this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2024
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I find there's usually an angle, rather than the wholesale reinvention of history. So I wonder what they're aiming for here? (Or really, is it a literal bare faced rewriting of history because that feels like a sad escalation)
If it were finding an "angle", I suspect it's going to be something like "native American tribes partnered with the colonies in their wars with each other, much of the land was bought in a voluntary way, only some of it was stolen etc". And "it's unfair to characterise the whole of America being built on slavery, state of Mississippi maybe, state of New York less so". Or something like that.
I've no idea what numbers they'd pull out for either of these, or where the actual objective truth lies.
The "angle" is that slavery is very inconvenient for their world view. If you want to Make America Great Again you have to pick a time in the past when it was great. For most on the Right that means a time before the civil rights movement but for another huge segment on the Right it's the time when the country was founded... They truly believe the Constitution was perfect after the Bill of Rights (when the 2nd Amendment was added).
It’s also important for the American civil religion. In this religion the founding fathers are sanctified, and that means we can’t acknowledge that not only was Thomas Jefferson a deeply evil man for participating in slave ownership, but he also knew better and had every reason to. It’s hard to see George Washington or a large chunk of the founding fathers as good and heroic when you understand how evil slavery was. And that’s not even touching on the lost causers
Interesting. I think it says something that they're trying to erase slavery, rather than saying 'ok it was a major economic factor but that's ok'. Can't tell if that significant or not..