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Harriet [CHAT]man
Quid
Definitely not a bananaRegistered User regular
Definitely not a bananaRegistered User regular
It's a proven fact that you can't take one credit hour of American History anywhere in the United States without at least hearing your boring teacher drone on about something remotely connected to the Underground Railroad, yet still to this day many people don't realize how insanely balls-out this over-the-top 19th century liberation movement actually was. A clandestine network of super-secret safehouses and crazy Jack Bauer-type CTU "WHERE IS THE BOMB?!"-type shit, the Underground is well known for having transported thousands of African slaves to freedom, but the commonly-utilized, and decidedly-unbadass term "Railroad" really makes the whole thing sound a hell of a lot less dangerous and life-threatening than it actually was. We're not talking about the fucking Chunnel here, folks - this was dangerous-as-hell work deep behind enemy lines, where the slightest misstep could result in the destruction of the entire Railroad system and capture meant a lifetime of savage beatings and humiliating, backbreaking servitude. This wasn't an enterprise taken up by spineless douchebags, a fact that was never more well-illustrated than by the face-meltingly unbelievable story of Harriet Tubman.
Born into slavery on a Maryland plantation, Harriet spent her first twenty-five years living under the watchful gaze of a number of different jackass overseers and housemistresses. While this five-foot tall woman may not have been the most physically imposing specimen this side of the She-Hulk exploding with 'roid rage, hard work made her tough as hell – she toned her body and her muscles working grueling manual labor twelve hours a day, seven days a week. Out in the unforgiving Maryland sun, she beat the hell out of trees with an axe, hacked up firewood, plowed an endless assortment fields, and drove unwieldy ox-carts. Before long, her physical strength matched her unshakable willpower.
Despite facing a lifetime of cruel bondage, Harriet Tubman never took fucking shit from anybody ever. Her stubbornness and refusal to back down generally resulted in her suffering endless beatings and physical abuse, including one time when she was smashed in the head with a lead weight for defending a fellow slave (a wound that left her suffering dizzy spells and light-headedness for the rest of her life), but she simply refused to have her spirit broken by a bunch of jackass rednecks on a power trip. Finally, one cloudy night in 1849, Harriet Tubman had enough of it. She made a break for freedom. Fleeing into the darkness, Tubman traveled for several days through the unfamiliar Maryland wilderness, and didn't look back until she reached the friendly, we-promise-we-won't-enslave-you confines of Philadelphia.
As awesome as it was to no longer live in slavery, there was still one problem – Harriet left behind her mother, father, and nine siblings. While most people would have just shrugged and said, "fuck it dudes, you're on your own," Harriet Tubman did the unbelievable – she fucking went BACK to the plantation, tracked down her family, and led THEM to freedom. That's just how she rolled, bitches.
Once Harried saw that she was capable of leading a large band of fugitive slaves safely to freedom (seriously, ten kids! Her family was almost as prolific as those crazy nutjobs in Utah who named all their kids with the letter J!) Harriet decided that she couldn't enjoy her freedom while her people remained in bondage. Using the code name "Moses", she returned to Maryland TWENTY more times, each time delivering her people from the chains of slavery to the promised land (which in this case was Niagara Falls, Canada, a 350-mile walk from the Maryland border) where they didn't have to worry about shit like getting whipped for insubordination or not having enough food to eat. Tubman rescued over 300 slaves over the course of 20 years, and was one of the greatest and most fearless heroines of antebellum America.
The Underground Railroad was some serious shit. Deep behind unfriendly lines for days and weeks at a time, Tubman and her crew slept in swamps, hid during the day, and moved under the cover of darkness. Travelling with women and children, young and old, and being pursued relentlessly by police, soldiers, attack dogs, bounty hunters, and slave-catchers barely caused her to flinch. She urged her people on, led them to freedom, and threatened to fucking face-shoot anybody who suggested giving up or turning back (seriously - if one member was caught or returned, it jeopardized the entire Railroad, and she would rather have capped someone in the face than seen that shit go down). Although she was illiterate and uneducated, Harriet Tubman was by no means stupid – she cleverly hid from her would-be captors, outsmarted the entire population of Maryland nearly two dozen times, and told everybody else to get bent harder than Uri Geller's silverware collection. She made her escapes on Saturdays, which bought her a one-day head start because wanted posters could not legally be posted on Sundays – and twenty-four hours was all she needed to leave her enemies in her dust. Despite the fact that there was a $40,000 reward for the "black ghost" (a figure that today equates to a cool $4 mil), she was never caught, never defeated, and never lost a single person she escorted to freedom.
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Posts
what is the proper response
is it a high five
this can be arranged
NNID: Hakkekage
:winky:
I mean, if I were to meet her, I would definitely offer her a high-five.
Though, as a white man speaking to a black woman in that era, raising my hand in such a manner would probably be misconstrued.
...Blech. I still feel terrible.
Would you know it, in my 6-year history on these forums this would be my first ever :winky: moment?
I need a cookie.
P.S. Yal: Lying to your folks is the answer.
:winky:
Also, tonight I see Dylan Moran.
Has anyone heard from Hippie? He's not been online in ages and with his possible concussion, I am somewhat concerned.
He got banned duder.
Hippie got banned. And Inq, you apparently do not understand how much of a pathetic spineless little shit I am.
Imposing?
Authoritative?
Evil?
Oh man, you don't lie? You gotta lie.
Look, you leave your house all the time to go take photos and shit right? Just tell them you are doing that, and then I meet up with you and we kick it or something.
Easy.
Like your face.
I leave for like half an hour to walk down to the park. Any time I'm gone beyond the walls of this little cul-de-sac, people are calling me and eachother like every 5 goddamned minutes to make sure I'm not dead.
NNID: Hakkekage
From Penny-Arcade, not AIM. You can't get bant from the internets.
Jesus seriously?
Jesus. :shock:
Have you considered faking your own death?