Cancel Culture Claims Hamilton? (The Musical)

[SirSamuelVimesBlackboardMonito]

Just seen a story (link below, it's DM for those who care) about calls on twitter for the musical Hamilton to be cancelled, due to the real life Alexander Hamilton having connections to the slave trade.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8492387/amp/Backlash-Hamilton-musical-revisionist-history-days-debuted-Disney-amid-BLM-protests.html

(Short version, for those that don't want to read the link, he didn't own slaves, but his wife's family did, and he did accounting for a firm with slaves. The musical doesn't address this nor does is explicitly condemn the other characters who own slaves.).

Have to say I am a bit by this. Five years ago when Hamilton hit Broadway it was hailed as revolutionary. Colour blind casting, a huge number of black actors on stage, an international hit. And now, five years later, boom, it's racist, get rid of it?

Surely the logical conclusion of this cancellation frenzy is to erase all references to anything and anyone from a past era with different moral values? Which, at this rate, will be anything from pre-2015. Any story from the past will have things we now don't find acceptable. But is the solution really to just ignore it? Wipe the slate clean?

It feels wrong to me.

YABU = Hamilton should be cancelled.
YANBU = Hamilton should NOT be cancelled.

That’s ridiculous, there are numerous references to wanting to abolish slavery in the show.

I don't think you enabled voting, but YANBU. I am no expert in US history, but as a nation it was quite literally built on slavery; I doubt any of the founding fathers were without exposure to it. I support the removal of statues of slave-owners from public view to museums, but where exactly in a musical about his life was Hamilton supposed to stop to critique in-depth his FIL's business practices? It is made quite clear that he was devoted to John Laurens and his anti-slavery work.

YANBU.

Oh, and I believe they're also dragging in the fact that Lin, who is of Puerto Rican heritage, expressed qualified support for a law which has had some negative funding consequences for PR.

I'm thinking the idea has come from someone who hasn't actually watched the show. Which isn't called 'Guilty By Association Hamilton'.

Are they clamouring for the removal of a large majority of US presidents who had direct association, indirect or tangential association or historical familial association with slavery? Perhaps the USA as a whole? Or us it just The Arts there are wrong 'uns?

YANBU.

There’s a difference between the Mail saying there are class in twitter for something to happen and anyone actually seriously wanting it to happen.

Calls on twitter not whatever I wrote there.

They definitely reference it in the show and Hamilton (the character) is quite scathing to another character about who is really doing the work in his state.

What about: "A civics lesson from a slaver, hey neighbor
Your debts are paid 'cause you don't pay for labor
We plant seeds in the South. We create.Yeah, keep ranting
We know who's really doing the planting"

And "We will never be truly free/ Until those in bondage have the same rights as you and me"?

You can't really miss the anti slavery messages in the show so I guess that what is being said is that the show is putting anti slavery messages into the mouths of people who didn't really think that, and thus presenting them as better people than they were? (I know nothing about them as real people so don't know if this is true or not). But I think that is missing the point of the musical which is that it is "a story of America then, told by America now".

**Surely the logical conclusion of this cancellation frenzy is to erase all references to anything and anyone from a past era with different moral values?

How very Orwellian

Hamilton was active in abolishing international trading in slaves and didn’t own slaves (unlike pretty much all the other founding fathers).

A quick google tells me that the only articles about it are the Sun and DM - basically trying to get people to think twitter represents all “woolly lefties” and all think it should be cancelled. Yes there’s arseholes on twitter on both sides. No a majority don’t think it should be cancelled. Try another paper.

@Enterthewolbes....He bought and sold slaves for his in laws and for the Continental.Army.

It’s just the daily mail taking a handful of tweets, some of which are blatantly satirical, and using it to whip up controversy.

Hamilton the Musical doesn’t directly address slavery. There are references to it here and there, but the fact that Washington, for example, owned slaves is never mentioned. I think there’s a fair conversation to be had about that - was Lin Manuel Miranda sanitising the history of slavery for the sake of entertainment? It’s a valid question.

Personally, I don’t think so. The deliberate decision to cast BIPOC actors (with a couple of exceptions) to play white historical figures was a way of co-opting history and reframing the conventional narrative through the voices of traditionally disenfranchised groups. I don’t think the musical needed to explicitly address slavery for it to make a valuable point about the experiences of non-white people in America.

‘Cancel culture’ is a trendy buzzword at the moment, and I think that there are reasonable concerns about it at times. But people also use it as a way of shutting down debate about issues they feel defensive about. There’s plenty of room for nuance in the complicated middle.

The finale also references his wife speaking out against slavery while Washington hangs his head in shame.

Sorry, had to disappear for the kids' dinner.

Obviously the mail are enjoying the drama, but unfortunately a few crazy Twitter users shouting does have clout these days. Lin Manuel Miranda has issued a response, so it's not like they're howling unnoticed into the void, is it?

Also, I read lots of papers. I find it helpful to get a rounded picture.

Gah posted too soon.

I think it's particularly interesting in terms of American culture. America has this real thing about venerating the founding fathers, the whole narrative of the brave American rebellion against the greedy and corrupt British empire. The founding fathers, the constitution, independence day - it's a central part of the American culture that British people just don't have. I think as a nation we are pretty much of the opinion that most of the people (royalty or politicians) who have run our country over the past millennia were nasty bastards in one way or other. Centuries of kings chopping each other to bits does that, I suppose. I mean, even the term 'founding fathers' is hugely emotionally loaded.

How do you acknowledge that the people who built your nation were a long way from righteous heroes by today's standards, when your national identity is built around them being so?

There’s a song on The Hamilton Mixtape (Cabinet Battle 3 - Demo) that Lin couldn’t fit into the show in the end, which is a debate about abolishing slavery.

Hamilton directly addresses Washington and says “sir, even you, you have hundreds of slaves, whose descendants will curse our names when we’re safe in our graves”. Also “ This is the stain on our soul and democracy. A land of the free? No, it's not, it's hypocrisy, to subjugate, dehumanise a race, call 'em property”.

Hamilton was Treasurer of the US in its early years. He did not own slaves, but was not an abolitionist either. Similarly, he agreed with Washington and others that women had the same mental capacity as a child and should continue as property of their father/husband/brother.

The anti slavery phrases from the musical are pure fantasy invented by Lin Manuel Miranda.

Hamilton was a man of his time. He was an illegitimate boy (meant a lot then) orphaned at 13 and at 15 immigrated by himself to the US. He came from nothing and was used by the more aristocratic founding fathers as a token charity case. He was their workhorse and he did not have the background or authority to question fundamental things like slavery. When he overstepped his bounds and questioned Jefferson, Jefferson had him politically destroyed by false allegations he’d usurped public money to pay for his mistress.

I saw this earlier and, while there are far more eloquent versions out there too, I thought it summed it up nicely-

“liking hamilton as a musical and appreciating the work it has done to give poc more recognition on broadway" and "recognizing that it doesn't portray history accurately and the founding fathers were actually horrible people" are statements that can coexist”

There won't be any history left if we get rid of everything that is unpalatable by modern standards.

the founding fathers were actually horrible people

Can American culture deal with that notion, though? It runs counter to the whole notion of American Exceptionalism.

YANBU. The musical didn’t glorify Alexander Hamilton, it showed his flaws and short comings. I don’t think one can watch it and walk away thinking he was a hero.

@SirSamuelVimesBlackboardMonito

Gah posted too soon.

I think it's particularly interesting in terms of American culture. America has this real thing about venerating the founding fathers, the whole narrative of the brave American rebellion against the greedy and corrupt British empire. The founding fathers, the constitution, independence day - it's a central part of the American culture that British people just don't have. I think as a nation we are pretty much of the opinion that most of the people (royalty or politicians) who have run our country over the past millennia were nasty bastards in one way or other. Centuries of kings chopping each other to bits does that, I suppose. I mean, even the term 'founding fathers' is hugely emotionally loaded.

How do you acknowledge that the people who built your nation were a long way from righteous heroes by today's standards, when your national identity is built around them being so?

Yes, actually I've been surprised that the anti-statue types have really gained any creedence in the UK, because of just this.

The Americans have such a sort history it creates a sort of weird myopia, where they imagine that somehow people from the past who were good people should embrace all the same ideas as people of today.

Anyone from a country where history goes back a thousand years has to see that's kind of crazy, right? Asking that a person who lived when slave labour was a major part of the economy had no contact with it at all is a bit like being upset because someone living in the 13th century had some relation to feudalism.

When Washington moved to Philadelphia, the capital at the time, there was a state law that said if slaves lived in the state for more than 6 months then they would be freed. Washington set up a slave rotation between his farm in Virginia and his house in the Capital so that they were swapped every 5 months and 3 weeks (or something similar) for key slaves who he wanted to keep with him they simply took a trip over the state line for the night and then returned and the 6 month clock started again.

There is a documentary/reenactment on sky history / Now TV about Washington and its very interesting. He was a good leader but he was merciless.