The History of Wealth
The History of Wealth
A new independent publisher for the fediverse! @nybooks joined last week (h/t to @FediFollows for letting us know). Here’s their review of historian Catherine Hall’s “Lucky Valley: Edward Long and the History of Racial Capitalism.” [Story may be paywalled]
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2025/04/24/charting-an-unheroic-past-lucky-valley-catherine-hall/
#Books @bookstodon #Reading #History @histodons #Jamaica #Slavery #HistoryOfSlavery
Sojourner Truth (l. c. 1797-1883) was an African American abolitionist, women's suffrage advocate, and civil rights activist who famously "walked away" from slavery in 1826, sued in court for the return of her son and, between 1843 and her death in 1883, became one of the most popular lecturers and preachers in the United States. #History #SojournerTruth #Abolitionism #Slavery #USHistory #HistoryFact https://whe.to/ci/1-24323-en/
@gerrymcgovern companies, corporations or individuals can declare bankruptcy and all their creditors just have to suck it up. But countries aren't allowed to escape- so,every day, some babies are born with debts around their necks that they will never repay. How far have we moved beyond #slavery
@lauren @lauren That is what they want. Since every public service will be privatized, work and workplaces will be unregulated.
#slavery #privatized #deregulation
The Womb of Exploitation
The Sexual Violence on Slave Plantations
Suggested Reading / Sources:
Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
Jennifer L. Morgan, Laboring Women: Reproduction and Gender in New World Slavery
Barbara Bush, Slave Women in Caribbean Society, 1650–1838
Deborah Gray White, Ar'n't I a Woman? Female Slaves in the Plantation South
Edward Long, The History of Jamaica (1774) – [racist but illustrative of colonial mindsets]
Stephanie E. Smallwood, Saltwater Slavery: A Middle Passage from Africa to American Diaspora
Harriet Jacobs (l. c. 1813-1897) was a former slave, abolitionist, and author of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861), her autobiography, describing her life as a slave in North Carolina, her flight to freedom in the North, and her experiences there. #History #HarrietJacobs #Abolitionism #Slavery #HistoryFact https://whe.to/ci/1-23889-en/
Speaking of cover-ups, the #NationalParkService now claims they didn't approve the removal of #HarrietTubman and references to #slavery from the #UndergroundRailroad page on their website.
Fear of Insurrection comes from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) by Harriet Jacobs (l. 1813-1897) describing the reaction of the White community of Edenton, North Carolina, to news of Nat Turner's Rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia, in August of 1831. #History #Abolitionism #HarrietJacobs #Slavery #USHistory #HistoryFact https://whe.to/ci/2-2693-en/
Today In Labor History April 8, 1864: The 13th amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified, banning chattel slavery. However, it permitted a continuation of wage slavery and the forced labor of convicts without pay. And on this date in 1911, 128 convict miners, mostly African-Americans jailed for minor offenses, were killed by a massive explosion at the Banner coalmine near Birmingham, Alabama. While the Triangle Shirtwaist fire, which occurred just two weeks earlier, elicited massive public attention and support for the plight of immigrant women working in sweatshop conditions, the Banner explosion garnered almost no public sympathy, probably due to racism and the fact that they were prisoners.
The US has been a dual state ever since its founding to various degrees. It is now back in a dual state almost as bad as when slaves in the South were the norm and the years of segregation.
Due process means little when ICE can go judge shopping in Texas.
It's important to understand that even in the regime's pettiest acts of rewriting history, we can find clear evidence of their authoritarian, Christian nationalist intentions. When they attack trans history, it's because they're trying to erase the existence of trans ppl; whether you believe that ends in denying medical care and driving trans folks out of public life or genocide is largely irrelevant (I believe one leads to the other, and history agrees with me) - the intention is clear. When they erase the achievements of women in our national record, they're trying to craft a future where a woman's role in society doesn't include things like scientific discovery, political activism, or breaking gender barriers in new fields of achievement. This ultimately is why no erasure, no reconstruction of our collective history along white nationalist principles, is too small, or too petty for these fascists to undertake. Every action has a reason - even if that reasoning seems far-fetched to you, a relatively normal person who is not a nazi that obsesses daily about how to force everyone else to adopt their worldview to justify and sustain a permanent Christian Nationalist dictatorship.
Given that, the administration's decision to erase or minimize the involvement of Harriet Tubman, deny the struggles of enslaved Black people to liberate themselves from a society organized to keep them in racialized bondage, and stress the idea that emancipation was the result of white ppl GRANTING liberation to Black ppl in America, has to be understood as something beyond cruelty or a desire to protect white feelings. This assault on Black history and in particular, the shameful history surrounding racialized chattel slavery in America, is clearly part of a larger project to restore and entrench a white nationalist order.
https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/06/us/national-parks-underground-railroad-harriet-tubman/index.html
"The National Parks Service webpage for the “Underground Railroad” used to lead with a quote from Tubman, the railroad’s most famous “conductor”, a comparison on the Wayback Machine between the webpage on January 21 and March 19 shows. Both the quote and an image of Tubman have since been removed, along with several references to “enslaved” people and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.
The Washington Post first reported on the changes. The webpage now leads with commemorative stamps of various civil rights leaders with text including the phrase “Black/White Cooperation.” Whereas previously, the article started with a description of enslaved peoples’ efforts to free themselves and the organization of the Underground Railroad after the Fugitive Slave Act, the article now starts with two paragraphs that emphasize the “American ideals of liberty and freedom” and do not specifically mention slavery."
I don't think it's a secret that crackers in America hate the symbol of Black liberation that Harriet Tubman represents; we are after all talking about a woman who escaped slavery, lead dozens of other enslaved people to freedom, and helped John Brown plan and recruit for his raid on Harper's Ferry that some (myself included) would argue ultimately made the Civil War inevitable (which was a good thing.) Afterwards, she served as a scout in the Union army during the Civil War where she is credited with helping to liberate hundreds more enslaved people. After the war, Tubman's struggles to get recognized or compensated for her services to the government made it very clear how serious of a threat the white ruling class order of the day considered her. Towards the end of her life, she was also actively involved in the struggle for women's suffrage. So when modern day cracker fascists toss their spaghetti over Tubman potentially appearing on currency, or try to erase her from the story of abolition and emancipation, you have to understand that this has not only been a longstanding, important ideological goal for white nationalists, but also a question of destroying a symbol whose life encapsulates multiple aspects of the struggle against white supremacy and patriarchy; and Tubman didn't just struggle, she often won - that's not the kind of example a Christian Nationalist order wants to highlight as it imposes its will to fully restore sanctioned white supremacy as the official history and policy of the USA.
Speaking more broadly, the modern study of Critical Race Theory and thus the ongoing struggle for equality in the face of white supremacy by African Americans, rises out of the historical study of institutional slavery, discrimination, and exploitation of Black ppl by a white supremacist ruling order in America. If you change the story of slavery to credit white ppl for granting African Americans liberty, you knock out the evidentiary supporting plank and origin for the MODERN study of white supremacy, discrimination, and exploitation of Black ppl in America too.
Brazil fights Harvard to reclaim African rebel’s skull after 190 years #HistSTM #HistSci
#Slavery
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/05/brazil-harvard-african-rebels-skull-190-years
Today In Labor History April 7, 1804: Haitian general, Toussaint Louverture died on this day. He was one of the most prominent members of the Haitian revolution for independence from France. The slave revolt against the French began in 1791 with the call by Dutty Boukman, a vodou priest. Encouraged by the French and American revolutions. Louverture led 100,000 enslaved Haitians in revolt, winning their freedom in 1793. In 1804, Haiti became first free black republic in the world. The U.S. refused to recognize Haiti for the next 70 and France extracted millions in restitution, destroying any hope of ever moving out of deep poverty. Louverture was betrayed in the end and died in prison. For a fantastic history of the Haitian Revolution, read “The Black Jacobins,” by C.L.R.James.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #toussaintlouverture #haiti #revolution #slavery #racism #boukman #vodou #revolt #independence #BlackMastadon #prison #BlackJacobins #CLRJames #book #writer #author #nonfiction @bookstadon
And no, #Trump|s #regime will #speedrun the #dedollarization of #WorldTrade in favour of the #Euro, because noone wants to deal with a regime that essentially devalued the #USD by 5,6% in the last 3 months, 2,4% in the last month alone compared to the #EUR!
It'll make the #USA more irrelevant and hopefully that'll be the end of it, with it ceasing to exist and it's remains being absorbed by #Mexico and #Canada along the former #SlaveryBelt!
Hopefully people will not require 8,5 years to grow a spine to get rid of #AgentKrasnov in time!