Conservative Mag Slams '12 Years a Slave' for Failing to Portray Happy Slaves

[Cigar]

Some conservatives have started laying into the Oscar-winning movie 12 Years a Slave for creating an unfairly negative portrayal of slavery. You see, the movie portrays slaves being made unhappy by slavery. But that negativity is merely anti-slavery "propaganda," according to (http://spectator.org/articles/56909/propaganda-not-%E2%80%98reality-or-%E2%80%98truth) James Bowman in conservative magazine The American Spectator:


If ever in slavery's 250-year history in North America there were a kind master or a contented slave, as in the nature of things there must have been, here and there, we may be sure that Mr McQueen does not want us to hear about it. This, in turn, surely means that his view of the history of the American South is as partial and one-sided as that of the hated Gone With the Wind.
...Yes, there was much cruelty and hardship in the slave-owning South, as there has been in most of the rest of the world most of the time, and Mr. McQueen's camera is all over that. But it strains ordinary credulity to suppose that there was nothing else.

We are wondering, was Bowman equally aggrieved by the lack of happy Jews in Schindler's List?
To be fair to the American Spectator's readers, the comment thread under the article (http://spectator.org/articles/56909/propaganda-not-%E2%80%98reality-or-%E2%80%98truth) is mainly filled with people asking WTF the article is all about. The top comment reads, "'a contented slave' - is this article a joke of some sort?"

http://politix.topix.com/story/10770-conservative-mag-slams-12-years-a-slave-for-failing-to-portray-happy-slaves

What about those good times when Mazza treated you kindly and just used the bullwhip made out of virgin cowhide soaked in his fine Port wine and gave you some of that ol' porkbelly to put in your bean-pot?

Conservatives angry that 12 Years As A Slave didn't portray the happier times as a slave. Jesus, these people don't have a brain or a soul. :rollseyes:

Happy Indians at Wounded Knee - Happy Jews in the Polish Ghetto - Happy 9th Calvary at Little Big Horn - Happy (the list goes on and on)

No wonder their Tent is empty of intellect :laugh:

[Chris]

Is this true? Was Anthony Johnson a happy man?

America's first slave owner was a black man (http://topconservativenews.com/2012/03/americas-first-slave-owner-was-a-black-man/)


...Prior to 1655 there were no legal slaves in the colonies, only indentured servants. All masters were required to free their servants after their time was up. Seven years was the limit that an indentured servant could be held. Upon their release they were granted 50 acres of land. This included any Negro purchased from slave traders. Negros were also granted 50 acres upon their release.

Anthony Johnson was a Negro from modern-day Angola. He was brought to the US to work on a tobacco farm in 1619. In 1622 he was almost killed when Powhatan Indians attacked the farm. 52 out of 57 people on the farm perished in the attack. He married a female black servant while working on the farm.

When Anthony was released he was legally recognized as a “free Negro” and ran a successful farm. In 1651 he held 250 acres and five black indentured servants. In 1654, it was time for Anthony to release John Casor, a black indentured servant. Instead Anthony told Casor he was extending his time. Casor left and became employed by the free white man Robert Parker.

Anthony Johnson sued Robert Parker in the Northampton Court in 1654. In 1655, the court ruled that Anthony Johnson could hold John Casor indefinitely. The court gave judicial sanction for blacks to own slave of their own race. Thus Casor became the first permanent slave and Johnson the first slave owner.

Whites still could not legally hold a black servant as an indefinite slave until 1670. In that year, the colonial assembly passed legislation permitting free whites, blacks, and Indians the right to own blacks as slaves....

Story corroborated @ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Johnson_(colonist), 100s of sites actually: https://www.google.com/search?q=lacks+who+owned+slaves&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS560US560&oq=lacks+who+owned+slaves&aqs=chrome..69i57.5113j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8#q=slaves+who+owned+slaves

I don't know if he was happy.

Cigar seems angry.

[Cigar]

Well then that settles it ... obviously Slaves were happy if Chris can Google one that was Happy :rofl:

[Mister D]

Actually, that there were a great many contented slaves shouldn't be surprising. It might tweak the pride of descendants but it's true. They knew nothing else. Frankly, I'd imagine "freedom" was actually quite frightening in some respects.

Secondly, why would anyone compare a Nazi death camp to a southern plantation?

[Mister D]

Well then that settles it ... obviously Slaves were happy if Chris can Google one that was Happy :rofl:

There were millions of slaves. Some probably were happy. Some not so happy. Some indifferent.

[Chris]

Well then that settles it ... obviously Slaves were happy if Chris can Google one that was Happy :rofl:

What, do you want instead to rewrite history?

[Mister D]

It's also true that popular depictions of slavery in the American south are laughable.

[Captain Obvious]

What, do you want instead to rewrite history?

Why not, he's rewriting the present.

[MrJimmyDale]

for creating an unfairly negative portrayal of slavery Yeah.....because before I saw the movie, slavery looked like a pretty good deal for them slaves to me...........

[Cigar]

What, do you want instead to rewrite history?

:thinking: ok are we trying to portray Slavery as a Happy and Joyous Time in American History?

[Captain Obvious]

:thinking: ok are we trying to portray Slavery as a Happy and Joyous Time in American History?

None of any of us were there.

[Cigar]

None of any of us were there.

I didn't go to the Moon either. :rollseyes:

[Mister D]

:thinking: ok are we trying to portray Slavery as a Happy and Joyous Time in American History?

No, actually.

[Captain Obvious]

I didn't go to the Moon either. :rollseyes:

And yet you're head's near Uranus.

[Cigar]

And yet you're head's near Uranus.

Got it ... you're fresh out of arguments :wink:

[Chris]

:thinking: ok are we trying to portray Slavery as a Happy and Joyous Time in American History?



I was just surprised the first American slave owner was a black. Why do you want to sweep that away with your race-card playing BS?

[Captain Obvious]

Got it ... you're fresh out of arguments :wink:

Kinda like you pussing out on the Shirley Temple thread.

Gotcha

[Captain Obvious]

I was just surprised the first American slave owner was a black. Why do you want to sweep that away with your race-card playing BS?

Some people only like storybook themelines when it favors their political position.

[Cigar]

Kinda like you pussing out on the Shirley Temple thread.

Gotcha

Did you or did your not actually read the responses ... or are you in denial :laugh:

[Captain Obvious]

Did you or did your not actually read the responses ... or are you in denial :laugh:

No, I don't deny it - you dodged yet another direct easy-to-answer question yet again there, el guapo.

[darroll]

Now they are going to fire up the slaves relatives which is all of us one time or another.

[Ravi]

Is this true? Was Anthony Johnson a happy man?

America's first slave owner was a black man (http://topconservativenews.com/2012/03/americas-first-slave-owner-was-a-black-man/)



Story corroborated @ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Johnson_(colonist), 100s of sites actually: https://www.google.com/search?q=lacks+who+owned+slaves&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS560US560&oq=lacks+who+owned+slaves&aqs=chrome..69i57.5113j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8#q=slaves+who+owned+slaves

I don't know if he was happy.

Cigar seems angry.

Actually, among America's first slave owners was Thomas Jefferson. He and the rest of the newly minted Americans that won the revolutionary war.

If you mean the first documented slave owner in the colonies, the owner of this man fits that bill.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Punch_%28slave%29

Nice distraction from the topic, though.

[nic34]

Is this true? Was Anthony Johnson a happy man?

America's first slave owner was a black man (http://topconservativenews.com/2012/03/americas-first-slave-owner-was-a-black-man/)



Story corroborated @ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Johnson_(colonist), 100s of sites actually: https://www.google.com/search?q=lacks+who+owned+slaves&rlz=1C1CHFX_enUS560US560&oq=lacks+who+owned+slaves&aqs=chrome..69i57.5113j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8#q=slaves+who+owned+slaves

I don't know if he was happy.

Cigar seems angry.

Wow, 100s of sites! Well they're on the internet so they MUST be true..... :laugh: