WEBVTT - What Were Human Zoos? 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:03.400 Welcome to Stuff You should know, a production of My 0:00:03.600 --> 0:00:12.640 Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:15.880 I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles w Chuck Bryan over there, 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:20.280 and there's Jerry over there, and we have a special 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:26.400 visitor today, Chuck. Jerry's miso soup? Is that what that is? Yeah, 0:00:26.680 --> 0:00:29.640 you'd lie, Jerry, that is miso soup. I don't care 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:32.760 what Jerry says. It's miso soup. Chuck is getting up 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:35.960 to sniffet. One of his beard hairs is dropped into 0:00:36.040 --> 0:00:39.680 Jerry's soup. Jerry's miso soup. It smells like, aren't its 0:00:40.040 --> 0:00:42.440 it's I don't know what that is. Because miso soup 0:00:42.440 --> 0:00:45.159 smells good. I don't think that's me. So it is 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:50.920 generally cloudier now Josh is smelling. It smells like miso 0:00:51.000 --> 0:00:54.560 soup mixed with hospital corridor. If you were smelling, why 0:00:54.560 --> 0:00:57.040 did the soup ripple under your nose as if you 0:00:57.080 --> 0:01:02.960 were blowing out so gross? Did not see this intro coming? Chuck? 0:01:04.319 --> 0:01:09.479 Oh goodness, So you feel okayh yeah, okay, a little 0:01:09.520 --> 0:01:13.679 unwieldy lately. This's gonna be that's gonna be good. This 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:15.600 is a really interesting one that a lot of people 0:01:15.640 --> 0:01:17.680 I think don't know about. I didn't know much about this, 0:01:18.040 --> 0:01:20.880 and I think I came across an article just randomly somewhere, 0:01:20.880 --> 0:01:27.440 you know, human zoos. What is that? And I was like, oh, yeah, 0:01:27.480 --> 0:01:32.000 it's like if you went to an EPCOT exhibit where 0:01:32.040 --> 0:01:36.199 they were showing like, hey, this is what this interesting 0:01:36.880 --> 0:01:39.040 tribe is like in this part of the world. Okay, 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:43.319 so so far kind of epcotty. Let's say Scandinavians. That 0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:45.480 all depends on your approach, you know, as long as 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:49.040 it's not like, look at this weird tribe and it's like, 0:01:49.040 --> 0:01:51.840 look at this interesting thing, right, look at this weird 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:55.200 tribe and maybe like throw money and bananas at them 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:57.920 to get them to dance for you. Well, we didn't 0:01:57.920 --> 0:02:01.480 get to that part. It's like if EPCOT used humans 0:02:01.800 --> 0:02:07.600 instead of you know, statues, and they do use some 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.120 humans to an extent, you could actually kind of weirdly 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:13.959 trace a line between Epcots like around the world thing 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:17.960 and this I don't know what that is. So you 0:02:18.000 --> 0:02:21.840 know the big dome head Upcot, the geodesic domes. If 0:02:21.840 --> 0:02:24.880 you go behind that, there's a bunch of different countries. 0:02:26.200 --> 0:02:28.440 I went to Epcot when I was like twelve, Oh 0:02:28.480 --> 0:02:32.399 oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. There's maybe a dozen countries, maybe ten, 0:02:33.320 --> 0:02:36.760 and it's staffed with people dressed like people from those countries. Sure, 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:40.000 but they are from those countries, right, A lot of 0:02:40.040 --> 0:02:42.880 them are, if not all, that's the deal. Like, if 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:47.639 you're Sweden, you're Swedish, okay, and you're coming out like saying, hey, 0:02:47.680 --> 0:02:50.240 I'm from Sweden, how can I help you today? Have 0:02:50.280 --> 0:02:53.080 some food? Basically the whole points to go eat. But 0:02:53.240 --> 0:02:57.720 they're they're people kind of bringing their culture forth to 0:02:57.720 --> 0:03:03.200 to be um enjoyed and um and to captivate the 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:05.960 people who were at Epcot. Right, Yeah, there's there's a 0:03:06.040 --> 0:03:09.480 right way to do that. There is. The human zoos 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:12.400 were the exact wrong way to do this, and not 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:14.520 only was it the wrong way to do it, they 0:03:14.560 --> 0:03:18.640 were done for all the wrong reasons too. Yeah, I 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:22.040 mean I was I wasn't trying to defend this at 0:03:22.040 --> 0:03:24.600 all when I was researching it, but I did think 0:03:24.639 --> 0:03:29.440 about the time period and like a Westerner's inherent fascination 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:32.240 with other parts of the world, which at its base 0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:35.520 is like that's fine, It's okay to be fascinated with 0:03:35.560 --> 0:03:39.040 another part of the world totally, but not like you know, 0:03:39.240 --> 0:03:42.040 look at how weird that person is who is different 0:03:42.080 --> 0:03:45.600 than me. Let's make fun of them because they you know, 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:48.600 we'll call them more primitive than we are, right, or 0:03:48.960 --> 0:03:54.720 are inherently inferior to our race, which was another prevailing idea, 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:58.840 and the the whole the premise of this chuck started with, 0:03:58.960 --> 0:04:02.640 like you said, just pure curiosity. It was, you know, 0:04:02.720 --> 0:04:07.560 Europeans traveling around the world to new areas and we're 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:11.560 encountering people that they'd never encountered before. And there were 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:14.600 a there was a thread of people who were exploring 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:17.159 and like saying, hey, you want to come back to 0:04:17.400 --> 0:04:19.320 England with me, or to France with me, or to 0:04:19.400 --> 0:04:22.240 the Netherlands with me. Um, I can actually introduce you 0:04:22.279 --> 0:04:24.479 to the king and the person would hop along on 0:04:24.520 --> 0:04:26.320 board and they would go back and they would be 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:28.720 gawked at and and everything. But they were treated as 0:04:28.760 --> 0:04:31.960 an individual. They had an identity, they were a person 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:36.200 even though they were different and another they still had 0:04:36.240 --> 0:04:40.600 some sort of agency. That was step one that didn't 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:44.160 last very long. Well, no, because as we saw, there 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:46.600 was a fine line between you can go meet the 0:04:46.720 --> 0:04:50.520 king and you can be the King's pet basically, yes, yeah, yeah, 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:53.640 So step two was really supported by this whole thing 0:04:53.680 --> 0:04:57.960 that happened. And about the eighteen hundreds, the early early, 0:04:58.080 --> 0:05:00.640 the first half of the eighteen hundreds, I gather something 0:05:00.680 --> 0:05:05.600 called like biological anthropology, and it basically is that thing 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:08.960 that I said about the hierarchy of races, where one 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:12.760 race is superior to another that's inferior, and that you know, 0:05:13.040 --> 0:05:18.159 there's a spectrum of human beings and UM on the 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:22.080 one end, or white Europeans, which under this this idea, 0:05:22.160 --> 0:05:26.400 this auspice was the pinnacle of humanity, and on the 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:28.520 other end, it just kept going and going until you 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:34.000 basically reached um. Other primates like the apes and all 0:05:34.040 --> 0:05:36.720 other peoples of the world were on the spectrum either 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:40.680 closer to Apes, closer to to white Europeans, but but 0:05:40.760 --> 0:05:44.560 really nothing compared to white Europeans. And so there's this 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:47.960 idea that the people around the world were to be 0:05:48.320 --> 0:05:52.760 studied and analyzed and and um poked at and prodded 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:58.559 and measured in this to support this burgeoning science, right yeah, 0:05:58.600 --> 0:06:03.360 in the name of like study by scientists, supposedly, but 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:06.000 as far as the general public was concerned, something to 0:06:06.040 --> 0:06:09.039 do on the weekend. Well that was stage three. Yeah. 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:11.840 Stage three is when the public is finally brought in 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:14.400 fully and that's when the human zoos really come in. 0:06:14.760 --> 0:06:18.200 And that was the peak of colonialism. You remember our 0:06:18.320 --> 0:06:22.400 Druids episode. It's just dropped today. So do you remember 0:06:22.440 --> 0:06:24.599 we talked about how like Caesar and some of these 0:06:24.600 --> 0:06:28.960 other conquering Romans were like basically writing propaganda about the Druids. 0:06:29.160 --> 0:06:32.080 They committed human sacrifice and cannibalis and all that. So 0:06:32.120 --> 0:06:35.479 they need to be civilized by the Romans. This is 0:06:35.520 --> 0:06:38.479 the same exact thing, except it was you know, nineteenth 0:06:38.520 --> 0:06:42.080 and twentieth century Europeans who were showing their people back home. 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:46.200 Look at how uncivilized these people are. Um, we need 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:48.760 to civilize them. This is it's good that we are 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:52.359 colonizing the rest of the world. Yeah. And obviously, um, 0:06:52.720 --> 0:06:55.080 this happened in Europe, it happened in the United States 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:59.160 and North America. UM, in France and the eight hundreds 0:06:59.240 --> 0:07:02.040 late eighteen hundre it's there was a a place. It 0:07:02.080 --> 0:07:05.240 was an agricultural site. Um. And this was sort of 0:07:05.279 --> 0:07:10.000 like that Epcotty idea, which was basically like let's throw 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:14.120 something called the Paris Colonial exposition, and let's recreate these 0:07:14.520 --> 0:07:18.480 uh and indigenous villages from the colonies. That's always in 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:22.400 the background. You know. People can't forget that because it's 0:07:22.440 --> 0:07:27.120 not Epcot. It's like, these are places we have conquered basically, um, 0:07:27.160 --> 0:07:29.520 and see what life was like there. So they would 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:34.800 recreate this with human live human beings, um, not quite 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:38.360 human zoos at this point, but more like acting out 0:07:38.760 --> 0:07:42.200 like what they did, you know, wherever they were from, 0:07:42.240 --> 0:07:46.080 but also really playing it up to the point where 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:49.160 it was just totally artificial. Yeah. Well, yeah, that might 0:07:49.200 --> 0:07:52.400 speak more to just all art back then there was 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:55.520 a lot of subtlety and right performance. But if you're 0:07:55.560 --> 0:07:58.560 also if you're saying, look at how one civilized these are, 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:00.640 and then turning around to the people, be like really 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:03.480 kind of like play up the shouting thing. Yeah, of course. 0:08:03.680 --> 0:08:07.680 Well they wanted to sell tickets or at least drive people, 0:08:07.880 --> 0:08:10.080 you know, drive people's attention there. I don't know if 0:08:10.080 --> 0:08:13.360 they were selling tickets, yes, said this one specifically. I 0:08:13.400 --> 0:08:18.080 believe they were to the Paris colonial um. So the 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:20.520 other thing you have to remember is they weren't just 0:08:20.560 --> 0:08:22.800 sort of like, uh, it was sort of like they 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:25.760 were carneys, they weren't treated well, they had terrible living conditions. 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:29.240 They would get sick, they would get disease, they would 0:08:29.240 --> 0:08:31.880 be left in the cold, and if they died, they 0:08:31.880 --> 0:08:35.319 would be buried in a mass grave, whether unceremoniously. Yeah, 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:38.640 so that's another thing, Like because the humans zoos are 0:08:38.640 --> 0:08:42.040 horrific enough, just the idea that that they put on 0:08:42.120 --> 0:08:46.280 these things, and then even worse than that that people 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:48.959 came to see and like throw money in bananas at 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:53.160 people and like mock them in jeer at them. Um, 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:55.959 that's bad enough, But then the idea that these people 0:08:56.080 --> 0:08:59.080 lost their lives as a result of coming over to 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:02.640 Europe to put on these performances or whatever, and we're 0:09:02.679 --> 0:09:05.400 just buried in unmarked graves. That just takes it down 0:09:06.080 --> 0:09:09.960 just the darkest path there is, you know, like that 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:12.760 that you go to Belgium to to be in this 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:16.000 exhibition and end up buried in an unmarked grave. You 0:09:16.120 --> 0:09:18.480 lost your life because you went to a place you 0:09:18.520 --> 0:09:22.320 otherwise wouldn't have gone had Belgium not colonized Congo, you know, 0:09:22.440 --> 0:09:26.680 in in eighteen seventy six, right, Yeah, I mean Belgium. 0:09:26.800 --> 0:09:28.120 We can get into that a little bit what was 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:31.400 their exhibit called Congo Rama. Well that was the last 0:09:31.440 --> 0:09:33.800 one of all of them, but sure, yeah, I mean 0:09:33.840 --> 0:09:36.360 the first one they were just something. It was France Belgium. Uh, 0:09:37.240 --> 0:09:38.960 like I said, it was going on all over the 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:41.760 place and they had congo rama spelled with the K 0:09:42.040 --> 0:09:45.719 even well I think this's Belgian, is it? I think? 0:09:45.760 --> 0:09:51.400 So okay? Or maybe they're just trying to sell more tickets. Um, 0:09:51.440 --> 0:09:55.320 who knows. Uh. These were men, women and children once 0:09:55.360 --> 0:09:59.640 again put in these basically shows that show uh what 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:02.319 they're a ley life was like like these living exhibits 0:10:02.400 --> 0:10:07.319 where white Europeans would be behind defense. It was always important. 0:10:07.320 --> 0:10:11.440 There was always huge offense there to sort of trump 0:10:11.480 --> 0:10:16.080 up the idea that like beware of what you're close to, 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:19.480 not just that chuck. It also reinforces a sense of 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:23.920 separateness and otherness too. Oh yeah, you know what I mean, 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:26.679 Like there's no mingling. You weren't meeting the people, like 0:10:27.040 --> 0:10:29.080 where you just didn't walk up to somebody and like 0:10:29.200 --> 0:10:32.800 introduce yourself to the person who was putting on the performance. 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:36.200 There wasn't any co mingling. It was offense separated you 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:41.000 from them, and you were there to observe and watch them, 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:43.520 and they were there to perform for you. Yeah. And 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:48.640 this uh, jumping back to King Leopold the Second brought 0:10:48.679 --> 0:10:52.160 over two hundred and sixty seven Congolese men, women and 0:10:52.240 --> 0:10:55.360 children to Brussels. Uh. And this was not even for 0:10:55.480 --> 0:11:00.880 the Congo rama exhibit. This was for his own palace basically, yeah, 0:11:01.040 --> 0:11:03.880 saying like put them in canoes and lakes and put 0:11:03.920 --> 0:11:06.280 them over here in the fields, and I just want 0:11:06.360 --> 0:11:08.880 sort of like this stuff going on all over the place. Yeah. 0:11:09.000 --> 0:11:11.080 He made it like a diversion. So this is a 0:11:11.120 --> 0:11:13.600 big deal for the Congo. And King Leopold also was 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:17.960 just a straight up villain. If you are um fascinated 0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:20.000 by this kind of stuff and horrified by you should 0:11:20.000 --> 0:11:23.320 go check out behind the bastards. By our colleague Robert Evans, 0:11:24.160 --> 0:11:27.480 he's done some work on King Leopold the Second himself. 0:11:27.880 --> 0:11:34.280 But so Belgium gets the Congo during this this this 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:38.559 U conference in Berlin in the eighteen seventies where basically 0:11:38.720 --> 0:11:42.240 Europe divided up Africa and so this is our colony. 0:11:42.280 --> 0:11:44.160 That's your calling, that's you're calling me. And the Congo 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:47.040 went to Belgium and Belgium is like this little tiny 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:50.320 country and the Congo is something like sixty or eighty 0:11:50.360 --> 0:11:54.040 times the size of Belgium. But Belgium went there and 0:11:54.120 --> 0:11:59.200 just ran rough shot over the people who were living there, 0:11:59.480 --> 0:12:02.320 to expla void it um for its rubber and to 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:05.000 make money off of this this possession that it now had. 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:07.680 But part of this also was for the king to 0:12:07.760 --> 0:12:10.640 show these people belong to us. I'm gonna have some 0:12:10.720 --> 0:12:14.280 come live in this in their primitive ways on the 0:12:14.360 --> 0:12:18.240 royal grounds, and all Belgians are welcome to come see 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:21.920 our new possessions. And they did, like more than a 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:27.120 quarter of Belgian residents citizens came to see this, this 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:29.959 display the King put on. Yeah, and this was in 0:12:30.800 --> 0:12:34.280 seven but Belgium, like they had one of the last ones, 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:37.959 like you said, in nineteen at the World's Fair in Brussels. 0:12:38.040 --> 0:12:41.240 That was a Congolese village there and uh, I believe 0:12:41.240 --> 0:12:44.960 they had almost six hundred people. Um. They were paid 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:47.560 And a lot of people will point to that and say, 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:49.040 like they didn't have to be there, they could leave. 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.040 They were paid, But that's sort of I don't know, 0:12:52.120 --> 0:12:54.600 that's a bit of a whitewashing. I think so because 0:12:54.640 --> 0:12:56.600 a lot of them died as well because of the 0:12:56.720 --> 0:12:59.319 cold summer. And I think that's really important though to 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:01.880 bring up Chuck, Like if you read a lot of 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.200 a lot of stuff on this, like it's just like 0:13:05.600 --> 0:13:09.320 these people were victims and and nothing more, um, And 0:13:09.360 --> 0:13:11.800 there removes a lot of agency from a lot of 0:13:11.840 --> 0:13:15.600 the people who went there to make money, um, off 0:13:15.640 --> 0:13:18.600 of the the Westerners who were going to come gawk 0:13:18.640 --> 0:13:21.280 at them or whatever, and they went back home and 0:13:21.320 --> 0:13:25.200 they took their money with them. Um. There was there 0:13:25.200 --> 0:13:28.280 were people who were straight up like victims, who were 0:13:28.320 --> 0:13:32.360 straight up captives who were brought to you know, Europe 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:36.800 in America virtually against their will or or they were 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:41.200 um they were tricked or fooled into signing contracts whatever. 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:43.640 But there were a lot of people who came on 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:46.120 their own accord and did it because they wanted to, 0:13:46.280 --> 0:13:48.840 because they wanted to make money or whatever. And you 0:13:48.920 --> 0:13:51.600 have to like, the whole thing is more complex than that, 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:55.000 and you have to recognize that fact so that the 0:13:55.040 --> 0:13:58.480 people do have agency still the agency that they did have. 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:01.280 But at the same time, you can't point to and 0:14:01.360 --> 0:14:04.560 be like, see, that justifies everything the white Europeans did, 0:14:04.760 --> 0:14:08.240 because it really justifies basically nothing. Well yeah, and they 0:14:08.280 --> 0:14:10.880 talk about after nineteen fifty eight that was like kind 0:14:10.880 --> 0:14:14.040 of the last Um, well, we'll talk about some sort 0:14:14.040 --> 0:14:17.760 of modern versions of this, but like ecot no, no, 0:14:18.160 --> 0:14:21.160 we love our friends at Disney. We love our imagineer friends. 0:14:21.560 --> 0:14:25.240 You know what they're called. Yes, imagine you gotta earn 0:14:25.280 --> 0:14:28.640 that rank. I think it's a specific kind of job 0:14:28.720 --> 0:14:33.360 at Disney. Okay, I think, Um, I think you really 0:14:33.360 --> 0:14:34.960 know this, but you'd have to kill me if you 0:14:35.000 --> 0:14:40.120 really divulged. You've got the insider secrets. Um. So, yeah, 0:14:40.160 --> 0:14:41.920 this is one of the last ones. And they said 0:14:41.960 --> 0:14:45.920 that the advent of movies and motion pictures is what 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:48.800 really stopped it, because it's not like it's not like 0:14:48.800 --> 0:14:51.120 they said we just shouldn't do this anymore. They were 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:53.280 just like, well, now we're just gonna make degrading racist 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:56.160 films portraying these people, like ten years later and have 0:14:56.320 --> 0:14:59.800 and have a lot widespread, more widespread release. What was 0:14:59.800 --> 0:15:03.080 that first documentary called like Mondo Kane or something like that. 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:06.040 I've never known how to pronounce it, but it was 0:15:06.080 --> 0:15:08.160 like my sen I don't know, Yeah, that's right, that's 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:10.480 how it spelled. But it was like the predecessor to 0:15:10.520 --> 0:15:12.560 things like faces of death or whatever. And it was 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.600 just they just took their their camera and went around 0:15:15.640 --> 0:15:18.000 the world and looked at how savage and weird other 0:15:18.040 --> 0:15:21.720 people were who played up everything for the camera, just 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:24.120 focused on weird rituals and stuff like that. But it 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:26.479 was the exact same thing. It was a total extension 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:29.520 and outgrowth of human zeus. Yeah, and this was this 0:15:29.560 --> 0:15:34.720 isn't us saying weird. Just clear that up, I think so. 0:15:34.800 --> 0:15:37.400 But we just gotta be careful. You want to take 0:15:37.400 --> 0:15:39.640 a break, Yeah, man, let's take a break, and uh, 0:15:40.120 --> 0:15:42.040 you want to come back and talk about Oda binga 0:15:42.120 --> 0:16:07.320 after that? Yeah? All right, all right. So I feel 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:10.360 like we've kind of given like a good overview of 0:16:10.480 --> 0:16:14.880 human zuos, right like basically from the last quarter of 0:16:14.920 --> 0:16:18.240 the nineteenth century up to the middle of the twentieth century, 0:16:18.560 --> 0:16:21.320 they had their heyday and then just became more more 0:16:21.320 --> 0:16:25.160 and more tasteless to Westerners over time as it became 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:29.240 obvious like what was really going on. Um. But there's 0:16:29.360 --> 0:16:33.240 one guy who kind of like had the most tragic 0:16:33.320 --> 0:16:37.600 life I've ever encountered ever, and his name was Ode Banga. Yeah, 0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:41.360 who was the kid kept in a box. There's been 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:45.440 most experience for that experiment. It's like his father too, 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:48.080 wouldn't it. I don't. Oh, the skinner kids, I think 0:16:48.120 --> 0:16:51.040 so like these are the two people that come to 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:55.480 mind when I think of like worst human existence. This 0:16:55.520 --> 0:17:00.760 is depressing. So ode Banga was um. He was a 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:04.800 hundred three pounds. He was four ft eleven um. He 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:07.680 was this this when you referenced before the break about 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:09.920 people that were literally sort of captured and brought over, 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:13.480 he fits that bill for sure. Uh. He was brought 0:17:13.520 --> 0:17:15.880 over to the United States by a man named Samuel 0:17:15.960 --> 0:17:21.080 Verner from South Carolina, Proud game Cock. He was an 0:17:21.119 --> 0:17:25.760 African missionary and was commissioned by the St. Louis World's Fair, 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:30.640 which was what nineteen o four. So before that they said, hey, 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:33.440 why don't you go over there and bring us back 0:17:33.480 --> 0:17:37.119 a bunch of pigmies and and he's like, all right, 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:39.639 I know that we're using that word now and they 0:17:39.680 --> 0:17:43.560 probably won't in the future, but you shouldn't even like 0:17:43.600 --> 0:17:45.879 say that word anymore. I see it. I've seen it. 0:17:46.000 --> 0:17:48.880 I've seen both. Yeah, I've seen I've seen it used 0:17:48.960 --> 0:17:52.240 like it's just you know, like calling Native Americans Indians 0:17:52.320 --> 0:17:54.800 like some some Native Americans are like, it's well, we're 0:17:54.880 --> 0:17:57.720 used to I've seen the same thing with Pygmy's as well, 0:17:57.800 --> 0:18:01.440 although I've also seen it's extremely derogatory because it was 0:18:01.480 --> 0:18:04.440 also back in the nineteenth century used as a term 0:18:04.520 --> 0:18:09.280 for monkey. So like if you're calling uh an African 0:18:09.840 --> 0:18:14.280 um Congolese tribes person um pigmy, at the time, you 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:16.680 were calling him a monkey. So yeah, I could see 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:19.800 how that would be extremely derogatory too. Well, this is 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:22.040 certainly the language they used back then. And they told 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:23.919 him to go over there, and he was like great. 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:28.920 He got letters from the U. S Secretary of State, 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:33.680 the president of the American Anthropological Association, the governor of Missouri. 0:18:34.359 --> 0:18:39.000 That'll open some doors, and the Belgian Secretary of State. 0:18:39.800 --> 0:18:45.400 Uh great name Chevalier couvaliera Um because at the time 0:18:45.480 --> 0:18:48.439 Congo was still under the control of Belgium. And they 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:51.040 were like, yeah, go get go, round up some people 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:54.240 and let's bring him back for the World's Fair. And 0:18:54.400 --> 0:18:57.320 one of the gentlemen they brought back was ode Banka. Yeah, 0:18:57.359 --> 0:18:59.920 so I want to give a little more background Odebanka 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:02.159 because the fact that he was brought back to to 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:05.200 be in a human zoo is pretty it's bad enough, 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:08.520 like that's a that's a really dark chapter of anybody's life. 0:19:09.560 --> 0:19:13.080 Like everything about his life leading up to that point 0:19:13.359 --> 0:19:16.600 predicted that this was going to happen. Um When he 0:19:16.680 --> 0:19:19.920 was a little kid, he was born into a tribe 0:19:20.720 --> 0:19:27.200 Muti tribe in Congo in about three and one day 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:30.440 he went off on an elephant hunt and came back 0:19:30.520 --> 0:19:34.199 and his entire family and village had been slaughtered by 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:37.760 the Belgians. Because remember we said that the Belgians like 0:19:38.000 --> 0:19:42.760 came to Congo and just overran the place for rubber production. Well, 0:19:42.800 --> 0:19:46.560 the king held a private army called the Forced Publique, 0:19:47.040 --> 0:19:51.120 and they enforced rubber quotas. So if your village didn't meet, 0:19:51.280 --> 0:19:53.560 it's you know, rubber quotas for the day or the 0:19:53.600 --> 0:19:55.879 month or the week or whatever. The Force public might 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.800 come in and kill everyone, or they might hold like 0:19:58.840 --> 0:20:02.520 some public amputation to make an example of somebody Um, 0:20:02.760 --> 0:20:05.080 or do basically any horrible thing you can do to 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:07.879 another human being, all to keep people in line and 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:11.120 to keep the rubber flowing for the king's coffers. Right, 0:20:11.760 --> 0:20:14.360 this happened to Oda Banga's family. So he finds himself 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:17.920 Um a little hundred pound, like less than five ft 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:24.360 tall oda banga Um basically wandering the congo alone, and 0:20:24.640 --> 0:20:27.840 he was in short order captured by by slave traders 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:31.040 who enslaved him and sold him to a labor camp. Yeah. 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:33.520 His uh if you see pictures of him, he has 0:20:33.640 --> 0:20:37.560 these fangs for teeth. His teeth were fied filed down 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:43.800 per the you know Congolese um customs and traditions. So 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:47.040 at first I thought that the Americans did that, but 0:20:47.200 --> 0:20:49.080 he had already did that. But they they were like, 0:20:49.119 --> 0:20:52.240 oh yeah, this like plays into our narrative perfectly. It's 0:20:52.280 --> 0:20:55.120 gonna sell so many tickets. Yeah, so they they trot 0:20:55.160 --> 0:20:58.720 him out at the St. Louis World's Fair. Um. But 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:01.160 that's not where his story is because he went from 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:05.280 there to the Bronx Zoo in New York. Um on 0:21:05.400 --> 0:21:11.160 display in a literal cage with animals with with chimpanzees 0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:16.400 sometimes and orangutans, I think was his his most frequent companion. Yeah, 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:19.560 and it's really, I mean just devastating, like people would 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:23.080 pokem and prod him and throw bananas at um. And 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:25.520 the New York Times wrote about I mean, I think 0:21:25.520 --> 0:21:28.840 they're harold their headline was bushman shares a cage with 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:33.080 Bronx park apes. Um, and the New York Times was 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.480 just it's not like they were writing an article of outrage. 0:21:36.880 --> 0:21:39.199 They were saying, like, come check this out. They were 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:43.040 actually responding to the outrage. So very short order. Um, 0:21:43.240 --> 0:21:47.639 the Colored Minister's Convention is what it was called. Um, 0:21:47.720 --> 0:21:51.480 the some of the black ministers around New York got together. 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:56.439 We're like, dude, um, this has to end immediately. We like, 0:21:56.800 --> 0:21:59.720 there's a black guy in a zoo and he's being 0:22:00.200 --> 0:22:03.000 he's being held in a cage on public display with 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:05.640 a monkey. Yeah, and this is like forty something years 0:22:05.680 --> 0:22:08.439 after the end of slavery, right, So um, they banded 0:22:08.480 --> 0:22:13.040 together and mounted protests and and eventually, in pretty quick 0:22:13.119 --> 0:22:17.000 short order, got um Odobanga released to their their custody 0:22:17.000 --> 0:22:23.439 and care. Um. But the New York Times like published editorials, 0:22:23.480 --> 0:22:25.320 at least one of them saying like, what's all the 0:22:25.400 --> 0:22:28.320 hubbub about? Like the guys on the low end of 0:22:28.320 --> 0:22:31.560 the spectrum, you know, Um, as far as this hierarchy 0:22:31.640 --> 0:22:34.439 of races is concerned, so why wouldn't we put him 0:22:34.440 --> 0:22:36.760 in a cage and study him and observe him like 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.760 of course there's much to be learned, right, So that 0:22:39.840 --> 0:22:42.240 really kind of gets it at the heart of of 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:46.080 what was driving this at the time, public curiosity, colonization, 0:22:46.200 --> 0:22:50.600 but also that completely racist science that would eventually lead 0:22:50.600 --> 0:22:54.040 to eugenics, the eugenics movement in the West in the 0:22:54.160 --> 0:22:57.600 United States. Yeah, he was turned over to um one 0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:00.439 of the leaders of the Colored Baptist Minister's Conference, Reverend 0:23:00.480 --> 0:23:03.760 James Gordon. Uh, he was a superintendent of the Howard 0:23:03.800 --> 0:23:07.920 Colored Orphan Asylum in Brooklyn. And his quote is like 0:23:08.840 --> 0:23:11.440 one of the saddest things I've ever read, he said, 0:23:11.840 --> 0:23:14.040 And this was like, this is how he tried to 0:23:14.080 --> 0:23:17.080 explain that it was bad. He said, our race, we 0:23:17.160 --> 0:23:20.840 think is depressed enough without exhibiting one of us with 0:23:20.920 --> 0:23:23.320 the apes. We think we are worthy of being considered 0:23:23.359 --> 0:23:26.399 human beings with souls. Like the very fact that he 0:23:26.440 --> 0:23:31.480 had to point out that fundamental, like so obvious thing 0:23:31.640 --> 0:23:34.479 is just so sad, you know. I mean, he had 0:23:34.520 --> 0:23:37.280 to actually make a press statement saying, by the way, 0:23:37.640 --> 0:23:41.400 he's a human, like you understand that, right, And we've 0:23:41.400 --> 0:23:45.560 got enough problems here trying to gain agency in this country. Uh, 0:23:45.600 --> 0:23:47.840