Why is ante bellum racist?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:This will be called trolling, but I'm trying to add to the conversation here. I grew up in CA and remember driving past the former internment camps in the 80s and wondering why they were ever "necessary" because I didn't see how the Asians around me could be harmful. They were (and continue to be) high achieving and hard working despite this history. What is it about Black culture still wears slavery as a mark of worthiness and value? That history only has relevance to an individual if they allow it to have relevance to who they are as a human today. It is a terrible period in history, but why does it continue to define individuals today in a way that Asians (or Irish, or Jewish or Egyptian or Greek...) don't?

It’s only trolling if people answer you thoughtfully and you shut down or mock in return.

The only other treatment of humans in America that rivals the way that Black people were treated in scope and depth is the Native American genocide, and for lots of Native Americans, that’s still an enormous part of their lives, too. But I’ll focus on Black people here.

It wasn’t just slavery. It was birthright slavery, slavery that people couldn’t get out of. Rarely people could save up to buy their own freedom or get freed via a will, but it wasn’t common. They were prevented from learning to read, they were prevented from worshipping freely. I just watched The Black Church: This is Our Story and in some places they weren’t even allowed to look skyward in prayer, lest they be checking the star position (and it was enforced by whipping). There were no protections for any enslaved person - no break from rape if that’s what the owner wanted, no break from anything, ever. They were used in medical experiments. If you’ve ever had gynecological surgery, thank the hapless Black victims of that doctor who operated on them without anesthesia under the belief that Black people were less than human and didn’t feel pain. Enslaved people literally built much of our nation, and they were definitely the engine that drove the economy, work for which they got nothing.

And it’s not like it quit with slaves being freed. The Ku Klux Klan terrorized Black people, torturing and murdering them, and it was frequently treated as a pleasant spectacle by white people who picnicked at lynchings - and stole “souvenirs” from the body. They were kept out of school, they were kept out of specific schools, they were kept in virtual slavery with the system of sharecropping. Redlining continued legally for decades. Systemic racism really does keep Black people in lower economic straits even to this day.

I’m not Black. I can read about this issue and understand it from that perspective, but I am not a descendant of slaves. It’s not personal for me. But it is still very much personal for those who are descended from enslaved people. It’s not the past. It’s the present.

Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

Japanese Americans have talked about it. It is not forgotten.

Yeah, the Japanese got an official apology from the US government and reparations.

If descendants of slaves received reparations would African Americans forget about it or stop talking about it? No, the wound is still there.

The wound is still there for many of those Japanese Americans. Your post sounded very dismissive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An antebellum party is racist because it is a celebration/replication of the lifestyle of the uber wealthy, slave owning, white people living on plantations in the pre Civil War south. These people owned and amassed their wealth, and were afforded this opulent lifestyle and their parties because they were slaveowners and amassed ridiculous wealth by owning other human beings.

Why would anyone have a party to celebrate this dark chapter in american history? Not a great choice for a theme for a party. Do you understand?

An antebellum party is about the clothes. I've never been to one, but I can tell you that is what I see. It also includes mint juleps. Lots of them.

Back then, nobody could afford to wash those dresses without free "help".

They couldn’t even dress themselves in that style without assistance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It sounds like the people on here that are offended by the word antebellum only refer to it in the context of parties and plantations. Fine. These are “bad”.

But I’m still going to refer to my parents house as antebellum because it predates the civil war, and refer to certain pieces of art and literature as antebellum. Sorry the word itself is NOT offensive. It simply means pre-war. If you see that word to mean 1860s crinoline dresses and plantation culture you are either woefully uneducated or willfully ignorant. Or both.

Does your parents house look like this --

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People are free to throw antebellum parties if they want. Other people are also free to think that they are in bad taste. Nobody is proposing a ban on it.

Sure, and we don't have to make the party goers feel good about themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People are free to throw antebellum parties if they want. Other people are also free to think that they are in bad taste. Nobody is proposing a ban on it.

Sure, and we don't have to make the party goers feel good about themselves.

And we the antebellum party goers don’t have to give a fiddle-dee-dee what you think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

I’m the PP you’re replying to, and I have to say I find it offensive that you refer to descending from enslaved people as “a badge,” like it’s a conscious decision to don it, to think about yourself that way. I’m also the PP whose great grandpa killed himself and I can assure you that I don’t consciously think about that, but it informs who I am. And that was one trauma, a hundred years ago, and there was no societal machine that made that happen.

Again, short of the genocide perpetrated on the Native Americans, there is no other American counterpart to what was done to Black people here. That doesn’t make the very real bigotry against Asians and the violence they face right now any less real or traumatic, but in scale and scope, it’s just not the same.

I don’t know if you’re intending to try and compare the two, but there are those people who bring up prejudice and violence against Asians as a means of trying to tell Black people to just get over it. I don’t think you’re doing that, but you might want to be aware that that is a cudgel used against Black people sometimes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People are free to throw antebellum parties if they want. Other people are also free to think that they are in bad taste. Nobody is proposing a ban on it.

Sure, and we don't have to make the party goers feel good about themselves.

And we the antebellum party goers don’t have to give a fiddle-dee-dee what you think.

Then why open this thread?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People are free to throw antebellum parties if they want. Other people are also free to think that they are in bad taste. Nobody is proposing a ban on it.

Sure, and we don't have to make the party goers feel good about themselves.

And we the antebellum party goers don’t have to give a fiddle-dee-dee what you think.

Your ancestors were too poor anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Not the same thing at all. There was much in the antebellum South that was not dominated by slavery. And, FWIW, hoop skirts were also worn in the North.


Could you share more on the bolded please? Curious to know what you mean.

While 25% of Southerners owned slaves (and that is too many, of course), 75% did NOT own slaves. Of course, the large plantations depended on slavery, but many other people did not. Slavery was outrageous and troubling, but it was not the ONLY thing in the South.

So, in effect, what you're saying is that non-slave owning whites didn't develop businesses related to slave labor? No white slave catchers, no white night patrollers, no white auctioneers, no white ship builders, no white dock workers, no white tanners, no white overseers? That would be absolutely amazing that in an area of the US dominated by slavery, the non-slave owning whites had nothing to do because the slaves were performing all the available work. IT would be amazing that no businesses were created to cater to the needs of the slave-owning class. Obviously, it makes you feel good to think that only slave owners benefitted from slavery, but nothing could be further from reality. You really need to do some guilt free research about slavery in the US.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

I’m the PP you’re replying to, and I have to say I find it offensive that you refer to descending from enslaved people as “a badge,” like it’s a conscious decision to don it, to think about yourself that way. I’m also the PP whose great grandpa killed himself and I can assure you that I don’t consciously think about that, but it informs who I am. And that was one trauma, a hundred years ago, and there was no societal machine that made that happen.

Again, short of the genocide perpetrated on the Native Americans, there is no other American counterpart to what was done to Black people here. That doesn’t make the very real bigotry against Asians and the violence they face right now any less real or traumatic, but in scale and scope, it’s just not the same.

I don’t know if you’re intending to try and compare the two, but there are those people who bring up prejudice and violence against Asians as a means of trying to tell Black people to just get over it. I don’t think you’re doing that, but you might want to be aware that that is a cudgel used against Black people sometimes.

I’m not using “badge” as if it is an honorific. It is to say “here is a thing I wear on my sleeve” - a label maybe? But a label that becomes a part of individual identity. I am the WT poster just above this and PP. it’s not a “get over it already” statement which I agree isn’t the way it works. But there is an element of self inflicted re-wounds, like using slurs or trying to reappropriate them within your own group, which is just a form of self harm. Like “remember where you came from” - as if that somehow means you can’t go somewhere else than a prescribed path.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

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Pardon me, but a U. S. Congressman stated out loud what many others are thinking, that the attempted coup on Jan 6th would have been concerning if it was a civil rights protest (aka Black Lives Matter). Meanwhile State Legislators are currently working to make it more difficult for people to vote. The votes of US citizens in “certain” geographies with large black populations were actively under attack by government officials including the President, and you want to have a philosophical discussion, then end to which you have predetermined by likening the culture / trauma of being black in America to wearing a badge. There is an entire governmental infrastructure actively working against a group of people...today, and you want to talk about reliving trauma, and not acknowledge living trauma! Welcome to America.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

.

Pardon me, but a U. S. Congressman stated out loud what many others are thinking, that the attempted coup on Jan 6th would have been concerning if it was a civil rights protest (aka Black Lives Matter). Meanwhile State Legislators are currently working to make it more difficult for people to vote. The votes of US citizens in “certain” geographies with large black populations were actively under attack by government officials including the President, and you want to have a philosophical discussion, then end to which you have predetermined by likening the culture / trauma of being black in America to wearing a badge. There is an entire governmental infrastructure actively working against a group of people...today, and you want to talk about reliving trauma, and not acknowledge living trauma! Welcome to America.

But at what point do those same Congressmembers recognize the political motivations of organize BLM riots that destroyed cities last summer? I agree that the Capitol riot was nonsensical. I also think the lack of ownership of who was financing and/or implicitly condoning BLM is a bit rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Yeah so? Ever heard of the Society for Creative Anacronism. where people dress up in the clothes of Medieval elites who were wealthy due to human serfdom, the second worst thing in the world, next to slavery? What about toga parties? That's where you dress up in the clothes of an ancient Roman elite that got wealthy based on slavery and world domination. Do we have to stop all that too?

Yes. If Girl Scouts have to give up dressing as little girls from other countries on Thinking Day, we certainly can all give up dressing up for parties. Remember, the girl who was attacked for wearing a dress with a mandarin collar to the prom? That was a good one, too.

Pretty soon, we will have to wear uniforms, a la Mao.

I went to a monster party once where someone came as Hitler. Wasn't because he was glorifying him. But, now if anyone does that, they are a Nazi.

That someone is a Nazi and so are you.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:My friends who were Kappas at UGA went to parties like this with KAs where they would wear those hoop skirt dresses and the men dressed like confederate generals. I've seen the photos. I cannot believe they had that in the late 90s. And I went to Chapel Hill, which is in the south but we didn't even those kind of parties. I mean tons of photos (the ones where the professional photographers comes and it has the date, the name of the frat/sorority and name of the party on the bottom). They told me you had to rent the dresses and uniforms. Gross all around. And friends would post on their fb page writing "OMG look at how young we were, ha ha."

People can be so stupid.

To be grossed out by costumes really is kind of stupid.

It’s really weird to me that this has been explained several times on this thread - Confederate cosplay glories slavery - and you still pretend not to see it. When people say and type this kind of thing, it’s difficult to pretend that it doesn’t come from a place of deep, unexamined racism.

That's your opinion, but it is not the opinion of those who engage in Confederate cosplay. Why should I trust your opinion over the opinion of the people who actually wear the costume?

NP, but uh, is this a serious question? That’s like saying “In your opinion, KKK robes are offensive and worn by domestic terrorists, but that’s not the opinion of those who are Klansmen. Why should I trust your opinion over the opinion of the people who actually wear KKK robes?”

What about movies depicting that era? How should the actors dress? Should those movies be banned as well?

I take it that nuance isn't really your thing

DP. Nor is it yours. Nor do you seem aware that HBO pulled Gone with the Wind for it's racism until people complained and they put it back with contextual explainers for how it ignores the horrors of slavery. Which is a fine solution to me, but if that works, why can't I dress like Scarlet O'Hara at a party without endorsing either greed or racism?

Because your costume, presumably, won’t include explicit condemnation of slavery, oppression, and racism, which will give the appearance that you are romanticizing a fictional slave owner and her life story, which was rife with racism. If you felt strongly about condemning the glorification of these things, you wouldn’t pick that costume in the first place. When was the last time you watched Gone With the Wind? You might not accurately remember just how racist it is. It’s painful to watch the depictions of the slaves.

Gone with the wind is awesome. There’s a reason it’s a classic. So there’s slaves in it, there were slaves then. Would you prefer a civil war film that has robots instead of slaves? Or squirrels?

Love this!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for this. Can you (or someone) address the question of reliving the trauma daily as an aspect of culture in contrast to others who witnessed similar hatred (not slavery, but see the earlier Japanese poster with living examples of similar legalized discrimination) but who don’t seem to wear it as a badge? Their experience is still very real - see Georgia yesterday.

.

Pardon me, but a U. S. Congressman stated out loud what many others are thinking, that the attempted coup on Jan 6th would have been concerning if it was a civil rights protest (aka Black Lives Matter). Meanwhile State Legislators are currently working to make it more difficult for people to vote. The votes of US citizens in “certain” geographies with large black populations were actively under attack by government officials including the President, and you want to have a philosophical discussion, then end to which you have predetermined by likening the culture / trauma of being black in America to wearing a badge. There is an entire governmental infrastructure actively working against a group of people...today, and you want to talk about reliving trauma, and not acknowledge living trauma! Welcome to America.

But at what point do those same Congressmembers recognize the political motivations of organize BLM riots that destroyed cities last summer? I agree that the Capitol riot was nonsensical. I also think the lack of ownership of who was financing and/or implicitly condoning BLM is a bit rich.

Wait. Stop. The January 6th insurrection was an attempted coup. There is zero equivalence.