Similarities between 1800s and 1976

One thing Butler does is that she makes 1976 as similar to the early 1800s as much as possible. She does this by having Dana have a white husband. Their marriage, being super progressive for 1976, is extremely strained by Kevin's white male patriarchal attitude as he asks Dana to type up his stories for him, a demeaning task, instead of letting her focus on her own work. Although this is not as intense as the institution of slavery, Kevin still feels entitled to have Dana do menial work for him because of her relation to him as a wife. Butler makes marriage seem like a slave-like institution that is exacerbated by Kevin's race.

Another thing that connects the two time periods is the reactions from both of Dana and Kevin's families. Dana's uncle was disappointed in Dana while Kevin's sister said she wouldn't allow Dana and Kevin to enter her house. These types of attitudes show how close-minded people were about interracial marriage in 1976 and how stigmatized love was between interracial couples. This stigma is similar to the type of things people thought during Rufus's time. This only brings the two time periods closer together as the progress that’s supposed to happen in 150 years from the early 1800s isn’t enough to completely dis-associate one era from another. This offers one explanation for how after a few months, Dana gets used to the antebellum south as there were similarities between the two lifestyles.

By showing the racism and patriarchy in both the 1800s and 1976, Butler was able to link the two eras by its similarities and show that there is still much more work to be done to further society from the antebellum era. 

Rufus's final evolution

When we first see Rufus, he was an innocent little boy who seemed to be goodhearted. He was friends with Alice and Nigel who he treated quite nicely despite the historical time period and he showed Dana respect and fondness. He even accepted Dana's correction of calling her a "black woman" instead of the n-word. Because of this, we feel that Rufus has the potential to become a good person and not be like his slave-owning father. Dana also thinks the same as she continuously takes care of Rufus and shows him affection as she thinks she could teach him tolerance.

But later in the book, we can see that Dana's efforts were mostly ineffective as Rufus turned into a copy his father. However, there is a key difference between him and his father and that is that he "loves" Alice, a black woman, which makes him seem more tolerant. But other than Alice, there is no other reason to think of him as more tolerant than his father as he also sells, beats, and rapes his slaves and breaks up slave families with an agenda. This only gets worse as he grows up and he becomes more and more like his father despite the occasional flashes of empathy and humanity with Dana and Alice.

The reason for Rufus's degradation is result of the power he was handed. As the son of a white slave owner and eventually an owner himself, he believes that it's his right to do whatever he wants with his slaves and as such, this corrupting influence changes him for the worst. It is worthy to note that Rufus does have feelings of regret for some of his actions, but instead of changing himself for the better, he keeps doing what he wants and makes other people change for him. A example of this is when he wants Alice. He makes Dana coerce Alice into having "consensual" sex with Rufus instead of him raping her. These backhanded attempts are Rufus's way of making himself feel better for his horrific actions.

In the end, because of the power given to white slave-owners during the Antebellum period, Rufus turns into a monster. I wonder how Kevin would turn out if he was given a bunch of slaves.