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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 1, 2024

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I’m oversimplifying immensely- refugees from the collapsing French new world empire were settled in then-Spanish Louisiana west of New Orleans to boost the white population.

Hoooo buddy. I definitely know an Acadian who would absolutely see red upon reading such an immense oversimplification. I would contend that the matter is somewhat subtle about the term "refugee", which often has a connotation of, "Well, some war or some shit was just happening, and it obviously sucked for people in the area, so they willingly chose the better of bad options to pick up and relocate," whereas the reality was that they were forcibly round up and deported. One can even have sympathies for the reasons why the deporters would do the deporting (or could even make a reasonable argument that whatever portion of the deported population shares in the blame for causing such reasons to exist), but my understanding is that the majority of them were collected by decree or chased down by men with guns, put onto ships at gunpoint, and then dumped in lands far away. It is not clear to me to what extent they were allowed much choice, once on the boat, as to which dump off spot they were dumped at.

The Acadians were ethnically cleansed(as were the white Haitians, which many Cajuns also trace descent to) but those who settled in Louisiana were mostly those who escaped whatever dumping ground they reached and made it too Louisiana voluntarily.

TIL that they didn't actually deport any Acadians directly to Louisiana. Thanks!