Learning the wrong lessons

Explanation: After the failed rebellion of Nat Turner, the legislature of Virginia actually debated ending slavery after seeing firsthand the desperation and anger that it evoked in it the enslaved, and fearful for their own safety.

Unfortunately, the pro-slavery side won out, in large part because of a push by slaver ideology to reconceptualize slavery not as a ’necessary evil’, but a ‘positive good’ which just hadn’t gone far enough to keep slaves in their ‘proper’ place. So the Virginia legislature instead passed stricter slavery laws, preventing slaves from learning to read or write or gathering for religious services without white supervision.

In Southampton County, ’round 1831…

Explanation: After the failed rebellion of Nat Turner, the legislature of Virginia actually debated ending slavery after seeing firsthand the desperation and anger that it evoked in it the enslaved, and fearful for their own safety.

Unfortunately, the pro-slavery side won out, in large part because of a push by slaver ideology to reconceptualize slavery not as a ’necessary evil’, but a ‘positive good’ which just hadn’t gone far enough to keep slaves in their ‘proper’ place. So the Virginia legislature instead passed stricter slavery laws, preventing slaves from learning to read or write or gathering for religious services without white supervision.

In Southampton County, ’round 1831…