nce from chains." (pg. 47)The true religion was practiced at night, often secretly, and was led by black preachers. The underground slave religion was a highly emotional affair that consisted of singing, shouting, and dancing. For Frederick Douglass and all other slaves, the singing of songs and religion were more of an affirmation of the joy in life rather than a rejection of worldly pleasures and temptations. They spoke out against the perils of bondage and asserted their right to be free.Despite the success of African Americans to develop a subculture, which afforded them an escape from their hardcore reality, pain and struggle persisted. There are many similarities, which can be drawn from the experiences of slavery as described by Frederick Douglass and the analogy to a Nazi prison camp included in the Stanley Elkins Thesis. Elkins asserted that slavery in the United States was similar to the conditions of a Nazi concentration camp because both exerted total physical and psychological control over its subordinates. In both cases, the subordinates were not allowed any personal freedoms, which included education, leisure, or any other personal allowance. Thomas Auld, the master of Frederick Douglass in Baltimore, said "A nigger should know nothing but to obey his master-to do as he is told to do." (pg. 57) He was referring to the wrongfulness of his wife's attempt to educate Frederick Douglass. Implicitly, this was the view held by most whites toward African Americans. Consequently, other adjectives such as: lazy, irresponsible, childlike, and simple-minded, were used by whites to describe the African American character. These reports coincide with observations made by Frederick Douglass referring to the attitude whites possessed toward African Americans. Of course the main goal, as seen by Elkins, and Douglass, of the whites was to suppress any notion of African American individuality. Furthermore, it stole the African ...
