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New York, 2:43 AM
Sun Nov 29
12 posts in the last 24 hours
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[www.theroot.com]
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Besides, it's completely American to reject Old World obsessions with blood lines and lineages and to accept and embrace our collective mutty-ness.
10/08/09
We're all very different people. We're not Watusi. We're not Spartans. We're Americans, with a capital 'A', huh? You know what that means? Do ya? That means that our forefathers were kicked out of every decent country in the world. We are the wretched refuse.
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Assuming the First Lady and her family accept the story's findings, I'd expect some changes are in store at that cemetery. It would certainly be a private matter, but talk about your "teachable moments."
10/08/09
She was a child. He was an adult. Worse than that, he owned her, and it's unlikely she was unaware of what that meant. Worse than that, with a word he could have her tortured, maimed, killed without repercussion.
But add to that the fact he was a white male landowner, likely rich -- and she was a black child slave. He had all the power in the world, to come and go as he pleased, to purchase things, to have realistic hopes and see them through to reality.
She was a slave, and the most she could realistically hope for was, what, not to be a slave? To have enough to eat?
Add to all of this the fact that there was NO CONCEPT of rape of a slave. It was considered uncouth, at worst, to bed your slaves, but it's not like there was any thing to stop it from occurring, nor even the slightest option for a 14-year-old slave girl would be able to act upon. So, even if she was brainwashed into being willing -- what was the option for her other than being willing.
So, just as in cases of kidnapping where the kidnapped child/bride/whatever claims love for the kidnapper -- no. It's rape. Whether she's forced down by the power of his muscles, or the power of servitude, age and inability to make a choice, or the power of a government that refuses to acknowledge the idea of rape of a slave... it's rape.
And no amount of modern revision should imply consent to any of these relationships, Sally Hemings on down...
10/08/09
marriage was a few steps better in past centuries, but not that many. wives were still property.
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this is an american story, and those who don't learn its meaning fail at their peril
one country, one people
yes we can
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I know my own family tree back hundreds of years. This simple ability is denied to Michelle Obama. We could find a white descendant of the owner, and doing a cheek swap of them and the First Lady, it could be determined if they are related to each other, much like Sally Hemmings and Tom Jefferson's descendants have done, to find that THEY are related to each other. I doubt if this will be done, just because of what an open wound this would be for all concerned.
As far as I know, none of my ancestors were owned by others. I have one guy that was eaten by his shipmates, but that's as weird as my family tree get. This 'ownership' concept is pretty freakin' horrific, Andrew. I care, even if you don't give a rip.
10/08/09
I want to know individual histories, and I want to know the history of the African American nation, who are, as far as I’m concerned, the chosen people of our time.
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It brings tears to my eyes to think of Melvinia dreaming big dreams for her children, and their children, and so on, the way we all do. Could she ever have dreamed this big? What woud Melvinia have thought had she known her offspring would be the First African American First Lady of ths country? From the depths to the mountaintops.
In response to hanneke, I don't think it is shocking. I think it is triumphant. That is what makes it such a "big news item."
10/08/09
I can't figure out is why such a wonderfully human story shouldn't be told. We learned about the black McCains during last year's election, after all, and I doubt that cost him many votes. As I've said before, we have a complex and interwoven history on this continent, and drawing lines doesn't really do our history justice.
(The other thing I can't figure out is why an African-American woman would use the picture of a white male from the Vanderbilt family as her avatar, but that's beside the point.)
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Oh.
One hundred and fifty years ago.
*cough* As you were.
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