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You couldn't be any more wrong with this statement. Texas wouldn't be what it is today if it wasn't for White settlers migrating to the territory for the pursuit of slavery. Decades before Texas became a state, White settlers came to Texas as slave owners and brought with them enslaved Africans. I recently found out that my Great Great Great Great Grandfather was an enslaved African from Virginia. The sick white slave owner "purchased" him in Virginia and later moved to Jonesville, Texas 20 minutes outside of Marshall,Texas. My ancestor gained his freedom and would later settle in Marshall. White "Settlers" were coming into Texas as Slaver owners while Mexico owned Texas. Majority of these "settlers" came from Slave holding states in the South and came so in droves due to soil exhaustion and stiff competition when it came to owning land. Not to mention there were even White "settlers" who didn't own slaves in the Southeast but migrated to Texas looking to get into the slave business in the new territories in the state.
Even before Mexico won it's independence from Spain in order to get Texas, the area still had a distinct history of Slavery. Because of Spanish control, slavery had a different approach. In fact freeing enslaved Africans was pushed throughout Spanish Texas. During this period many enslaved Africans escaped to Spanish Texas and joined Indigenous tribes or settled in parts of East Texas as freedman or runaways. Some intermarried with indigenous and Spanish people and created a class of mulatto's in area's around and in San Antonio. Galveston was used as a port of entry to smuggle enslaved Africans into the United States and sale them in New Orleans. During this time the importation of enslaved Africans was considered Illegal in United States. Also you had many more enslaved Africans that escaped into Mexico via Texas.(what is considered Mexico to this day) Their descendants still live in Mexico to this day.
The problem with a lot of White Texas historians is they like to only recognize slavery in Texas when it became a State. This completely ignores the most important events that took place and helped make the state what it is to this very day. It's easy to say Texas wasn't like those other southern states because we only had 20 years of slavery. Yeah that was 20 years as a State. But the events that led to those 20 years of Statehood is the biggest pieces to the historical puzzle. Tensions were a constant theme between Anglo "settlers" and Mexicans because those Anglo's didn't want to follow the program. They wanted to bear arms, speak English legally under Mexican rule, be apart of the legal system and continue to OWN SLAVES. That's why historians leave out those details when talking about the Alamo or the birth of Texas.
Easier to sell you the idea that Texas was full of heroic larger than life White Men who fought the tyrannical Mexican army, than to tell you these were racist sexist and entitled White Men who fought for the right to own slaves and not accept rules in what was than a foreign land. The truth isn't good for tourism I guess.
Bottom line, Texas while having a distinct culture different than most of the south(Louisiana also had a distinct culture as well since they were under Spanish and French rule before Americans took over) the culture is still heavily rooted in the Deep South. It's a reason why Marshall was going to be considered the capital of Missouri during the Civil War by a Missouri Confederate sympathizer. It's a reason why segregation and Jim Crow Laws were prevalent in Texas after the emancipation of slavery like other southern states.
I sense a bit of discourse or maybe bitterness in your views. The population of Texas in the 1860's was roughly 600,000 people; of which about 180,000 were slaves. As you mentioned, many had come to Texas from other states such as Tennessee, Missouri and others. This was at the request of the Mexican government when Texas was under Mexican rule to encourage migration and help grow population that already included the Mexican "Tejanos" and German immigrants. Mexico abolished slavery sometime around 1830 which made many of the slave owners very unhappy, but that was not the sole reason for the Texas Republic declaring it's independence from Mexico. However, this DOES NOT make it a racist society. To paint a generation of people as being racist and sexist goes along with modern day leftist ideologies. Although I'll agree with many of the points you made as being historically correct, you are basing your personal feelings on a generation of people from 200 years ago that were raised a certain way in order to make a living. As horrific as slavery was, the owners of such slaves were not considered "racists" back in those days or sexist by any means. Having slaves for many was a way of life. Although most owners were good to their slaves, there are accounts of brutal men who did terrible things. Unfortunately, that was the way of life for many cultures throughout the world. The European nations that introduced the African slave trade were assisted by other African tribes in many cases; or was that just something added by "white" historians? Spain, Portugal, England and others utilized this trade for many years (centuries) before America (U.S) was even a nation and they were also some of the nations to outlaw slavery. Focusing in on "white settlers" as the root cause of a state, region or nation to be considered so called racist, is to me a self petty of 150 year old grudge that many people need to let go.
I believe this thread was to once again raise a polarizing but friendly conversation that Texas (although it is in the south), is not a "southern" state but a unique blend of cultures; and yes that includes the American southern culture. As I've said before and many may have stated already, the sheer size and geography, history and location of the state of Texas makes it uniquely Texan, not southern, in my opinion.
Mississippi isn't in the "colonial south" and yet it's the most iconic southern state. You do realise the Colonial South is a strip that includes VA, the Carolinas and GA and that's about it. KY, TN, AL, FL, MS, AR, LA are not colonial. Neither are TX and OK.
For the record I see Texas as Southern but also Southwestern. In the sense that it's not Southeastern. Southern like Illinois is Northern, but not Northeastern. Likewise I see Arizona and New Mexico as ALSO Southwestern BUT not Southern.
No... no it doesn't. Kansas City is more similar to Minneapolis-Saint Paul than Dallas. I haven't been to St. Louis but that city has been described as being a cultural cousin to Chicago. I can see some connections with KC and DFW but overall KC is very Midwestern. DFW is NOT.
I sense a bit of discourse or maybe bitterness in your views. The population of Texas in the 1860's was roughly 600,000 people; of which about 180,000 were slaves. As you mentioned, many had come to Texas from other states such as Tennessee, Missouri and others. This was at the request of the Mexican government when Texas was under Mexican rule to encourage migration and help grow population that already included the Mexican "Tejanos" and German immigrants. Mexico abolished slavery sometime around 1830 which made many of the slave owners very unhappy, but that was not the sole reason for the Texas Republic declaring it's independence from Mexico. However, this DOES NOT make it a racist society. To paint a generation of people as being racist and sexist goes along with modern day leftist ideologies. Although I'll agree with many of the points you made as being historically correct, you are basing your personal feelings on a generation of people from 200 years ago that were raised a certain way in order to make a living. As horrific as slavery was, the owners of such slaves were not considered "racists" back in those days or sexist by any means. Having slaves for many was a way of life. Although most owners were good to their slaves, there are accounts of brutal men who did terrible things. Unfortunately, that was the way of life for many cultures throughout the world. The European nations that introduced the African slave trade were assisted by other African tribes in many cases; or was that just something added by "white" historians? Spain, Portugal, England and others utilized this trade for many years (centuries) before America (U.S) was even a nation and they were also some of the nations to outlaw slavery. Focusing in on "white settlers" as the root cause of a state, region or nation to be considered so called racist, is to me a self petty of 150 year old grudge that many people need to let go.
I believe this thread was to once again raise a polarizing but friendly conversation that Texas (although it is in the south), is not a "southern" state but a unique blend of cultures; and yes that includes the American southern culture. As I've said before and many may have stated already, the sheer size and geography, history and location of the state of Texas makes it uniquely Texan, not southern, in my opinion.
It's not being "good" to someone to own them and their children. No matter how "good" you treat your slave, there's no escaping the fact that you own the person, thus taking away all of their rights and choices. This is one of the more disgusting things I've read here.
Focusing in on "white settlers" as the root cause of a state, region or nation to be considered so called racist, is to me a self petty of 150 year old grudge that many people need to let go.
A 150-year old grudge that white southerners such as yourself still carry on to this very day as well. I'm sure you're in denial of that though.
Nor is it the norm. Seven southern states are ranked in the top half of the states in total when it comes to diversity - and they are also doing very well economically, though of course some more than others (I'm looking at you, Louisiana). They are - in order - Texas (ranked #2 by the way, only surpassed by California), Florida, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Louisiana, and South Carolina.
The bottom ten states (ranked from least diverse up but all are in the top bottom ten) are: West Virginia (my husband calls WV "the land time forgot), Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Montana, Kentucky, Iowa, Utah, Ohio, Wyoming, and Indiana. https://ceoworld.biz/2018/09/19/repo...-u-s-for-2018/
Having lived in Texas, Georgia, and Virginia, Georgia never struck me as highly diverse. Its overwhelmingly a black/white populace.
Status:
"Christians are not oppressed in the US."
(set 10 days ago)
Location: Minneapolis, MN
7,094 posts, read 5,390,200 times
Reputation: 9401
Quote:
Originally Posted by soletaire
Yes..yes it does. YMMV but Ive been to both also, and DFW definitely reminds me of KC in landscape and somewhat of St Louis in culture & dialect.
What? The Dallas accent is a southern twang. St. Louis' dialect is Midwestern. How on earth are they similar in dialect? I used to have a professor when I went to UNT (Denton) who was from St. Louis and her accent sounded similar to Chicago's... nothing at all like Dallas'.
So exactly how do those areas feel far more Southwest than the South? I live in Houston, lived in Dallas, grew up in Northeast Texas in a area called Arklatex and have family in Beaumont. Golden Triangle feels like an extension of SouthWEST Louisiana. Houston is international and global but culturally it’s still a Gulf coast southern city. Dallas is a global and just as international but culturally it’s a southern city with some Great Plains attributes. Ft. Worth is where the “west” begins atleast for the Anglo Saxon groups.
Where I grew up in East Texas, where closer to Memphis than we are even Austin in miles and culturally. Our bbq is more like other parts of the south(much better) were not centered around brisket like the rest of the state. Blacks in most cities and towns in East Texas and South East Texas are still the 2nd largest minority group over Hispanics like most other southern cities. I promise you most East Texans have never been to West Texas or anywhere bordering Mexico. We border Louisiana and Arkansas.
Southwest consist of cities like Phoenix,Albuquerque, El Paso,Tucson. Houston has more in common with New Orleans than those cities. Dallas while being more cosmopolitan has more in common with OKC and Little Rock than those cities. I honestly think people categorize these areas of Texas as Southwest due to decades of media’s portrayal of Texas as some desert no mans land. Yes Texas does have a distinct culture apart from the rest of the southern south but in certain areas there are far more similarities than there are differences.
"Our bbq is more like other parts of the south(much better) were not centered around brisket like the rest of the state". NOT buying that at all! I've tasted bbq east of Texas...there's some good spots but not much when it comes to beef and that sorry vinegar-based stuff that prevails in the Carolinas needs to go!
Status:
"Christians are not oppressed in the US."
(set 10 days ago)
Location: Minneapolis, MN
7,094 posts, read 5,390,200 times
Reputation: 9401
Quote:
Originally Posted by walker1962
Don't see the "flexibility" of which you speak regarding the "North". The eastern sea-board, especially, from Baltimore to Boston are very "Yankee-ish".
I dunno what you're talking about. And the eastern seaboard is full of people from all over, and it doesn't take away from its "northern-ness." You're proving my point.
It's not being "good" to someone to own them and their children. No matter how "good" you treat your slave, there's no escaping the fact that you own the person, thus taking away all of their rights and choices. This is one of the more disgusting things I've read here.
Yeah, this guy is totally missing the point.
He doesn't seem to understand that the primary evil of slavery is owning someone. How you treat them is secondary. (but definitely was usually cruel and inhumane as well)
There is some credibility to the claim that some slaves were better fed than nearby poor whites, but that misses the whole point.
It doesn't matter how you treat your slaves, the owning of the slaves is the primary moral wrong. Abusing them is just adding insult to injury.
Fredrick Douglas totally agrees with my above point BTW.
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