I think in elementary school I was taught that Jefferson "fell in love with a slave" but it was framed as a positive trait, proving he's not that racist. The fact that he had 6 kids with her and enslaved them until his own death was not mentioned. This is probably common knowledge around here but wtf that's probably one of the most evil things you can do
jefferson was a legend among men, a powerful orator who cared about freedom above all else, but he just wasn't a good enough person to know that raping people and enslaving the children was bad! how could you possibly judge him for that
What they never ask about Jefferson is if "the slave" loved him back or consented.
Goes hand-in-hand with how history classes focus on Jefferson's writings (which occasionally mention some vague disapprovals of slavery) instead of his actions. Jefferson was a feckless little weenie who would sometimes mention how he was squeemish over slavery but was totally good profiting from it his whole life and didn't really do much to stop it.
"oh gee, I feel like such a dick for fucking a person that I own and enslaving the child we made together. Oh well, gonna do it another FIVE TIMES"
It's actually way worse. Sally Hemings was the half-sister of Jefferson's wife, and daughter of his father-in-law. His chef was also the half-brother of his wife...
CW VERY BAD SV
Think about that. John Wayles rapes a slave, Betty Hemings, for decades, and enslaves all of his children with her. He then gifts two of those children to his son-in-law Thomas Jefferson, who then rapes one of them, Sally, for decades, and enslaves all of his children with her.
It's MONSTROUS.
and enslaved them until his own death
I think this detail is a lot less well known
I spent the past half hour looking at wikipedia (not that much info on them before they were freed, curious). 4 of the 6 survived to adulthood, I believe 2 escaped/were allowed to escape(?) and the other 2 were freed in Jefferson's will. The only other slave freed in Jefferson's will (out of hundreds of slaves) was the mother's brother, but the mother was later freed by one of Jefferson's white daughters
Just a friendly reminder that the only thing John Brown did wrong is he didn't kill enough slavers
There was a romanian book about roma slaves in romania and it mentioned about how common it was for slavemasters to impregnate the women when they didn't feel like going through all the trouble of buying a new slave... some humans are just irredeemable
This came up when I was watching Shaun's video on "The 1776 Project". How could you possibly believe in american exceptionalism and the values of the declaration of independence and constitution if one of its most important founders didn't even believe in the rights of his own fucking kids????? I'm mad right now, what a piece of shit
achtually, hamilton dunks on jefferson for owning slaves in exactly one line during the rap battle scene, one of the two mentions of the slave trade over the entire play
its almost as if its impossible to come to terms with the slave trade while maintaining a positive view of the founding fathers! who knew
mmm he was just instilling them with hard work ethics like a good dad should do sweetie 💅
And he said, "Son, this world is rough
And if a man's gonna make it, he's gotta be tough
And I knew I wouldn't be there to help ya along.
So I made you a slave and I said goodbye
I knew you'd have to get tough or die
And it's the slavery that helped to make you strong."
And then the boy named sue beat his father to death. what a happy ending!
it was a very common practice among slaveowners for them to rape slaves and enslave and sell their own children
