“How hard they work to define the slave as inhuman, savage, when in fact the definition of the inhuman describes overwhelmingly the punisher. When they rest, exhausted, between bouts of lashing, the punishment is more sadistic than corrective. If sustained whipping tires the lasher, and he or she must take a series of breaks before continuing, what good does its duration do to the whipped? Such extreme pain seems to be designed for the pleasure of the one with the lash. The necessity of rendering the slave a foreign species appears to be a desperate attempt to confirm one’s own self as normal. The urgency of distinguishing between those who belong to the human race and those who are decidedly non-human is so powerful the spotlight turns away and shines not on the object of degradation but on its creator. Even assuming exaggeration by the slaves, the sensibility of slave owners is gothic. It’s as though they are shouting, “I am not a beast! I’m not a beast! I torture the helpless to prove I am not weak.” The danger of sympathizing with the stranger is the possibility of becoming a stranger. To lose one’s racial-ized rank is to lose one’s own valued and enshrined difference.” ― Toni Morrison, The Origin of Others