[Vision2020] Aaaaaa! Slavery!

Jeremy Downey dunadhaigh@hotmail.com
Mon, 13 Oct 2003 02:14:29 -0700


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<P>Melynda Huskey wrote:</P>
<P>"Instead, you chose to write about the splendid lives enjoyed by Southern slaves -- about the abundant food, the simple pleasures, and the tender care they received. You chose to write about what a fine thing it was for those black people to held as property, to be forbidden to contract legally binding marriages, to be taken from their children to tend their owner's homes and children, to watch their children sold away from them, to be bred against their wills to one another, to be beaten and branded and chained. That's apparently your idea of the best race-relations in the history of the world. </P>
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<P>"And you're surprised that the subtle anti-racism of your position isn't clear?"</P>
<P>With all due respect, you seem to have missed the entire point of the book, which was to question that sort of broad stereotyping of a much-maligned people group, a society for whom you seem to have no tolerance whatsoever.&nbsp; Mr. Wilson is coming to the defense of a people whom he believes to be viciously and unjustly treated in the self-congratulatory modern rhetoric.&nbsp; He is questioning the dominant historical assumption, like any number of other historians in any number of other fields.&nbsp; It appears, however, that the historical establishment is unquestionable on this issue, and that once again Mr. Wilson has blasphemed a modern god.<BR><BR>Melynda Huskey also wrote:</P>
<P>"Note that none of those reasons precludes Doug's defense of slavery from being racist. The old "Some of my best friends are black" defense no longer holds much currency."</P></DIV>
<P>Bonds of friendship are so out-of-date.&nbsp; You may think you love the black man, but Melynda Huskey knows better.&nbsp; The Thought Gestapo is the wave of the future.</P>
<P>And yes, a title like "The Biblical Offence of Racism" is pretty subtle.&nbsp; Why can't Wilson just say what he means?</P>
<P><BR>Jeremy Downey,</P>
<P>Former roommate of Steve "The White Supremacist Hatemonger" Wilkins' son,</P>
<P>Friend of Chris "If I Were Any Blacker My Obsidian Stout Would Get Jealous" Morris</P>
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;From: "Melynda Huskey" <MGHUSKEY@HOTMAIL.COM>
<DIV></DIV>&gt;To: "vision2020" <VISION2020@MOSCOW.COM>
<DIV></DIV>&gt;Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Aaaaaa! Slavery! 
<DIV></DIV>&gt;Date: Sun, 12 Oct 2003 16:09:28 -0700 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;Dear Doug, 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;Several books of the OT, notably Leviticus and Deuteronomy, do indeed legislate the terms on which the Israelites may hold slaves. But in my readings of the Bible, not a single state of the Confederacy is mentioned. The title of your tract is not "A Defense of Slavery among the Hebrew Peoples," so why bring in U.S. slaveholders at all, if the Bible is your concern? 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;In fact, if Biblical law was indeed your primary concern, you *might* have written a book which condemned slavery in the antebellum South. For example, African slaves were not taken as prisoners in battle. African women were not married to their white owners, as is required by Biblical law, or set free after being raped. Southern slave-owners did not free their slaves after causing them permanent disability, such as the loss of a tooth or an eye. Southern slaves couldn't inherit their owner/father's property. Any of these failures to observe the Law could have served as a starting point for a fine denunciation of the evils of Southern slavery, even while you defended Biblical slavery -- if you really felt it needed you to undertake its defense. 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;Instead, you chose to write about the splendid lives enjoyed by Southern slaves -- about the abundant food, the simple pleasures, and the tender care they received. You chose to write about what a fine thing it was for those black people to held as property, to be forbidden to contract legally binding marriages, to be taken from their children to tend their owner's homes and children, to watch their children sold away from them, to be bred against their wills to one another, to be beaten and branded and chained. That's apparently your idea of the best race-relations in the history of the world. 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;And you're surprised that the subtle anti-racism of your position isn't clear? 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;If Nazi womanhood doesn't appeal, may I suggest polygyny and concubinage as your next growth industry? There's a Biblical warrant for it every bit as robust as the one for slavery, and I'm sure you'd find plenty of takers. 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;Melynda Huskey 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;P.S. Jack wonders why there are people of color attending Doug Wilson Inc and its subsidiaries if the CEO is a racist. Well, I can imagine a number of alternatives: they don't know quite how bizarre his position is; they think he's deluded on this point, but pretty good on some others (not unlike, say, Colin Powell or Condaleeza Rice on the Republican Party); or they find some advantage accrues to them if they're willing to ignore this one thing (you might call that the J.C. Watts position). I suppose it's even possible that there are some people of color who agree with him (James Meredith worked for Jesse Helms, after all.) 
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<DIV></DIV>&gt;Note that none of those reasons precludes Doug's defense of slavery from being racist. The old "Some of my best friends are black" defense no longer holds much currency.Get more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com 
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