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> Oompa-Loompas were literal slaves form Africa I can find a lot of stuff written online about this, but none of it quotes the original text. The original oom

by zizee 3y ago

> Oompa-Loompas were literal slaves form Africa I can find a lot of stuff written online about this, but none of it quotes the original text. The original oompa-loompas were pygmies from Africa, written in a pretty racist way, and with wonka being a type of white-messiah-savior for them. I can definitely see an argument that wonka was a shitty employer, violating all sorts of legal and moral rules. But we're they actual slaves? From what I have been able to find they were paid, but chose to take payments in cocoa. Were they forced to work and imprisoned? I guess I would like to see the original text, as all the articles written on the subject make proclamations of them being actual slaves, but don't show anything from the original text (or make the argument) to demonstrate they were actually slaves. One such article: https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/170755 https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/170755

teachrdan 3y ago
We might both be right. It appears the original version was a fantasy where the Oompa-Loompa's were happy to be taken from their homeland to an underground factory to work for free. This is from "Jeremy Treglown’s Roald Dahl: A Biography" "In the version first published, [the Oompa-Loompas were] a tribe of 3,000 amiable black pygmies who have been imported by Mr. Willy Wonka from ‘the very deepest and darkest part of the African jungle where no white man had been before.’ Mr. Wonka keeps them in the factory, where they have replaced the sacked white workers. Wonka’s little slaves are delighted with their new circumstances, and particularly with their diet of chocolate. Before they lived on green caterpillars, beetles, eucalyptus leaves, ‘and the bark of the bong-bong tree.'" Is this technically slavery? Maybe not, by the fairy tale logic of the book. But this is a troublesome, to say the least, trope of oppressed people who are perversely grateful to be exploited by (invariably) white men. To each their own bong-bong tree. https://groovyhistory.com/oompa-loompas-the-original-ones/4 https://groovyhistory.com/oompa-loompas-the-original-ones/4
- zizee 3y ago
  It's all good. I'm a bit of a pendant for word definitions people are using. I think loose definitions lead to all sorts of subtle miscommunications. Most of the time it's not a big deal, but I do have a soft spot for Ronald Dahl, so would like to verify when claims. For all of the articles I can find written about Dahl's oompa-loompa slaves, not one of them puts together an argument as to why they are slaves. They just make the claim, and surround it with statements of the opmpa-loompas being originally black native inhabitants of Africa, and they worked for a white-man Wonka. I can see how people's minds go to slavery when describing a unbalanced power dynamic between an exclusively black workforce and a white boss man, but innuendo does not make for a compelling argument IMHO. If the book doesn't mention them being imprisoned, doesn't mention being forced to work, talks about them being paid a wage, and given the choice on how to be paid, then they are not slaves. We can make lots of assumptions about what is happening behind the scenes of the factory, but we could do that just as easily to suggest the Oompa-loompas are actually the masterminds behind everything, and secretly control the governments of the world. Personally, I think Dahl's original depiction was racist, but not describing slavery. The fact all these articles don't provide anything from the original text* showing that they are slaves makes me think this is a case of people wanting to inflate someones misdeads in order to generate clicks. It's easy enough to find real things to criticize the man for, but they should stick to the facts, or make an actual argument. *The biographer was doing the same thing as the articles.

by zizee 3y ago

teachrdan 3y ago

We might both be right. It appears the original version was a fantasy where the Oompa-Loompa's were happy to be taken from their homeland to an underground factory to work for free. This is from "Jeremy Treglown’s Roald Dahl: A Biography" "In the version first published, [the Oompa-Loompas were] a tribe of 3,000 amiable black pygmies who have been imported by Mr. Willy Wonka from ‘the very deepest and darkest part of the African jungle where no white man had been before.’ Mr. Wonka keeps them in the factory, where they have replaced the sacked white workers. Wonka’s little slaves are delighted with their new circumstances, and particularly with their diet of chocolate. Before they lived on green caterpillars, beetles, eucalyptus leaves, ‘and the bark of the bong-bong tree.'" Is this technically slavery? Maybe not, by the fairy tale logic of the book. But this is a troublesome, to say the least, trope of oppressed people who are perversely grateful to be exploited by (invariably) white men. To each their own bong-bong tree. https://groovyhistory.com/oompa-loompas-the-original-ones/4 https://groovyhistory.com/oompa-loompas-the-original-ones/4

zizee 3y ago
It's all good. I'm a bit of a pendant for word definitions people are using. I think loose definitions lead to all sorts of subtle miscommunications. Most of the time it's not a big deal, but I do have a soft spot for Ronald Dahl, so would like to verify when claims. For all of the articles I can find written about Dahl's oompa-loompa slaves, not one of them puts together an argument as to why they are slaves. They just make the claim, and surround it with statements of the opmpa-loompas being originally black native inhabitants of Africa, and they worked for a white-man Wonka. I can see how people's minds go to slavery when describing a unbalanced power dynamic between an exclusively black workforce and a white boss man, but innuendo does not make for a compelling argument IMHO. If the book doesn't mention them being imprisoned, doesn't mention being forced to work, talks about them being paid a wage, and given the choice on how to be paid, then they are not slaves. We can make lots of assumptions about what is happening behind the scenes of the factory, but we could do that just as easily to suggest the Oompa-loompas are actually the masterminds behind everything, and secretly control the governments of the world. Personally, I think Dahl's original depiction was racist, but not describing slavery. The fact all these articles don't provide anything from the original text* showing that they are slaves makes me think this is a case of people wanting to inflate someones misdeads in order to generate clicks. It's easy enough to find real things to criticize the man for, but they should stick to the facts, or make an actual argument. *The biographer was doing the same thing as the articles.