Depends on the situation. I have an uncle who is, for his generation (boomer), fairly progressive-minded.
For years, he repeated that his favorite book was “The Education of Little Tree” which was published in 76, and to my understanding takes a pretty irreverent and sometimes satirical stance on much of society’s generally accepted social norms and formal institutions. It has an environmentalist tone and is critical of the prejudice that the indigenous protagonist faces.
The weird part is that the author, “Forrest Carter,” was actually Asa Earl Carter who was formerly a prominent Klan member and speech writer for George Wallace, one of the premiere racist ghoul politicians of the American South. Ever heard the speech that goes “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever”? Yeah, that’s a George Wallace speech that was written by Carter. It’s been known that they’re the same guy since the early 90’s, but my uncle still wasn’t aware of it in the 2010’s.
My Uncle’s a pretty reasonable guy and he’s capable of critical thinking. I don’t know why Carter went on to write a book that was critical of prejudice after spending his early life being super fucking turbo-racist, but the guy’s long dead and while it certainly recontextualizes his anti-prejudice work, it’s not like you can’t still like his books. When I shared the info with my uncle about Carter’s identity, I expected him to take it much the way I did like “Well that’s pretty weird. Wonder what the hell happened to have made the same man write such different things in his life. Sucks he was a racist,” but instead it really seemed like he took it personally. He got really defensive about something that has literally been settled fact since the 90s, suggesting it was all lies even though I was showing him the Wikipedia page for Carter. I even heard him mutter something under his breath after the conversation which is waaay more petty than I’ve ever seen him act.
If I don’t think the person I’m talking to is capable of critical thought and nuance, I’ll keep things like that to myself, but my uncle and I have had tons of interesting conversations. In my head this was just another one of those. It’s not like I was accusing my uncle of being racist. After all, he had no idea. I thought I was just sharing a bizarre detail about an author he liked.
He may have simply been in shock, it’s not unusual for someone to be in denial at first when they learn something like this about someone they looked up to.
It may even be healthy to be initially skeptical, makes you less easy to manipulate with slander.
Sooner or later you have to face the facts, at least when they’re proven and well-established, but it can take time to process that information
I almost suggested that, but the story goes that the reason he chose “Forrest” as a pseudonym when writing the book was because of Nathan Bedford Forrest, founder of the Klan. People contain multitudes. I can’t claim to know why he did what he did, but nothing I’ve read about the man (admittedly little) indicates that he was sorry for what he’d done. Ashamed perhaps, but even that I’m just guessing based on the fact that he tried changing his identity and denied being Asa Carter.
Depends on the situation. I have an uncle who is, for his generation (boomer), fairly progressive-minded.
For years, he repeated that his favorite book was “The Education of Little Tree” which was published in 76, and to my understanding takes a pretty irreverent and sometimes satirical stance on much of society’s generally accepted social norms and formal institutions. It has an environmentalist tone and is critical of the prejudice that the indigenous protagonist faces.
The weird part is that the author, “Forrest Carter,” was actually Asa Earl Carter who was formerly a prominent Klan member and speech writer for George Wallace, one of the premiere racist ghoul politicians of the American South. Ever heard the speech that goes “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever”? Yeah, that’s a George Wallace speech that was written by Carter. It’s been known that they’re the same guy since the early 90’s, but my uncle still wasn’t aware of it in the 2010’s.
My Uncle’s a pretty reasonable guy and he’s capable of critical thinking. I don’t know why Carter went on to write a book that was critical of prejudice after spending his early life being super fucking turbo-racist, but the guy’s long dead and while it certainly recontextualizes his anti-prejudice work, it’s not like you can’t still like his books. When I shared the info with my uncle about Carter’s identity, I expected him to take it much the way I did like “Well that’s pretty weird. Wonder what the hell happened to have made the same man write such different things in his life. Sucks he was a racist,” but instead it really seemed like he took it personally. He got really defensive about something that has literally been settled fact since the 90s, suggesting it was all lies even though I was showing him the Wikipedia page for Carter. I even heard him mutter something under his breath after the conversation which is waaay more petty than I’ve ever seen him act.
If I don’t think the person I’m talking to is capable of critical thought and nuance, I’ll keep things like that to myself, but my uncle and I have had tons of interesting conversations. In my head this was just another one of those. It’s not like I was accusing my uncle of being racist. After all, he had no idea. I thought I was just sharing a bizarre detail about an author he liked.
He may have simply been in shock, it’s not unusual for someone to be in denial at first when they learn something like this about someone they looked up to.
It may even be healthy to be initially skeptical, makes you less easy to manipulate with slander.
Sooner or later you have to face the facts, at least when they’re proven and well-established, but it can take time to process that information
Maybe he came across some dignity later in life? People are always changing and that’s something we should all be respecting.
Yeah, my thoughts. Cancel culture makes people forget this. Not everyone is a mini hitler (i.e won’t change)
I almost suggested that, but the story goes that the reason he chose “Forrest” as a pseudonym when writing the book was because of Nathan Bedford Forrest, founder of the Klan. People contain multitudes. I can’t claim to know why he did what he did, but nothing I’ve read about the man (admittedly little) indicates that he was sorry for what he’d done. Ashamed perhaps, but even that I’m just guessing based on the fact that he tried changing his identity and denied being Asa Carter.