Skinned: The Commodification of Black Flesh in European and American History

This is a harrowing and powerful piece that demands a deep analysis on multiple levels — historical, psychological, moral, and sociocultural. It’s not just a recounting of a disturbing past — it’s a call to conscience. A mirror held up to Europe, and the Western world, asking: Do you know what was done in your name? In your image?

Let’s break it down.

🔸1. Opening Line as Confrontation

“Europeans, Did you know…”

The direct address (“Europeans”) isn’t just geographical — it’s cultural and psychological.
It calls out the privileged distance many have from the trauma their ancestors created or benefited from.
It forces an ownership of history — not as passive onlookers, but as part of a system that once saw Black bodies as raw material.

This opening is a moral summons.

🔸2. The Shock of Skin as Commodity

“Shoes, bags, even medical tools…”

The use of Black skin wasn’t metaphorical — it was literal.
Not only were Black people enslaved in life — their bodies were desecrated in death.
This signals a complete dehumanization: even death didn’t free them from being exploited.

This also highlights the psychopathy of racism: transforming atrocity into fashion, into utility, into casual practice.

🔸3. Doctor David Pilgrim and the Role of Truth-keepers

“Founder of a museum dedicated to the history of racism…”

Pilgrim is doing the sacred work of memory.
Institutions like his are resistance archives — preserving what dominant narratives refuse to teach.
By naming him, the piece anchors itself in documented truth, resisting the urge to sensationalize.

This section shows that memory is rebellion when history has been sanitized.

🔸4. The 1888 Doctor’s Pride

“Proudly walked the streets… softer, stronger, more durable…”

The horror isn’t just in the act — it’s in the pride.
His boastfulness is a glimpse into a culture where the most vile acts were not only tolerated — they were celebrated in professional circles.
He didn’t hide — because he didn’t have to. There was no shame, no social punishment.

This is a lesson: evil rarely hides when the world allows it to flourish.

🔸5. Medical Schools as Suppliers

“After dissections, the skin was collected and repurposed…”

Medical schools — institutions of learning — were complicit in desecration.
This wasn’t an underground market. It was systemic.
The fact that these bodies were used after dissection speaks to how Black life was reduced to biological utility — first for labor, then for experimentation, then for material.

There’s a direct connection between this and the history of gynecological experiments on Black women, like those by J. Marion Sims.

🔸6. Accessories and Instruments of Horror

“Cigarette pouches, medical instruments…”

These objects weren’t just tools — they were trophies.
Just like lynching photos were turned into postcards, these items were souvenirs of dominance.
It speaks to how white supremacy doesn’t just control — it celebrates and commodifies its control.

This crosses into the territory of ritualized dehumanization — cruelty institutionalized into culture.

🔸7. The Silence and Erasure

“Too horrific for textbooks, too disturbing for Hollywood…”

This line indicts the systems of historical omission.
The silence isn’t accidental — it’s protective.
What’s “too horrific” is often too inconvenient to a society that wants the privileges of the past without the responsibility of it.

This calls out the comfort culture — the refusal to deal with the blood in the soil and in the stories.

🔸8. The Closing Charge

“History isn’t just facts. It’s pain, power and truth…”

This final note is a moral anchor.
History is not neutral — it is charged, complex, and still present in our lives.
“Exposing it breaks the silence” — this is healing through unveiling, and a call to dismantle the comfort of forgetting.

🔥 Deeper Themes and Meaning:

🔹 Commodification of Blackness:

This isn’t just about slavery — it’s about the ongoing logic of Black commodification:

From plantations to prisons
From minstrel shows to TikTok
From body to labor to culture

It’s a legacy of exploitation that evolves but never ends — unless we confront it.

🔹 Psychological Legacy:

The intergenerational trauma from knowing that your ancestors were seen as raw material affects:

Self-worth
Trust in institutions
Relationship to history and citizenship

This piece doesn’t just recount pain — it explains why so many descendants still feel it.

🔹 Courage of Truth-telling:

Telling stories like these takes emotional stamina and cultural courage.
But every time it’s told, it chips away at the wall of denial.

✊🏾 Final Thought:

This is more than history.
It’s a testimony. A lament. A warning. A mirror.
It tells us: until we name every buried truth, we remain haunted by them.