article_snippet.sent: Henry Louis Gates stands accused of scrubbing part of a segment in Henry Louis Gates PBS documentary series "Finding Your Roots" because the actor Ben Affleck put pressure on the actor Ben Affleck.
article_snippet.sent: Ben Affleck's concern was that the segment would have aired the actor Ben Affleck family's dirty laundry, which includes a slaveholding ancestor, Benjamin Cole.
article_snippet.sent: Ben Affleck said, in a statement posted on Facebook, that the actor Ben Affleck "didn't want any television show about his family to include a guy who owned slaves.
article_snippet.sent: What more could Ben Affleck do if Ben Affleck instinct is also to tackle issues closer to home: the legacy of slavery in Ben Affleck own family tree and how it is possible -- necessary -- to reject the racism passed through generations even today.
article_snippet.sent: In any case, why did Ben Affleck agree to do a television show if Ben Affleck was concerned about what might be discovered?
article_snippet.sent: Ben Affleck could have paid a genealogist to uncover Ben Affleck ancestry, if privacy was what Ben Affleck wanted.
article_snippet.sent: For Affleck's "Finding Your Roots" segment, Gates substituted a Revolutionary War ancestor instead of the slave-owning one.
article_snippet.sent: If Gates thought there was no need for the slavery segment because the slavery segment didn't make for good television, there would have been no need to consult with Lynton; Gates could have given Affleck what Gates wanted because Gates made the assessment of how strong Affleck's story was.
article_snippet.sent: Then the voice-over lowers the boom: "We wanted to see if We could learn how Ben's ancestor felt about (slavery).
highlights_snippet.sent: Ben Affleck and Henry Louis Gates scrubbed segment about Affleck's slave-owning ancestors from TV show .
  
highlights_snippet.sent: Ben Affleck and Henry Louis Gates says Ben Affleck and Henry Louis Gates two missed a chance to discuss racial issues that still fester in this country .