Why America at 250 Still Cannot Face Slavery ⁠85%

By Reveal⁠78%

7/4/2026, 7:01:00 AM

BS Summary: This article contains 18 faulty reasoning types, including Framing Effect, Negativity Bias, and Halo Effect, with Biased Writer Voice as the most egregious example at 38.6% saturation with 81 hits. Analysis detected 684 faulty-reasoning hits from 210 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 77.3% and a BS Rank of ⁠85% (3,201 of 21,197 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 84.90% of the article peer group.

When Bryan Stevenson moved to Montgomery, Alabama, in the 1980s, the city—one of America’s most prominent slave trading spaces before the Civil War—had dozens of Confederate monuments and memorials, but nothing commemorating slavery. 
Subscribe to Mother Jones podcasts on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast app. 
Today, thanks to Stevenson’s efforts, the city looks much different. 
Over the last decade, the executive director of the nonprofit Equal Justice Initiative has transformed parts of Montgomery through markers acknowledging the legacy of slavery while building the Legacy Sites, a museum and memorials that commemorate the nation’s history of lynching, enslavement, and racial terror across the South. 
“We have to now fight to correct the historic record, to have an honest accounting of what happened to our parents and grandparents and their parents,” Stevenson says. 
“Because without an honest accounting, we will not make it to the next step.” 
This week on Reveal, host Al Letson travels to Montgomery to interview Stevenson as America marks its 250th anniversary. 
He talks about the importance of memorializing the nation’s darkest chapters as the Trump administration attempts to erase slavery from America’s museums and explains why he sees today’s narrative struggle for racial justice as a generational battle. 
Article reasoning-pattern comparisonThis article: 4.8%Reveal: 1.0%Mother Jones: 4.0%Confirmation Bias4.8%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 1.2%Mother Jones: 0.7%Anchoring Bias0.0%This article: 15.7%Reveal: 4.7%Mother Jones: 3.2%Availability Heuristic15.7%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.8%Representativeness Heuristic0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 1.7%Mother Jones: 0.8%Hindsight Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.5%Mother Jones: 1.1%Overconfidence Bias0.0%This article: 34.8%Reveal: 13.7%Mother Jones: 7.2%Framing Effect34.8%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 2.1%Mother Jones: 0.6%Loss Aversion0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.3%Mother Jones: 0.6%Status Quo Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Sunk Cost Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.2%Mother Jones: 1.6%Optimism Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 4.6%Mother Jones: 1.8%Pessimism Bias0.0%This article: 34.8%Reveal: 13.6%Mother Jones: 9.6%Negativity Bias34.8%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.8%Mother Jones: 0.8%Self-Serving Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 1.0%Fundamental Attribution Error0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.2%Actor-Observer Bias0.0%This article: 17.6%Reveal: 0.7%Mother Jones: 1.1%In-Group Bias17.6%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.5%Out-Group Homogeneity Bias0.0%This article: 27.6%Reveal: 2.7%Mother Jones: 1.6%Halo Effect27.6%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.7%Mother Jones: 0.4%Horn Effect0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.0%Dunning-Kruger Effect0.0%This article: 9.0%Reveal: 2.5%Mother Jones: 1.1%Recency Bias9.0%This article: 22.9%Reveal: 1.5%Mother Jones: 0.3%Primacy Effect22.9%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.0%Blind-Spot Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 1.9%Ad Hominem0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.6%Straw Man0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 2.6%Mother Jones: 3.6%Appeal to Authority0.0%This article: 6.7%Reveal: 1.0%Mother Jones: 1.4%False Dilemma6.7%This article: 17.6%Reveal: 2.2%Mother Jones: 1.7%Slippery Slope17.6%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Circular Reasoning0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 7.0%Mother Jones: 4.7%Hasty Generalization0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.8%Mother Jones: 0.2%Red Herring0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.3%Mother Jones: 0.5%Bandwagon0.0%This article: 17.6%Reveal: 11.2%Mother Jones: 6.5%Appeal to Emotion17.6%This article: 13.3%Reveal: 1.7%Mother Jones: 1.1%Begging the Question13.3%This article: 4.8%Reveal: 0.2%Mother Jones: 2.1%Post Hoc (False Cause)4.8%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Tu Quoque0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.3%Mother Jones: 0.6%Burden of Proof0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.3%Appeal to Nature0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.3%Composition/Division0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 3.9%Mother Jones: 2.3%Anecdotal0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%No True Scotsman0.0%This article: 22.9%Reveal: 1.8%Mother Jones: 1.5%Ambiguity (Equivocation)22.9%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.0%Gambler’s Fallacy0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Middle Ground0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Personal Incredulity0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.1%Special Pleading0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.3%Genetic Fallacy0.0%This article: 13.3%Reveal: 3.0%Mother Jones: 1.8%Unattributed Quote13.3%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 1.4%Mother Jones: 1.5%Quote-first Misdirection0.0%This article: 38.6%Reveal: 9.3%Mother Jones: 9.3%Biased Writer Voice38.6%This article: 17.6%Reveal: 5.3%Mother Jones: 1.8%Indoctrination17.6%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 4.7%Mother Jones: 4.6%Politically Left Leaning Bias0.0%This article: 0.0%Reveal: 0.0%Mother Jones: 0.3%Politically Right Leaning Bias0.0%This article: 6.2%Reveal: 10.9%Mother Jones: 0.7%Attempt to Sell a Product or S…6.2%

210 words analyzed.

Speakers

4speakers58%attributed speech88writer words
Voice mapSelect a segment to jump to its words
Writer's voice • 8 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 33 words • 100.0% coverageMother Jones • 13 words • 100.0% coverageWriter's voice • 10 words • 0.0% coverageEqual Justice Initiative • 48 words • 100.0% coverageBryan Stevenson • 28 words • 100.0% coverageBryan Stevenson • 14 words • 0.0% coverageAl Letson • 19 words • 0.0% coverageWriter's voice • 37 words • 100.0% coverage
100%flagged-word coverage
48 attributed words39% of attributed speech100% writer coverage
0%50.0%100.0%Biased Writer Voice+62.5 ptsWriter: 37.5%Equal Justice Initiative: 100.0%100.0%Indoctrination-42.0 ptsWriter: 42.0%Equal Justice Initiative: 0.0%0.0%

Attribution is sentence-level. Pattern percentages are calculated only from words assigned to that voice.

Loading…
Loading…
Loading…
Loading…

Analysis

Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.