What's a better way to write this sentence?

Question

She was governed by manipulated fear of ending up in prison for being nice to an african american. Yeah. I want to focus on making the "being nice to an african american " part sound more professional... This is an essay about the times of slavery in the U.S. so I'm not being racist or anything.

Answer 1

Since she had shown politeness towards and African American, she was governed by the manipulated fear of ending up in prison.

Answer 2

Ok, sounds very run-on

how about

She was manipulated by fear of ending up in prison for showing favor to an African American.

or

She was governed by fear of prison for showing favor to an African American.


**by the way African American should be capitalized.
hope this helps

Answer 3

After she respected an african american she was governed by manipulated fear of ending up in prison.

Answer 4

What is "manipulated fear" supposed to mean? Sounds like a cool phrase, but it doesn't add meaning to your sentence. And "She was governed by..." - sounds like you're trying hard to make it sound grown-up and serious, but it's overkill.

In order to rephrase "being nice" we need to know what she did that was "nice" to the African-American person.

Maybe something like:
She feared being sent to prison for helping a slave.
If you must be wordy:
Her actions were governed by her fear of being imprisoned for socializing with a person of color. (This is not a derogatory phrase. They didn't use the words African-American back in slave times. If the person was African born, you can just say African.)