Dope1: If you took a slave and made him a blacksmith, then the slave upon being freed is still a blacksmith.

First, let's look at the language of the curriculum in Florida’s State Academic Standards -- Social Studies, 2023:

SS.68.AA.2.3
Examine the various duties and trades performed by slaves (e.g., agricultural work, painting, carpentry, tailoring, domestic service, blacksmithing, transportation).

Benchmark Clarifications: Clarification 1: Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.

So the language of the curriculum is pretty clear: "slaves developed skills."

And isn't referring to picking cotton as "agricultural work" a rather lovely, using your word, "spin"?


Anyway, here are some of the problems with the entire line of thinking:

First, the majority of slaves lived and worked on cotton plantations and their primary labor was picking cotton or planting and harvesting rice, corn, sugarcane, and tobacco; not exactly useful, high wage-earning skills post-slavery skills. Enslaved people also had to clear land, dig ditches, cut and haul wood, slaughter livestock, and make repairs to buildings and tools. Again, not highly coveted jobs. And, yes, some worked as mechanics, blacksmiths, drivers, carpenters, and in other skilled trades.

Women were either "field slaves" or "house servants" and many were forced to become sex workers. Wait, that's not the right description though, is it? Sex workers are paid and have a different relationship with their customers than slaves, who were sexually exploited and often raped.

And that brings us to the real problem with rationalizing slavery by way of a learned skillset: on the slim chance that a slave was able to become a carpenter or a blacksmith or a good maid, that role was not determined by the individual slave, it was determined by somebody else, their owners.

And that, folks, is not an acceptable rationalization for enslavement.