White people on the Texas State Board of Education are concerned that non-white people are mentioned in social studies textbooks. The smaller the Republican Party gets, the meaner and stupider it gets.
Whitewashing History
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The Local Crank
I testified at the social studies textbook hearings last time around, and was just astounded at the (you certainly got it right) meanness and stupidity.
Two of my favorite wingnut quotes from the hearings:
“Come on, now, slavery wasn’t really all that bad,” and
“Why should we have any tolerance for people we disagree with?”
Those with a strong enough stomach should attend one of these hearings justfor the sheer lunacy of it. I added a line to my prepared remarks after listening to a couple of hours of their drivel–”We should strive to show tolerance for everyone’s beliefs, even theirs”.
Good Lord. You are a braver man than I, Gunga Din. As I always say, “It’s too bad stupidity isn’t painful”
“Come on, now, slavery wasn’t really all that bad,”
I wonder what white people were so afraid of then, when slavery was abolished? The cry then was that ex slaves would turn around and enslave whites.
Idiots.
“Why should we have any tolerance for people we disagree with?”
That comment should qualify the speaker for deportation, for misunderstanding the basic nature of American society and democracy.
“I wonder what white people were so afraid of then, when slavery was abolished? The cry then was that ex slaves would turn around and enslave whites. Idiots.”
You make it sound as if “whites” were a monolithic group that all thought and acted the same way, when in fact most Abolitionists were white.
Not that I’m trying to white-wash (pardon the pun) or excuse the horrible sin of slavery in any way. I just think it’s a disservice to the thousands of white Abolitionists and tens of thousands of Union soldiers who died during the Civil War to suggest that “whites” all felt or acted a certain away toward slaves and slavery.
I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that pheeno was referring specifically to Southern, former Confederate whites, not that racism (or slavery) was an exclusively southern phenomenon
Or an exclusively white or American phenomenon, for that matter.
Abolitionists weren’t that noble either, given that they were more than happy to ship freed slaves out of the country. And, even white abolitionists benefited by slavery, racism and oppression. It didn’t magically make them not racist either. They also weren’t exactly living on pristine, happily gifted land either as we all know. My sympathies just can only stretch so far.
And yes Crank, I was speaking of the pro-slavery set that believed educating slaves (and other non white people) would lead to white people being enslaved in return. I don’t think I’ve ever read about a huge concern that freed slaves would enslave anyone other than white people.
Fair enough. My only real concern is when I see people saying, “White people [fill in the blank],” as if white people have ever thought, acted, or done anything in lockstep unison as a monolithic entity, in this country or any other, at any time in history. I’m equally irritated, by the way, whenever someone makes blanket statements about the way Native Americans thought or acted, because anyone who’s even passingly familiar with Native American history knows that the tribes of North America were as diverse in their customs, habits, etc. as any nations on earth ever were. Yes, it’s a crime what happened to them, yes, slavery too was an enormous crime. The whole of human history is filled with similar and worse tales of human oppression, from time immemorial. Jared Diamond, among many others, has done a great job in his books demonstrating that there is nothing uniquely white about genocide or slavery.
*nod* I’m aware of both, my mother is white and my father is NA. In a sense, white people are a monolith – meaning they as a group all benefited from a slave-based economy. And abolitionist literature was deeply racist. (All that I’ve personally read, I can’t claim to have read every bit that exists) No one has stated to my knowledge (here )that slavery was or is uniquely American or white- however when we discuss slavery in the US, white people dominated that particular oppression by a country mile. And one of the counter arguments against educating slaves was that slaves would then overthrow their masters and enslave the poor white folk. And now we see the depth of denial some white folk here have when they dismiss slavery as “not all that bad”. I’d love to ask them
1) How would they know?
and
2) If it’s not so bad, why did slave owners fear it so much?
And then stooge slap the lot of them…but that’s wishful fantasizing on my part.
I agree with you completely. I probably got us off on a tangent, but yes, the argument that freed slaves would turn around and enslave whites was and still is idiotic, as is any comment to the effect that “slavery wasn’t all that bad.” It’s incredible to me that any self-respecting human being would say that, but then, there are an awful lot of idiots out there. I basically start with the premise that human history is a long catalogue of horrific crimes, so I never have any issues with denial when it comes to any one of those crimes in particular. I do sometimes have issues with people’s lack of historical or moral perspective when discussing particular events, but that’s about it.
“white people are a monolith – meaning they as a group all benefited from a slave-based economy.”
Where to begin with all the fallacies?
OK, first off, not all whites benefited from a slave-based economy. The phrase “poor white trash” was liberally applied to the 94% of Southern whites who DIDN’T own slaves at the PEAK of slavery. Many of them became virtual outcasts from the entire Southern economy.
Secondly, the North obviously had much more industrial might and wealth than the South, or they wouldn’t have been able to defeat them in war. That fact alone shatters the ubiquitous myth that all of America’s wealth was built on slavery.
Thirdly, the South’s economy was obliterated after the Civil War. You needed a wheelbarrow full of Confederate dollars to buy a loaf of bread. Whatever wealth was built by slavery was absolutely demolished by the war.
Fourthly, if whites benefited from this system, it stands to reason that American blacks are benefiting, too. Otherwise, how do you explain the gaping differences in their standard of living here compared to the the standard of living in the host areas of Africa from which they came?
The entire country benefited from the free labor of slavery, though as you correctly point out poor Southern whites ended up even poorer because the value of their labor was practically non-existent. Ironically, these poor whites made up the overwhelming bulk of the CS Army. And do we REALLY want to start the “blacks are better off in America than in Africa” bit? It sounds suspiciously like a backhanded justification for slavery and it isn’t even accurate. Sure, African-Americans NOW, 130 years after Emancipation, are better off that blacks in Africa, but at the height of slavery? And even if it were true, do we really want to argue that material comforts are worth being treated as cattle?