I can not understand how any one would want to celebrate a special day at a place of such evil.
67
What a ridiculous argument. Slavery happened. It was evil. It has ended. Not every white person alive is a racist, nor is every place where racism happened in the past to be discounted as evil. People keep racism alive in many ways, including an inability to let the past go. This is a beautiful piece of land, with beautiful buildings. What’s wrong with erasing the stain of past ugliness with joy filled and hopeful events? And as the descendent of African slaves, I say, move on.
124
Oh, but “slaves were taught to read and write “ there. Well, okay then, party on!
79
“There were bad acts that happened on some plantations, but not all plantations,” he added.
So slavery was not itself a “bad act”?
74
You really have to wonder what kinds of people would want to do this. It's pretty gross. I guess there is no wonder that many white people are so insensitive, and basically racist, although they will be shocked to hear that accusation. After all, they are just naturally superior, and can't do any such wrong. Are these people who still think slavery was just white people taking good care of black people who couldn't care for themselves? Good grief! Wake up!!!
44
Anything dealing with black Americans/black history its always an afterthought and willful ignorance! As many have mentioned, are concentration camps advertised as "charming" or places to have ceremonies? Of course not, any sane person would be horrified at the thought. But the nerve of people on here to suggest that black Americans should be past this.
58
Plantations are not beautiful- there is a rot in them. Denmark Vesey’s Garden by Ethan J. Kytle & Blain Roberts is a book that speaks to the issue of the whitewashing of slavery. So many try to mask the reality of life on the plantation. If you want to go to a plantation go to the Whitney Plantation in Wallace, Louisiana.
28
Is it appropriate to hold weddings at the site of a mass shooting like Sandy Hook, Columbine, and dozens of others? What about a joyful, elegant wedding at the World Trade Center 9/11 site or the D-Day beaches at Normandy? These are all places of major tragedy. Do we memorialize them in order to learn from and remember the past or do we replace the pain with celebration? I'm not sure. Plantations are arguably worse than any of the previous examples because they were part of a deliberate system and persisted for centuries.
74
The epitome of a 2019 solution: it offers no material help to the victims, punishes no perpetrators, and seeks to inflict economic damage on those who have done no wrong. Bravo.
83
Buildings and pieces of land are not inherently evil, it’s the people who operated them that could have been evil or unjust. If one was to look into the history of any location it would be easy to find horrifying events that happened. If you’re really serious about not getting married somewhere that wasn’t specifically designed to oppress others then you wouldn’t even step into a courthouse to get a marriage certificate because the entire US legal system was, at one time, designed to suppress anyone other than white males.
59
Just because a couple chooses a venue that has a tortured past does not justify what these media outlets have chosen to “correct”. Removing the word plantation, sure, that makes some sense. But to ban these couples from having their wedding announced is unfair. I lived in Charleston, SC for a number of years. If they follow through with this plan, very few couples in Charleston could announce their nuptials. Not to mention all of the jobs of weddings like catering, will go to file 13 in a short time.
37
Attention brought to this is warranted and appreciated
27
So much of romantic plantation mystique derives from the false narrative of the Lost Cause ideology. So, it could be argued that plantation weddings help to perpetuate the smoke that gets blown to obscure what really happened on some (or many) of those plantations, to include physical and mental cruelty and sexual exploitation. A plantation is a monument, and we would do well to ask ourselves, to what? Would we not think it bizarre if weddings at Auschwitz were a 'thing'?
34
The owners of these plantations are in business. Weddings, among other celebrations, provide them and their employees with income. Denying them a living is political correctness at its worst. And, no, I’m not a conservative; I’m a liberal.
105
I'm not sure why this so upsetting to so many people. Couples are still free to marry where they choose, including plantations with a history of human rights violations if they so wish.
It is merely a matter of the advertisers/websites making the choice to not promote these venues -- which they are under no obligation to promote.
I worked in the wedding industry for many years. Everyone is going to be just fine.
40
@aks How about if people got married at Auschwitz or Bergen-Belsen?
26
I try to see the multiple sides of an issue because I always have something to learn. I’m still mulling this one over. And I’m wondering about an alternative to shaming those who choose to get married in what they perceive as a beautiful place. Could not every wedding be an opportunity to educate people about what happened on plantations? Life is a co-mingling of beauty and ugliness, unfortunately. I believe I’d rather have a regular reminder of the past, in hope that we don’t repeat it, than one big media blitz that will be forgotten shortly.
13
@Lisa FABER Ginggen If I want to learn about the horrors of slavery, I doubt I'd want to do it on my wedding day. Also, imagine you came from a lineage of slavery. This would not be a beautiful place. It would be a place of enslavement, torture, rape, and other horrors. Anyone who sees that as "beautiful," or turns a blind eye (or "white eye" might be more appropriate) has bigger work to do than could be accomplished on a wedding day.
24
This is ridiculous. We Americans cannot go back in time and change what has happened throughout our history. There are so many horrific things that have occurred in this country, and still occurring on this planet. Get serious. While acknowledging the history of said plantations, it doesn't mean we should burn it all to the ground. When does this end? I am so sorry that slavery existed ever. I am so sorry that Native Americans were decimated and driven from their land. However, we can do nothing to change these facts but learn the history and move forward. What you can do something about is to support our Constitution by removing a President that attempted to damage our democracy. What you can do is learn about so many needs that exist today, and volunteer your time and donate your money to them. Move forward. Change the future. Learn from the past, and move on. I cannot change the facts that I am sure that my parents (possibly when I was young), definitely my grandparents were Southern poor racists. My parents changed in their lifetime, I have never held racist views, and my grown children definitely do not. Keep moving forward.
94
@Pollyanna
Very good comments. Thank you and best wishes.
10
Folks, we have bigger problems that affect real living people today. Worry about those and forget about social media.
32
What should be done with these properties? Preserved as historic houses with full documentation of their history? There are too many for that. Demolition? Continued use with prominent marking of their history?
The past won't disappear.
27
Maybe these plantation owners can get their properties declared Superfund sites. Either that or they can burn some sage, or juniper, for purification. Seriously, though, can they just not use the word "plantation" in their advertising, avoiding any hint of romanticizing a sordid history? Or is it not as simple as that? Are they forever bound by the history of their property?
12
@TMJ That's the point: white people glamorizing slavery.
11
"There were bad acts that happened on some plantations, but not all plantations."
That's a slippery slope to ride, Mr. McRae. Slavery is a pretty bad act in my book.
94
A childhood friend got married recently at one such plantation in Georgia. My mother and father were extremely perturbed that the (mostly white) guests were being served by an almost entirely black waitstaff- like some sort of nightmare 2019 version of "Gone With the Wind".
People are free to get married wherever they want, but a publication is also free to selectively endorse products or venues that reflect their values. Good on them for ending the romanticizing and white-washing of these institutions.
And let's be clear- Mt. Vernon and Monticello, etc, are destinations *specifically* for education, and yes, to point out the wrongness of our forefathers in owning slaves. Now, in Manhattan, we don't bulldoze and pave over burial grounds for former slaves- and no, this wasn't always the case- but when the opportunity to make corrective action exists we must take it. Not blithely pretend that these Grand Houses were merely built for the sake of creating a beautiful house.
51
My child was considering a plantation wedding and never even thought that it promotes an abhorrent practice from 200 years ago.
Thankfully, common sense does still reign is some corners of our increasingly crazy American universe.
BUT, my child decided not to have a plantation wedding for another reason. It was very, very expensive.
Instead, the couple decided to have the wedding at a German castle on the Rhine. It cost less than a typical plantation wedding and was absolutely spectacular in every way. Given the number of international guests, the combined airfare for all attendees was probably half the cost of everyone getting to South Carolina.
I don’t have anything to do with German tourism. Cross my heart. But I would encourage any couple considering a destination wedding to broaden their horizons and consider a foreign wedding.
11
@John Less expensive? Surely not considering flight fares for all the guests! And the carbon footprint.
11
@John Unfortunately getting married at a castle doesn’t avoid this issue, instead it brings up the legacy of feudalism.
-NW
30
A number of years ago we went to a plantation in Louisiana to celebrate a 40th birthday. While I didn't really have a problem with the use of the venue, it struck me as odd that there was no acknowledgement of the slave history of the property. It was only after some persistent badgering that the owner reluctantly showed me what he called the "slave documents". As I said this was a number of years ago and I can only hope that there is now more recognition of the real history of the plantation.
23
Trying to sanitize real estate from what may have happened there in the past is a very slippery slope. Do we also want to put off limits, as a examples; Court Houses where unfair trials were held; State Legislatures and the US Capitol because they once passed laws allowing slavery, segregation, and discrimination (not that long ago in some cases); town squares and village commons where public executions were once held, regardless of whether the sentence of death was ill-founded or discriminatory, and so on?
No. Just buck up with the fact that history is replete with things we wouldn't tolerate today, and pledge not to repeat them, but don't try and erase real estate from the planet.
77
“We are not responsible for the actions of our ancestors... “
The sincerity of the above refrain is belied by continually profiting from those ancestors’ horrific acts. You can’t have it both ways.
Persistence in national amnesia, willful ignorance, or callous disregard of the horrors of American chattel slavery is just breathtaking.
I know of no other civilized nation that still romanticizes the insurrectionists who tried to destroy it. Black Americans seem to be collectively saying that we can no longer arrogantly dismiss their pain, or to just ‘get over it’.
42
@TR No one in the Union States celebrates the Rebellion.
4
Mr. McRae, of Boone Hall, seems to miss the point by claiming that slaves on that plantation were taught to read and write, as if that mitigates the reality that the people being taught were actually possessions, like horses or cattle, and were not free to take what little education they had and make their own way in the world. I do think it's important to keep that history in mind. I wouldn't want to be married on ground where slaves were beaten and raped. Sounds creepy.
53
It isn’t that these sites happened to have slaves 200 years ago. It is that they still trade on the supposed charm and majesty of that time specifically by preserving their sites to look as they did then.
They keep the look and feel of the “good ol’ days” when they owned other human beings with maybe a brief mention on the property. They are selling a false history by only including big oak trees and huge homes. No one is getting married in the shack the enslaved people lived in. That part of the sordid past isn’t mentioned at all.
These couples are getting married at places that continue to celebrate the glory days of slavery by maintaining the sites as though they are still in 1830.
88
@Anne you hit the nail on the head.
13
Wow, the outrage on here is astounding! First of all, a few wedding websites discouraging people from choosing a certain venue is hardly injurious to anyone. They’re simply choosing not to promote something that they find ethically wrong. No one is marching up to brides and yanking their dream wedding out of their hands. They just can’t Pinterest it any more. It’s hardly a civil rights violation. It’s not even really an annoyance, as anyone who IS determined to wed at these sites will now face less competition for venue dates. Get a grip.
Second of all, wake up.
Yes, plantations were sites of extreme human rights violations and a centuries-long genocide that continues to impact our society today. Not just sites of them, but built specifically to accomplish those human rights violations.
Yes, a wedding is entirely different from a class trip to a museum.
Yes, a building that was expressly built, named, designed and maintained to exploit the forced labor of human beings is different from a site built with forced labor or obtained through colonialism. In degree if not in kind.
It’s different and you know it’s different. Stop pretending otherwise.
45
I thought that people got married at Boone Hall Plantation because of the pretty gardens and all the spots where photographers can take beautiful pictures.
I am sure that the people who got married there in the past had no idea that they were some how condoning slavery.
Are we going to conduct research on all wedding venues to find out what took place at that site years ago? I hate to tell you that some horrible things took place in many places in the past. Placing all of these places "off limits" doesn't help anybody.
Actually all this just seems like "neoliberal political correctness" run amuck. It is a cheap way for Pinterest to be in the forefront of something.
59
How much research is required to discover that a plantation prospered on backbreaking slave labor? It's the very definition of a plantation! Couples who say getting married there doesn't mean they condone slavery are just deliberately playing dumb. As another commenter said, the reception isn't in a slave shack, it's in the grand house and grounds that are maintained in the lavish style of the early 1800s.
43
I toured a plantation outside of New Orleans last month. It was a beautiful museum site that was very open and straightforward about the history and contributions of the enslaved people who built it and kept it running. It recognized the atrocities and honored those from that time. It was central to their story, not just an aside.
That site is available for weddings. No doubt, that site is heavily dependent on the funds raised from those weddings to keep in operation, to continue to share the stories of the enslaved, to ensure their stories are not forgotten. Our government falls woefully short of supporting museum sites.
Should how each site addresses the full story be considered in choosing to support them?
Should a wedding or other celebration at sites consider acknowledging the stories of all as part of their ceremony - perhaps a moment of silence or prayer in recognition of those who came before?
69
Can we get Pinterest to pledge to stop being a cesspool of unattributed photos and stolen images?
68
Thanks for inspiring me to delete my Pinterest account. I’d been meaning to do that for a while.
31
That's going too far. Plantations are marvelous settings physically, and make for attractive wedding sites for example. That does not need to be associated with what took place at plantations long ago. The romance is in the natural beauty, not slavery. I can for example admire the music of the deep south, without admiring what its economy was based on. A better approach would be put some of the proceeds of weddings at plantations towards say historically black colleges.
150
You wouldn’t have a wedding at a concentration camp no matter how much ivy is growing up an old chimney. They’re both the sites of atrocities.
332
@Katrina Correct, though would you get married in Yosemite or Yellowstone, sites where Native Americans were ruthlessly displaced in favor of "naturalism" and National Parks? Shenandoah, where the same was done to Appalachians? How about at many universities, which were funded with proceeds of slave labor? The list goes on an on, unfortunately. The soil is tainted with history, and the only decision we can make is whether and how to move forward.
182
@george
You’re creating a false choice. The entirety of a national park or western state is very different from a building and plot of immediately adjacent land that was expressly established for and by the subjugation of an entire race of people.
And last I checked, none of these sites promote universities or the White House as wedding venues either.
79
This is inane and insane. They are beautiful homes that had a sordid past. Do we not visit Monticello or Mt. Vernon, homes of our founding fathers, because they too were staffed by slaves. What about the White House? Manhattan Island was practically stolen from the Native American tribe that lived on it...do we boycott New York City?
Get a grip people. Know your history, honor it, don’t repeat our ancestors mistakes. We are not responsible for the actions of our ancestors, we can only ensure we repeat the good and forgo the bad.
281
@Stefanie The town I went to college in was an Iroquois village that was burned to the ground by The Sullivan Clinton campaign. It's a huge wedding place for people from the city.
16
@Stefanie
Thank you. While I have cringed at pictures of plantation weddings, I feel uncomfortable with the increasing number of scenarios in which a small group decides which things are deplorable and which other things, as you mention, have no significance. Plantations are a more immediate image and access to a complicated past with unspeakable atrocities, but you capture it here. An honest review of where native Americans have been punished, extracted and ruined is less convenient. I love living in New York City; i have no interest in setting a foot on a plantation.
25
This is pretty obtuse. I agree, generally speaking, that we need a path forward with resuming our lives in spaces that had this kind of stuff happen but the discussion is not inane and certainly not insane.
13
On the one hand, I completely agree - these places were sites of incredible brutality, and should be recognized for their sordid history. However, I do not think they are the same as Auschwitz - a place designed solely for genocide - so the comparison as if to prove the point is not right. I agree there is a lot of tone deafness in those who ask ‘what’s the harm?’ and yet I don’t entirely think we can condemn these places to live on only as memorials of oppression and tragedy. Many scenic places were made with forced slave labor or are the fruits of ill-gotten gains. Our whole country is basically stolen from the Native Americans, who were systematically murdered. There is a lot of hypocrisy from a lot of ‘woke’ people who are focusing their outrage primarily on one kind of racist brutality, and insisting on a singular course of action as a just or acceptable outcome. I think there has to be a more nuanced approach that accepts our history in all of its ugliness and hypocrisy without either turning a blind eye to it or insisting on ‘canceling’ its vestiges for an arguably positive use in the present-day.
All that said, the term “plantation wedding” is good to cut out of the popular lexicon and stop promoting as such.
51
A few years ago I visited a plantation home in Charleston, SC. As people quietly, somberly went in and out of the slave quarters and read stories of how these people were treated, just down the row a wedding was being set up. I was absolutely astonished. I never knew such a thing existed. How could anyone think a slave plantation is an appropriate place for a wedding? I actually think it's disgusting. Shame on anyone who can so cruelly ignore our history just for those 'perfect' wedding photos beneath the large oaks.
47
Perhaps we should stop all trans-Atlantic ship traffic since that was the mode of transportation for slaves.
A plantation is a plantation and a ghetto is a ghetto and a reservation is a reservation and an enclave is an enclave, and a camp is a camp.
And if you have a problem with that, perhaps you might first consider the name of the Washington "Indigenous People" football team; a name which appears on these sacred documents of the Old Gray Lady with madding frequency.
The real question is this: why are these brides allowed to wear white dresses without a virginity test? Now that is a problem which should be front and center.
And you wonder why the White House has a case of the DTs.
23
Can we say “Cultural Revolution”?
11
people can spend their money where they like. But still, there a strong smell of hypocrisy in the air. I remember talking to someone who was going on one of the 'back to the motherland' African tours. During the conversation I pointed out that all of the African countries had/were built on slavery and the ones on the West coast were the suppliers of the Americas slave trade and those on the East coast were the suppliers of the Middle East slave trade. His answer, "that's different".
46
Understandable, but how far are we going to take this? Accordingly, we should X out most venues in the South including some venerable churches and old homes and what of cities and towns in general? My Southern hometown still retains a Confederate monument and was the scene of the particularly brutal lynching of three people in 1925. The monument and the site of the mob led kidnapping prior to the lynching sit very close to an old now boutique hotel extremely popular as a wedding venue.
14
@HK actually, in the current political climate, you couldn't pay me to spend a dime in the South. So yes.
9
The comments so far (5:42 am) have been fascinating, I was particularly moved by @Marie's response.
Having just sat in on a Unconscious Bias training, I guess I was primed for the "aha" moment. Of course plantations that had enslaved people are inappropriate places for a wedding celebration. I'm guessing that it as an "aha" moment for many, as per Mr. Robinson's quote: "That is a failure of all of us, that we have not forced people to remember."
I know that some plantations are now museums, and I'm guessing that some attempt to explain their sordid history.
But there are other options. I was also taken by the comment from @Alish, who asked whether owners are partnering with African American owned businesses and/or HBCUs.
Based on that, here's my question to descendants of slaves: how would reparations (in any form) impact how plantations could be perceived in our current times?
12
Ask yourself: Would you get married in a cemetery or a concentration camp or the Tower of London?
I suspect the answer is “no” for most people.
Why not?
Could it be because some people might feel it’s disrespectful to the dead and/or past? So is getting married in a plantation.
Is it because these places may elicit sadness? So does a plantation.
Maybe because it’s macabre? So is a plantation.
A significant proportion of the US population is directly related to people who were tortured, raped, and murdered on plantations. ALL plantations. There was no such thing as a “happy slave” no matter how much latter-day, wannabe confederates claim there was.
I don’t see the Knot or Zola or Martha Steward advertising or promoting weddings in cemeteries or concentration camps or London Tower. That doesn’t prevent anyone from getting married there if they want to. It just recognizes the fact that some places are not generally appropriate for wedding “celebrations”.
This is no different.
86
Has any polling been done on what Southern Black people think of plantation weddings? This is close to the exclusive group whose opinion I want on the subject.
22
And how many local people of color depend on jobs related to these weddings for their livelihood? The south has historical complications and also a present day population. Which is more important, cancel culture or employment opportunity? I visited sea island Georgia, a 4 star hotel and resort built on former plantation land. It has some historical explantations of extant slave quarters-preserved as respectful acknowledgments, not trivial tourist pretense. And: Every staff person in the dining room was a person of color who seemed proud of their employment. How to reconcile all that?
33
People need to reflect on what actually happened at plantations. They were forced labor camps with no hope of escape, for life. heir existence was enforced by the constant threat and reality of violence and rape. Inmates lacked family, lacked any quality of life, lacked a real life. Like holding a wedding at the site of a concentration camp. But pretty.
37
Why would you want to hold a ceremony that symbolizes your love for somebody at a place whose very existence relied upon the bondage of human beings. Exploitation, sexual violence, torture, lynching, etc. funded that pretty house you find so romantic. Bodies once swung from those moss trees you find so enchanting. Does America not have any lovely destinations that weren’t so heavily entangled with human rights violations? And if you can so easily separate plantations from slavery, not only are you not “accepting the past,” you are actively erasing it. You are digging your heel into the backs of those who were made to suffer there. Why would a decent person with any knowledge of history want their wedding in the shadow of brutality? Plantations should be used as memorials and museums, like the Whitney in Louisiana.
35
The tone deafness of some people is astounding!
“ we were one of the first places to teach slaves to read and write”.
Read it a couple of times so it sinks in.
I have not heard of weddings being held at Auschwitz or Treblinka.
82
I guess this means no more schoolkid bus trips to Mount Vernon.
After all, our first President, Washington, owned slaves.
Oh, and while we're at it we'd better demolish or re-name the Washington Monument, Washington State, Washington DC, etc., and anything having to do with the founding fathers, all or virtually all of whom owned slaves.
29
@Mon Ray School kids can learn important facts about our history at Mt. Vernon--including the abysmal fact that Washington owned slaves.
Weddings are not occasions for learning history, so your comparison strikes me as invalid.
I would not have yearned to be married at either Auschwitz or a plantation, no matter how many lovely trees might adorn those sites today.
36
A Mount Vernon educational trip about the home and personality of a great states man will, I hope, include that he owned slaves. It will paint a picture of the complicated founding of our country - a country white men founded based on ideals of freedom yet built on the backs of enslaved people they didn’t recognize as fully human.
20
Uh oh!
I guess this means school trips to Mount Vernon will have to be canceled because George Washington was a slave owner.
And then of course we'll have to demolish or rename the Washington Monument, Washington DC, Washington State, you get the idea.
12
Should we also remove the Colosseum from guided tours of Rome? That place was built specifically to violate human rights
30
I urge the New York Times Weddings section to also eliminate all references to weddings in New York City. Slavery ended rather abruptly in South Carolina 150 years ago; in contrast, today, New York’s public schools are among the most racially segregated in the country (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/nyregion/school-segregation-new-york.html).
28
Many "ex"plantations are beautiful buildings with beautiful settings. The history of how they were built and by whom should not determine how they are used today. Many structures in the United states that were built by slaves are used in more significant ways than the setting for weddings.
Michele Obama said while she was first lady, "I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves."
Nancy Pelosi said, while unveiling a commemorative marker in the Capitol Visitors Center to pay tribute to the black men and women who constructed it, “For too long, the sacrifice of men and women who built this temple of democracy were overlooked; their toil forgotten; their story ignored or denied, and their voices silenced in the pages of history."
According to USA Today, all four major rail networks in North America—Norfolk Southern, CSX, Union Pacific and Canadian National—own lines that were built and operated with the labor of enslaved black people. Not only did many slaves construct these railways, but they also ran them.
Thomas Jefferson's Estate at Monticello, as well as other presidential estates were built by slaves.
The very name ‘Wall Street’ is born of slavery, with enslaved Africans building a wall in 1653 to protect Dutch settlers from Indian raids.
There are countless buildings and monuments around the word built by slave labor, i,e, the pyramids of Eygpt, The Parthenon, The Roman Colosseum, the Basilica Cistern in Istanbul, etc.
42
Great use of what-about-ery!
Fantastic how you draw comparisons between a system of slavery that existed 2000 years ago on another continent to something that occurred on our very shores and only ended under intense duress 150 years ago. Also, good job defining the end of slavery so that it discounts the fact that similar pernicious systems like sharecropping, voter disenfranchisement, Jim Crow, and other pervasive and violent forms of oppression continued until only 50 years ago.
I think we in the US should all feel uncomfortable about the fact that so many of our buildings, infrastructures, and institutions were steeped in the blood of slavery. And we should sit in that feeling of discomfort. How many people toiled under the lash? How many toiled knowing their "payment" would be rape or separation from their own families? Being uncomfortable with and acknowledging our problematic past should be the merest price we can pay for inheriting this legacy that made our country into a wealthy and prosperous nation.
Weddings or parties in which the married couple are in essence seeking to portray themselves as the masters of a plantation in the "good old days" are abhorrent. [And if you don't believe that this is exactly what they are doing, look up Paula Deen, who held just such a party and specifically requested black wait-staff.]
Using infrastructure or visiting historical sites is one thing, but glorifying slavery and play-acting its return is another.
46
@Gary Castille It's true that the history of slavery and other atrocities is everywhere.
Does that mean we should rejoice when it is ignored?
16
@Gary Castille , The pyramids were not, by way of the latest theories. Do some research.
4
The homes are beautiful. the land is beautiful, the trees are beautiful. I’m sick of the censorship already. The Left can be just as censorious as the Right, only the Left believes that it’s censorship is pure and ideologically good and so therefore correct and just. So did the Stalinists and Maoists. Left or Right, extremes are bad. Enough of this nonsense already.
69
And will country clubs be next, which seem to be the loci of privileged, white, 'old money' power whose domestic foundations are, in short, the black help?
The atrocious history of slavery permeates our society completely, but the wholesale 'cancelling' of plantations seems reductive, reactionary and ludicrous. This could very well be an opportunity to educate folks about that sinister history, were we to embrace it.
20
“We’ve been a farm for 300 years; I don’t want to make anything racial out of it,” Mr. McRae said.
“There were bad acts that happened on some plantations, but not all plantations,” he added. “This was one of the first ones that taught slaves to read and write.”
I cannot fault Mr. McRae for being the unwitting beneficiary of the sins of his predecessors, but his willful ignorance regarding the brutality of slavery is dispiriting.
138
Catholic churches all across the country have now been revealed as sites of horrific sexual abuse. Children were molested and raped. Should these buildings no longer be used for weddings? Should magazines no longer feature them because of their hateful past?
Of course not. These are buildings. What matters is what happens in them now.
If these "plantations" still depended on slavery and the owners still had slaves, they would be horrible and reviled. No one would have an event there or be associated with them. But slavery and the original owners are long gone.
Using the venue to stage a wedding with an antebellum theme would also be wrong. That would romanticize a past way of life that is objectionable.
But these are now simply grand buildings in beautiful settings. They are not inherently evil. Can't they be appreciated simply as fine works of architecture?
These are outstanding examples of American design. In many cases, they only exist because of the revenue generated by special events. It would be a loss for all if these buildings fall into ruin because of "political correctness."
62
Maybe the Knot should have asked the local African American and Gullah communities for their perspective. Everything in this region was touched by slavery and plantations are now used for pumpkin patches, concerts, and cultural events that employ many people of color. If you want to support the community, buy a Sweetgrass basket and support minority owned businesses here. Donate to the new International African Museum that will be built soon. Donate to the Avery Center of studies. Those are things that help more than this gesture.
68
@Soda Pop
I was also thinking how much money/work these wedding places put into the local econmy
24
Am I reading the pages of The Onion, for heaven's sake?
Kidding aside, this is exactly the sort of inane, missed-the-point, self-aggrandizing pot-stirring that is already causing a tidal wave of backlash against *all* efforts by sincere, intelligent people to create a global future which is more just, culturally sensitive and truly tolerant rather than bullied into fake gestures.
These huge media corporations with deep pockets need to start taking real social responsibility by standing up to this sort of bullying in the courts and in the media instead of shrinking away from the confrontation and shirking their social responsibility to uphold the foundations of our American way of life. They've got the resources to stand up for our civil rights and liberties but they don't bother.
29
Cruelty to innocent business owners over things that happened on their property 100 years before they were born. The part where they want to prevent wedding venues from circumventing the ban on publicizing plantation weddings by rebranding themselves as “farms” tells the story. This isn’t about preventing glorification of the plantation concept, it is about exercising the power to bully innocent people (since these lands are no longer in the hands of their antebellum owners). Morally wrong on all levels.
38
While this reaction is very much understandable, it seems hard to draw limits. If the word Plantation is the problem, then no one should get married in the State of Rhode Island, the full name of which is The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. if the problem is the association with slavery itself, nor should anyone be married in any place that was built with slave labor (many churches and public buildings in the South) or with exploitive labor post-Emancipation (basically every building built everywhere since that time). Or on any land that was once Native American land, because we kicked the Native Americans out and/or killed them. Or maybe people can get married all those places as long as The Internet does not advocate that they do so? As long as they don't post anything about their weddings on social media afterwards? And why focus on marriage? Really no one should do anything in any of these places.
33
@george
I agree with you, but please, enough with the "slaves built everything/built America" nonsense. Its tiresome and its wrong.
20
Well no one can have a wedding in Europe anymore either then. Or Asia. Or Africa. Or anywhere really. Humanity is largely defined by war. Everywhere. In every era. For millennia. So just cancel all weddings because we should all just focus on the brutality of humanity in general instead.
34
Getting married on a plantation is like getting married at a German labor camp. A place where atrocities happened should absolutely be open to the public and used for educational purposes-- and I'm not even sure couples shouldn't be able to decide to marry there. But I can't imagine deciding to do so myself or promoting the spaces as 'elegant' or 'charming.' How insulting and painful. In general, Americans seem to be on a race to the bottom-- who can do the most distasteful thing, and disregard the most history, while claiming that there's nothing wrong with their personal choice. I see that here.
27
It's a wedding. A new start to a new family. Let the change happen. Be part of the change. There are spots everywhere - everywhere! - on this earth where atrocities and misery have occured....in the past. But we live in the here and now. I am grateful for how the world has changed and how the USA ended slavery, but I also want the beauty of the south to be used and enjoyed. Don't be so sanctimonious. It does not take us forward, it does not heal.
37
This is too much! In no way are these businesses promoting the harmful history of the past. In fact they are publicizing a healing use of the property. We cannot become a society where a few outraged people trample the rights of others. This, ironically, is perpetuating the unfair behavior of the powerful few over the many good.
46
No one’s rights are being trampled. A few businesses — some online wedding sites and The NY Times — are responding to client pressure. This happens all the time. It’s just that this time, the clients in question are (predominantly) African-American. Everyone still can get married wherever they want.
16
So once again, the will of the minority has enforced censorship of the masses. We are getting closer and closer to policies enforced in China and Russia. The ruling class decides what is seen, said, purchased, acknowledged, educated, etc. It just so happens that this ruling class is NOT the government, but a small group of people. So let's get real here - In the end this has negatively affected freedom of expression for tax paying, law abiding PLANTATION owners (free of slaves, and probably major employers in their locality) and the law abiding, tax paying, local business supporting brides and grooms that just wanted to have a pretty wedding memory and pictures to go with it. If enough people boycott these places, they will be shut down. This will negatively impact the business owners, their employees, and the communities that probably received MILLIONS each year in revenue due to a constant influx of out-of-town guests. People won't come visit. Hotels will shut down. Restaurants will shut down. Dress makers will close up shop. ALL of that income will no longer be a source of revenue to support those already poverty stricken localities. And due to the lost revenue - those cities will no longer be able to support the budget that covers the social services they have. Yep - sounds like a great idea..... keep us informed on how it all works out. ;-(
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@Redd
How do you think these "tax paying, law abiding PLANTATION owners" got these properties? By stealing land from Native Americans and making a profit by exploiting enslaved Africans and their descendants!
22
@xyz History is written by the winners. Besides, the Indians had slaves from other tribes.
8
Anyone who's been to Boone Hall can attest to the fact that they do not deny what happened there and they work to educate the public on the role of slavery and the really bad parts of it.
The fact is, slavery did happen. So what do we do with history now- pretend like it didn't happen?
For those that are so offended, what do you propose? Should we destroy these beautiful historic homes because their past does not align with modern values?
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@Betsy while I agree that slavery happened, the pain of slavery and it’s overall impact on me and people in my family who are descendants of slavery — is still very present in modern times. Sadly. So it’s less about being “offended” and more about ensuring that empathy & compassion and are top of mind. That the owners are partnering with African American owned businesses and/or HBCUs. Not everything is so cut and dry as you seem to imply.
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@Alish Nothing ever is cut and dried. But we must move forward. While respecting the past and learning from it. Acting as if real life cannot go on at certain place will not allow us to move forward.
For that reason, I like cemeteries that do not put up vertical stones or markers. I like the park like atmosphere. I know the place are still filled with loss but ....on we go.
8
@Linseigh Green
Then don't get married in a Catholic church, for surely they were sites of exploitation and brutalization of children. And I'm thinking we should also avoid Protestant churches and synagogues
11
Wow I find it appalling that anyone would be so insensitive, so ignorant as to create/use/post a hashtag using (romanticizing??) the word “plantation” — and not give one thought to it’s meaning or backstory. Thankful to the people at Color of Change for taking this on, and the companies that recognized their role in adding to its ugly legacy. Martha Stewart, get back to them soon, please!
58
Not all plantations used slave labor. Should we not celebrate any historical structure that employed slave labor?
10
Why don't they drop the Plantation and substitute with Farms or Estates or Retreats or Venues? 'Nuff said.
19
@Delway The word "plantation" is not an offensive word. Look at Cornell University. It is a word that has a use, and a history. Keep the word. Be grateful that there has been change.
7
My God what does nature have to do with those horrible things, are we going to stop using cotton for that reason?
80
I have to say that even I have my limits in political correctness. How dare any organization infringe in any person's right to choose a wedding venue? I can understand not glorifying a slavery past...but Color of Change is basically trying to undercut businesses (largely not part of the pre-Civil War ownership) so that they have a more difficult time making a living with property they own. If The Knot or WeddingWire or any of the others were putting up racist images or promoting having African American reinactors wait on the wedding party or using slogans like "The Lost Cause is Found at the Simpson-Bleaker Wedding event!" - that I get. But is it right to condemn a property?
None of us can run from history. The best way we can learn from it is to own it - all of it. These former slave plantations could certainly address bringing into full sight that side of the historical record. But to now say that a columned house or a garden surrounded by ancient willows can't be used by someone looking for a venue? That's exactly the kind of ideological purity that I believe President Obama was talking about. And it's literally infringing on a business that doesn't promote slavery or it's past. It's a building and land - if we were to cast aspersions on every property and plot that has evil history attached - we'd raze the entire country. Where does this end?
143
@Cgriff Who is infringing on anyone's right to marry where they like? The fact that certain companies who are in the business of promoting wedding information choose not to promote certain types of venues does not prevent anyone from getting married there.
70
@Cgriff If you find it ethically okay to get married at a place whose existence relied upon some of the worst human rights violations in our nation’s history, I would call that running from, not embracing, the realities of the past. There is nothing romantic about it.
33
@gail
This discussion is about unreasonable pressure and political correctness, not saying you can't spend your money where you like
9
It's understandable that someone who makes a living off of weddings at plantations would defend the practice. But the notion that, during slavery, "bad acts" happened at some plantations and not others is laughable. Slavery *was* a bad act, however it manifested. White couples who choose the location based on some hazy nostalgia for the "elegance" of the antebellum South really should think again.
161
There are plenty of plantations that were share cropped or built post slavery. Why on Earth should they be penalized?
10
@Courtney Thompson I strongly urge you to open a book and read more about how 'fair' share cropping was to those who did it.
30
My home is a former Presbyterian church -- built in the 1870 by a reengage group who felt the "normal" church was not religious enough. When I think about it -- I sort of like that a gay couple now live in this beautifully built building. I don't think of it very often.
Should I hate the builders and so the building -- I know the history .. it's not pretty.
We know the history of the plantations as well ... People will say -- it's different ... it's really not. The idea is the same -- take ownership in the present.
There is a lot of self righteousness going on .. it's not good.
106
@GT Quoting the cover of Ta-Nahesi Coasts' article: 250 years of slavery, 90 years of Jim Crow, 60 years of separate but equal, 35 years of state-sanctioned redlining.
No, we're not self-righteous. We just have a long history of being traded, sold, bought, raped, illiteracy, mutilations, forced sex between mothers and sons, cross burnings, inferior education, etc.
Don't tell me that it is not different. You are not affected by this history the way we are. Therefore, I will politely ask you to refrain from telling us to "...take ownership in the present." People of African descent inhabit the past and present simultaneously...we don't have the luxury to bifurcate the two.
85
@Marie And gay people have been stoned, tortured, murdered, ostracized, lynched, and subjected to “corrective rape.” Unfortunately history is often not pleasant.
-NW
13