That's really amazing (and sad). Thanks for adding personal history to my off-the-cuff guesswork.

Yeah, I'm not sure if Nottoway has, but many other plantations have. It's infuriating.

That's amazing–I had no idea!

That might be the most frustrating thing of all - can you imagine how amazing the dialog could be between white feminism and feminists of colour at a place like you describe?

Zahi Hawass is not necessarily what you would call an unbiased source. :-) (And it's not really relevant to the conversation, save that people defending DiFranco and involved in the event wanted to equate slavery from 150 years ago to slavery from 5000 years ago.)

I think so, yes. I can't imagine the same kind of outrage over a plantation that is upfront and honest about slavery. Unfortunately, most for-profit plantations run with the "slavery was good for slaves" narrative (and Nottoway Plantation is notorious among the notorious for it). In many places, the slave quarters and…

in defense of choosing an explicitly racist site

There's that, yep. There's also just the freshness of it. I remember several of my great-grandparents, and it's only through A Series of Unfortunate Events none of my great, great-grandparents were alive when I was born. For many people–especially (especially!) in New Orleans–when you talk about slavery, you're…

I'm gonna go with yes. When you're paying a place six or seven figures to hang out there for a couple of days, you're tacitly agreeing with the narrative and supporting its continued existence.

That's not really a great definition, given how extreme our Republican party has become in the last 30 years. ;-)

The most irritating is that both could be done: there's nothing inherently wrong with preserving a place that is beautiful and allowing weddings and other events, so long as you're not trying to perpetuate the myth of the happy slave.

That seems very different to me than choosing to have a feminist retreat at a place that is trying to promote the idea that slavery was good for slaves, eh? I mean, I was doing the math on it, and we're talking people's great-grandparents, great-great-grandparents being the slaves building these places. Saying "our…

It's a lovely, large mansion with beautifully curated grounds.

People associated with it were saying things on Facebook last night about how it was the past "like pyramids" and we needed to move on. So I did the math and that's into great, great-grandfather (or, depending on age, great-grandfather) range. Which really? Not so much "like pyramids" at all. :|

Pretty sure most of the movie is native Canadian actors helping out a native Canadian company expand. (Not really sure it's a 'poor them' thing when they're helping boost arts and cultures at home.)

? The Legend of Sarila was the first 3D CGI animated movie produced completely in Quebec. Plummer is a Quebec native, and has always done a lot to promote hometown arts/culture/movie stuff. I believe Lefevre and most of the other voice actors are Canadian, too.

Webcasts and readings are available here.

Yup. Believe me, I facepalmed hard at the entire thing. (But today I'm tilting at the McMath windmill. ...so many windmills, so little time.)

Very incredibly well-said. (Thank you for sparing me from being That Person today. Yesterday.)

It made a couple of heads turn, because (as noted in the article), it's not something that's expected of someone who's 32. The general belief is more that it's something people do who are older, who already have a draw with the crowds going to Vegas - and who might have trouble selling out shows in a tour (just…