#oh boy do i have strong fucking feelings about jefferson and his fucking mens rea

[splendidemendax]

one of the really fucked up things here is that this training isn't actually fully factually wrong about washington and jefferson, especially (to my knowledge) the latter, but it selectively presents true information in a way that leads to dramatic misinterpretations.

here's a quote from jefferson about slavery that's really stuck with me:

A geographical line,* coinciding with a marked principle, moral and political, once concieved and held up to the angry passions of men, will never be obliterated; and every new irritation will mark it deeper and deeper. I can say with conscious truth that there is not a man on earth who would sacrifice more than I would, to relieve us from this heavy reproach, in any practicable way. The cession of that kind of property, for so it is misnamed, is a bagatelle which would not cost me in a second thought, if, in that way, a general emancipation and expatriation could be effected: and, gradually, and with due sacrifices, I think it might be. But, as it is, we have the wolf by the ear,** and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. Justice is in one scale, and self-preservation in the other. —letter from jefferson to john holmes, april 22, 1820 (bolding mine)

the man who wrote this, the man who claimed "that there is not a man on earth who would sacrifice more," at the very same time claimed ownership of other human beings. he considered slavery an evil, a danger to the nation he had helped to create, a "wolf by the ear," and continued profiting from the exploitation of hundreds of people, including some who seemed to have been his own children.

he knew it was wrong and he did it anyway because it benefitted him. the former doesn't cancel out the latter; it makes the latter all the more horrifying. i am both fascinated by and terrified of people who, seeing this, think that his demonstrably full understanding of his own crime somehow mitigates his culpability.

*this letter is about the debate surrounding the missouri compromise; the "geographical line" in question is the 36°30' parallel that was set as the northern limit of the expansion of slavery in the louisiana purchase territories.

**this phrase is (a) mildly famous, (b) used by jefferson repeatedly and (c) the source of the title of a 1991 ya historical fiction novel by ann rinaldi i read as a kid (i haven't read it recently enough to know whether it's worth recommending, but i can tell you it left a impact)

“A new civics training program for public school teachers in Florida says it is a “misconception” that “the founders desired strict separation of church and state,” the Washington Post reports. Driving the news: That and other content in a state-sponsored training course has raised eyebrows among some who have participated and felt it was omitting unflattering information about the country’s founders, pushing inaccuracies and centering religious ideas, per the Post. The Constitution explicitly bars the government from “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.“ Scholars interpret the passage to require a separation of church and state, per the Post. In another example, the training states that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were against slavery, while omitting the fact that each owned enslaved people.”

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Florida training program: “Misconception” that founders wanted separation of church and state

So … DeSantis and his Fascist supporters want to just straight up lie to generations of children about the history of American violence, oppression, racism, and they are using the law to do that.

I’m speechless. I haven’t finished my coffee yet, and it’s early, but … holy fuck. I am speechless.