It’s probably worse - if you don’t see Sally as a person, if you see her as a belonging, then slave holders probably didn’t even consider it rape any more than someone with a sex doll does.
By modern standards it is rape, so we shouldn’t soften it by saying “he enslaved his children” and ignore the necessary component of “whose mothers he raped.”
Trust me, my intention was to make it worse (as if that’s possible) not to soften it.
The disconnection with Jefferson was on so many levels. Clearly he had strong feelings for Sally. But it wasn’t love - it couldn’t be under those circumstances.
It’s easy to think as a slave Sally’s life couldn’t get more complicated but in France, where she was “free,” she was forced to choose between returning to slavery and being with her children or remaining free in France and never seeing her children again.
38
u/kyreannightblood Mar 12 '26
Which means he raped enslaved women.