Working for human rights in Mauritania makes certain things very clear. Like the power of the state to make people’s lives better, or make them miserable. Like how the state can use the police to make criminals out of human rights defenders. Like how standing up for the rights of slaves and ex-slaves in a very real sense is standing up to power. And that power, when resisted, gets angry and violent.
The U.S.A. is going through some of these same issues these days. There’s the amazingly depressing, militaristic police response to protests over the police murder of the unarmed teen-ager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. There are other police homicides around the country of unarmed Black people (mostly young men, like Eric Garner in New York and John Crawford III in Beavercreek Ohio). There’s the militarisation of our town police forces as designed by the federal government (see the editorial on this by ACLU senior counsel Kara Dansky).
The legacy of slavery in the U.S. is still strong. Racism has deep, ugly roots in too many parts of this nation. And then, in response to a book by a Cornell University historian that portrayed slave markets in the USA and the reality of how people were publicly marketed and sold, there was the Economist’s review that insisted that the book was mere “advocacy” and not “real history.”
The Economist’s review tried to fault the book for not discussing economics more thoroughly, but the point is that economics is not really the point when it comes to slavery. The point is that human rights trump economics.
Under massive criticism from social media, the Economist was forced to withdraw the review.
But I want to emphasise here the importance of the Economist even publishing such a review in the first place. Sure, they were shamed into retracting it. But it is not like they have expressed a lot of remorse or a clear program to change their editorial staff. They will not suffer any consequences.
Meanwhile, real people suffer racism, they suffer enslavement and the legacy of slavery. I love the wit and humor that forced the Economist to take down their offensive publication, and hope we can make some real changes.
KEY LINKS: Ed Baptist, author of The Half Hasn’t Been Told charactized the Economist’s review as blatantly racist.
Twitter flamed with witty responses in defense of Baptist’s book.
“If your devotion to a certain worldpoint or ideology leads you to attempt to authorize a defense of an institution like the transatlantic slave trade, perhaps you should step back and reconsider what it is that you’re devoted to.”
From Hatless SuspectFlowbeeBryant, Thursday 7:49pm Recounting the Economist’s criticism on Twitter post says, “Mr Baptist has not written an objective history of slavery. Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains. This is not history; it is advocacy.” The poster then comments, “This has to be satire of some sort, right? Like, no one could be that dense.”
Adam Weinstein, writing on Gawker, Let’s Look at These Slavery-Inspired #EconomistBookReviews, Shall We?, captures the mood of incredulity at the Economist’s bizarre review,
“So a Cornell historian wrote a book about how slavery, rather than God, the Marlboro Man or Vince Lombardi, fueled America’s capitalist development. But did you ever consider how nice some slaveowners were, Mr. Historian? Your Economist book reviewer did, and now he’s getting torched on Twitter.
“Cornell professor Ed Baptist’s argument seems pretty straightforward, given that his book is titled The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism. But he commits fatal errors of bias and imbalance, according to the Economist’s unnamed critic! Has he ever considered things from the leisurely antebellum plantation tycoon’s point of view?
Baptist apparently cites the threefold increase in slaves’ cotton-field productivity from 1800 to 1860, a figure that vaulted South Carolina, Mississippi, Louisiana and Georgia to the top of the list of richest states—for whites, at least. Using testimonies from slaves, Baptist says this productivity boost came from a system of harsher treatment of slaves, “calibrated pain.”
But! “A historian cannot know whether these few spokesmen adequately speak for all,” the Economist’s reviewer states. And anyway, there could be lots of benign—even benevolent—explanations for better bale-totin’, he says:
Slave owners surely had a vested interest in keeping their “hands” ever fitter and stronger to pick more cotton. Some of the rise in productivity could have come from better treatment. Unlike Mr Thomas, Mr Baptist has not written an objective history of slavery. Almost all the blacks in his book are victims, almost all the whites villains. This is not history; it is advocacy. Emphasis added. Mind you, this reviewer’s just sayin’, since unlike Baptist, he hasn’t done any research into any of this.”
Weinstein also copied some choice Twitter reposes,
“The People of Twitter, inspired by the Economist’s plea for even-handedness, decided to undertake a bit of revisionist criticism of their own, interrogating the literary canon and its lack of objectivity. I present to you #EconomistBookReviews:
STEVE HUFF @SteveHuff, “Mr. Capote does not address the Clutter family’s responsibility, as they were clearly well-to-do and worth robbing.” #economistbookreviews
Zeddonymous @ZeddRebel, #economistbookreviews “Jonas Salk is portrayed as a hero, but what of the irreparable harm he did to the children’s wheelchair industry?”
Joel Gordon @JoelGord, Has Mr. Preston not thought to ask for Ebola’s side of the story? #economistbookreviews
Matthew Rindge @mattrindge, “I can’t recommend these Gospels. The protagonist defends the poor and says not one good thing about rich people” #economistbookreviews
Katje @silentkpants, Nowhere in Mr. Dickens’ account does he acknowledge the proprietor’s generosity in providing orphans with factory work #EconomistBookReviews
Penny Schenk @galoot, The portrayal of Lady Macbeth is relentlessly negative; it’s entirely possible that her hands were in fact dirty #economistbookreviews 5:40 PM – 4 Sep 2014
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