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IDKMYDE: Drapetomania and the Lexicon of Oppession · The Breakfast Club

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: On today's episode. If I didn't know, maybe you didn't either.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about something wild. Drape domania, now, don't worry,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: is not another WWE event. It's not a new crypto
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: scam or a TikTok trend. It's actually a piece of
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: history that's so ridiculous it sounds like satire. I didn't know.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. I
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: didn't know. I didn't know. Back in eighteen fifty one,
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: this guy named Samuel Cartwright, he's a doctor. Mind you
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: comes up with this disease called drape toomania. And what
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: was this illness? You ask, Well, I'll share. It was
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: when enslaved black people wanted to escape. Yes, apparently wanting
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: freedom was considered a mental disorder, like, oh wait, you
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: don't enjoy being beaten and overworked and treated like property,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: must be something wrong with your brain. And doctor Cartwright
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: wasn't just joking around. He had treatment plans spoiler alert,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: they weren't great. His cure was basically, you just got
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: to hit them harder, because you know, nothing says mental
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: health care like a little violence. But drape domania wasn't
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: the only wild word. They came up with during this time.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: Oh no, they had a whole lexicon of oppression. Take
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: chattle for example, that's what they called the enslaved people.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: You've heard of chattle slavery. Yeah, chattel means property like
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: a couch or a cow. Imagine being referred to as
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: someone's love seat. Or how about the term fugitive slave.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: That term was for people who escaped slavery. They made
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: it sound like these folks were robbing banks instead of,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: you know, trying to not be enslaved. Then there were
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the slave codes, and we've discussed these in previous seasons
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: of I didn't know, maybe you dine either, But these
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: were actually laws designed to control enslaved people. They dictated
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: everything where you could go, who you could talk to,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: even whether you could learn to read. Like, we're already
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: still in your freedom, but let's go ahead and micro
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: manage your existence too. Oh here's another fun one, manumissions.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: Now that these were rare, because that's when in enslaver
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: decided to free someone thoughtful. Congratulations, you're free. Now go
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: figure out life in the world has been set up
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: to screw you over. They also had a term the
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: task system and that's where enslaved people were giving daily
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: assignments instead of just working from sun up to sundown. Yeah,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: people actually thought this was progress. It's like saying good news,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: you only have to suffer for half the day now.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: So why am I telling you all this? Because words
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: have power. Back then, they use words to dehumanize, to control,
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: to justify the unjustifiable. And today we still see how
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: language shapes the way we view people and history. But
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: here's the thing. We get to decide how we use
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: our words now. So let's use them to lift each
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: other up, to tell the truth, and to remind the
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: world that no one should ever need need a diagnosis
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: to want their freedom. Drake, doromania a word that I
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: didn't know. Maybe you didn't either,