Family Research Phobia

I went to a literacy workshop. There were people from Literacy Volunteers of America from all over the eastern part of the US, Northeast and Southeast. Many black people said their students loved the series, "Roots," but didn't want to find out how much pain and torture their ancestors had gone through. Some were adopted and that made things even harder. But one guy who refused to do it until he got mad one day and did research just to shut her up and prove he was the grandchild of slaves, he found out he was the grandchild of a bet. No ancestors had been sold into slavery. They had been kidnapped and put on a ship, but it was just part of a bet that this guy could get people from Africa here despite the law without being caught. I'm not crazy about one member of my family tree. He was a Mercenary. He was hired to kill Native Americans in Canada. My relatives put that in the newspaper! Luckily, my last name isn't the same as his. He had no land and no money in France. Mercenaries were hired, so he came over. But the funny thing about the English, later on, they hired Celtic people to kill the French. So many Mercenaries went from being the hunters to the hunted. Personally, I don't think we can help what happened centuries before we were born. But some people still harbor hatred and putting it in the newspaper was stupid! Most of my ancestors were farmers, teachers, and people who worked on ships and in lumber camps. The first born was usually given to the Roman Catholic church, so I have many relatives who were Nuns and Priests. So yes, there are many problems that people can face when researching their family tree. Many people were oppressed and many were the oppressors. But most people were just average working people. Take care