{"id":123,"date":"2020-02-14T14:41:22","date_gmt":"2020-02-14T18:41:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/?p=123"},"modified":"2020-02-24T19:23:18","modified_gmt":"2020-02-24T23:23:18","slug":"fredrick-the-black-oconnell-douglass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/2020\/02\/14\/fredrick-the-black-oconnell-douglass\/","title":{"rendered":"Fredrick “The Black O’Connell” Douglass"},"content":{"rendered":"

The question of whether it is insulting to call Fredrick Douglas the <\/span>Black O\u2019Connell <\/span><\/i>is an interesting one. The issue of race is clearly present, even though Ireland\u2019s economic problems aren\u2019t necessarily racially driven. However most, if not all, of America\u2019s issues are driven by some sense of racial superiority (Civil War, Mexican-American War, etc.), so it makes sense why Douglass could never overcome the biases towards him. We\u2019ve discussed how race is a \u201cmade up\u201d social construct that we as humans use to differentiate and identify ourselves, and in the McCann & Jenkins articles we see how even internationally race precedes other social issues.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Nevertheless, Fredrick Douglass was not the first black man to visit Ireland, nor was he the only black person they had ever seen. Yet the color of his skin seems to belittle his intelligence. Despite his scholarly advantage over the people of Ireland, even the poor see him as \u201cother\u201d. With that being said, there is no doubt that the Irish people recognized him as a highly intelligent, well versed individual, and to even mention him with O\u2019Connell is an honor, however, I see calling him the <\/span>Black O\u2019Connell<\/span><\/i> as a backhanded compliment at best.\u00a0 There is obviously a level of respect and admiration intended behind the comment, and there is even a sense of the Irish trying to relate to black Americans. But the fact that he had to be the \u201cBlack\u201d O\u2019Connell and not the \u201cNext\u201d O\u2019Connell (or something along those lines), supports the idea of racial inequality.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Jason Williams (basketball player)\u00a0 would be a great modern day example of this sort of backhanded compliment. Williams, being white, was nicknamed \u201cWhite Chocolate\u201d because he was so good at playing the sport that he could be mistaken for a black basketball player. There was a large amount of respect intended behind the name, but it disregards his skill as a basketball player first. He was identified by his skin color before he was identified as a good basketball player. The same could be said about Douglass.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The question of whether it is insulting to call Fredrick Douglas the Black O\u2019Connell is an interesting one. The issue of race is clearly present, even though Ireland\u2019s economic problems aren\u2019t necessarily racially driven. However most, if not all, of America\u2019s issues are driven by some sense of racial superiority (Civil War, Mexican-American War, etc.), … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Fredrick “The Black O’Connell” Douglass”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3684,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3684"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":125,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions\/125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/blackandgreenatlantic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}