*Four major wedding planning websites are curbing the promotion of slave plantation venues that white American women are booking for their weddings.
According to the BBC, Zola has removed all the listed plantations from its site, while Pinterest, the Knot Worldwide and Brides intend to limit plantation advertisements and remove all descriptors that romanticize the venues such as “charming” or “elegant,” the report states.
The changes come after civil rights group Color of Change called for a ban on the promotion of plantations.
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I think we should drop the words “antebellum” and “plantation” as they’re part of why slavery is romanticized and instead replace them with something like “American concentration camps” or “American slave labor camps.”https://t.co/6JFrWz54Nz
— Cora Harrington (@lingerie_addict) December 4, 2019
“The decision to glorify plantations as nostalgic sites of celebration is not a compassionate one for the black women and justice-minded people who use your site,” the organization wrote in a letter to Zola executives, according to BuzzFeed News.
“In fact, ‘classic,’ ‘elegant,’ and ‘glamorous,’ are just a few of the tags that your site uses to describe the places where many of your readers’ ancestors were tortured and stripped of their most fundamental rights,” Color of Change wrote.
Plantations are scattered across the American South and for many, they remain a dark and painful reminder of slavery and racism, for others, however, they have become a popular choice for weddings and vacation spots.
“Weddings should be a symbol of love and unity. Plantations represent none of those things,” noted a Pinterest spokesperson in an email to US media. “We are working to limit the distribution of this content and accounts across our platform, and continue to not accept advertisements for them.”
White folks have masked the horrific history of plantations with “idyllic southern charm,” allowing tourists to “struggle to reconcile the beauty around them with the brutality of slavery,” BBC writes.
“Slavery was not that bad – it’s probably the number one thing we hear,” says plantation tour guide Olivia Williams.
