What A Piece of Work

The Renaissance initiated the move towards humanism that shifted human perception from being solely focused on depravation to being wholly enlightened by inspiration. The idea was that man could become more that what he was. Men had the capacity to learn, grow, improve, achieve, etc. This idea was a revolutionary step of progress for the time. However, while this new sense of ideals proved a good thing in many ways, you can still see the flaws of human nature causing a good thing to take a turn for the worse.

The new sense of self-improvement launched a search for more knowledge, riches, and power. Along the way, man found situations in which he chose to subject those of "lesser intelligence" to harsh labor in order to gain more. Now it's true that slaves were present before this time in history, but after this, they became a very prominent trade. It could be assumed that Europeans took advantage of the natives in these new lands simply because it helped them gain riches quicker, but I would like to offer an additional motivation as a possibility.

As I stated earlier, the Renaissance opened up doors for talented people to display those talents and receive praise. However, those that were not as talented—those that didn't paint or write or sculpt—still wanted to find a way to fit into this new improvement fad. As more and more people joined ship crews and sailed to new lands, they found that they could display their abilities by asserting power over these new beings. The natives of these discovered lands suffered horrors that most of us living in a free country can hardly fathom. The innate human flaw of pride mixed with the pressure to constantly prove your superiority could have been a huge factor in the tragedy that occurred during the exploration phase of the Renaissance.

Image credit: Slaves being transported in Africa, 19th century engraving (public domain images via Wikimedia Commons)