Suffragette movement of the 19-20th centuries racist?

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This picture has been going around on tumblr and people are claiming it's racist, despite that it's a quote from an English suffragette at the turn of the 20th century.



It's garnered many different comments, such as "white women are trash." And "I’m done with these white women and their movies."

The one that confuses me most is this rebuttal from someone when another person told the history of the film these actresses are promoting (takes place in Northern England at the turn of the century)

I am utterly confused as to what they're meaning. That every white person ever is connected forever, and that some random suffragette in Northern England in 1903 is responsible for slavery that was abolished before she was even born and that no one but black Americans can ever talk about slavery?

I suppose saying “white women are trash” is totally not racist

America's founding fathers routinely described the British tyranny that they were seeking to overthrow as "slavery". And half of those same founding fathers themselves owned slaves at the time. So if America's Founding Fathers had the chutzpah to complain about being "enslaved" White women of later centuries ( either suffragettes of the 20th, or the actresses who play them in the 21st) who did not own slaves certainly have the right to use the word "slavery".

Last edited by naturalplastic on 06 Oct 2015, 6:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I thought they meant slave to a male dominated society or abusive men.

^ yeah. thats probably what they do mean.

What is your question?

I suppose the rationale wasn’t that slavery in itself is wrong, but that it’s wrong for “free” men not to be entirely free. In their view, slaves were never meant to be free, so their proper destiny was to continue to be slaves to their masters; in fact, since they were property, owning them was part of their masters’ sacred and essential freedom.

My question?
Why are people getting offended that the suffragettes said they'd rather not be slaves? How is it in any way offensive, and am I missing something huge or are they just overreacting because of the US's history, which is not connected to N. England 1903?

People are dumb.

History and context are hard.

Good question , and good question , and yes I suspect that its the latter(that the complainers are overreacting, not that you are missing anything ).

There was a difference between the Suffragists and Suffragettes. By modern standards you can't really say they were totally egalitarian.

Suffragettes were not originally fighting for equal right for all, they mainly represented upper an middle class women. There were other groups besides WSPU which were more egalitarian, and there are largely overshadowed. It might be becuase they are associated more with the labour movement.

These people remind me of "the most sensitive man" in the world. They can't help it because they're so darn sensitive.

I wouldn't say it's racist, but obviously they could have used better language to get their message across and avoid racial controversy (slave and rebel are both politically charged words in current culture), but of course that's most likely the point: controversy = attention.

Even in reference to England? I'm having a hard time understanding how anyone can... claim? the word slave/slavery for just one group when it's been every race subjected to it. America isn't special in 'owning' the word, albeit the US had the first known "race" based slavery (prior and everywhere else, it was usually prisoners of war and the poor, didn't matter on race - basically groups of people, not skin color, which is what the US made it about in order to cause a separation)
Because while the US was going on with their slavery, the rest of the world was as well, and still is, though in far fewer and less legal ways.

The word "slave" comes from the mass enslaving of the Slavic peoples from about 800-1400+/-. The slavers appropriated the Slavs' word for themselves, so honestly, if anyone should call bullcrap on anyone using the word, it should be them...

But why is rebel a politically charged word here now? Mostly when I think of rebel, I think of the IRA or the early colonists who rebelled against England, or random kids who do things that will make their parents upset...

First, I'd say rebel is always a controversial word since it's a direct threat to the powers that be, whether it's the Jacobites against Britain in the 1600's or the Confederacy of the US civil war. Second, slavery is always a racial issue, the Egyptian slaves of old were not Egyptian, nor were the Athenian slaves from Athens. Slavery has always been based on bringing in an outside group for forced labor, not internal members-- that would be indentured servitude, serfdom, or in today's world merely "a job".

As for the US slavery issue, don't forget it was endorsed initially by the British government, long before there was even a concept of the United States-- also of note, the UK only banned slavery a mere 32 years before the US did. Just because Britain didn't have to deal with the fallout doesn't mean they weren't involved.

All that said, my only point is there are better ways to make the same statement without wading into racially charged waters-- whether it's a historical quote or not.

Ironically- the side that fought to KEEP American Blacks enslaved were called "The Rebels".

If you win your war against a government, you are a patriot. If you lose, you are a rebel.