After a fire engulfed a mansion at Louisiana's Nottoway Plantation, one of the largest remaining pre-Civil War houses in the Deep South where scores of enslaved Africans labored, video footage of the combusted landmark lit the internet ablaze with mass jubilation and consternation over the weekend.
For some, it was a moment to celebrate what they saw as centuries-deferred vengeance for enslaved ancestors. There was no shortage of memes and humorous social media posts to ignite the celebrations: from video of the plantation’s burning mansion set to the R&B hit song “Let It Burn” by Usher to other footage with the volume of burning wood cranked all the way up to trigger a cozy autonomous sensory meridian response.
