Did you see Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention? If you didn’t, stop reading this right now and click here. Not only did I see her speech; I felt it. It was captivating and moving and starkly contrasted the gloom of the Republican convention during the prior week. The most poignant part was this:
“I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves. And I watch my daughters, two beautiful, intelligent, black young women, playing with their dogs on the White House lawn.”
Not everyone believed the First Lady. Various critics questioned whether the White House was really erected by slaves. And obviously, Obama said this to stoke the nation’s racial divide. Obviously, right?
Good thing that Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly decided to do some of his own fact-checking. He explained to his viewers that lots of different types of people built the White House and yes, some of them were white and yes, many of them were slaves hired by subcontractors. However, these slaves were “were well-fed and had decent lodgings provided by the government.”
You’ve got to wonder why O’Reilly felt the need to talk up the nice food and homes that slaves lived in. O’Reilly didn’t exactly condone slavery, but his remarks nonetheless portray outdated happy-slave propaganda.
In response, Shonda Rhimes tweeted, “The idiocy never ceases to amaze me. Try slavery, Bill. Let us know how good the food is while you were chains.”
For the record, there’s no historical proof of whether slaves were well-fed. But there is evidence that their work was strenuous, punishing, and—you know, because slavery is what it is—against their will.
Unfortunately, we hear these sorts of remarks too often. Remember when Ben Carson observed some “really quite nice” Syrian refugee camps in Jordan? Or how about how Donald Trump talked up Roger Ailes as a great guy while sexual harassment claims against the now-former Fox News chief were flooding in.
Shame on O’Reilly for trying to imply that a tired, beaten slave was somehow better off because he may have been thrown an extra pork rib. (And shame on Trump for being Trump.) And shame on anyone who doesn’t recognize that these sorts of comments are nothing but thinly veiled attempts to obscure critical pieces of history that, rather than diminish, we should all strive to learn from.
