UNCLE TOMS
When Harriett Beecher Stowe penned the classic novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1851, she had no idea who here hero, Tom, would become one of the most hurtful epithet of any short of the N word. The term has changed the concept of the slave who risked his life to protect two enslaved women who had fled their owners.
Mike and Steve look at how the term morphed into a derisive from the pages of the storied novel.
The term is now used to describe a black person who is willing to purposely embrace a subservient status to the dominant white class. These people, usually men, but not always, are willing to play this role even at the expense of themselves and others like them. Samuel L. Jackson’s portrayal of the sycophantic Steven in the motion picture Django has emerged as the NEW prototype for the Uncle Tom of pre-Civil War America. But they still exist today. Some proudly.
Do you know an “Uncle Tom”? Have you been called an Uncle Tom?
LISTEN. LAUGH. LEARN.