Americans excel at ego-boosting myths of exceptionalism: It’s our ingenuity, energy and can-do attitude that explain our rise from frontier to world power. But what if slavery were the real secret of our success? We like to condemn slavery as an exotic evil perpetrated by plantation Southerners, but two new books and a museum exhibit provide nightmarish reminders that slavery was… return to article
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Reader Comments (16)Page 1 of 1 pagesHey…I’m a modern day indentured slave, so I know that the economy is propped up by my efforts…and I produce nothing of appreciable value (unless you calculate the happiness engendered among family members who are exhausted with dealing with their own disabled siblings and children)
If you haven’t figured out your own slave/master equilibrium, I’m sure this article will be shocking to you.
(
Posted by minerva on Jan 8, 2006 at 6:28 AM Being a White male,here in the midwest,I often feel guilt over the events of the past that brought us to this point.Both Slavery and the Genocide of the native population here on the mainland.Even though I had nothing to do with it!(Nor did my ancestors as far as I know of)I still recieve the benefits though of course.I’d much rather NOT though,had it been different,and the races of man had become great through co-operation rather than competition and domination!Then maybe I could find a reason for pride,in being an American,and a human.Even if I had much less of the pie. Things haven’t really changed much since then either,thinks the Kid.Now however,people are exploited regardless of race,and paid token amounts to keep them pacifide. I am NOT saying race isn’t still a BIG part of it though.Just look at How many black folks are in prisons compared to thier percentage of the population!,and how hard it STILL is for natives to become intigrated into the population.many many are still very poor and living on reservations.
Posted by Kaw Valley Kid on Jan 8, 2006 at 5:19 PM “what if slavery were the real secret of our success?”
If?
Posted by theloneous on Jan 16, 2006 at 7:25 AM If I were a descendent of Southern planters I would rightfully have a sense of white guilt. Being that my ancestors roots were from Eastern Europe my concerns lie with their own serfdom in the hands of rich and powerful elites of the time. White guilt should only be spread to those who deserve it.
Posted by Anti-War Conservative on Jan 23, 2006 at 12:25 AM In a historical context there are NO INNOCENTS, no matter what your color, your ethnicity, your race, your religion. NONE! To arbitrarily draw a line at a certain date in order to demand someone take blame for that period of the past is beyond stupid.
OK it’s 1850 folks. Quick NAME a NATION that is NOT was exploiting, oppressing, degrading other nations, other lands AND most of all IT’S OWN PEOPLE?
The early days of the industrial revolution was a hellish nightmare for 95% of the people who lived in it, and for those people the word “freedom” was as hollow as the hearts of the capitalist kleptocrats and industrialists who ruled and directed their world.
This truth held sway strongest in agriculture-dependent economies like the pre-civil war South, where thanks to slavery there was NO MIDDLE CLASS, because the one thing that all “free” men have of value was almost WORTHLESS in the South, and that was their labor, skills and trades.
In the South, the elite slave-holding elite didn’t have to depend on his “white” brothers for a damn thing, because the Southern plutocratic elite had slaves to do their work.
FREE does NOT mean safe, secure, financially independent, well-fed and healthy. Freedom doesn’t mean much if you don’t have anything.
This nonsense that the whites in the antebellum South were ALL slaveholders has got to stop. It’s as stupid as assuming that all Pre-civil war white people lived in mansions on plantations.
The small slave-holding class owned the overwhelming majority of slaves. Slave-owning was in itself a statement of wealth. If you read the article, the person states a slave could be sold for $1000. Adjusted for inflation, what’s that in today’s dollars $50,000 perhaps?
The idea that ALL white Southerners benefited from slavery is asinine and absurd, because the overwhelming majority of Southern whites could NOT compete against slave labor. Thus they had NO money to buy them. Those that did have slaves, often had huge numbers, a really large plantation could have 1000s, all owned by one person..
The glamorous life of the “free” white person in the pre-civil war south was a typically hellish existence with NO opportunities. Since the jobs that they might have been hired to do, were done by slaves.
Yeah they were “free” so what. Free to get married at 12 yrs, die young. Free to hunt for you food OR starve. If a store was nearbye, you didn’t have money to buy food anyway. Educashun, what’s that? You better not get sick. Medical attn. in the rural south was non-existent.
Those evil white hard-scrabble, die young whites lived a lush life, while the slaves lived a miserable, hard-scrabble, die-young life…Wait a minute they lived the same lives.
Maybe that’s why Southern whites seem so “pig-headed” about race. Yeah maybe they’re a bit too proud, but that is about all they got from those days. The benefits of slavery went to a very few Southerners. Maybe that’s why they can’t give a damn when someone starts telling them to feel guilty about slavery.
It’s time to move on, and forget this issue. There can be NO rectification of a crimes committed 150, crimes that were legal, just and accepted as right in most of the world save for a few emerging western industrial nations of the day. Everyone suffered in those days save for a privileged few. To try to tag the blame on the decedents is beyond absurd.
There is NOTHING TO WIN, and EVERYTHING TO LOSE by trying to beat your allies over the head and demand they shoulder guilt for crimes they did not commit. Does any of these guilt-trippers ever stop to ask the question what percentage of Americans descended from people who immigrated to the USA AFTER slavery was abolished. How are they guilty - but that’s another story.
Posted by johnnyincentx on Jan 26, 2006 at 6:08 AM johnnyincentx
You say, “The idea that ALL white Southerners benefited from slavery is asinine and absurd,”
This article was about the history of slavery in New York. What do white Southerners have to do with that?
Detailing the history of slavery in New York and its economic impact is not “trying to beat your allies over the head and demand they shoulder guilt for crimes they did not commit.” This is just information. Why such an emotional reaction?
You wonder “Does any of these guilt-trippers ever stop to ask the question what percentage of Americans descended from people who immigrated to the USA AFTER slavery was abolished.” I wonder what attracted all those immigrants to the USA, what did all those immigrants find so desirable about America and what was so wrong with their home countries that they’d just pack up and leave. Knowing that would give me a better understanding of American history.
You feel that “It’s time to move on, and forget this issue.” How can you forget something you don’t know. Learning about the institution of slavery in the US and the Western Hemispere would give everyone a better understanding of American history.
Posted by theloneous on Jan 26, 2006 at 8:20 PM Theloneous:
Your comments are fascinating for what it says what you learned in school and in your studies vs. I.
The overwhelming majority of immigrants to the USA were VERY POOR. They were refugees, often forced to flee their homelands lest they starve living a life of absolute poverty and misery (can you say Irish Potato Famine?)
The “slave” rebellion in earl on in NYC is that “slave” also refers to “white people” who were INDENTURED SERVANTS - which is another name for slave, especially early on. They were penniless in Europe and when offered a chance to come here, if they promised to work off the cost of transport. Once here though, they found their debt could never be paid off. They ended up being slaves, just as blacks were. This went on for a long time. Only when the threats of rebellion became too great to ignore did the authorities end the practice.
When they did of course, the slave trade from Africa took it’s place.
The history of the “white” in the USA is one of slavery too.
Only the elite experience any notion of freedom, and only men.
Women white, black Asian or whatever were basically property until the early 20th. century.
Bottom line is, except for a small elite, there was no such thing as “free” men NOT as we use the term today.
The source of the absurdity lies in trying to lay blame for “black” slavery on the backs of “whites” whose lives were hardly better. Ironically these people were NOT the slaveholders. The land-owning plantation owning elite were.
In order to make us “proud” of our history. The horrible conditions and lives of immigrants has been glossed over and sanitized. Most people do NOT know that many immigrants did NOT come here willingly. Many were desperately poor and force loaded like cattle onto ships to America, the excess of the nations of Europe, unwanted, expendable.
The words on the Statue of Liberty “give me your tired, your weak and your poor” (something like that) Actually was sort of a joke for the French. Who like England, Spain and the other Euro powers looked down on the USA as a nation of worthless, poor people. Who if they had stayed in Europe would have ruined it for them.
OF COURSE, there was a fair # despite their poverty were able to scrape together enough money to come here on their own and willingly, BUT that was much later in the nation’s history. The ONLY freedom these people had was the freedom to flee.
The problem with this article and thinking is it requires the elevation of a particular group to saint/martyr status that inherently pretends they are innocent of being part of the cycle.
Go far back in history enough and you will find the suffering of that day, were the conquerors descended from that day’s historical conquerors the yesterdays of their ancestors.
Bottom line is, the guilt if any for the crime of slavery does NOT belong on the backs of the working class or peasants, many of whom lived lives nearly or as miserable. Whatever guilt there is should be placed on the dead elite of those bygone days.
To seek a compromise and help those whose ancestors suffered from slavery by punishing the decedents of peasants and workers is inane at best.
Sometimes some things are impossible to redress. Especially if redressing creates more hard feelings than good. This is the case with this topic. It’s best just ignored. Go back far enough and NO ONE is innocent, using the reasons stated in this article to damn Americans as “guilty” for the crime of slavery.
Finally in your desire to seek justice you fail to see, this desire to inflict guilt on NYC is an attempt to silence it, not bring about justice. It’s an attempt by the Fright wing. Think about it.
Posted by johnnyincentx on Jan 26, 2006 at 9:08 PM johnnyincentx
My questions regarding European immigration were rhetorical, their story is relatively well documented and the American educational system actually devotes a chapter or two to it in its function of indoctrinating American children. Lerone Bennet Jr.‘s They Came Before The Mayflower is one of my sources for historical perspective regarding the economics of class, race, culture and gender division during 1600 and 1700’s Americas.
What’s intriguing to me about your comments are how this article and my post brought to your mind comments like, “the guilt if any for the crime of slavery does NOT belong on the backs of the working class or peasants, many of whom lived lives nearly or as miserable.”
I re-read the article and once again did not see anything to suggest poor and working class white Americans were responsible for slavery or that current day white Americans should compensate decendents of slaves for the centuries of free labor America profited from.
You say, “the guilt if any for the crime of slavery does NOT belong on the backs of the working class or peasants,” Nobody said it did.
You say, “Sometimes some things are impossible to redress. Especially if redressing creates more hard feelings than good.” “Redress” or the dreaded “R” word, reparations, was not uttered in this article, why are you going there?
Posted by theloneous on Jan 26, 2006 at 11:41 PM Read this below and ask yourself when did slavery end, the civil war just made everyone a slace on the US Plantation.
Roach
Many things, but consider this as information I’ll bet you didn’t get from school
and don’t get from main stream media:Taxes are our cost of government.
In 1946 taxes equaled 45% of peoples’ earnings*
In 1959 - 50%*
In 1982 - 59.3%*
In 1998 - 66.7%*
An increase of 0.43% per yearIt now takes 2 people in the family, working full time to support the family
in the same style it did in the 50’s.At this rate of growth, taxes will equal 100% of earnings on
Saturday, March 18th, 2052 @ 5:49 PMIf this doesn’t matter to you, what do you think taxes will be on Thursday, March 18th, 2010?
This is the kind of information you do get in Total Power Of One.
If you earn a $100 and get $100 you are 100% free.
If you earn a $100 and get $0 because some one or some thing takes them away from you
you are 100% slave.Today, you and I are 66.7% slave.
(* Data From Steven Shwiff, Corporate Economist
and Data Resource Institute Data Banks - Pg 470 TPOne)
Posted by Roach on Feb 3, 2006 at 12:43 PM i’m just glad these facts are finally coming to light among the populace in any manner or degree. the falacy, abolition of slavery as a moral cause for northern invasion of the south, can no longer be sustained. it may take centuries, but truth always wins.
roach is correct, we are all (tax) slaves of the Federal Reserve, and its enforcing agent the IRS.
for more information on lincoln; his connections (financial/political) to the robber barons of the time,
his war on civilian populations,
his unbridled trampling of the constitution and bill of rights…visit dilorenzo’s archive and learn the truth of the history you have been denied at the hand of indoctrination to institutionally sanctioned lies.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo-arch.html
Thomas J. DiLorenzo is the author of The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War, (Three Rivers Press/Random House).
Posted by kikz on Feb 3, 2006 at 3:14 PM Let’s not forget, one of these days, we’ll have immigrants living next door to us who will recount, through word of mouth, film, books and litigation the horrors of having worked for pennies a day so that Americans could buy cheap clothes and electronics, thus maintaining our “freedom from high prices” standard of living.
Already we are hearing from those frustrated people whose dictatorial or monarchical governments we have supported (Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia) so that we could have cheap oil, thus maintaining our “freedom” from unpatriotic gas-efficient cars.
Mitch
Posted by Mitcherino on Feb 5, 2006 at 2:41 AM Roach: you’re numbers are bogus, and anyone who reads that and believes you without question doesn’t deserve an explanation. I think it’s best to let you and your ilk have all the fools anyway. LOL
Posted by johnnyincentx on Feb 5, 2006 at 3:36 AM At least I posted where it came from if you read that far, you just posted your opinion with out any proof just your government taught mind. Only a fool will continue to be a slave with out fighting.
Roach
Posted by Roach on Feb 6, 2006 at 4:31 PM Oh so you posted where it came from SO. Just because someone posted it somewhere does NOT mean it’s accurate. I take it you are yet another person who believes if he “read it somewhere” it must be true?
Your only goal is to tie people up in pointless debates with you.
ProLibs are lovers of facts and reason. It’s almost an addiction for some. It’s nearly impossible for a ProLib to hear inaccurate data without reflexively trying to correct it. We assume that knowing the truth will change minds.
Unfortunately with the likes of you, it’s an emotional not factual thing. You will believe what you want as long as it backs up what you feel.
So I’m not going to dispute your “information” its so obviously bogus. Your intent is just as obvious.
I swear Rove’s breast milk must be getting particularly bitter. I can’t think of any other reason why so many Repugnican idjuts are fleeing the safety of his warm bosom and seeking shelter where they are not wanted. LOL
Posted by johnnyincentx on Feb 6, 2006 at 5:16 PM You fit right into what you posted, instead of you showing fact to discredit the artical you run your mouth to hide behind the half truths you were taught. If you like to thank someone can take your money you traded your life for does not classify you as a slave you are free to think that, no problem, but its that kind of brainwashing that your government has been engaged in for over a hundred years.
For some that seek the truth know its time for change from the socialist government we have and get it back to the constitution that was put into the law of this land to keep my libertys and from people like you and Lincoln from taking them away. I could go on and on but it seems you would rather believe the brainwashing you were taught so I will not respond any longer unless you can prove your stand with fact instead of your opinion.Roach
Posted by Roach on Feb 6, 2006 at 5:51 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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