A collection of 6 posts
The transatlantic slave trade was a monstrous crime against humanity. Yet it represented just one example of an ancient evil that spanned many civilisations.
If good educational opportunities were there for the taking, the sense of racial injustice in America would be much less.
That slaves were able to develop beneficial skills while in bondage is a tribute to the human ability to wrest value and create meaning even under conditions of almost unfathomable duress.
So in the end, slavery, the slave trade and imperialism were not only morally disgusting but also of dubious economic value.
Listen onSpotify Kentucky State political science professor Wilfred Reilly talks to Toby Young about his new book Taboo: 10 Facts You Can’t Talk About. Professor Reilly’s last piece for Quillette was about the 1776 project.
The unhinged reasoning in Fairbanks’s essay invites an overcorrection. It would be easy—and tendentious—to reverse her argument. The Left are the real heirs of the proslavery tradition—intolerant aggression disguised as aggrieved fragility, etc.