Huckleberry Finn: A Black-White Paradigm

            
            
             "Well, den! Dad blame it, why doan he talk like a man? You answer me dat!"" (80).
             Believing that all men are the same, Jim simply cannot seem to understand the fact that all men do not speak the same language. Thomas Jefferson's idea of "all men [being] created equal,"" has long resided in the beliefs of many Americans, yet ironically, even slave-owning Americans supported the idea. Perhaps to their credit, America eventually abolished slavery, but their extreme racism towards blacks still continued afterwards. To this day, racism does not just affect blacks, but also to many other races. Although modern society largely scorns racism, racism still continues, making books like "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," a story about slavery and racism, still relevant to today. The novel takes place in pre-Civil War America where slavery still exists, and it tells a story of a boy who goes on a quest to free Jim, a slave. During his quest, Huck, the boy, faces a series of events that force him into a position between two very different cultures. In "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," by reversing the black-white paradigm, Huck ultimately learns of the invalidity of the ideology behind slavery and racism that has governed his beliefs about whites and blacks his entire life.
             In justifying slavery and racism, whites would attribute to themselves many positive traits, like empathy, reason, education, and civility "such traits would then allow them to seem more human than and far more superior to blacks. Using this existing idea of whites, Mark Twain instead characterizes them by rather opposing traits, evidently criticizing their supposed "goodness " throughout the novel. Huck Finn, therefore, serves as a spectator, judging them based on realistic observations. Through doing so, Huck soon grows disgusted and ashamed of the human race altogether. Always greedy for money, the duke and the dauphin, a pair of con men, pretend to cry as the long lost brothers of Mr.