The whole column is worth reading, but just to expand a little on this comment about why the racist right is in such a frenzy about the #TheOdyssey cast: "[Black people don't belong, because] The Odyssey is a pillar of “Western civilization,” which they consider to be white. SO MUCH work went into constructing this view of a "Western Civilization" stretching from the ancient Mediterranean (or even Mesopotamia) to the northern European/American present, much of it carried out in the nineteenth century as part of an explicit program of racial and imperial justification. And the contortions to make it "white" are equally illuminating. #Renaissance authors who looked to the ancient past were much more acutely attuned to the distinctions between southern Europe with its connections to the Mediterranean, and the northern areas outside of Rome. 🎁 link: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/07/odyssey-race/688058/?gift=2KhEOewKu103aR6RIOWuaqHRMEZxJM4PdCaSqDwGdkg&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share @histodons #WesternCivilization #imperialism