On a randomly patriotic note...

[seriousfic]

It always annoys me, the common snarkicism that America was founded by a bunch of slave-owners. Snark is supposed to be bitchily accurate, not openly dishonest.

It was a huge controversy, even way back then. There were people who supported slavery, people who wanted to abolish slavery, and most of all people who wanted to present a unified front against the British Empire. Thomas Jefferson put a line in the Declaration of Independence openly criticizing slavery and had to take it out, that's how controversial it was.

Learn your history. Characterizing the Founding Fathers as a bunch of gleeful whip-crackers is as asinine as, I don't know, saying Obama's last tax bill was passed by a bunch of homophobes.

Comments

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

[...] saying Obama's last tax bill was passed by a bunch of homophobes [...]

To be fair, this statement is not entirely wrong. Hell, I voted for the guy, and I still have issues with Obama being so hesitant to define marriage outside the confines of one man, one woman. I can only hope that we as a society evolve to the point where homosexuality becomes so much Not A Big Deal that the ignorant youth of the future see us all as a bunch of Fred Phelpses by comparison to the standards of their own era.

Fair point on calling out the complexity and controversy of the issue during the Founding Fathers' days, since I do think it's tempting for modern-day social justice advocates to see the old dead white men of a previous era as being a bunch of two-dimensional Snidely Whiplashes twirling their mustaches and cackling in racist/sexist/homophobic glee, but given Thomas Jefferson's own issues with practicing what he preached in real life, I'd probably advise against using him as an example with regard to this particular subject.

[seriousfic.livejournal.com]

Hell, I voted for the guy, and I still have issues with Obama being so hesitant to define marriage outside the confines of one man, one woman.

Yeah, but you wouldn't be able to say that everyone in Congress is homophobic, is my point.

[box-in-the-box.livejournal.com]

True, although I would say that the ones who aren't — or at least the ones who are comfortable with openly admitting that they're not — are at least less than half.

[violenttemper.livejournal.com]

Thomas Jefferson is not a good example as he was in fact a slave-owner.