#slavery

[fantasy-findling]

I have made a new friend. Isn't he incredibly beautiful and hot? Its owner isn't bad either. ;) giggle

At least he has a right big bone for me. I'm really so excited for the first walk with him. Put the collar on. Sweet Ares here will surely take good care of me.

Dear pack. What’s you mind about that. Tell me.

[animentality]

[globalriseofblackpeople]

Our ancestors didn’t sell us . They always run with this false history so they use it as a scapegoat of what they truly did.

[spnexploration]

Collared part 34

Pairing: Dean x Reader eventually

Series summary: Sam and Dean save a woman from where she has been held as a slave by a witch. But things turn dark whenever they try to take her magic collar off, leaving them with a slave to look after and a curse to break.

Episode summary: The drive back to the bunker

Warnings: Nothing particularly in this chapter.

Word count: 1.9k

Series masterlist | Supernatural writing masterlist

Part 33 <- -> Part 35

“Dean, pull over,” Sam ordered. Dean stole a glance over his shoulder and hastily pulled to the side of the road. You were visibly shaking, your knees to your chest and your whole frame vibrating.

Loud banging came from the boot of the car. It’d started a couple of minutes ago, but he had been going to wait until he found a good place to pull over to deal with it.

Dean jumped out of the front seat as soon as the car was off. He quickly opened your door, being careful that you hadn't been leaning on it. Sam was opening the other back door.

Dean tentatively reached out to you, not wanting to startle you.

“Hey, hey, it's ok,” he said in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. “How about you come out here and get some air?”

You looked up at him then and nodded, placing your hand in his and letting him help you out of the car. He shut the door behind you and led you around the front of the car, further off the road and further from Azaneth.

“I forgot he was in there,” you whispered, your voice shaking.

Dean pulled you to him, wrapping his arms around you. He realised partway through it that he'd acted on instinct, forgotten to be cautious and confirm every movement before doing it. He was reassured when you leant into him and even raised your own arms slightly to clutch at his sides.

“He's an asshole, but he can't get to you, ok? I promise, he cannot get out of there.”

You nodded, still shaking.

Dean was worried, there was still hours of driving left and they hadn't expected Azaneth to wake up this soon. He and Sam would just put up with it, but it was clearly going to be a lot harder for you.

Sam had been checking through the supplies in the car. He came around the front to where Dean was holding you. “We've got one more dose of Rowena’s stuff, but with the speed he’s metabolising it, it won't last.”

“Wh-what?” you asked, pulling back from Dean's chest slightly.

“We've been keeping him drugged, but he's churning through it faster than expected.”

“What happens if he's not?”

“He just annoys us. He can't do magic, he can't get out, he can't hurt you. But, he can bang on things.”

You nodded slowly, biting your lip. You were still holding on to Dean and so he kept hold of you. He liked having you in his arms, liked that you let him look after you. He tried not to continue that thought any further though. He was here to protect you, that's all.

“Possibly more important to have him drugged when we’re going through Lebanon than on the highway, don't want someone noticing,” Sam said to Dean.

You took a deep breath, “How long do I have to put up with it then?”

“Couple of hours, before we can give him the last dose. Sorry.”

Dean held you a little tighter, feeling the tension building in your body again. “How about you sit up front? Or one of us can sit in the back with you?”

“I'll be ok,” you said unconvincingly. Dean felt your grip on him tighten as you said it.

He glanced at Sam over your head, expecting his help to convince you to sit with him. Sam surprised Dean though by holding his hand out, “Pass me the keys.”

Dean raised his eyebrow. Sam gestured up and down at you, still held against Dean's chest. Dean supposed he could see his point, but Sam had always been the one to comfort you since the collar came off. You didn’t like Dean, you didn't like Dean touching you, Dean made you angry.

And yet, he couldn't deny the evidence in his arms.

“How about I sit with you, Bambi?” he asked you gently. You sniffled and nodded, but didn't pull away from him. He held you a few moments more, until you finally started to straighten up. “Ready?” he murmured.

“No, but yes,” you muttered.

He chuckled and rubbed his hands gently up your arms, then spun you around and wrapped an arm around your shoulders. He led you to the backseat, opening the door for you and then climbing in after you.

Azaneth was smashing out the beat to Baby Shark. Bastard.

Sam jumped in the front and started the car.

Dean held his hand open to you. You put your hand in it. He gave it a squeeze.

A very tiny smile appeared on your face.

---

Azaneth was like a child trying to entertain themselves. Dean was sure he was actually trying to think about what would be most upsetting and traumatising to you, because he’s a total dick. And a demon. But what it came across as was a little kid kicking the seat in front of them on the plane.

The problem was that he was good at knowing what would upset you.

Eventually, you seemed to have gotten used to just his normal tapping. Azaneth couldn’t see you to know that, so there was maybe half an hour where you were a bit more relaxed, sitting on your own side of the backseat and looking out the window.

Then he changed tact.

There was silence for a short while, then a loud BANG on one side of the backseat. You damn near jumped out of your skin. Dean reached out to rub your arm gently and you smiled weakly back at him. “Just gave me a fright,” you whispered.

You settled back down, leaning against the door, when BANG! BANG! Azaneth had managed to do it right near your head. Dean supposed he was trying out different locations, as the first bang had been closer to him. It didn’t help your nerves, though.

You started to shake. He could tell you were trying to suppress it, but failing. He reached out to you, gently grabbing your arm. You allowed yourself to be pulled to him. He tucked you against him, his arm around your shoulders.

“He’s an asshole,” he whispered. “Just remember that.”

You smiled slightly, but it didn’t reach your eyes.

BANG. Again, where you had been just before. Quickly followed by BANG, on Dean’s side. Azaneth must be using his hands and feet, maybe even his head. What would a demon care about whacking the vessel’s body around?

BANG BANG BANG

Your frame shook each time he did it. He’d definitely found the winning formula, making his blows unpredictable and incredibly loud. Asshole.

You covered your ears and hunched your shoulders. Dean could see how exhausted you were, how much this was taking a further toll on your body. You’d slept a bit last night, but not enough. He rubbed his hand up your arm, “How about you lie down and see if you can get some rest?”

You looked at him wide-eyed. “What, here? And I’m not going to be able to sleep through that.”

“Let’s just try, hey? It’ll stop you having to listen to it.”

“There’s not enough space.”

“Sure there is, put your head on my knee. It’ll deaden some of the sound.” You bit your lip, but eventually started to move. He guided you to lie down on the backseat, your head on his leg, facing away from him. He put his hand over your ear, trying to help block out Azaneth’s banging.

As he predicted, you were out cold pretty quickly.

With you no longer upset about it, it was much easier for him to tune out Azaneth’s stupid banging, too.

---

You woke up as the car pulled off the road. You were suddenly aware that you were literally lying in Dean’s lap, with his hand over the side of your head to help cut down on the noise from Azaneth. You felt incredibly embarrassed about what you were putting him through, when he was just trying to be nice. You quickly sat up and moved away from him.

“What’s going on?” you asked drowsily.

“We’re going to dose him up so he’s unconscious when we’re driving through town.” Dean reached out and squeezed your hand before jumping out of the car with Sam. They both went to the boot, Sam carrying something from the front seat. You decided to stay where you were, not wanting to see Azaneth.

There was more banging, probably Azaneth trying to fight them as they drugged him. You shivered and tried to reassure yourself that he couldn’t see you, couldn’t get to you.

Sam came around to where Dean had gotten out of the car. “Dean’s gonna drive again, do you want me to sit in the back with you? Or you could sit up front if you want?”

“How long does it take to kick in?”

“Maybe a minute or two, it’s pretty quick.” As he spoke, the banging was getting weaker and softer.

“I’ll be ok.”

“Alright. But you let us know if you want to change, we don’t mind.” Sam shut the back door and climbed in next to Dean in the front.

“Everyone ok?” Dean asked. You nodded and he started the car.

---

“Hey look Bambi,” Dean joked, “I can see your tree from here!” The woods around the bunker had come into view, you were finally nearly home. You smiled weakly.

Sam spun around to face you. “I think it might be better if Azaneth doesn’t see you until after he’s in the devil’s trap in the dungeon. We have demon cuffs on him and he’s drugged, so it should all be fine and he certainly won’t be able to get away from Dean and I, but just to be sure. Is that ok?”

You nodded, biting your lip. You hadn’t really thought about how they would get him out of the boot. You hadn’t even thought about how they got him in there.

“Ok, so I’ll take you to your room and then come back and help Dean with him. And then we’ll come get you as soon as it’s all clear, ok?” You nodded again.

“It’ll be alright, Y/N,” Dean said, looking at you in the rearview mirror. “Nothing’s going to happen, we just like to be cautious.”

You felt your fear and worries starting to creep up again, and fought to push them back down. It was fine. It was going to be fine. You could do your part, you could stay out of their way.

You got out of the car after Dean parked it, Sam coming around to you and shutting your door behind you. He put his arm around your shoulders and led you inside and to your room. “Are you going to be ok here by yourself?” he asked gently.

“I’ll be fine, Sam. I can handle ten minutes in a room!” You understood why they were so cautious with you, but their overprotectiveness did get annoying at times. Even though you could also feel your anxiety increasing, knowing Azaneth was going to be nearby... But no. You could deal.

He smiled, “Sorry, I know you can. I’ll be back soon, ok?” You nodded and he left.

---

“All clear, Bambi,” Dean said, knocking on your door. “Package has been delivered.”

You laughed, “I didn’t realise we were in Independence Day.”

He grinned. “Come on, I’ll make dinner. Burgers?”

.

.

.

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[n-e-w--y-0-r-k]

… and just as he was behind the virus that harmed your computer back then, he is behind the virus that harms your body now

Bill Gates is a eugenicist, same as other members of his family before him. He did not develop Microsoft in some little residential garage up near the Bay Area in California. The framework that launched his empire was stolen from Apple devs and handed to Gates whom took it over for the simple purposes of enslaving the people thru brainwashing, doling out forms of MK Ultra harm, making billions off people’s addiction to tech, and giving the government a means to invade  your privacy

Ex 1:  when you play the little captcha game, you are not telling the website that you are human… you are telling it your location; in detail down to your country, state, city, street, home, room, wall socket you are plugged into

Do not agree? … prove me wrong yo; I double dogg dare you

Too, do not simply Like… pass it on

‘

— some vampire on Tumblr was here

[officialyourdailyinspiration]

No government on earth has the power to set this world free from its slavery to the corruption in which it has existed since Eve and Adam sinned in garden of Eden.

Darrell B. Harrison

[doomhope]

UPDATE: turning off reblogs since voting is over for this cycle

this is absolutely not a "go vote or you're evil!" post BUT you should know that if you're registered to vote in Oregon, Alabama, Louisiana, Tennessee, or Vermont you have the opportunity to vote to abolish prison slavery this year, and i think you should strongly consider it.

from the washington post:

"The 13th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution bans slavery or involuntary servitude, except when it is used as punishment for a crime.

If passed, the proposals would wholly abolish slavery in those states, though they would not automatically change protocols on prison labor or inmate pay.

[...] the bills could give lawyers more license to pursue greater rights and higher pay for U.S. prisoners; Dolovich said that paying inmates below the minimum-wage protections set by each state is arguably 'a species of slavery.'

'It’ll be a fight in court. This question will be manifested by lawyers bringing cases on behalf of incarcerated workers,' she said. 'It’s a hopeful sign for me.'"

(Source; warning for more detailed discussion of prison slavery and related cruelty in the article)

so again, if you're able to vote and live in Oregon, Alabama, Louisiana, Tennessee, or Vermont, please consider it. prison abolition will not happen solely via voting it away but if these pass it will certainly be a victory and hopefully a stepping stone for other victories.

[rebel-girl-queen-of-my-world]

“After arriving in America to forge a life of honest, hard work and toil, many of these colonists realized they couldn’t be arsed, so they stole people from Africa and made them do it instead. You might think these were precisely the people Rousseau had been talking about when he said mankind needed to throw off their chains. But they weren’t. Like many humanists, he’d found a clever loophole. By not thinking of slaves as human, he was free to not give a shit.” - Philomena Cunk, “Cunk on Earth”

[probablyasocialecologist]

The British monarchy was central to the establishment, expansion, and maintenance of the British empire and the transatlantic slave trade. The declaration of English empire was first made by Henry VIII in 1532. Elizabeth I granted a royal charter (an instrument of incorporation) to Sir John Hawkins, widely considered one of the first English traders to profit from the slave trade. She also granted a charter to the British East India Company in 1600.

After Elizabeth’s death, Charles II formed the Royal African Company in 1660, led by the Duke of York (later James II), which extracted goods such as gold and ivory from the Gold Coast, and transported over 3,000 Africans to Barbados. Many of these people had the initials “DY” burned into their skin to signify their belonging to the Duke of York. Both men invested private funds in the company.

Queen Victoria assumed the title of Empress of India in 1877, and by 1920 the empire was 13.71 million square miles. The British monarch’s global significance and power stemmed directly from the enslavement of people of colour.

[odinsblog]

“State’s Rights” is bullshit doublespeak for white supremacy. Keeping lies like, “The Civil War was about state’s rights,” alive is why Republicans are always so anti-education and so pro-book burning. It makes erasure and whitewashing history easier.

[metalheadsforblacklivesmatter]

Image Description.

Facebook post from Matt Norris.

Post reads like a conversation between 2 people:

Prison labor is a problem we need to address soon.

Convicts in prison should have to work like the rest of us.

You mean like slavery?

No, we're giving them 3 meals and a bed, at our expense, while they just sit around and watch TV. They should have to work!

Right. Like slavery.

It's not like slavery!

Can they leave?

No.

Can they refuse work?

No.

So how exactly isn't this slavery?

We DO pay them!

Do we pay in accordance with labor laws?

No. We pay them between 33 cents and $1.41/hour with a maximum daily wage below $5, then take up to half of that as room&board fees and victim compensation.

Right. So like slavery.

BUT.

No.

Image then links to this url.

Below URL image reads "fun bonus fact: enough of our labor market currently relies on labor at these depressed rates, that it has a substantial downward pressure on both wages and job availability in low-skilled sectors. Immigrants aren't taking your jobs. Slavery is.

End description.

I'd also like to add it's not just private prisons. It's also private detention centers where ICE keeps the immigrants.

-fae

[culturevulturette]

This, plus and inclusion of who was and is doing the selling as well as the buying.  

In other words, the whole truth of this stain on humanity, not the convenient cherry-picked aspects of it helpful to building a particular narrative.  

[dresshistorynerd]

How did cotton win over linen anyway?

In short, colonialism, slavery and the industrial revolution. In length:

Cotton doesn't grow in Europe so before the Modern Era, cotton was rare and used in small quantities for specific purposes (lining doublets for example). The thing with cotton is, that's it can be printed with dye very easily. The colors are bright and they don't fade easily. With wool and silk fabrics, which were the more traditional fabrics for outer wear in Europe (silk for upper classes of course), patterns usually needed to be embroidered or woven to the cloth to last, which was very expensive. Wool is extremely hard to print to anything detailed that would stay even with modern technology. Silk can be printed easily today with screen printing, but before late 18th century the technique wasn't known in western world (it was invented in China a millenium ago) and the available methods didn't yeld good results.

So when in the late 17th century European trading companies were establishing trading posts in India, a huge producer of cotton fabrics, suddenly cotton was much more available in Europe. Indian calico cotton, which was sturdy and cheap and was painted or printed with colorful and intricate floral patters, chintz, especially caught on and became very fashionable. The popular Orientalism of the time also contributed to it becoming fasionable, chintz was seen as "exotic" and therefore appealing.

Here's a typical calico jacket from late 18th century. The ones in European markets often had white background, but red background was also fairly common.

The problem with this was that this was not great for the business of the European fabric producers, especially silk producers in France and wool producers in England, who before were dominating the European textile market and didn't like that they now had competition. So European countries imposed trade restrictions for Indian cotton, England banning cotton almost fully in 1721. Since the introduction of Indian cottons, there had been attempts to recreate it in Europe with little success. They didn't have nearly advanced enough fabric printing and cotton weaving techniques to match the level of Indian calico. Cotton trade with India didn't end though. The European trading companies would export Indian cottons to West African market to fund the trans-Atlantic slave trade that was growing quickly. European cottons were also imported to Africa. At first they didn't have great demand as they were so lacking compared to Indian cotton, but by the mid 1700s quality of English cotton had improved enough to be competitive.

Inventions in industrial textile machinery, specifically spinning jenny in 1780s and water frame in 1770s, would finally give England the advantages they needed to conquer the cotton market. These inventions allowed producing very cheap but good quality cotton and fabric printing, which would finally produce decent imitations of Indian calico in large quantities. Around the same time in mid 1700s, The East Indian Company had taken over Bengal and soon following most of the Indian sub-continent, effectively putting it under British colonial rule (but with a corporate rule dystopian twist). So when industrialized English cotton took over the market, The East India Company would suppress Indian textile industry to utilize Indian raw cotton production for English textile industry and then import cotton textiles back to India. In 1750s India's exports were mainly fine cotton and silk, but during the next century Indian export would become mostly raw materials. They effectively de-industrialized India to industrialize England further.

India, most notably Bengal area, had been an international textile hub for millennia, producing the finest cottons and silks with extremely advance techniques. Loosing cotton textile industry devastated Indian local economies and eradicated many traditional textile craft skills. Perhaps the most glaring example is that of Dhaka muslin. Named after the city in Bengal it was produced in, it was extremely fine and thin cotton requiring very complicated and time consuming spinning process, painstakingly meticulous hand-weaving process and a very specific breed of cotton. It was basically transparent as seen depicted in this Mughal painting from early 17th century.

It was used by e.g. the ancient Greeks, Mughal emperors and, while the methods and it's production was systematically being destroyed by the British to squash competition, it became super fashionable in Europe. It was extremely expensive, even more so than silk, which is probably why it became so popular among the rich. In 1780s Marie Antoinette famously and scandalously wore chemise a la reine made from multiple layers of Dhaka muslin. In 1790s, when the empire silhouette took over, it became even more popular, continuing to the very early 1800s, till Dhaka muslin production fully collapsed and the knowledge and skill to produce it were lost. But earlier this year, after years lasting research to revive the Dhaka muslin funded by Bangladeshi government, they actually recreated it after finding the right right cotton plant and gathering spinners and weavers skilled in traditional craft to train with it. (It's super cool and I'm making a whole post about it (it has been in the making for months now) so I won't extend this post more.)

Marie Antoinette in the famous painting with wearing Dhaka muslin in 1783, and empress Joséphine Bonaparte in 1801 also wearing Dhaka muslin.

While the trans-Atlantic slave trade was partly funded by the cotton trade and industrial English cotton, the slave trade would also be used to bolster the emerging English cotton industry by forcing African slaves to work in the cotton plantations of Southern US. This produced even more (and cheaper (again slave labor)) raw material, which allowed the quick upward scaling of the cotton factories in Britain. Cotton was what really kicked off the industrial revolution, and it started in England, because they colonized their biggest competitor India and therefore were able to take hold of the whole cotton market and fund rapid industrialization.

Eventually the availability of cotton, increase in ready-made clothing and the luxurious reputation of cotton lead to cotton underwear replacing linen underwear (and eventually sheets) (the far superior option for the reasons I talked about here) in early Victorian Era. Before Victorian era underwear was very practical, just simple rectangles and triangles sewn together. It was just meant to protect the outer clothing and the skin, and it wasn't seen anyway, so why put the relatively scarce resources into making it pretty? Well, by the mid 1800s England was basically fully industrialized and resource were not scarce anymore. Middle class was increasing during the Victorian Era and, after the hard won battles of the workers movement, the conditions of workers was improving a bit. That combined with decrease in prices of clothing, most people were able to partake in fashion. This of course led to the upper classes finding new ways to separate themselves from lower classes. One of these things was getting fancy underwear. Fine cotton kept the fancy reputation it had gained first as an exotic new commodity in late 17th century and then in Regency Era as the extremely expensive fabric of queens and empresses. Cotton also is softer than linen, and therefore was seen as more luxurious against skin. So cotton shifts became the fancier shifts. At the same time cotton drawers were becoming common additional underwear for women.

It wouldn't stay as an upper class thing, because as said cotton was cheap and available. Ready-made clothing also helped spread the fancier cotton underwear, as then you could buy fairly cheaply pretty underwear and you didn't even have to put extra effort into it's decoration. At the same time cotton industry was massive and powerful and very much eager to promote cotton underwear as it would make a very steady and long lasting demand for cotton.

In conclusion, cotton has a dark and bloody history and it didn't become the standard underwear fabric for very good reasons.

Here's couple of excellent sources regarding the history of cotton industry:

The European Response to Indian Cottons, Prasannan Parthasarathi

INDIAN COTTON MILLS AND THE BRITISH ECONOMIC POLICY, 1854-1894, Rajib Lochan Sahoo

[vivian-332111]

Damn 🤭🥰

Play dress up and I fuck your ass deal ?😉

[everlastingrandom]

This is sea shanty discourse all over again.

There's been some posts saying that Our Flag Means Death is antiblack for being ahistorical. But a fair amount don't sit well with me, a black person. So I'm gonna pull an ADHD and go on several tangents about it. Also, marginalized people aren't a monolith and when I see "listen to black people" from nonblack people, I get sus about who is doing the loudest talking and how, why, etc.

Also this is mostly about the show textually. Taika had a lot of creative influence on OFMD (and he directed the pilot episode) but he is not the creator of the show. David Jenkins is the main show runner, producer, and writer. That said, I'm gonna read more on both of their track records because I did see some important points that were made by others, so bear with me.

Anyway, this post will have heavy spoilers!

TL;DR Personally, I don't think this specific comedy/romance show is antiblack for choosing to not highlight the transatlantic slave trade in relation to their reimagined protagonists. However, OFMD feeds into the swashbuckler genre and I definitely think we should deconstruct that as a whole. Also I wish more people would put their righteous anger into substantially supporting Black creators.

The MEAT

OFMD doesn't shy away from depicting white people as racist: the British Navy refer to Stede's BIPOC crew members as "savages" when aboard Stede's ship. The show acknowledges the atrocities committed against the Native populations of the Caribbean and American mainlands. The tribesman who guards Stede literally says, "you [white people] keep killing us." Nor does it shy away from colonizers exoticizing people from lands that are now former victims of imperialism. Oluwande and Frenchie's scam of being an African prince relies on of the ignorance of the foppish, rich white people that they swindle.

But OFMD is not a documentary, it is a comedy/adventure show with a romantic subplot. It genre bends quite frequently, occasionally dropping the comedy to have serious moments. But the main characters are a white englishman and a white barbadian being played by a white new zealander and a maori new zealander. The conceit is that none of this is supposed to be taken seriously. No one's accent is the same. A man gets weird with some seagulls on more than one occasion. We are having fun in muppet treasure island. There are dummy mechanics in use. This is not a place of honor.

I went into watching OMFD with mental blinders fully up, because I knew pirates + caribbean = oh potential yikes. But as it progressed through S1, the fear that slavery would be depicted in an upsetting way slowly dissipated. And then it just wasn't there really. I think the choice to not explicitly depict the relationship between piracy and the transatlantic slave trade—especially in regards to Stede and Blackbeard—made sense for their tone, but ended up being an oversight in their worldbuilding. If the showrunners continue into s2, they should bring in Black/Afro-caribbean consultants to give insight on what those depictions might be, if addressed.

The swashbuckling genre is distinctive due to 1) shenanigans on a boat 2.) romance. A lot of OFMD is about the romanticization of pirate life, but it also challenges those romantic notions directly. Add two historical figures with radically opposing methods of piracy and THERE WAS ONLY ONE BOAT. That's not true, there was a max of three boats. And you end up with an untapped hotbed of creative potential. The Gentleman Pirate was a narrative figure in Stede's own lifetime and Blackbeard is a goddamn legend. There's only so much influence you can draw before people claim you're blatantly ripping something off.

Slavery is a pretty hard sell, generally. Like, commit a whole episode and tread lightly from there, hard sell. But I wouldn't be surprised if there were efforts to address it in media rez, that just didn't make it to the final cut (but this is me speculating.) TV shows are not made in vacuums, hundreds of people were involved in this production. My point is that sometimes media is not here to trick you into believing that real-life terrible people were actually good and admirable. (Sometimes it is.)

But I feel strongly that OMFD expects you to be on the side of the characters of color from the jump. Catch the implicit, "Can you believe these white people?" in the way they roll their eyes and sigh and give each other looks. The way Oluwende and Frenchie include the African servants(?) into their scheme in Ep. 5. The way the Elder pities Stede when he has a breakdown, but at the same couples Stede with every other white person who's attacked the tribe. I think OFMD seeks to depower the image we have of colonizers as inhuman forces of nature, when they were all very painfully human.

Why did fans not background check this show?

I knew the history of Stede Bonnet prior to watching OFMD, which I'm guessing was not the majority experience (?) I was interested in watching the show when I first heard about it, mainly because the costumes looked nice.

From the number of "Here's the TRUTH about Stede Bonnet" posts circulating, it's clear he's a relatively un-talked about figure. Honestly, that's fine. It happens to be that we will not learn about everything about everyone in human history. But the history of piracy + the slave trade—THAT should've been more widely known. When there's a widespread deficit in knowledge, that's a systematic issue more than an individual one.

That said, if you do not currently connect piracy with slavery, hello, here's your wake up call.

You should be able to infer that Stede, being landed gentry in Barbados, gained his wealth from slave labor. That these characters were inspired by real people who existed in and benefited from a slave labor economy. That chattel slavery ballooned during this time period. The show does not go out its way to acknowledge this. And because it didn't, where does that leave us? Filling in the gaps? Doing our own research?

(The answer is yes.)

It's Just Hamilton 2.0

I didn't make this connection like others did, and at first I was annoyed by it but now I'm kind of like. Yah.

25 year old me understands that the problems at the root of Hamilton extend deep into the entertainment industry: the way white historical figures continue to be romanticized, who we let spearhead big productions, and the histories of actual Black historical figures that were completely excluded from the narrative.

19 year old me thought, "Omg, Black people in major broadway roles! Songs that I and other Black theater kids can perform! An accessible way for me to learn more about American history!" I was in a black theatrical ensemble in college. We had that play m e m o r i z e d.

25 year old me looks at OFMD right now and thinks, "Omg, a show that shows a smart Black woman in a compelling role, a fat, Black man as a compelling love interest, and show that openly says White imperialism was fueled by greed and ignorance. Also!! Good LGBT+ rep!! HOLY SHIT!" 25 year old me also understands that we cannot scrub away the scars left by colonialism. Not even in silly Blorbo show. All media will become problematic with time, and we will never be able to get ahead of it.

But for now I would love for folks to take a step back and touch grass because fanon woobifies historical figures waaaay worse than canon does. Lin did not curse us with Miku Binder Jefferson. Y'all did that yourselves and I mine eyes will never be scrubbed of the memory. Also the lack of love towards dark skinned characters does not go unnoticed don't think I don't see y'all sleeping on spanish jackie.

If you don't want to consume OMFD, cool! Please seek out and endorse media actually helmed by Black people. If someone wants to present a counter-argument to this that isn't an angry stream of consciousness and has paragraph breaks, I will weep for joy.