Why did they invent white people?

[Dr. Zaus]

According to Battalora, (2013), Ruediger, (2020), and Tomlins, (2001), 1) Whites were not a category of persons until the late 1680s (Battalora, 2013), 2) before the 1660s the vast majority of persons who came to the Americas, regardless of country of origin, came on a 7 year indenture-ship contract and were free to then, themselves, obtain indentured servants (Tomlins, 2001), 3) c. 1640 there were places in the British american colonies where nearly half of the black men had white wives owing to the fact that the category of 'black and white' did not yet exist (Battalora, 2013) and 4) Race was invented to 'divide and conquer' the laboring class; and brought into law following Bacon's Rebellion (Ruediger, 2020)

I had no idea until I read these sources (and a few others) so I created a video to tell everyone.

I'd love some feedback on the video, or the ideas presented here.

Battalora, J. (2013). Birth of a white nation: The invention of white people and its relevance today. Strategic Book Publishing.
Ruediger, D. (2020). " Neither Utterly to Reject Them, Nor Yet to Drawe Them to Come In": Tributary Subordination and Settler Colonialism in Virginia. Early American Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 18(1), 1-31.
Tomlins, C. (2001). Reconsidering indentured servitude: European migration and the early American labor force, 1600–1775. Labor History, 42(1), 5-43.

 

[zinfamous]

Hmm, don't know much about that, but what is unique about the American/Dutch/British version of slavery, is that it was the first example of a model of slavery as an economic system based explicitly on racial lines. Prior to the age of colonialization, slavery was a class-based thing that was generally sustained through war prisoners. Anyone could be a slave in Ancient Rome, and anyone of any color could generally be found in all levels of society. Any slave had a means of freeing themselves, as well, as there was often a limit of service that you were obligated to complete.

"No difference between White and Black", in general at that time, I find to be a bit dubious, but it does track with the Christian and philosophical defenses of what became and what ultimately supported the slave trade, and how it was necessary to enslave a specific race of people from Africa--as if they were marked by God for this "service." Again, that model of slavery never existed before, so it would does support the notion of what might have been a nascent need to define races in such a way, in order to support this vile institution.

 

[Greenman]

It was because they needed a market for mayonnaise.

 

[woolfe9998]

Hmm, don't know much about that, but what is unique about the American/Dutch/British version of slavery, is that it was the first example of a model of slavery as an economic system based explicitly on racial lines. Prior to the age of colonialization, slavery was a class-based thing that was generally sustained through war prisoners. Anyone could be a slave in Ancient Rome, and anyone of any color could generally be found in all levels of society. Any slave had a means of freeing themselves, as well, as there was often a limit of service that you were obligated to complete.

"No difference between White and Black", in general at that time, I find to be a bit dubious, but it does track with the Christian and philosophical defenses of what became and what ultimately supported the slave trade, and how it was necessary to enslave a specific race of people from Africa--as if they were marked by God for this "service." Again, that model of slavery never existed before, so it would does support the notion of what might have been a nascent need to define races in such a way, in order to support this vile institution.

This is accurate IIRC. I recall black Africans being persecuted in Spain during the early inquisitions, but it was always because they were Muslim, not because they were black. I think going farther back past the 16th century most group based persecution was based on religion, not race.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

"No difference between White and Black", in general at that time, I find to be a bit dubious, but it does track with the Christian and philosophical defenses of what became and what ultimately supported the slave trade, and how it was necessary to enslave a specific race of people from Africa--as if they were marked by God for this "service." Again, that model of slavery never existed before, so it would does support the notion of what might have been a nascent need to define races in such a way, in order to support this vile institution.

I do have a concern about this.

Which woolfe attended to:

This is accurate IIRC. I recall black Africans being persecuted in Spain during the early inquisitions, but it was always because they were Muslim, not because they were black. I think going farther back past the 16th century most group based persecution was based on religion, not race.

I didn't address the trans-Atlantic slave trade engaged in mostly by the Spanish and French; which was based on going to Africa to get slaves, justified by them being "non-Catholic." Of course the protestant Great-Britten, which still held a sizable Catholic minority, couldn't use Catholicism as their justification.

Also, there's a huge erasure of the Native American's perspective in all of this.

 

[Fenixgoon]

very surprising and interesting. one thing i would do is regularly cite the research throughout the video. i think that would help establish credibility (even though in the description you do cite the original research!)

 

[UNCjigga]

"No difference between White and Black", in general at that time, I find to be a bit dubious, but it does track with the Christian and philosophical defenses of what became and what ultimately supported the slave trade, and how it was necessary to enslave a specific race of people from Africa--as if they were marked by God for this "service." Again, that model of slavery never existed before, so it would does support the notion of what might have been a nascent need to define races in such a way, in order to support this vile institution.

I’m no expert on this subject, but there is a whole volume of work devoted to the Roman Catholic Church essentially blessing slavery as “God’s Will” in order to further enrich themselves off colonial loot.

 

[UberNeuman]

Why? Well, God wanted Hee-Haw. Couldn't make it for himself, so he made White People to make Hee-Haw.

/joke stolen from St. George Carlin and God's need for plastic:

 

[hal2kilo]

It was because they needed a market for mayonnaise.

I have to acknowledge that was funny.

 

[HomerJS]

My guess they wanted a contrast to those inferior darkies

 

[Dr. Zaus]

My guess they wanted a contrast to those inferior darkies

Right.

The big idea is to make laborers see themselves as having more in common with Ivanka Trump than their fellow laborer, because Ivanka has the same skin color.

I appreciate the feedback to include citations in the video; so you can see the part of the text I'm pulling from.

 

[Moonbeam]

Looking at some of the:

Connection Questions
------------------------------------------------
What motivated Virginia’s lawmakers to make legal distinctions between white and black inhabitants? What effect did those distinctions have on Virginia’s universe of obligation? Can laws influence the way people think about who belongs and who does not?

How does creating an “out” group strengthen the identity and status of the “in” group?

In the documentary Race: The Power of an Illusion, historian Mia Bay says that “part of where the idea of race comes from [is] in the tendency for people to see existing power relationships as having some sort of natural quality to them.”

What does she mean? Why would people of European descent in the late 1600s begin to believe that people of African descent were naturally or biologically inferior to them?

What role might economics have played in encouraging this belief? What role might have been played by the insecurity some felt about their social status?
-------------------------------------------------
I ask myself what about us explains why these questions arise. What about our nature or conditioning causes us to ask them and see in them relevance? What human motivation lies behind them?

The answer, I believe, is that we hate ourselves and whenever whatever notion of ourselves we have taken on to substitute for the real self respect that was taken from us is substituted in its place to mask the pain of that loss will evoke our capacity to rationalize away anything that would rob us of that substitute. We will find any way there is to believe we are superior to others because the real hidden feeling is that each of us is actually the worst person in the world, not in reality, mind you. but in how we really feel.

So when we deal with almost any issue of human insanity, be it racism sexism poverty climate change, you name it, we can't really solve those problems at their origin because we will not face the fact of this deeply hidden self hate.

Every advance we make in self understanding, every step we take to redress the injustice we bring into the world by projecting our self hate onto others just kicks the ball down the court of endless denial of how bad we really feel, of how far down the rabbit hole our self hate goes.

I am deeply committed to the notion that racism should be combatted in all of its hideous forms, but it is only a side issue of a much more intractible problem and even at times a substitute for facing the real source of our pain. It is a good thing to fight against racism, but it is pretentions, in my opinion, to think that that good we do in the world will actually change how we feel. It will help, certainly. Nobody who wishes that all people be seen as the same can possibly be the worst person in the world, but alone, I don't think it will root out self hate at its core. But it certainly helps.

The big problem with identifying racism as evil is that we already believe we are and will resist knowing it with violence if need be. We would rather die than know how we feel because we are already emotionally dead. We died psychically as children and don't want to remember how deeply it hurt.

To forgive others is to forgive oneself.

 

[Dr. Zaus]

Moonbeam: So you would peg joining groups as a way to avoid self-hate?

The research I've read says people don't "hate" others - they love each other; and are afraid that the 'other' is going to harm those they love.

 

[Moonbeam]

Moonbeam: So you would peg joining groups as a way to avoid self-hate?

The research I've read says people don't "hate" others - they love each other; and are afraid that the 'other' is going to harm those they love.

Sorry, because you didn’t quote me I only found this question You ask me here by chance or I would have responded earlier:

I am having trouble with the logic you present:

In the first place, but not so much on the problem I have with your logic, I don’t think you will find much research that implies that the researcher him or her self is suggesting that they are aware they feel like the worst person in the world or that the reason they do is because they were put down as children or that they are very very sure they have undone that damage via psychotherapy and actually re-experienced the events that inculcated that pain by feeling it all over again.

However, I know nothing so, while I believe what I just said, I do not do scholarly research myself so how could I really know I am right. The effect of that opinion, therefore, is that I personally put little faith in the so called experts and assume them to be, in this area, as blind as everybody else. I have no faith in the so called experts in this area. Why?:

We do not know we feel like the worst in the world, don’t want to know and do not want to know we do not want to know. We do not want to relive our own psychic deaths. When the hero goes to slay the dragon, the obstacles that get his way are enormous. Check our mythology.

This I say as a heads up, then, a confession of potential bias. I may just be profoundly bigoted and arrogant, or maybe, as I believe, I am right.

As to where I have a problem with your comment:

l see joining groups as an evolutionary development in social animals that increases species survivability, and group loyalty the product of that. The problem is there is only one human race to belong to. So where did the other come from? We can’t at the same time love each other, that would mean loving everyone, while at the same time fearing those we love harming each other as the other. The other is an invention, just as inventing Black people was, a projection of our separation from God or loss of undivided being. Once we invented language and the ability to name, we created the defense mechanism of projection, the need to see in others what we will not see in ourselves.

A group is one thing, a collection of robots all programmed to fear any deviation from some psychologically deranged cult prison is quite another thing.

Furthermore, and sorry, but we self haters are not really capable of real love. Real love can’t turn to hate.