectual freedom. Cheryl Harris, in her essay “Whiteness as Property,” argues that the privileges attached to whiteness function as an invisible form of property ownership, granting rights and protections that Black Americans are denied. Frederick Douglass’s line that states “fetters all his movements” supports Harris’s claim: even when free in body, the Black body remains constrained by the boundaries of whiteness that define access to safety, opportunity, and respect.
Frederick Douglass’s insight also anticipates what modern Critical Race Theory scholars call structural racism—the systemic reproduction of racial inequality through institutions that appear neutral. Today, this same “adverse sentiment” can be traced in mass incarceration, redlining, and employment discrimination—systems that maintain racial disparity under the guise of law and order. Frederick Douglass understands that such sentiment is not an attitude to be overcome through goodwill but a structure that needs to be dismantled.
It’s nearly impossible to dismantle a racial structure created and multiplied by generations of hateful people when in order to dismantle it, power needs to be shifted to those who have been oppressed. Racism is about power and superiority, which means that the systems set in place will always favor those ideas because it is rooted in every corner since the inception of America. That for some reason, white people have always been intimidated by a Black person’s existence, feared that they would somehow have more access and power than them. This concept that white people have this much hatred towards another race due to skin color should be looked into as a severe case of mental health issue. To surveil young and old Black bodies by creating small and large ways to make them feel unwelcome, especially in a country they built and continue to grow economically, is ironic. To be viewed as a most violent race, beasts, 3/5 of a person when the first documentation of violence was from a white person. A violence that hangs in the air as they gather around to watch life drain from the Black bodies hanging from the trees they dangle from, or the putrid smell of Black bodies being burned like a roast for dinner. Ironic they have monitored our movements and pushed us out of places they feel we don’t belong and have violently murdered and erased towns and neighborhoods built by Black people so that we could have a place we feel safe and can build our own businesses. “Because white men can’t police their imagination Black people are dying” has rung true for centuries. To assert their dominance, they must and will always remind us that they can degrade, mock, exclude, taunt, and kill Black people with insurmountable support, praise, and righteousness.
Racism and its superiority and power complex is mainly about control. We know that racism is most beneficial when white people are the only ones benefiting from the racial capitalism and exploitation of Black labor. When they noticed that Black neighborhoods were prospering without them, white people were threatened and sought to destroy these neighborhoods by mass murdering and erasing these neighborhoods. There is a loss of power that comes with Black people surviving and thriving without the help of white people, and to control and maintain their racial hierarchy, they must tear down any evidence of Black progress. Black success in building something from literally nothing challenges the idea that they are equal to white people, capable of creating spaces where Black people don’t need access to their resources and are able to break free of the social and economic barriers that have been set against them. “Being surrounded by an adverse sentiment which fetters all his movements” means to forever be held captive in this structural and racist capitalist system.
Frederick Douglass’s words remind us that though we may be free from the physical restraints of slavery, the equality we seek and deserve is a facade white people like to dangle in our faces when it best suits them. Forgetting our skin color is a privilege unknown to any Black person who has to remember why they’re fighting so hard for justice and racial equality. To want to be recognized as citizens, citizens who built a country with the hands of pain and a sore heart, seems an improbable idea. White people decided Black people were not to be accepted and considered for their contributions or existence due to their tight grip of their biases and the racist thinking.
Black minds, Black bodies, and Black culture and creativity will continue to be exploited with a fervent fever of harmful erasure and evil behavior. Kanye West said it best in his song All Falls Down, “Even if you in a Benz, you still a nigga in a coup”. As a Black person, you will always have to prove your intelligence, your right for belonging, will always need to be the example of a good Black person because they see Black people as a monolith and not as a group of people with a beautiful vastness and uniqueness that makes waves across this county. It is enraging and at times debilitating to be surrounded by a society whose entire existence is based on the work of upholding white supremacy by continuously allowing their imagination to play out in real time with a danger known only to those oppressed.
Racism remains at the forefront of the American social structure, with an evolution that becomes more and more obvious of the racial hierarchy they so much need and want to control. Frederick Douglass’ motive in the Address of the Honorable Frederick Douglass has always been to highlight the ways in which Black people have been fighting for freedom of the shackles of slavery and the chains of racial constructs that continue to deny us true liberation. The tangible and intangible oppressions exist in tandem and can not function without the other, thus creating an atmosphere that is seen and felt and sinks and floats, the emotional and psychological labor of being a Black person in America.