And I disagree with you. Thank you for being civil.
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You do know that many of the WW2 labor camps provided cheap labor for German corporations, right? In fact, Schindler was able to save the Jews he did because he hired them. Today, in modern privatized prisons, once again, you have prisoners providing cheap labor for pennies on the dollar what they can get from the free population. Not everyone agrees that profit motives are not involved or even secondary in building labor camps.
Iâm not necessarily advocating for calling the plantation system labor camps. I do think making the comparison can probably be fruitful, both where they show similarities and where they differ.
Writing history is not an exact science. itâs an art - it changes with the time and how we view historically events. shifting into a mode were we highlight the sheer violence of the plantation system could help end the utterly stupid âslavery (and by extension, Jim Crow) wasnât so badâ narrative is critical, I think, if weâre finally going to come to terms with our past and actually deal with it. Again, at least Germany has attempted to do that. We continue to sweep it under the rug. Itâs shameful and it needs to stop.
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I too like âslave plantation.â It conveys a specific meaning without glossing over the awfulness.
To me, using the word âcampâ (as in âlabor campâ or even âslave campâ) implies something short-term rather than an institution that spanned centuries. Even the death camps employed during the Holocaust were only up and running for a few years.
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I agree, but again, I donât think this method (as per the article) is the way to do that. Comparing plantations to German labor camps in full, as you suggest? Good idea, although Iâll still point out that the core purpose of each was distinct. And yes, history in general but sadly, both USA history and a more general current narrative both keep trying to paint the picture that a: our history isnât as bad as it is and b: bigotry isnât as bad as it is, and both of those concepts need to be challenged mercilessly.
i donât think the current method needs much alteration. Just push the facts, as they stand, and when someone says something stupid like, âI donât think being a hateful bigot makes Kim Davis a bad person, you should leave her alone,â you turn, give them âthat look,â and then maybe taze them or something for good measure. Itâs enough, I think, to just repeat and demonstrate, repeatedly, that yes bigotry really is that bad and we need to treat it as such.
Well, I disagree. All youâre arguing for is substituting one set of shorthands for another rather than actually understanding what happened at the time. If you use one language in a quote and another in a discussion, all you achieve is cognitive dissonance. I guess that is the difference between real history and pop history.
And historians try to avoid judgments, btw. History is a story of evolution, and judgments shortcut that story. Mark Twain is a case in point. Heâs regularly condemned for using the N-word but he was inarguably the most liberal, least racist person of his day. His language did not foresee modern sensibilities, and many people pass judgment on that while failing to understand his role as a vehicle of change.
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WPA?
Those guys volunteered and were glad to get jobs (paying jobs), and while they were indeed âcampingâ, and doing âlaborâ, equating the WPA with prison farms or Stalags (I think you meant Gulags, there is a difference) is way off base.
Sorry, pedantry, but Iâve met some old-timers who would get upset if you put down the WPA or CCC.
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OK, Iâm a Twain fan but itâs silly to say he was âinarguablyâ any of those things. There were plenty of people who were actively fighting racism and sexism with far more gusto than he ever did.
And Iâm totally, 100% on board with people not using the N-word anymore.
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There, FTFY
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Iâd be OK with other people choosing not to use it too, I just donât think thatâs my call.
If a certain group decides that name applies to them and only lets others like them use it, I have to deal with that. Itâs their choice in the end.
It doesnât change the wordâs historical connotations.
Only lets? How could they forbid others from using it?
No one here said it does, unless I missed something. Not all black people are okay with other black people using it, but it has connotations among a lot of black people that differ from other peopleâs senses of âhistorical connotations.â
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Fair point.
I canât help but think that if we made this kind of sea change in our history books, several generations hence we would be changing it back, or changing it to something else. Maybe thatâs just the way historiography works. Fair enough.
I think in 50 years it will either be stamped out, or neutered to the point it is used like âdudeâ.
I donât honestly think thereâs anything that will make them change their worldview, short of some âTwilight Zoneâ scenario where they experience actual 19th century American slavery. Changing the language isnât an attempt to sway them, they are probably beyond that anyway.
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There were people who were fighting it in different ways than Twain but not anyone who was more opposed to the idea of racism. Jim was the only decent human being in Huckleberry Finn, and not by accident.
When weâre talking about comparatives, opinions will inevitably vary. I think weâre (mostly) on board with not using the N-word any more, and I think it is safe to say that if Twain were alive today, he would be too. And that is basically the point. It is a mistake to condemn the past for not knowing everything we know today. You have to understand the intent behind the words, and in their historical context, and that gets back to the original post: letâs change the names of everything as a shorthand way of condemning everything we hate so that we donât have to be bothered with subtleties, distinctions, and the bother of understanding.
Whoâs âweâ?
And âInjun Joeâ was the most terrifying character in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and not by accident.
Again, Twain was a very progressive guy for his time but I wouldnât say âthere wasnât anyone who was more opposed to the idea of racism.â
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A âslave ownerâsâ position in the food chain is immaterial. If they bought a person and did not immediately set them free, they were an enslaver. Likewise if they claimed slavesâ offspring as property. âOne who initiates enslavementâ and, âone who perpetuates enslavementâ is a distinction without a difference. In most of Africa, âslaveâ had a distinctly different meaning from the much more brutal chattel slavery practiced by the American south. The most accurate description would be slow-moving genocide IMO. Forced labor was the most benign aspect of it, focusing on that in itself minimizes what really happened.
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I think youâve got the right of it. I think its a situation where its a good idea to make sure to use more accurate terms and those more accurate terms will almost invariably paint these things in a more negative light (because they were very bad things). To use terminology that stresses those negative aspects but isnât any more accurate may feel right, but isnât really all that useful. The labor camp one is great example. A plantation is not a labor camp. Nor is it automatically a bad thing, or by necessity tied to slavery. There are still plenty of plantations today. Thatâs where our bananas, coffee, and natural rubber come from. But plantations usually contain a labor camp (of sorts, work camp might be more accurate). And the plantations of the American south contained a slave labor camp. Which is why we already have a better term for those plantations Slave Plantation. Its a term thatâs already in frequent use today, and wasnât even all that uncommon back then. âSlave Plantationâ draws a nice distinction by focusing on the slavery bit, âLabor Campâ seems like a lazy attempt to invite comparisons to the holocaust and prisons. Which frankly seems a bit unnecessary (this horrible thing is kind of like this other horrible thing, arenât they both so horrible).
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