Daniel Kleven > Recent Status Updates

Imagine a "kind doctor" whose practice consisted of treating torture victims. He set up shop right outside the dungeon chambers. He was kind, he treated the victims well, and he made a fortune as an ancillary to this brutal system. His practice would not exist apart from Torture, Inc. Should we praise such a doctor for his "kindness"? I say not. And thus for the "kind slave-master."

Slaves worked hard and were loyal to the "kind master," not because they "loved" him, or were "accepting" of their position, but because the alternative was brutal treatment at the hands of other masters. And the "kind master" thus collected to himself "loyal and hardworking slaves" and so his enterprise became more profitable. At bottom, this master is still *stealing labor* from fellow men and women.

"Many of them even used to fault him for feeding his slaves so well as he did; but he told them the slaves thereby looked better and did more work" (151).

Equiano has a "kind master" in the West Indies, but reflection on the situation reveals that the "kindness" of the master is based fundamentally in a brutally unjust system. This master's "kindness" is profitable, because of the brutality surrounding him.

"My master was several times offered by different gentlemen one hundred guineas for me; but he always told them he would not sell me, to my great joy: and I used to double my diligence and care for fear of getting into the hands of those men who did not allow a valuable slave the common support of life" (150–51).

Okay, so I'm pretty sure The Critics don't consider Du Bois to be what they call a "great novelist" and I'm sure they're right, but I don't care, I already love this book. LOVE it. If you love Du Bois's other work, you should love this one too.

"No scholar has considered in depth the soul of the man who first gained national recognition for a book on souls.

By dismissing religion in his life, scholars cheat American history of one of its brightest religious stars. Du Bois was not antireligious; he was against faith used for fraud, belief used to bully, and Christianity when used to control" (10).

"...that he had favorite hymns and spirituals, that he repeatedly invoked images of the divine, that he cried out for the "Prince of Peace' to vanquish the warmongers, and that many of his contemporaries viewed him as a prophet: all of this makes little sense if we exclude religion from narratives of Du Bois's life and times" (10).