Uncle Ben is literally a generic name given to house slaves. There were many Uncle Bens all across the south.
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MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 4 months agoApparently the character was based on a black maître d’, so it wasn’t even particularly racist, since many white people also do this job. Therefore I’m inclined to believe the second reason might have been their actual motive, and the supposed racism was just a convenient excuse.
RedAggroBest@lemmy.world 4 months ago
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 4 months ago
My Uncle Ben at yo momma’s house last night.
felixwhynot@lemmy.world 4 months ago
Remind me why we have tipping in the US?
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 4 months ago
To Insure Proper Service
felixwhynot@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I suggest you have a quick search for the “history of tipping”
Here’s one: cbsnews.com/…/tipping-jobs-history-slave-wage-cbs…
Maggoty@lemmy.world 4 months ago
No. That was simply the man who originally posed for the picture. The brand was officially named after a sharecropper. However Uncle was also a common title for an older male house slave. Same with Aunt. Both the original rice farmer and pancake mix inventor were born into slavery and had their products lifted from them by white corporations.
eatthecake@lemmy.world 4 months ago
I have no ides about this, being Australian. Are you saying that the people on the boxes represent real people who had their recipes stolen?
Maggoty@lemmy.world 4 months ago
They weren’t stolen in the legal sense. There was a contract but it wasn’t an equal contract. The US actually has a history of this from the Reconstruction period right through the Civil Rights period (about 1865-1965). Especially with black musicians who supported white bands via record companies buying the songs off of them for a pittance compared to what they were worth.