Pernicious Fiction 0
In a long article, Leonard Pitts, Jr., explored the history of race as a social concept.
Contrary to what you and I were taught, the idea of different races based on color is relatively new, about 300 to 400 years old.
Slavery had existed for centuries, but historically was a result of conquest or indebtedness (sort of the ultimate late payment penalty). Quite coincidentally, no doubt, the birth of the concept of an immutable characteristic called “race,” which confers superiority on some and inferiority on others in perpetuity, coincides with the growth of chattel slavery–the belief that some persons are destined by heredity to be owned and exploited, like cattle, forever.
A nugget:
Read it.
