It ' s official , racism was invented for government scamming . <| sep |> There ' s a bit more to it than that though . Very few owned slaves , yes , but they were almost all dependent on it . Think of the guys who made wagons to haul cotton to the markets , the workers on the ships bringing cotton to harbours , the sailors shipping cotton , the craftsmen making tools to pick cotton , and so on . Or replace cotton with sugar or tobacco . People can recognise that their entire way of life depends on slavery even before you put race into the equation . This is also not to mention the sectors of the population whose husbands , fathers , relatives owned slaves , as well as those who aspired to own slaves one day . Slaveowning was part of the Southern dream in antebellum days .