NAVEL GAZING AND TOWN: How hard can it be to know what to think...

TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 2021

...about our (nation's) brutal past?: How hard can it be to know what to think about our brutal past?

Actually, let's put that slightly differently. 

How hard is to to know what to think about our nation's brutal past?

We add one word because the brutal past to which we refer wasn't invented or devised by anyone living today. No one living today made the decisions to which we, on the left, now lovingly tend to return.

Because as humans we're very dumb, we "on the left" often seem eager to make modern people feel guilty about that brutal past. That impulse is dumb in every respect. Did we mention the fact that we're human?

No one living today invented that past, but we humans "on the left" long to keep that past alive in various ways, some of which may make sense. That leads us back to the curious headline which sat atop an interview piece this past weekend at Slate:

"Understanding the Horror of Slavery Is Impossible," the first part of that rather strange headline rather strangely proclaims. The full headline said and says this:

Understanding the Horror of Slavery Is Impossible. But a Simple Cotton Sack Can Bring Us Closer.

The cotton sack in question is an historical artifact. It forms the basis of a new book by Tiya Miles, a history professor at Harvard, whose work we've discussed in the past.

In the piece which carries that headline, Miles is interviewed by Slate's Rebecca Onion. At the end of the interview, Miles offers some good sound advice—advice we'll quote and consider tomorrow.

For today, we want to return to our basic question about that peculiar headline:

For whom is it even hard to understand the horror of slavery, let alone impossible? What can the strange assertion in that headline possibly mean?

Calendars claim that we're living in the year 2021. For whom is the assessment in question difficult, let alone impossible?

According to that rather peculiar headline, the cotton sack discussed in Miles' new book may be able to bring us closer to understanding the horror of slavery. As you can see if you read the interview, the cotton sack is supposed to serve us that way because it evokes one heartbreaking—and brutal—event which apparently took place, apparently in South Carolina, when slavery was still alive.

An inscription on the sack suggests a heartbreaking, brutal story. As Onion and Miles discuss that story, the story is supposed to help us in our attempt to understand—no, to better understand—the horror of that institution, which no longer exists.

That said, we offer a question. Who could possibly need such help? Our reason for asking is this:

Professor Miles hasn't exactly discovered the horror of slavery. Her book revolves around one particular case—an apparent case whose historical details she can't completely pin down.

That said, the horror involved in other such cases have been well known for years. Who isn't fully aware of this fact? Who could possibly need new instruction?

This past Sunday morning, that headline struck us as perhaps even disrespectful. As a result, we pulled out our copy of Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made, an award-winning book by Professor Genovese which appeared in 1974. 

(It followed an earlier book by Genovese, The World the Slaveholders Made. In Our Town, we continue to recommend aspects of that world in ways which strike us as foolish, inhumane, unintelligent.) 

Roll, Jordan, Roll is a very long, very detailed book, based on a wealth of historical sources (diaries, "slave narratives," newspaper reports.) As happenstance had it, we opened to page 484-485, and our eye fell upon a discussion of sexual assaults on enslaved women during the era in question.

Starting at the bottom on page 5484, Genovese describes one particular incident. His account starts like this:

GENOVESE (page 484): Black women fell victim to white lust, but many escaped because the whites knew they had black men who would rather die than stand idly by. In some cases black men protected their women and got off with a whipping or no punishment at all; in other cases they sacrificed their lives. Knowledge of their inevitable response prevented many outrages from happening.

At that point, Genovese quotes a Georgia woman of the Civil War era ridiculing enslaved black men as "cowards." He's quoting her from a published account. 

She "should have known better," he says.

"In view of the risks, the wonder is not that more black men did not defend their women but that so many did," Genovese writes. He notes that sexual attacks of the type in question caused many of these men to "reveal a far greater strength than most men and women are ever asked—or ever should be asked—to display."

With our apologies for where this leads, Genovese then starts to describe one such incident, apparently from the 1790s. The name of a witness is cited:

GENOVESE: An overseer tried to rape Josiah Henson's mother but was overpowered by his father. Yielding to his wife's pleas and the overseer's promise of no reprisal, the enraged slave desisted from killing him. The overseer broke his promise. Henson's father suffered one hundred lashes and had an ear nailed to the whipping post and then severed.

At this point, we've only started to describe the horror involved in this incident. As he continues, Genovese quotes Josiah Henson himself, drawing from one of Henson's published accounts of his own life.

Henson's published quotation appears in italics. Genovese then proceeds:

GENOVESE (continuing directly): Previous to this affair my father, from all I can learn, had been a good-humored and light-hearted man, the ringleader in all fun at corn-huskings and Christmas buffoonery. His banjo was the life of the farm, and all night long at a merry-making would he play on it while the other negroes danced. But from this hour he became utterly changed. Sullen, morose, and dogged, nothing could be done with him.

Threats of being sold south had no effect on him. The thoughts running through his mind as he came to prefer separation from the wife he loved to enduring life there must remain a matter of speculation. His master sold him to Alabama, and he was never heard from again.

This was the horrific incident we encountered when we flipped open the book. Other such events, sourced to historical records, appears throughout Roll. Jordan, Roll, a book which celebrates the moral brilliance of "the world the slaves made" in the face of such brutal treatment.

(For ourselves, we'd be inclined to use the term "enslaved people," not "slaves.")

Our point about this is simple. There's nothing new about the fact that such behavior abounded during our nation's past. Consider:

Genovese's account of this incident appeared in 1974. The account, one of many, appeared in a book which was widely praised.

That said, this wasn't the first occasion upon which the world was able to learn of this particular incident. In the passage we've posted above, Genovese was quoting from the second of Josiah Henson's three published account of his own life.

More specifically, Genovese was quoting from Truth Stranger Than Fiction. Father Henson's Story of His Own Life, a memoir which appeared in 1858. 

Henson had escaped to Canada in 1830. His three memoirs described the horrors he had witnessed and endured as a child born into slavery in the state of Maryland, not far from the nation's capital.

According to the leading authority on the subject, Henson's first book, which appeared in 1849, "is believed to have inspired the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)."  Also according to that authority, that 1852 novel "was the second best-selling book of the 19th century, following the Bible."

People read about the horror of slavery in all the books we've mentioned. Today, the book by Henson which Genovese quoted is in the public domain. 

You can read Henson's full account of that brutal incident, in the book's opening chapter, simply by clicking this link. You'll find the passage Genovese quoted, along with Henson's own first-person account of that horrific incident.

Our point is simple. The horror of slavery has been well known for an extremely long time. 

No one is recommending the reinstitution of that brutal system. We have no idea why anyone living today would find it hard to "understand" the horror of that institution, an institution which no one living today had a hand in creating or extending.

Who could possibly find it hard, let alone "impossible,"  to "understand the horror of slavery?" Does that headline really reflect anything Onion or Miles actually thought as they discussed the professor's new book? Does it reflect any part of Miles' purpose in creating the book?

As we've noted, Miles offered some good advice as the interview came to an end. But what could that headline possibly mean or intend to suggest? Also, what might it possibly say about the possible moral vapidity of us, the deeply self-involved, possibly navel-gazing denizens of this, Our Own Failing Town?

How hard is it to know what to think about our (nation's) brutal past? How hard is it to "understand" the horror involved in that history?

Who could possibly find the task hard? What can that headline, and parts of that interview, suggest about us in Our Town?

Tomorrow: Possibly a bit late in the game, Miles offers some good advice


31 comments:

  1. "How hard is to to know what to think about our nation's brutal past?"

    Not hard at all, dear Bob.

    Every nation on this Earth has a brutal past. It's nothing special, and there is no reason to think about it at all, other than perhaps on special occasions.

    "Because as humans we're very dumb"

    Don't judge humyns, dear Bob. You liberals are dumb indeed, but we humyns are perfectly fine.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ma0 ma0 * ,!, ,!,

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  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Agreed, that teaching children about the racism of the entire Republican Party today, is more important than teaching them about slavery 160 years ago.
    But we should still teach both.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We'd be a better nation, if the media would learn about the racism of the entire Republican Party today.

      Delete
    2. Bitch, I have your cotton sack hangin' right here.

      Delete
    3. 10:43,
      That's a pretty good imitation of a Klansman, but Mitch McConnell's is more authentic.

      Delete
  4. The GOP's Southern Strategy should be taught in every grade school in the county. Journalism schools, too.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Brilliant post by Somerby. One of his best, sure to attacked by the usual flock of haters.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Do you ever get the feeling you're being played?

      https://twitter.com/SykesCharlie/status/1396844806547050499/photo/1

      It's a political strategy to rile up the base, and sway the low-information voter.

      Delete
    2. Agreed, it was a great post by Somerby.

      And what do we have as the counterpoint in the comments? Nothing of substance. Pointing at the Republicans and saying they are bad (The Others)!

      If you listen quietly you can almost hear rationality dying a soft, whimpering death.

      Delete
    3. Is one still a "hater" if they only hate Somerby but love everyone else?

      Delete
    4. Somerby sure does have the "running interference for the bigot party " down pat.

      Delete
  6. "How hard is it to know what to think about our (nation's) brutal past?
    How hard is it to "understand" the horror involved in that history?"

    Not that hard. It's just that Republicans (a minority of the country) have the microphone, AGAIN, and they are stirring up shit to rile up their base.
    All they have is punching down. Without it, there is no ideology on the Right.

    ReplyDelete
  7. When you read about the horrors of slavery, who do you identify with? Based on my race-blind up-bringing, I can identify with the slave as easily as with the slave-owner. And, a black American also can identify as easily with the slave-owner as with the slave. After all, none of us was a slave or a slave-owner.

    Needless to say, this POV is probably incomprehensible to many people today.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Not very long ago, white people (including doctors) believed that African Americans were uniquely suited to being slaves because they could work hard for long hours and withstand pain. People still think that about black boxers. How would someone with those assumptions interpret that story about being given 100 lashes as a slave? Do people today understand what a single lash feels like? Do they know that it breaks the skin and leaves a scar for the length of the wound? Do they know that men faint after 3 lashes and cry out in agony after each one? Do they know that 100 lashes can kill a person?

      Somerby assumes that people today can understand what the various experiences in slavery without further explanation. That is unlikely to be true. That's why this needs to be taught in history courses -- so that students can understand what was actually happening.

      David, clearly doesn't understand. He thinks it is only a matter of who you identify with -- no further understanding required.

      For example, why would that mother have given her daughter a cotton sack? Because it was trash, empty and discarded, and because slaves had no personal possessions beyond what was given to them by their owners. The symbolism the mother attached to the bag is touching, but the bag itself means more than just that. It shows the poverty and the lack of property owned by slaves who were themselves owned by another person. Will a child understand this without explanation. I doubt it.

      Somerby is an asshole when he assumes that because he understands something everyone else must too, and in exactly the same way he does. And when he doesn't understand something, he assumes others do not either because it is a phantom explanation. I don't know why Somerby thinks like this, but it shows an extreme lack of empathy, a failure of what psychologists call "theory of mind" -- the understanding that other people think different things than oneself, and the ability to put yourself into the mind of another person. Somerby seems deficient in that regard.

      Delete
    2. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    3. @david
      So it’s easy to see yourself treating others as property, buying and selling them, ripping their children away to be sold, raping the women, brutally punishing them? You may be a sociopath. Or maybe you haven’t learned enough true history.

      Delete
    4. Needless to say, this POV is probably incomprehensible to many people today.
      Yep, it sure is.

      Delete
    5. mh - Yes, I can imagine doing those horrible things and I can imagine having those horrible things done to me. IMO that's perfectly normal

      I'm in the middle of a very fine novel, "The Intuitionist" by prize-winning author Colin Whitehead. It includes a horrific torture scene. Works of art like this allow readers to imagine being on either side of horrendous behavior.

      Delete
    6. ILya - I disagree with the popular belief that one can only identify with people of the same race. E.g., when I work out I'm inspired by Jerry Rice.

      Delete
    7. There should be no issue with talking about the horrors of slavery as mitigated by the age of the student.

      What's concerning is this going to be nothing but a political device to instill in all races an animosity, pessimism, and a sense of alienation towards the entirety of our history and tradition.

      This empowers a oligarchy-technocracy and its subservient managerial class that will literary run the planet "for the good of all".

      We're not in Kansas anymore. We now live a world where mass interaction happens at the speed of light and every movement is instantly tracked.

      Delete
    8. And of course only the oligarch Trump can save us from the oligarchy.

      Delete
    9. There was the hope that Fred Flintstone with money could forestall it. He may have gold toilet seats, but bosses from Quens dont like being pushed around either.

      Delete
    10. @Cecelia June 15, 2021 at 7:01 PM

      Well said.

      @mh, "the oligarch Trump"
      Is he an oligarch or a pauper posing as a billionaire? Could you check with your supervisor which talking point is active today, please. It's confusing.

      Delete
    11. "What's concerning..."

      Thoughts and prayers, Cecelia.

      Delete
    12. Thank you, Anonymouse 11:56am.

      Delete
  8. “How hard is to to know what to think about our nation's brutal past?”

    How did Bob Somerby know what to think? By reading some books (Roll, Jordan, Roll/ Truth Stranger Than Fiction). So, reading these books helped Somerby understand the horrors of slavery.

    But how many people have actually read these books? Most probably haven’t, and would only encounter them in a high school, college or university class where they were assigned reading material. But that is precisely what is endangered right now: these books may be deemed unacceptable because they present a negative view of America or of white people. So, you end up with future generations ignorant of the stories contained in such books, and therefore unable “to know what to think about our nation’s brutal past.”

    Somerby says “we "on the left" often seem eager to make modern people feel guilty about that brutal past.”

    First of all, if simply reading factual accounts about the brutality, as Somerby did in those books, makes people feel guilty, then that is not the fault of liberals who want to teach about the brutal history of slavery, and it certainly isn’t a reason to ban the books or the teaching.

    But I would argue that Somerby is wrong about the motives of liberals. Millions of black people can trace their family tree back to an enslaved person. Learning about the lives of such people helps make us more understanding of these people and their present situation, just as learning about the history of any group helps us understand that group today, This seems obvious. Just because no one today created slavery isn’t any reason to ignore it or outright ban it from being taught.

    And what of future generations of Americans? Won’t they need to be exposed to these stories in these books in order to be able to understand what to think about our brutal past? After all, he who is ignorant of the past is doomed to repeat it…

    ReplyDelete
  9. The latest from Kevin Drum:

    ‘Critical Race Theory Is Just the Latest Hysteria About Black People From Fox News’
    https://jabberwocking.com/critical-race-theory-is-just-the-latest-hysteria-about-black-people-from-fox-news/

    I can’t help thinking that Drum is talking about Somerby when he says “well-meaning moderates and liberals.” (Even though one can dispute whether he is well-meaning or liberal):

    ‘there are also well-meaning moderates and liberals out there who have gotten on the "let's hear them out" bandwagon. These are people who would insist that they aren't influenced by right-wing agitprop, but they are. It goes like this: Fox keeps up the noise long enough; a few Republican legislatures propose performative laws to "ban CRT"; the mainstream media takes notice; and now we're all talking about it.’

    And there are charts...

    ReplyDelete
  10. LOTTO, lottery,jackpot.
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    ReplyDelete