A Marriage of Convenience: Southern Cross Afterwards

Throughout most of class we found a number of flaws with Heyrman’s argument, but I believe that by the end of class we could look at Evangelism in a way that fits with the our continuing discussion of class. In our group as well as in the larger discussion we bounced around the idea that from the issues brought up in Southern Cross, Evangelism could be similar to how racism was portrayed in Morgan’s book—a tool for keeping the power with the wealthy white slave owner. Even though Evangelism started out as a religion that flew in the face of the white male gentry’s power and life style—anti-slavery, equality of both sex and race, and a modest life style—it eventually became one of its greatest proponents. This change, as with racism, most probably came about because the wealthiest and most powerful people in the south at the time could benefit most from it. Although we have no real proof that white slave owning men sat in a smoke filled room and plotted how to alter Evangelism to benefit them, we can see attempts to fight the people that stood for counter belief to their own; just as we do not have proof that wealthy white men purposely promoted racism to ensure that they could continue to exploit African slave labor. The white gentry may have not even needed to plot how to change Evangelism or promote racism, but just by the fact that they (the most influential group in the society) preferred those shifts caused them to occur. Another similarity between racism and Evangelism is that it does not seem to be the optimal choice for the wealthy white man nor in either case does it seem that they created these tools for the director purpose of keeping their power. Evangelism took time to change and probably would be a poor substitute for some religion that was created to solely idealize the wealthy white man and African slaves were probably not the cheapest to come (factoring in shipping costs alone), yet it both cases these options might have actually been the best since they perpetuated what the wealthy white man wanted as well as garner support from other groups. In that sense it both were a marriage of convenience, at least for the wealthy white male. Interestingly, in both cases there are a number of other agents that are proponents of these “tools.” Weather it was men that wanted to keep masculinity as a positive attribute or poor whites that did not want to be the lowest rung on the social totem pole, it is clear that white males were not acting on their own—and probably could not have. Furthermore it is fascinating that these goggles that were created by racism and Evangelism with which the South seem to perceive the world have lasted for quiet some time.

Print this post