Sarah Saartjie Baartman was cruelly exploited in Europe by being exhibited as a freak show attraction because of her protruding butt. After her death, her body was displayed in a Paris museum for over 100yrs.
The exploitation of Sarah Baartman.
A THREAD!
SARAH "Saarjte" Baartman of the khoikhoi people of South Africa was born in 1789 and was one of 2 women put on display as a "FREAK SHOW" act in England and then later France.
The men who promised her a life of pride in sharing her culture with the World tricked her, and though she was given pay she often was at the expense of verbal, sexual, and physical abuse.
You see the HOTTENTOT VENUS (Hottentot is very derogatory) had a very distinct look, because the women of her people had extremely large buttocks, and an abnormally elongated labia.
Nude photos of khoikhoi women with steatopygia were collected by white colonialists. Steatopygia is the accumulation of large amounts of fat on the buttocks, especially as a normal condition in the Khoikhoi of Southern Africa.
She was made to wear a coloured skin tight outfit revealing what was to be a naked black woman for the paying public to inspect, view, and allegedly at times for extra coin... have a "Private Showing".
When sold to another manager, she was taken to France where she was forced to perform at private parties in homes of the most affluent and wealthy, with the final act being an invitation to the party attendees to approach, touch, feel, and inspect a laid down SARAH'S GENITALS
She was to be later handed off to medical professionals who drew the details of her body. She died penniless from diseases in Paris, as a sex slave in 1815.
Her body had a molded cast made, her brain & pelvic bone put in PRESERVING JARS with her flesh & corpse being discarded.
Her remains were finally reclaimed by South Africa, and was given a ceremonial burial in 2002 (187 years later after her death). SARAH never saw her homeland again... Only parts of her body in death
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In Louisiana, black women were put in cells with male prisoners and some became pregnant.
All children born in the penitentiary to blacks were property of the state.
At 10 years, they would be auctioned off. The proceeds were used to fund schools for white children.
-THREAD-
Before the Civil War, most prisoners in the South were white. The punishment of enslaved African Americans was generally left up to their owners. Louisiana, however, did imprison enslaved people for "serious" crimes, generally involving acts of rebellion against the slave system.
A number of these imprisoned slaves were women. Penitentiary records show a number of women imprisoned for "assaulting a white," arson, or attempting to poison someone, most likely their enslavers.
On this day in 1942, Job Maseko, a WW2 hero, sank a NAZI ship with a bomb made from a tin can with condensed milk. He was denied the highest military decoration, due to his race.
A THREAD
Maseko was working as a delivery driver when he volunteered for service in the South African Native Military Corps during WWII (NMC). Later he was sent to the 2nd South African Infantry Division after finishing basic training in North Africa.
Due to South African race regulations at the time, they were unable to carry firearms. They were only allowed traditional weapons such as spears for guard and ceremonial duty.
On this day in 1865, enslaved people in Texas were notified by Union Civil War soldiers about the abolition of slavery. This was 2.5 years after the final Emancipation Proclamation which freed all enslaved Black Americans. #Juneteenth
But Slavery continued…
A THREAD
In 1866, a year after the amendment was ratified, Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Tennessee, and South Carolina began to lease out convicts for labor.
This made the business of arresting black people very lucrative, thus hundreds of white men were hired by these states as police officers.
Their primary responsibility being to search out and arrest black peoples who were in violation of ‘Black Codes’
On this day in 1944, George Stinney, 14, became the youngest person executed in the US in the 20th century. He was so small they had to stack books on the electric chair.
Due to no evidence, his conviction was posthumously vacated 70 years after his execution!
A THREAD!
George was accused of killing two white missing girls, 11-Year-old Betty and 7-year-old Mary, their bodies were found near the house where he lived with his parents in Alcolu, South Carolina march 1944.
The sheriff arrested George and his brother John (later released), because he claimed that George confessed and led officers to the 'place where he hid the murder weapon'. His father was fired from his job at a local sawmill and ordered to vacate the company house.
In 1951, Henrietta Lacks' cells were taken without her knowledge (HeLa Cells) at Johns Hopkins Hospital and they became one of the most important tools in medicine, vital for developing the polio vaccine, gene mapping, vitro fertilization and more...
A THREAD
Henrietta Lacks was black woman who unknowingly was the source of cells (from her cancerous tumor) which were cultured by George Otto Gey to create the 1st known human immortal cell line for medical research.
The Diagnosis:
On January 29, 1951, Henrietta went to Johns Hopkins Hospital because she felt a knot inside her. It all started when she asked her cousins to feel her belly, asking if they felt the lump that she did. Her cousins assumed correctly that she was pregnant.
Sarah Saartjie Baartman was cruelly exploited in Europe by being exhibited as a freak show attraction because of her protruding butt. After her death, her body was displayed in a Paris museum for over 100yrs.
The exploitation of Sarah Baartman.
A THREAD!
SARAH "Saarjte" Baartman of the khoikhoi people of South Africa was born in 1789 and was one of 2 women put on display as a "FREAK SHOW" act in England and then later France.
The men who promised her a life of pride in sharing her culture with the World tricked her, and though she was given pay she often was at the expense of verbal, sexual, and physical abuse.