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bmoreboy410 t1_ixtcah8 wrote

Reply to comment by brouhaha13 in It’s always nice to see Baltimore recognized on the world stage - Go USA ⚽️ by chrisbeall

From the third verse:

No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave

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brouhaha13 t1_ixtjm9b wrote

So not the anthem. The poem?

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tansreer t1_ixuba7y wrote

You're trying to split hairs. Where are you finding that distinction encoded into the law that declares the Star Spangled Banner the anthem?

I don't see anything that says "just the first verse, we don't like the verse about killing runaway slaves that joined the British so they could be free."

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bmore t1_ixun762 wrote

The verse is not wrong in a retconned sense that Black Loyalists were doomed, for the British/Canadians were happy to abandon them in corners of Nova Scotia to starve and fend off racist whites, but yes the verse is bad and while I enjoy this country's anthem I do wish we'd formally codify it as the first part alone.

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bmoreboy410 t1_ixuq8x2 wrote

Its not even about whether it was true or not. But I think that you are wrong.

The final provocation was that men who escaped their bonds of slavery were welcome to join the British Corps of Colonial Marines in exchange for land after their service. As many as 4,000 people, mostly from Virginia and Maryland, escaped.

Whether manipulation or not, the British kept their word to Colonial Marines after the war, refusing the United States’ demand that they be returned and providing them land in Trinidad and Tobago to resettle with their families. Their descendants, called “Merikins,” still live there today.

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bmore t1_ixurgye wrote

I guess this is splitting hairs a bit too, fair. They definitely did a bit better on round 2 vs the 1770s resettlements I was referencing.

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