This past Summer I went to New Orleans on a family trip to experience food, entertainment and the outdoors. Once we arrived we quickly found out that New Orleans has a vibrant tourism around the issue of slavery. There are many tours to various landmarks within the city but the big excursion is to the actual slave plantations that have been converted to tourist attractions. I immediately thought it was ridiculous that anyone would want to visit a place with such a horrible past but after a few days in New Orleans we decided to give this a try. We went out to the plantation that I have linked below. Upon arrival you are welcomed and offered to sip on a mint julep “just like the old days” and to enjoy the scenery of the plantation on the veranda before the actual tour starts. Once the tour started it became obvious that efforts were made to decry the horrors of slavery but also to shed light on the heroism of those early Americans that made American what it is today. And in this delicate balance of the violence of slavery, the heroism and hard work of plantation owners and the end result of nation creation we end up in a very confusing place.

Of course this is a very complicated situation and no doubt my own race had to do with the dynamics of the interaction with staff. Being Mexican with a family that passes for Anglo and engaging the tour guide on historical issues was obviously confusing to him.

The question is this; should this type of tourism be allowed and if so how should it be regulated? Look at the website and do some other browsing on neighboring plantations. All that you have read should prepare you to make a solid statement on the morality of slave tourism. Argue why or why not this type of tourism is good or not. Does it press the issue of making sure this type of racism never exists again or does it empower latent racism? Be very specific for your reasons why or why not. You should quote language from the attached document to aid in making your point. You only have to read the first five pages of the Frederick Douglass speech.

This should be no more than one page but should make references to either the readings or other material you have found. This is an exercise in historical interpretation.