(August 18, 2017 at 1:17 pm)SteelCurtain Wrote:(August 18, 2017 at 1:07 pm)Catholic_Lady Wrote: I hear you and see where you are coming from. I grew up in the north, so we learned that the war was all about slavery. But since then, I've heard from other people who supposedly also know their history, that it wasn't. That the north didn't care at all about the slaves, and were only forbidding them to handicap the south... and the South was merely fighting for Independence.
I'm not a history buff at all. I'm just someone who has heard 2 different stories. You could very well be 100% right. And if that's the case, then I would say the people telling the other story are ignorant, not necessarily racist.
Does it matter if anyone in the North really cared about black people though? I mean, there are plenty of contemporary writings in the newspapers reflecting a growing progressive movement towards abolition. The term abolitionist was around for decades before the war. But even if the North's motivation was purely political, how does that change things?
From Shit No One Ever Said (episode 13):
[Slave 1]: Did you hear? They've outlawed slavery. We're free!
[Slave 2]: Finally, they recognized our worth as human beings and did the right thing out of a profound respect for our dignity and rights!
[Slave 1]: Well, not exactly. I think it was really about politics. Word is a lot of folks in the North don't really care about us. They just wanted to stick it to our oppressors.
[Slave 2]: Well, fuck that then! I'm staying.
*Resumes his field work*
