this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2024
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To be clear: your interpretation of it is not being defended. People are arguing instead that you've interpreted it wrong -- i.e. that the 'hirelings and slaves' are the British soldiers, being likened to mercenaries (hirelings) and pointing out that they often served unwillingly after being press-ganged (slaves).
I have no skin in the game, but you seem to be taking others' statements in pretty bad faith.
it's cope, post hoc rationalization. the person who wrote the poem was a slave owner who believed black people to be an inferior race. it was a threat to black slaves not to flee or fight for the British side (i wonder why they would ever do that).
It was a poem about the bombardment of a fort at the subsequent repulsion of the British forces in the Battle of Baltimore in 1814. It was literally titled "Defence of Fort M'Henry" before it was used as the lyrics to the national anthem.
The context of the poem doesn't jibe with it being about African slaves.
We have lots of bullshit revisionist history that tries to whitewash racism, but this ain't it.