Happy St. Patrick's Day

https://substack.com/@3r1cc0at3s/note/c-101188740?r=51hdz9

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Did you know that in the 1600s when England had captured Jamaica from Spain that the English had thousands of Irish people brought to Jamaica as “indentured servants”?

These Irish were “indentured” which means bound, they were bound for serving on sugar and tobacco plantations for periods ranging from 2 to 7 years. This servitude was without pay and was done by contracts where the Irish served for free in exchange for passage to the New World, food, housing and shelter for their indentured periods and many of whom were forced to do so against their wills and although not considered slavery because they had term contracts which could be extended if they tried to run away and women could get impregnated if they tried to run.

In summation:

1. Some Irish were forcibly removed from their homeland and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean in boats by the English.

2. Those Irish were forced to work on plantations for free for 2-7 years by contract and if they tried to escape their contracts could be extended for more time and if they were women could be raped and forcibly made pregnant against their will.

3. Because they were technically on contract and were considered human and their servitude was not passed onto their children, it did not qualify them as slaves but as employees of a sort.(and arguably because their treatment was not as brutal as the treatment of the Africans)

The term for the Irish being kidnapped like this was referred to as “Barbadosed” which is much like the term “Shanghaied”.

Note: Some of these Irish ironically after their periods were up actually had African slaves of their own and this isn't too shocking because there were likewise many Africans who were actually involved with the slavery of other Africans too, many of which actually sold slaves themselves to European and Arab traders.

Note: there are Irish descendants in Barbados called “Redlegs” as a result who have had issues with poverty etc.

Note: Some people from Scotland and Wales were indentured servants too, also who are white people.

Note: Unlike African slaves the Irish were considered human and did not pass their servitude onto their children.

With this all said:

What does that sound like to you?

That's right, it is 100% slavery, just by a different name and different terms and that in no way diminishes the brutality of the TransAtlantic slave trade of Africans but it absolutely does mean that these people were obviously slaves but because they were white, they had better conditions than the African slaves BUT that also means that because they were white and had better conditions that history doesn't consider them as slaves, they consider them “indentured servants”, which means servants without pay for a binding period in exchange for things like “free travel” from Ireland to the New World in the Caribbean and food and shelter during the servitude and afterwards they were free to settle in the New World even though some of them were forced into this situation and forced to leave Ireland.

For all intents and purposes they were white slaves, who some were forced to do this and if they protested had their contracts extended and if women: raped and forced into pregnancy.

Remember this when you dress up as Irish on St. Patrick's Day, also remember that it's perfectly OK to dress up in a costume to pose as Irish, but if it was any other ethnic group this would be considered wildly racist and this is NO different than doing “Black Face”.

This is exactly what “my culture is not a costume” leftist types claim to want to prevent with other groups but these same people have zero issue with using the Irish as a costume and the only reason they don't see this as an issue is because the Irish are white and they likewise deny the Irish (and some Welsh and Scottish) were slaves because technically they were “indentured” and if anyone says anything about it; they will accuse you of being insensitive to the Africans because of African slavery and in today's culture will likely accuse YOU of being racist for daring to talk about the white slavery that did actually happen.

Look, me personally I see no issue with wearing harmless costumes (and Yes I would include “Black Face” if it is in the spirit of good natured fun and not with vitriol and where is that line?: everyone knows intuitively when they are being hateful or not but with that said, if the African community feels differently, then that's fine but everyone should be held to the same standards and dressing up as Irish people on St. Patrick's Day is no different and frankly, I think St. Patrick's Day costumes are perfectly fine because it's good natured. Now, does that mean that “Black Face”’s origins or some use is racist? Yes, absolutely but is Jimmy Fallon impersonating Chris Rock in “Black Face” racist? No, obviously not because it's good natured) of other cultures.

(Many various celebrities and entertainers have dressed up in “Black Face” and some were in the spirit of good natured fun and some were not. A few examples are: Sammy Davis Jr. (who was African American himself), Dan Ackroyd, Fred Armisen, Jack Black, Zach Braff, Billy Crystal, Ted Danson, Shane Dawson, Robert Downey Jr., Drake, Jimmy Fallon, Bill Hader, Jon Ham, Jimmy Kimmel, Jenna Marbles, Joni Mitchell, Sarah Silverman, Howard Stern, Betty White, Tracey Ullman, Shirley Temple, Rob McElhenney, Kaitlin Olson, heck even Justin Trudeau did as a costume for Halloween as a “Genie” and so did Dave Chappelle.

(Note: there is some controversy about the Chappelle episode because although Chappelle himself was in “Black Face” on his show, he felt during the filming process that it became not in the spirit of good nature and subsequently distanced himself from the entire show itself, it's a long story and given Chappelle is a comedic genius, I think he knows when things cross a line) 

And there's also some fictional characters that did it too like Eric Cartman (South Park), Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, The Smith Family (in part) on TV show American Dad etc. and some of those examples could be in bad taste or in mean spirit and others could be or are good natured fun as no one at the time took any kind of serious issue with these entertainers/fictional characters and many of which are still at the very top of the entertainment business today and absolutely no on thinks these people are racist because they clearly are not and are just entertainers trying to make people laugh and have fun, so I don’t personally believe that “Black Face” or dressing up as other ethnicities is inherently racist but the point is nowadays this is seen as unacceptable except if someone is dressing up as a Caucasian (or White European) ethnicity (of which I am talking about the Irish) furthermore I think it's perfectly normal if some kids want to dress up to play Peter Pan as Indigenous First Nations people clearly that's in the spirit of good fun but what I am trying to highlight is that these same leftist types who will absolutely lose their minds of someone playfully dresses up in another person's ethnicity will unabashedly dress up as Irish and if you bring up the plight of Irish slavery they will quibble with you because technically the Irish were “indentured” and not technically slaves.

What I'm getting at is that dressing up as another's ethnicity if it's playful isn't harmful to anyone and if you cannot laugh at that, then it's you, you're the problem BUT at the same time we have some standards that white people are not allowed to dress up as other ethnicities but anyone is perfectly allowed to dress up as white ethnicities, it's a ridiculous double standard and if “Black Face” is culturally frowned upon then mocking the Irish should be too.

Moreover, our entire culture due to this absolute insanity completely glosses over the slavery of white people and that that part of history is not acknowledged in a meaningful way because it doesn't fit the narrative of today's leftists that all white people are inherently bad because they exist and have existed and furthermore that white people are responsible for all the world's woes and also doesn't acknowledge that history is complex and even Africans were selling other Africans to Europeans and Arabs and for that matter do we discuss about the Arabs buying African slaves? No and this is what I'm getting at. History is complex and nuanced and that's hard to deal with anyways but it's much harder when we aren't even allowed to talk about it at all.

In short, we need to take ourselves less seriously in some ways and more seriously in others.

It's fun to dress up and it's OK to acknowledge the suffering of white people and also the participation of black people in bad things like slavery because history is complex.

No one says anything about any of this because many are terrified of being labelled a racist because it can absolutely ruin someone's life. (at least in part) 

Happy St. Patrick's Day 

Note: sources were Google and Google's AI search Gemini and Wikipedia.