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Manhood in the Slaves (Part I) |
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The very practices of plantation life removed even the honorific attributes of fatherhood from the Negro male. He was addressed as "boy" until past his prime. Then he was allowed to assume the title of "uncle." The law gave the slave owner absolute power over the slaves which, of course, meant the absolute dependency of each slave. A slave law said: "the father of a slave is unknown to our law." This implied the legal stripping of slave fathers of their last semblance of masculinity (Silberman, Crisis in Black and White, p. 89).
The manhood of the slaves was about physical strength and "breeder potency." Physical strength was encouraged by the slave owner for purposes of doing heavy work in the field (e.g. clearing land of trees) or in fighting slaves on other plantations for the entertainment of the captors. Every conceivable measure was used in order for the slave master to keep female and especially male slaves dumb. For slave children, the plantation offered no really satisfactory father-image other than the master. The "sperm" donor slave father had virtually no authority over his children.
Discipline, parental responsibility, and control of rewards and punishments all rested in other hands. Slave fathers were also distanced from their own children -- either by them or their children being sold to other plantations. No doubt, this was terribly painful and frustrating to Black males but they were essentially powerless.
Thus, the African practice of establishing patterns about marriage, parenting, taking care of children, and the financial requirements of manhood were essentially wiped out ("August Wilson," in Elkins, p. 138, 157, 185). The slave father could not even protect the mother of his children except by appealing directly to the master. The effects of these slavery generated attacks on manhood acted like a prism in causing different displays of manhood patterns in slave descendants. Instead of the slave male being the father of his children, those children were taught to look to the slave owner as their "judge and jury."
On the one hand, the master's role as "the father" was to guide slave males into his loyalty and with docility, humility, cheerfulness, and (under supervision) his diligence (Weinstein, Am. Negro Slavery, p. 214). on the other hand, the master, as father, expected his slave boys to be irresponsible, playful, silly, lazy, and with a tendency to lie and steal -- i.e. to essentially fit the role of "Sambo."
Force breeding was a cheap solution for the slave-owner to increase his riches. Breeder potency was about enticing the male slaves' sexual impulses, starting in early puberty, to be so free as to take sexual liberties with any slave female of any age (e.g. 11 years old). When the sexual impulses of slave males were no longer controlled by African Tradition, they became subject only to the periodic urge of animalistic-like sexual hunger -- a hunger which seized upon every available Black woman. This was an indicator of the successful "rolling stone" or "stud" brainwashing applied by the White man to vulnerable slaves.
To increase their riches from selling slaves and to increase their work force for the selling of crops, slave owners offered incentives to slave males who could father the most children. As a result, it was typical for slave females to start bearing children at age 12 or 13 and produce one every 18 months. This brainwashing away of African morals was so complete for many slave males that it was made into contests. Not only was the "winning" slave male rewarded by the slave owner for siring the most babies, but he was applauded by fellow slaves! (Stevenson, Life in Black and White, p. 24).
website: jablifeskills.com
Joseph A. Bailey, II, M.D.
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