Sunday, July 4, 2010

from my friend on facebook......(Bruce Asbury)" I think we need to stop feeling guilty about slavery. Virtually the entire Western world maintained slavery well into the 1800's. Yes, it was terrible..BUT we learned it from the Brits, the French, the Danes, the Spanish etc. In the East and Mideast, slavery continued into the 20th century. In many African countries, slavery continues to this day. It was horrible...and it is horrible. But I didn't do it...and I have stopped feeling guilty about it. I voted for Obama as my penance."

i'm not certain how i feel about bruce's post. i like bruce alot and that makes me less concerned...but if we don't feel a bit angry or have this tragedy in some part of our collective brains, then i worry that with the conservative zest and the tea party peeps that have leaders like rand paul and sarah palin..we may relapse from our very short history of trying to equalize the war between the white man and any other color man. who gives a shit where or from whom we learned it? it just isn't enough to say it was horrible. we have mexicans risking everything to work for the lowest wages in the country, who do our biding as nannies, gardeners, caretakers, diaper changes of the young and old, cleaning and all the worst jobs that no one will do...same kind of jobs...living in shacks, hiding from the white man, being arrested, terrorized and used. i do feel guilty. don't think it matters that bruce or i didn't do it...it matters because it exists.

2 comments:

  1. yes, madalyn sue, I totally agree with you---stopping feeling guilty (not sure if guilt is the correct word)about our country's past is like forgetting about the wars or how we obtained our freedoms. we shouldn't take a chance on many historical events repeating themselves.

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  2. Slavery is only a small part of it. Nance is correct. Guilty is not the word. Shame is. I am ashamed, not guilty. As I posted somewhere on HuffPo, I am ashamed of the treatment of all people of color, so many innocent people who are still terrorized bc they are different; Native Americans, African Americans, Muslims, Italians, Jews, Chinese, Japanese, Eskimos, now Hispanics. Never forget the shame of it all.

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