Bearing the Cross, We Danced: Racism, Stolen Labor, and America’s Unpaid Debt

Bearing the Cross, We Danced: Racism, Stolen Labor, and America’s Unpaid Debt

A moral reckoning with racism, stolen labor,

and America’s unpaid debt—examining history, faith,

and the human cost behind the nation’s wealth

I exclaimed, Domini… Salva Nos… Perimus! as I read a Washington Post column by Michael Gerson, President George W. Bush’s chief speechwriter. 

He'd written it as a rebuke to those excusing Trump’s racism. Here's what he wrote (verse-formatted):

I had fully intended
to ignore President Trump’s
latest round of racially charged taunts…

But I made the mistake
of pulling James Cone’s
The Cross and the Lynching Tree
off my shelf…

Cone recounts the case
of a white mob
in Valdosta, Ga.,
in 1918
that lynched
an innocent man
named Haynes Turner.

His wife, Mary,
promised justice.

The sheriff
turned her over
to the mob.

She was stripped,
hung upside down,
soaked with gasoline,
roasted to death.

In the midst of this torment,
a white man
ripped her belly open
with a knife
and her infant
fell to the ground
and was stomped to death.

God help us.

It is hard
to write the words.

This evil —
white supremacy,
dehumanization,
murder —
is the worst stain
of U.S. history.

It is the thing
that proved generations
of Christians
to be vicious hypocrites.

It is the thing
that turned
normal people
into moral monsters.

That column appeared in August 2019, during Trump’s first term.

Michael Gerson did not live to see a second Trump term. He passed away in 2022. Rest in peace, Michael Gerson (1964–2022).

Reading that passage knocked me flat. It made me think about the true barbarity Black people have faced. 

Not only in the United States but across the Americas. I had heard references before - even in Muhammad Ali interviews - to babies ripped from mothers’ wombs.

I thought it might be hyperbole. I was wrong.

Mary Turner was eight months pregnant. Her husband had been murdered. She dared to grieve. She dared to speak. 

For that she was strung up, her belly cut open, her unborn child stomped to death. Think about that.

---

Racism is bewildering.

Left speechless — I have reduced my consternation to just five words: “Don’t you have a fucking life?”

Seven more: What is the purpose of all this?

I’d like to sit a racist down, pat him on the back, and tell him to be serious. They are only trying to live their lives — to go about their business, to climb the ladder of hope, to recover lost time, lost wages, lost dignity.

These Africans you hate so much were stolen. Have you ever thought about that? They never asked to be part of your story. And if you now want to decouple them from your story, then pay up.

Pay what? Here is the arithmetic of stolen labour — for your guidance.

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The Arithmetic of Stolen Labor

If you want to talk about “Go Back To Africa,” here are some numbers to hold in your head:

• Period of coercion considered: 1619–1865 (slavery) + 1865–1965 (Jim Crow) = 346 years.
  
  
• Estimated population under coercion (average): ~10 million people per year.
  
  
• Average weekly labor hours (historical coerced labor): 60–90 hours.
  
  
• Estimated lifetime coerced hours per person: ~1.1–1.6 million hours.
  
  
• Total coerced man-hours across 346 years: 11–16 trillion hours.

Using the 1938 federal minimum wage of $0.25/hour as a crude baseline:

• 11 trillion hours × $0.25 ≈ $3 trillion (1938 dollars)
• 16 trillion hours × $0.25 ≈ $4 trillion (1938 dollars)

Adjusted into today’s dollars (converting historic wages to present value is imprecise, but for illustration):
Approximately $55–80 trillion in today’s money.

Let that sink in!

America’s GDP in 2025 is roughly $27 trillion.
Only about half of what was effectively stolen through centuries of coerced labor.

The U.S. economy has, in part, been built on a debt it never paid.

---

So what is the Black man’s crime?
How much suffering is enough suffering??

Blacks moved on. They rebuilt, innovated, created culture, served in wars that did not free them, and—despite everything—contributed magnificently to the nation's wealth.

But moving on is not the same as forgetting or forgiving injustice without reckoning. To say “we moved on” is true; to pretend the theft never happened is not.

Don Kenobi wrote, two decades ago, in Of Gods and Negroes:

“Wasn’t it amazing, that the African American had won every single battle he has playing defence? … I know that when the (man) finally makes his mind up, it will be a thing of beauty to see (many like him) collectivize their dreams and carry on.”

Take the $55–80 trillion and stop the cheap, performative grievance-mongering — or you’ll lose everything… to neglect, or worse, to China!

There’s a rule in paleontology: ornamentation and complication often precede extinction.

Your culture wars — launched to “recover” what was never lost and to remake the republic to suit one demographic — are mere ornamentation: complexity for complexity’s sake, a flailing before the fall. Take heed.

“Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.” — 1 Corinthians 10:12

---

They survived 346 years in a wilderness bereft of warmth from men and from the elements.

Put their suffering in your heart for one day, can you?
Even one hour, one minute. They never asked to be part of your story.

That is why they should be left to reclaim their humanity!
Stop the hate-mongering!

Denied basic humanity for 246 years under institutional slavery and then 100 years under Jim Crow, Black people are only trying to catch up. Let them.

Never forget!
They never asked to be part of your story.

---

Every skyline in America — brick upon brick, girder upon girder — was built by African labor. Enslaved Africans made America rich, powerful, and bold enough to dream of independence. Without them, America would have been just another colony.

African Americans are, in truth, a gift to America — to humanity. Their stolen labor birthed wealth and culture: jazz, art, struggle, soul.

Even in chains, they fought in wars they would not benefit from. They climbed mountains with weights on their backs — and still they climbed. That is the reckoning racists fear.

Yet the violence continues: physical, psychological, unrelenting.

---

Dens of Malice — Echo Chambers of Hate

There are Dens of Malice today —
dark places where grievance festers like a disease.
Modern ears may know them better as echo chambers of hate.

There, reason is drowned out.
There, history is rationalized away.
And there, the old poison is poured into new vessels.

They do this by demonizing Blacks and other minorities.

Their Crime?

The same crime the early Christians committed against pagan Rome:

Waking each morning,
looking heavenward with hope.
Praying to a God hidden from them.
Having nothing, yet living as though they had everything.

---

Why the Hatred?

Because kindness — compassion, empathy, humanity, grace — is emotional wealth.
And to the emotionally bankrupt, it is unbearable.
It reminds them of their lack.

The more they lack, the more viciously they tear down
the very pillars of Christianity — of civilization.

They glory in this shame, parading their emptiness as though it were strength.

---

Scripture Speaks

As Paul wrote in Philippians 3:19:

“Their end is destruction,
their god is their belly,
their glory is in their shame.
Their minds are set on earthly things.”

---

For your eternity’s sake, entertain this thought:

That those who stoke your grievance — second-hand grievances — may be the true enemies of your soul. While they profit from your fury, they cause the fruits of the Holy Spirit in your life to rot and drop off!

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An Admonition to the Downtrodden

Cling to the One who has always loved you — the true Jesus, not the fake gospel that equates faithfulness with money and lowers faith’s bar to a transactional “seed-sowing” scheme. The false gospel promises riches to faithfulness and recruits the vulnerable with a very low standard.

---

Sing with David, Who Knew Persecution

“How are they increased that trouble us!
Many are they that rise against us.
Many there be who say of our souls:
‘There is no help for them in God.’
But Thou, O Lord, art a shield for us.
Our glory, the lifter of our head.”

---

Shorten the days — lest we perish.

I rest my case.

— Don Kenobi, 23-09-2025

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Sources & Further Reading

• Michael Gerson, Washington Post column (August 2019).
• James H. Cone, The Cross and the Lynching Tree.
• Philippians 3:19 — see: BibleHub