Trivia Today!

When charged with the duty of copilot to my Mom's driving, many of what I call "phone errands" must be done. "Call her", "text him" and "check that" are commonly the beginning phrases of her commands. Very frequently I am asked to check her email through her phone, and to my surprise, where most emails come from is an account that goes by the username of Trivia Today Question of the Day. It happens to be one of the many ways of learning random facts about anything and everything, which is one of today's trends. The instagram, twitter and facebook accounts for random or "fun facts"are impossible to list. Signing up for the Trivia Today Question of the Day is my mothers preference for this trend.

What does this have to do with The Narrative of the Life of Fredercik Douglass: An American Slave?

What, indeed.

Reading the first two chapters of this narrative, what shocks me the most are the things that slaves are deprived of. Things that I would have never imagined or thought about when thinking, or in this case reading, about the era of slavery in the United States. But once these "things" were mentioned by Douglass, I got to thinking of what they really meant.

"(...) my first glimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of slavery." (Location 578 of 2239).

1. Birthdays.
It had never before ocurred to me that one could be deprived of the knowledge a birthday provides. Age was apparently one of the things white people of the time used to trivialize the slaves existence and rights. The word trivialize comes to mind because 'animalize' simply doesn't exist. Because the way I see it, slavery began on the basis that one race was superior to another. And by superior I mean 'more human'. And what better way to demonstrate, not one's superiority but rather demise someone else's, than through the depravation of such trivial things, as birthdays are. Knowing ones age is such a natural thing to me, that I can't imagine living without knowing it. And now that I think about it, parents could very easily lie about their childrens birthday, what could ever be reason for such a lie, is a whole other story.

"A want of information concerning my own was a source of unhappinness to me even during childhood. The white children couldt tell their ages. I could not tell why I ought to be deprived of the same privilege." (Location 428 of 2239).

On the bright side of things, if the U.S. were Alice's Wonderland, then all slaves would be part of a never ending celebration: Have a very merry unbirthday!

2. Mother-Child Long Distance Relationships.
The second 'thing' that particularly caught my attention was the mother-child separating technique. There exists the possibility of having to grow up without one or both parents in life. Today, accidents bring forth such circumstances. Then, white people did. The obvious difference being that today, if one's parents are not around, other individuals will in one way or another assume or provide the mother and or father figures that are so vital in a person's life and specially his or her upbringing. I call it a technique, because again, it is the white's way of trivializing the slaves. In this case, differentiating from the birthday depravation technique, there is a specific area of a humans life being demoralized, or how I prefer to call it: animalized. Said area is the following: the bond between mother and child, from which compassion, love and the deepest and sincerest form of affection, surpassing love, can and will flourish.

"For what this separation is done, I do not know, unless it be to hinder development of the child's affection toward its mother, and to blunt and destroy the natural affection of the mother for a child." (Location 439 of 2239).

The lack of unconditional love, typical and natural of a mother towards her child, can be catastrophic in the early development of an individual, because no guidance is like a mothers'. An individuals values highly depend on the upbringing provided in the first decade of a persons life. This in turn affects their behaviors and tendencies of the future. Thus, the separation of mother and child is a technique for making of slaves more animal than human individuals.

Another form of trivialization I found throughout the first two chapters of the narrative was the way Douglass himself approached the two subjects previously mentioned. Each topic got by far one page of explanation, description and analysis. This struck me as a sign of an indifferent tone exercised by Douglass. Although, to be fair, this seems to be a recurring tone which enables deep emotion to be expressed through vocabulary and direct emphasis, rather than tone. Regardless of this fact, my first impression of Douglass's thoughts on the matter was that he thought such details of slave life to be trivial and of no potent importance.

So you see, triviality all around. And more directly associated with my Mom's Trivia Today! fun, facts such as slaves being separated from their mothers since infancy and their deprivation of their birthdays, should be included as fun or random facts of todays "the least you know about a subject, the better, so here have a fun fact" culture. Beacuse at the end of the day, these are just two of a million facts about slavery in the U.S. Two of a million questions that can appear in my Mom's mail inbox, within a Trivia Today Question of the Day email.