Throughout history, greed is an all too common theme. This spans back to the beginning of human civilization and shown through both fiction and nonfiction writings of several very different time periods. Events in Equiano’s narrative, Miller’s play, and Bradford’s accounts prove this demonstrating how some people such as the Puritans seek new opportunities and freedom in a new land while others, like the crew members of the Mayflower, exploit it for their own benefit, creating greed as the basis for which America was built upon.
This exploitation of people for the benefit of others was extremely prevalent in the founding of America and followed it through hundreds of years. In the accounts of William Bradford, the suffering of the pilgrims …show more content…
When approached by the pilgrims for help, or even for just a little bit of food, Bradford remembers the crew “...saying they would not hazard their lives for them, they should be infected by coming to help them in their cabins, and so, after they came to die by it, would do little or nothing for them, but it they died let them die.” The pilgrims were forced to suffer in order for the crew members to retain their luxuries, already starting America on a streak of greed before it was even officially …show more content…
Equiano himself said that “the closeness of the place, and the heat of the climate, added to the number in the ship, which was so crowded that each had scarcely room to turn himself, almost suffocated us.” The awful conditions were all for the cause of the white people in America. They wanted to have slaves to work for them for free, and this led to the horrible exploitation of Africans to further their own benefit. The slave trade affected the country massively, blinding so many people with greed for so many