American Slavery: How bad was it really? (drug, racist, how much)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
But they do need to get over it don't they? What purpose does it serve to not get over it? Why would you choose to be a perpetual victim rather than move on? It has been roughly 154 years since slavery was abolished. It can't be a good thing mental health wise to dwell on the fact your ancestors were slaves can it?
It's not so much Slavery, it's what happened afterwards. With the jim crow era laws, Lynching black men up until the early 60's, Allowing whites to prosper with the GI-bill after WWII, But Blacks who fought in the war were denied the GI bill and home loans in record numbers.
"How can you pull yourself up by your boots straps, when you don't have any boots"
Quote:
Additionally, banks and mortgage agencies refused loans to blacks, making the G.I.Bill even less effective for blacks. Once they returned from the war, blacks faced discrimination and poverty, which represented a barrier to harnessing the benefits of the G.I
But they do need to get over it don't they? What purpose does it serve to not get over it? Why would you choose to be a perpetual victim rather than move on? It has been roughly 154 years since slavery was abolished. It can't be a good thing mental health wise to dwell on the fact your ancestors were slaves can it?
That problem wasn't slavery, that problem was Jim Crow.
You mentioned our "ancestors", but technically, you can find the kids smiling in postcards of innocent black men being burned alive or pregnant women being hanged as old men walking around today. Even though legalized slavery, as it existed before the Civil War ended, it was a few generations ago. I have a friend who works in a nursing home who tells me about one of her patients who wistfully reminisces about the days when you could "do whatever you want to a ni**er" and nobody could/would do anything about it...
That was still true when I was in elementary school, and I'm only on the precipice of retirement now.
Jim Crow laws ended only 54 years ago. For many, their parents and grandparents were subjected to institutional racism. Saying "get over it" is a bit absurd.
Pretty easy for people who were never victims to point fingers and say to stop playing victim.
Even though the laws were 54 years ago, the concept that localities actually had to obey laws out of Washington DC hadn't yet been settled. That took another decade to prove out.
The last time I had to watch a movie in a segregated theater was July 20, 1969.
My mother grew up in a white, working class family in the very same small southern town and at the same time as Maya Angelou (Stamps, AR in the 1950s). No, they didn't know each other, and it was largely due to rampant segregation, because it's a very small town and they were the exact same age - so if they'd gone to school together, they probably would have known each other.
My mom grew up to be a supporter of the Civil Rights movement however, and our parents raised us kids to embrace equality and equal opportunity for all.
By the time I went to school, the schools were integrated and the Civil Rights movement had accomplished a lot, but there was still a lot to make up for, because racism and slavery and the effects of it last for generations.
I never blamed African Americans for being skeptical of white folks - who could blame them? Or of "the system" or "Da Man." The system, the government, white folks in general, had stripped them of so many rights and privileges for so many decades, hundreds of years actually. My gosh, look at the Irish and English or Scottish and English, or the Tutsis and Hutus in Rwanda, or Armenians in Azurbaijan, or Jews and Muslims in Israel/Palestine. Or just fill in the blank. Do we tell these groups to just "get over it?" Do we expect, within one or two generations, for everything to just be hunky dory between ethnic groups when there's been a blatant imbalance of power and abuse for decades or even hundreds of years?
I always go back to the Golden Rule. Treat others as you want to be treated. Period. Today. Right now. We can't change the past, but we can create a better future for our children.
"How can you pull yourself up by your boots straps, when you don't have any boots"
Slavery is always horrible.
Many, probably most of the participants in this thread don't seem to recognize that servitude, albeit in a less-direct form, was the rule for the vast majority of Americans until the early Twentieth Century -- due to an economy centered on agriculture (agrarianism) which could not sustain itself in any other form.
And it wasn't that much different on the other side of the Atlantic. Most of my ancestors were simple German peasants not that far removed from serfdom; when a revolution failed in 1848, it was a choice of either continued suffering under a nobility which had wasted many of their uncles and cousins in the Napoleanic wars, or emigration as an indentured servant. Then came a year or two of working off their passage, after which there were free to start over, and clear and work their own homestead in less-settled regions.
And after that came subsistence farming, whereby they supplied most of their own necessities -- the patriarch ruled, and successive generations had to fend for themselves -- usually by toil in the fields. The cash economy was limited; most of the tradesmen-- layers included -- had to supplement their incomes and lifestyles by manual labor. Even in the South, hardscrabble farmers far outnumbered those engaged in the plantation system -- black and white.
Those who seek to sit in judgement too often have no concept of how brutal things really were -- and this system continued until the development of industrialism -- often a generation or two later in the South and West.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 05-23-2019 at 12:16 PM..
Many, probably most of the participants in this thread don't seem to recognize that servitude, albeit in a less-direct form, was the rule for the vast majority of Americans until the early Twentieth Century -- due to an economy centered on agriculture (agrarianism) which could not sustain itself in any other form.
And it wasn't that much different on the other side of the Atlantic. Most of my ancestors were simple German peasants not that far removed from serfdom; when a revolution failed in 1848, it was a choice of either continued suffering under a nobility which had wasted many of their uncles and cousins in the Napoleanic wars, or emigration as an indentured servant. Then came a year or two of working off their passage, after which there were free to start over, and clear and work their own homestead in less-settled regions.
And after that came subsistence farming, whereby they supplied most of their own necessities -- the patriarch ruled, and successive generations had to fend for themselves -- usually by toil in the fields. The cash economy was limited; most of the tradesmen-- layers included -- had to supplement their incomes and lifestyles by manual labor. Even in the South, hardscrabble farmers far outnumbered those engaged in the plantation system -- black and white.
Those who seek to sit in judgement too often have no concept of how brutal things really were -- and this system continued until the development of industrialism -- often a generation or two later in the South and West.
PLEASE take some time to listen to the podcast in the OP. Because it directly addresses this “everybody had it bad” type of thinking about slavery, etc.
Harriet Beecher Stowe did a really good job of describing how slavery was really bad 'even for the slaves who had it really good.'
There are also other period-written narratives. There's no need to speculate on what it was like. We have direct witness reports.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
