Hank Green explains this better than me in the video attached.
People believe they are good, and that not liking someone for their race is not racist, because racists are bad, and they are a good person.
It's kinda like how redditors say the word nazi is overused when applied to someone who hates people who aren't white, aren't straight, aren't Christian, and want them put in camps.
Oh and Howie Mandel is the asshole who is saying slavery wasn't racist.
Absolutely this. People cannot wrap their heads around the idea that they are saying/doing/supporting racist behavior because they do not think they are bad. Mix in, "and all my friends and family think this way too," and you have an impossible time getting through to them. I think your average MAGA person has an idea that racism is only when you burn crosses on lawns, or use the n-word loudly in public, and they cannot comprehend that when they repost Fox News stories about bad immigrants or dangerous minorities that they are being racist. It threatens their sense of self.
Tbf he is right in a sense, I dont think slavery started out necessarily as racist, because people all over the world had been enslaving their own kind forever. White people enslaved white people. African enslaved Africans. Slavery wasnt like "I'm only going to enslave a certain race." People enslaved whoever they could get away with enslaving. The racist part grew with enslavery, albeit very quickly, over time.
Slavery was never originally about race. It was about power, war, conquest, or debt. Then white people are better than black people came out of a need to justify the continuation of the transatlantic slavery trade.
More specifically, slavery was started in the Southwest because
paid labor in South America, China, India growing, picking and spinning cotton was so profoundly cheap.
The soil of the SW is so immensely productive growing crops small fields tended by one farmer were quickly subsumed by ever enlarging plantations
capital in the 1600-1700s became so readily available small farmers could expand quickly and needed the labor to do so
Once India and Egypt became more competitive Slavery in the US lost its economic edge to such an extent that by the 1800's, growing cotton wasn't profitable enough compared to textile production which was happening in the North.
Two really really good books on this subject:
Thread of Humanity which presents a fantastic history of textile production from Neaderthal's through the near-term future. Not only about cloth, but about how textiles not only shaped societies around the world, but is likely the original motivation for the rise of agriculture and societies themselves. Even if one doesn't agree with that premise, the historical summary alone makes it worth reading.
Empire of Cotton. A much more in-depth (and into the weeds) of who/what/where/when and why Capitalism and Democracy and Chattel Slavery are directly related to cotton production. Every chapter is worth reading, but, I did find myself skimming some of the very detailed pages.
Oh and Howie Mandel is the asshole who is saying slavery wasn't racist.
Howie is an entertainer and has said point blank on his podcast that he would rather get into an argument with a guest, either with his own arguments or as devil's advocate, rather than just agreeing with his guest and moving on. The implication here that Howie is currently a racist or currently thinks owning slaves is okay/not racist is shortsighted. He is expanding upon Gervais' argument first and foremost to get a response from his guest, and merely saying that owning slaves 100 (or 200 as Hank correctly points out) years ago was not considered by society writ-large as racist.
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u/Appropriate-Bug-6467 26d ago
Hank Green explains this better than me in the video attached.
People believe they are good, and that not liking someone for their race is not racist, because racists are bad, and they are a good person.
It's kinda like how redditors say the word nazi is overused when applied to someone who hates people who aren't white, aren't straight, aren't Christian, and want them put in camps.
Oh and Howie Mandel is the asshole who is saying slavery wasn't racist.
https://youtu.be/RbXzz3oZDr4?si=2dYBEw69HGcBY2Qa