Thomas Jefferson wrote some of the most inspiring words on freedom and liberty, yet kept his slaves. To this day, people say as a result: He didn’t mean all men are created equal or he wouldn’t have done what he did. He did, so he must have meant all white men are created equal. It’s difficult to impossible to lead without credibility or integrity. Jefferson undermined both by violating the[…] Keep reading →

Compiling resources on Robert Carter III for reference: Why do I care about Carter? A CNN article quoted Andrew Levy, who wrote a book on Carter, on why Americans seem to bury Carter’s story: Levy, whose books include a biography of Carter, “The First Emancipator,” has another suspicion: America doesn’t care – because it’s inconvenient. “It blows an enormous hole in this legacy we’re trying to balance for these founders,”[…] Keep reading →

This week I finished: The Anti-Jefferson: Why Robert Carter III Freed His Slaves (And Why We Couldn’t Care Less), by Andrew Levy: This piece was a journal article in the spring 2001 issue of The American Scholar. Robert Carter III plays a major role in Sustainability Simplified as a contrast to Jefferson, Washington, and their peers who spoke of freedom but did not free their slaves. Carter freed all his[…] Keep reading →

Since people describe me as “extreme” so often, I experiment with how to respond since I don’t use the measure they do. They compare me with people around them—that is, with culture. I consider how my behavior affects others. I don’t want to hurt innocent people. My book treats the relationship between our culture and slavery, with the main difference that the cruelty of today’s culture is much greater than[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written about Robert Carter III a bunch here. He figures in my book a lot, as someone who could have remained corrupted by slavery, as everyone around him did in Virginia after the American Revolution, but he freed his slaves. Thomas Jefferson didn’t, despite his brilliant words on freedom. [EDIT: Here’s someone else’s post on Robert Carter III: The Forgotten First Emancipator. An excerpt: Robert Carter, then, stands as[…] Keep reading →

A friend of mine who is also friends with Scott Galloway emailed me about Galloway’s initiative to influence politics by changing consumer behavior. The initiative aims to lead people to stop doing business with companies that influence politics he and his followers disagree with. Context Galloway calls it “Resist and Unsubscribe.” Our mutual friend’s email included screen shots of his cancelling his accounts with Amazon, X, and ChatGPT. He included[…] Keep reading →

Each Sunday I post selected books, movies, courses, and other media I finished that week. Today, I’ll see if I can pick the ones I liked the most. I’ll write the categories first, then fill them in after searching this year’s posts. I’m not sure which I’ll remember or forget. I don’t think I read many fiction books. I don’t usually note podcasts or short videos, but I listen to[…] Keep reading →

This week I finished: The Constitution Today: Timeless Lessons for the Issues of our Era, by Akhil Reed Amar: I have been studying the Constitution like never before. The path to it was realizing sustainability meant changing culture, which forced me to ask if it was possible, which pointed me to abolitionism, which pointed me to Lincoln and abolitionists, which led me to the Thirteenth Amendment, which led me to[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written many times about Thomas Jefferson embodying American culture today. He said all the right things about freedom and liberty. He considered slavery wrong. He still practiced it. His rationalizations and justifications are ours. I link to a bunch of those posts at the bottom of this post. I recommend them. If you want to understand how you sound to someone who lives by values you likely say you[…] Keep reading →