Yeah, I could make the case for Austen drawing connections between the status of women and slaves in Antigua (because that's something that Mary Wollstonecraft and other early feminists did), albeit not explicitly, but I don't read it as being simply Fanny-as-slave. For one thing, if we accept that Sir Thomas is a slave owner and he returns from Antigua (during the period of slave rebellions), and immediately begins to elevate Fanny, then isn't he drawing a distinction between Fanny and his actual slaves? Unless he freed his slaves then what he's actually doing is making sure that no one mistakes a good Christian white woman for a slave, you know?

But yeah, I was surprised that people didn't seem at all offended. I gave her this face =|