Controversial Opinions (For Everything Other Than DC Comics)

[Adam Allen]

Honestly, Alexander Hamilton's personal and individual beliefs about race, or even his practices in regards to slavery, are kind of beside the point, as far as my issue with the musical. I think what bugs me is that there were people of color alive and in the world in 1776, and it is not just some weird coincidence that the founding fathers were all white guys. I mean, I do not think it was an accident.

7 Black Heroes of the American Revolution

So, ya -- there were non-white folks around. They just were not able to participate in reality anything like the way it looks in the show. Which, you know, is fine -- it's entertainment, and hopefully nobody really tries to take it like it's a documentary. I guess I'm just being a stick in the mud about it because ... I don't know, on some level, if the point of the show is so that POC can see this story and see themselves as a part of it ... well, be entertained, but don't really believe that, I guess.

The reality is that people who look like the actors in the show would have been lucky to just not be owned as someone else's property, if they were alive back then. They would not have been generals and politicians.

But yeah I realize, I'm taking it too seriously. Just kind of rubs me the wrong way, unfortunately.

[C_Miller]

Alexander Hamilton was against slavery, FWIW.

In theory, so was Jefferson. But it's all a lot more complicated than that. It often is.

[Kirby101]

I'll try again.
New Research Suggests Alexander Hamilton Was a Slave Owner

If you Google "Smithsonian Hamilton slaves". it should be there.

I see the problem CBR is taking
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/new- r e s e a r c h-alexander-hamilton-slave-owner-180976260/

And making it
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/histo...ner-180976260/

And removing the word (research). Weird.

[The Darknight Detective]

I see the problem CBR is taking
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/new- r e s e a r c h-alexander-hamilton-slave-owner-180976260/

And making it
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/histo...ner-180976260/

And removing the word (research). Weird.

I'm assuming there is a cloud over the story, since Wikipedia hasn't picked it up (or someone hasn't posted something in the Talk section of Hamilton's page arguing for it's inclusion).

[Kirby101]

I'm assuming there is a cloud over the story, since Wikipedia hasn't picked it up (or someone hasn't posted something in the Talk section of Hamilton's page arguing for it's inclusion).

In the article, which is only from last November, it talks about how Hamilton both opposed to slavery but also participated in it. It was one of the dichotomies we see in other founders.

[The Darknight Detective]

In the article, which is only from last November, it talks about how Hamilton both opposed to slavery but also participated in it. It was one of the dichotomies we see in other founders.

I read it last year, but I'm not sure if it's actually accurate. At this point, it's still up in the air to me.

[Gray Lensman]

In the article, which is only from last November, it talks about how Hamilton both opposed to slavery but also participated in it. It was one of the dichotomies we see in other founders.

I found something similar (or maybe the same one) on search. Hamilton's dichotomy isn't the same as Jefferson's. TJ considered it morally repugnant, but in practical terms he never really did much more than that. Hamilton defended black citizens in court against white people who claimed they had bills of sale for them. Granted, that could just be a lawyer taking on clients irregardless of circumstances (as he also represented slave holders) but it's still miles ahead of those who said it was wrong but we're unwilling to part with the comfort and cash of owning a large number of people in the slightest fashion.

[Adam Allen]

In the article, which is only from last November, it talks about how Hamilton both opposed to slavery but also participated in it. It was one of the dichotomies we see in other founders.

I think this is my problem with the musical, and with veneration of the founders in general -- again, leaving aside the specifics of exactly how much Alexander Hamilton himself participated in the the institutional of slavery, as a private individual.

You'll have to forgive me for just going full Godwin here, but the easiest analogy I can think of to compare it to is if there was someone who was an integral part of the founding of the Third Reich, but then we want to give some lenience for what their personal beliefs about race were. Now, the US government did grant lenience to some former Nazis, because they had useful information/skills/knowledge ... I have a problem with that, too.

I admit that I did not know this until just reading it, but apparently Vermont was the first US state to abolish slavery, as early as 1777. Not only that, but Quakers in the US were opposed to slavery in the colonies pretty well from the very start, which counters that old common defense that "everyone thought that way" back then, and supposedly the founders just didn't know any better, or whatever. No, there always were people who knew and said loudly that it was evil -- furthermore, how racist and evil is the idea anyway, that somehow reasonable white people could look at an enslaved black person and not understand this was a human being every much as they themselves? I think that is apologist bs. I don't think it's really possible to talk about the human spirit and freedom and all that, and really not see that someone with darker skin has every much an intrinsic right as someone with lighter skin. I think the founders just chose to ignore this out of pragmatism and personal interest.

Which is what it is, as far as it goes, because there is no changing the past. But just saying, this is where it bugs me, to see a story told about a "heroic" founding father, using music that came from African American culture, and using a multi-racial cast so the story feels accessible to people who are not white, or might be put off by an all-white cast. I mean, I'm saying I guess that I see the pragmatic reason to do that ... maybe even the artistic reason, because the show is entertaining, as I've already noted.

Just leaves a bad taste for me. I'll aim to stop ranting about it now though, because I don't know if I can be any more clear about why it bugs me.

[TheRay]

Keanu Reeves should be in more movies.

[The Darknight Detective]

I think this is my problem with the musical, and with veneration of the founders in general -- again, leaving aside the specifics of exactly how much Alexander Hamilton himself participated in the the institutional of slavery, as a private individual.

You'll have to forgive me for just going full Godwin here, but the easiest analogy I can think of to compare it to is if there was someone who was an integral part of the founding of the Third Reich, but then we want to give some lenience for what their personal beliefs about race were. Now, the US government did grant lenience to some former Nazis, because they had useful information/skills/knowledge ... I have a problem with that, too.

I admit that I did not know this until just reading it, but apparently Vermont was the first US state to abolish slavery, as early as 1777. Not only that, but Quakers in the US were opposed to slavery in the colonies pretty well from the very start, which counters that old common defense that "everyone thought that way" back then, and supposedly the founders just didn't know any better, or whatever. No, there always were people who knew and said loudly that it was evil -- furthermore, how racist and evil is the idea anyway, that somehow reasonable white people could look at an enslaved black person and not understand this was a human being every much as they themselves? I think that is apologist bs. I don't think it's really possible to talk about the human spirit and freedom and all that, and really not see that someone with darker skin has every much an intrinsic right as someone with lighter skin. I think the founders just chose to ignore this out of pragmatism and personal interest.

Which is what it is, as far as it goes, because there is no changing the past. But just saying, this is where it bugs me, to see a story told about a "heroic" founding father, using music that came from African American culture, and using a multi-racial cast so the story feels accessible to people who are not white, or might be put off by an all-white cast. I mean, I'm saying I guess that I see the pragmatic reason to do that ... maybe even the artistic reason, because the show is entertaining, as I've already noted.

Just leaves a bad taste for me. I'll aim to stop ranting about it now though, because I don't know if I can be any more clear about why it bugs me.

My feeling is always to place these people from the past in the context of their times, just in the way I want future generations to do regarding us (what? you mean they won't think we're the perfect specimens of humanity that we think we are? )

[Adam Allen]

My feeling is always to place these people from the past in the context of their times, just in the way I want future generations to do regarding us (what? you mean they won't think we're the perfect specimens of humanity that we think we are? )

I think that I do place them in the context of their times, which is why I think it's important to note that there always were people who opposed slavery on moral grounds, even before it ever became institutional in the proto-US.

And no, I don't think we are perfect. I fully recognize that I am culpable for the ongoing atrocities of the systems that I am a part of, even if only through my complacence. Just one example is our food industry, which I did not create and do not control, but which wreaks a disastrous environmental toll and is responsible for monstrous cruelty towards animals. My ignorance of these problems would not excuse my participation in the system, and likewise my knowing and "thinking" right -- that I would vote to change these systems tomorrow if it were possible -- means pretty much nothing, because the fact on the ground is that I am doing nothing to change it.

Yeah, I'd rather not be hated by future generations for my not somehow changing these massive globalized systems ... I just also don't expect them to give me a free pass "for not knowing any better". I'm giving our ancestors the same allowance -- maybe they did the best they could, day to day, as I try to. That doesn't mean I shouldn't recognize their failures, or that I expect future generations to not recognize mine.

[The Darknight Detective]

I think that I do place them in the context of their times, which is why I think it's important to note that there always were people who opposed slavery on moral grounds, even before it ever became institutional in the proto-US.

True, but they were far and away fewer back then. The odds are most of us on this site wouldn't have had the same eact views on slavery and people of African descent had we been born in the 188th century. Same exact people, but just a different time and place.

[Starter Set]

Keanu Reeves should be in more movies.

Cdprojekt sure managed to hype that man. People are so easy to manipulate, it's all kind of depressing.

Anyway, he has been in a LOT of movies. I'm sure there are enough of them around to appease your newly discovered adoration for mister Reeves.

[The Darknight Detective]

Cdprojekt sure managed to hype that man. People are so easy to manipulate, it's all kind of depressing.

Anyway, he has been in a LOT of movies. I'm sure there are enough of them around to appease your newly discovered adoration for mister Reeves.

My view is he's fine depending on the project, because he can only be effective in limited roles, IMO.

[OopsIdiditagain]

A lot of popular mangas/anime would be considered "SJW" if they were made in the USA despite some people's claims that manga isn't "political".