W hite trash! Bigot! Racist! …SINNER!

These are all things that I apparently am for fact-checking the book, Twelve Years a Slave. Guilty of Writing While White.

(Yes, THAT Twelve Years a Slave. It was a book 160 years before it was a film.)

I’ve also been told I’m not allowed, as a white woman, to write about black history. It’s not my history. I’m not trustworthy. I’m the enemy. But somehow I’m also the racist?!

Alrighty! I accept that there’s no logic in racism on any side but DAMN, guys.

(…for the record, all critical research done on Solomon Northup & Twelve Years A Slave to date has been done by white folks.)

I wonder if the haters knew how much I agonized over doing my job well, how meticulously I approached the subject, and how emotionally detached a researcher should be to do this stuff right…would they hate less? I think, no, they’d probably hate from a new angle, proclaiming, “You spent two years trying to discredit Solomon Northup because he’s black!”