Fredrick Douglass was one of the most inspirational and influential men on the matter of the slave trade and many believe that if it weren't for Douglass, slavery would have lasted many years longer than it did. In Douglass's Learning to Read and Write he reveals many of his beliefs and values such as human rights, and that knowledge is imperative for success. For instance "to treat me as she supposed one human being ought to treat another. In entering upon the duties of a slaveholder, she did not seem to perceive that I sustained to her the relation of a mere chattel, and that for her to treat me as a human being was not only wrong, but dangerously so." In this section of his excerpt he demonstrates how his mistress was not even acknowledging him as a human, and how that even though his mistress was not a bad person, it was a crime to not treat the slaves like an animal on the street or even worse a piece of property. This shows that since he firsthand experienced what it was like to be treated like a piece of garbage and not a human he incredibly valued human rights and that all humans no matter what the social status have equal rights. An instance where he believed that knowledge was necessary to achieve success was," This bread I used to bestow upon the hungry little urchins, who, in return, would give me that more valuable breadth of knowledge.". In this statement he is informing that he was incredibly desperate to acquire knowledge and that implying the "Breadth" is showing how vast and large the power of knowledge actually is. Therefore Fredrick Douglass valued Human rights and that
knowledge is the key to success.

Me being a Palestinian makes Human rights my number one value. I have many friends and family that are now refugees and are basically just a "nuisance" or a "pain" for other countries to deal with, not realizing that the refugees are humans one in the same as everyone else in the world. The refugees of current day Syria, Palestine, Iraq, and Iran are all treated like garbage without people giving them a second thought in the world. I feel like that there shouldn't be this type of discrimination between humans blacks, whites, Arabs, Asians are all one in the same... We are humans. I value human rights the most out of anything else because I feel like every soul resting in a human body should have the right of living a normal life and having a voice in the worlds society.