For Germany, their greatest national sin is undoubtedly the Holocaust. But for most other Western countries, including the United States, slavery is the single most reprehensible aspect of a nation’s history. This notion holds true for Great Britain, France, Spain, and scores of others. Slavery was a horrific crime against humanity. But like the Holocaust, slavery was unique in its horror, and drawing comparisons of other injustices to it are almost always ill-advised. So too is the practice of attributing modern phenomena as being remnants of slavery, because in doing so we trivialize the brutality of that horrible institution. Such was the case this week when Nikole Hannah-Jones gave the idea a try.
Winner: Nikole Hannah-Jones, discredited reporter and founder of the 1619 Project, declares the practice of tipping is “a legacy of slavery.”
As we saw this week when Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson was making her own, strong case to be named the week’s top knucklehead, our friends on the left would have us believe that any criticism directed at a black woman is verboten, constituting an act of racism, misogyny, or both. But the fact remains: Black women are just as capable of doing and saying stupid stuff as members of any other race or gender. And Nikole Hannah-Jones proved that point this week.
On Monday, Hannah-Jones quickly deleted a tweet shortly after posting it, and it’s not surprising that she would have regrets and want it withdrawn. But as is the case with virtually everything else related to the internet, once something makes it onto the web, it’s out there forever. The contents of that tweet are as follows:
“Tipping is a legacy of slavery and if it’s not optional then it shouldn’t be a tip but simply included in the bill. Have you ever stopped to think why we tip, like why tipping is a practice in the US and almost nowhere else?”
And even though she deleted her original tweet, Hannah-Jones wasn’t backing off her stance as indicated by subsequent responses she gave to her critics.
So, what should we make of Hannah-Jones’ assertion? On its face, the idea sounds ridiculous, but is it? Yes, it most certainly is. The idea that giving someone a little extra money is rooted in racism sounds absurd because it is absurd.
Tipping is a show of appreciation and generosity, and if Nikole Hannah-Jones was making the claim that Americans are exceptionally generous, she would have a point. No country is more charitable than the United States. But the idea that giving folks money that’s not required is somehow rooted in slavery is beyond silly. Did slave masters tip their slaves? Were slaves working extra hard to position themselves to receive a few extra dollars? Of course not, because slaves didn’t even get base pay, let alone extra pay. They were property.
It’s also worth noting that Hannah-Jones’ point that tipping happens “almost nowhere else” is flat-out bizarre. (continued)
Featured photo by Associação Brasileira de Jornalismo Investigativo, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
This post originally appeared on The Blue State Conservative.