Tuesday, January 1, 2008

Harriet Tubman

Possibilities instead of fate...Resistance rather than compliance.

Araminta Ross, though physically and mentally abused, was compelled to push fear aside to find "liberty". Her self fulfillment was found in defying unjust standards and putting a new definition to the courage required to achieve freedom.

Consistently open-minded, intolerant of apathy and aggressively motivational, Harriet Tubman insisted upon evoking change in a time where challenging those in positions of power would mean abuse, torture or even death. In seeking liberty for all, she is not only a figure in African-American history, but women's suffrage and subsequently a legacy that enlightens to the greater good.

Enabling hundreds of people to be true to their conscience and liberate themselves of the inhumanity of the period. A patriotic humanitarian with the ability and tenacity to remain true to a government that harshly denied her wartime efforts. Only after her death, of which she was not afraid, did her contributions get recognized and still celebrated to this day.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

She was also an agitator who caused as much trouble as she allegedly fixed. She helped recruit men for John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry and she took part in armed assaults in the Civil War, helping Union troops set fire to Southern homes and plantations. Apparently in her vengeful mind no price was too high for "liberty". It is quite evident from her actions that she had little or no conscience herself and that she was no better than her former white masters. Because, in fact, she did not desire freedom for blacks. What she really desired was the death and destruction of whites.

elainamack said...

There are conflicting sets of research on the raid itself and since I wasn't present, I certainly cannot presume her intentions. In reviewing the things that she did do, I see no evidence that supports your claim that she wanted the death and destruction of "whites". Death is not too high of a price for liberty...we live in a society that propagates that notion.

Anonymous said...

Actually it IS too high a price, because there is no such thing as liberty, or freedom. We're all slaves. As Dostoevsky wrote, "Nothing has ever been so intolerable to man and to human society as freedom". He also said, "When man finds himself free, there is no concern more pressing and more tormenting to him than the desire immediately to seek out someone to worship".