Slavery

[Bombadillo]

Originally posted by Insidious Rex
Yes massa!

There's a black friend of mine who says that all the time. A teacher (who is also black) recently took him aside in the hallway and yelled at him for it, accusing him of knowingly lowering himself and disrespecting his history. That's a dumb thing to think, IMO.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Bombadillo
There's a black friend of mine who says that all the time. A teacher (who is also black) recently took him aside in the hallway and yelled at him for it, accusing him of knowingly lowering himself and disrespecting his history. That's a dumb thing to think, IMO.

What was his attitude toward the teacher's comment? I think it's stupid - because so many people laugh at their own miserable history. Look at Mel Brook's History of the World Part I. He has in there a skit about the Spanish Inquisition and for the intro to Part II (which never was filmed) a scene about Hitler. Mel Brooks is Jewish as many people know.

[Rían]

Originally posted by Ruinel
RÃ*an, read this... it is really interesting.

Thanks, Your Elfliness I've read it, and think it is just further proof for my contention that there is no way that evolution explains the existence of morals - actually, let me modify that to: the existence of the type of morals that we observe - I'm discussing it over on the Offshoot thread with His Rexliness, if you want to follow it there

I've thought some more on the slavery issue, but it's too late to post any more tonight.

I'll add another angle to the discussion on the subject, tho, that I think is a good thing to consider - when a slave is freed, how should it be done? I don't mean legally, I mean should there be some type of training, for lack of a better word, to help him/her adjust to life as a non-slave? It seems like a lot of problems arose when slaves, who knew no other lifestyle, were suddenly set free then left on their own. Thoughts?

[Rían]

Originally posted by Ruinel
Another way to put it is...
1. If you didn't have a son, then the only conclusion would be that your hubby cleaned it up.

But I do have a son, m'dear, and that IS the truth - in fact, I have 2 sons and a daugher! So there!

I think you're just being a stinker on purpose here It's obvious that I'm right for the particular analogy that I gave - if the truth is that my son cleaned up, then even if I think my hubby did, the truth REMAINS that my son did. Now please be a nice elf and admit it, or I'll start to cry and I'll never give you my cell phone number, either!)

I respect your belief that there is no God and believe that you arrived at that belief sincerely and with a lot of thought.

Do you respect my belief that there IS a God and believe that I arrived at that belief sincerely and with a lot of thought?

[Insidious Rex]

Originally posted by RÃ*an
I'll add another angle to the discussion on the subject, tho, that I think is a good thing to consider - when a slave is freed, how should it be done? I don't mean legally, I mean should there be some type of training, for lack of a better word, to help him/her adjust to life as a non-slave?

40 acres and a mule!

[Rían]

That's a good start

But really, think of how much of being a good citizen in a free society is learning by example and learning by teaching. IOW, even if a particular slave is kind, honest, intelligent, etc., there are still SKILLS that he/she may not have had to develop, and if they're just thrown out into society with their freedom but with no help, the lack of skills may cause them to fail. Any other thoughts?

[Bombadillo]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
What was his attitude toward the teacher's comment? I think it's stupid - because so many people laugh at their own miserable history. Look at Mel Brook's History of the World Part I. He has in there a skit about the Spanish Inquisition and for the intro to Part II (which never was filmed) a scene about Hitler. Mel Brooks is Jewish as many people know.

He was civil about it, but laughed at her immediately upon her turning around. It was ridiculous how offended she was.

Mel Brooks is exactly the example that came to my mind, and what I told him.

[HOBBIT]

Originally posted by RÃ*an
That's a good start

But really, think of how much of being a good citizen in a free society is learning by example and learning by teaching. IOW, even if a particular slave is kind, honest, intelligent, etc., there are still SKILLS that he/she may not have had to develop, and if they're just thrown out into society with their freedom but with no help, the lack of skills may cause them to fail. Any other thoughts?

what exactly are you talking about.

What slaves, where?

Are we still talking about biblical slaves I think it is too late to free those.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Insidious Rex
40 acres and a mule!

Actually - the 40 acres and a mule never passed congress.

As for what should be done when someone is freed from slavery - talking about American slavery in the 1800's - they should have been given an education and brought into society. The problem is - even the people who were against slavery - still thought blacks were lower than whites. it wasn't until the 1960's that desegration happened and that blacks had full rights as US citizens. it took almost a hundred years from the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement.

After the Civil War there had been the suggestion to round up all blacks and ship them back to Africa too. Should that have happened?

[Rían]

Originally posted by HOBBIT
[B]what exactly are you talking about.

Oh, just another of my crazy thoughts ... no one understands me *sniff* ...

What slaves, where?

Are we still talking about biblical slaves I think it is too late to free those.

No, I wasn't talking about Biblical slaves - some people don't seem to like when I blab on about the Bible *sniff* *feels sorry for self* *feels sorry for others for having to try to slog thru her posts* *decides to throw a pity party for self*

Actually, JD seemed to get what I was trying to say, and proposed some good ideas. That's the kind of thing I meant. I was thinking of American slavery in particular, because that's what I know the most about. I'll post more of my thoughts later, when my party is over ...

[Ruinel]

Originally posted by Gwaimir Windgem
But through that indirect evidence and deductive reasoning, you totally discount millions, perhaps billions of people throughout the span of Christian history as nothing but shameless liars, including some whom you claim to count as friends. Is then the word of a friend nothing to you?

[sarcasm]Do I? Thanks for letting me know. [/sarcasm]

Actually, I have never said that. People make mistakes, they trust what they are told is truth, and usually without question. I do not call someone who is mistaken a liar. That would not be fair.

Originally posted by jerseydevil

As for what should be done when someone is freed from slavery - talking about American slavery in the 1800's - they should have been given an education and brought into society....

Agreed. The government and general population of free citizens did not make profit from the labor of slaves, and therefore should not been obligated to provide a monitary compensation to them. Since the owner of the slaves was acting in accordance with the laws that allow slavery, he/she didn't break any laws, and therefore is not legally obligated to compensate the slave.

However, when slaves were freed, the owner should have provided something to start them out with. And the government should have provided for their equal education, right from the start.

It took too long for African-Americans to obtain their equality in the world (I'm not just talking about the US). As I suspect the Jews who were freed from Egypt were not looked upon as equals where they traveled afterwards.

After the Civil War there had been the suggestion to round up all blacks and ship them back to Africa too. Should that have happened?

Only if they had wanted to go.

[Valandil]

A formal education was a rare thing even for a white person in the mid-1800's. Especially in the frontier areas.

[Guillaume le Maréchal]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
After the Civil War there had been the suggestion to round up all blacks and ship them back to Africa too. Should that have happened?

It did. Liberia.

--Dave

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Guillaume le Maréchal
It did. Liberia.

They weren't rounded up. There is a difference between the founding of Liberia and carting off all the freed slaves back to Africa.

[Guillaume le Maréchal]

Aye. I know what your saying. But that kind of thinking, voluntary (and there is evidence of coercion) or otherwise demonstrates very well the predominate attitudes of the time. Many may have thought that to own a human being was wrong, but at the same time they didn’t think these ex-slaves were Americans. Americans pride themselves on their social liberties and human rights, but it doesn’t hurt for us to reflect on the fact that these same social liberties and human rights were denied to whole classes of people not very long ago (only 40 or so years ago, in fact)... and in some cases they are still being denied to some people.

--Dave

[Rían]

It's late, and I'm tired, so I might not get my thoughts across well, but here's what I meant, HOBBIT -

I read something once along the lines of (roughly) "the trouble with being a slave is that when you've been forced by others to do things for so long, when you're finally free, you can lose the power to force yourself."

I saw this on a small scale when I went to college away from home. No one to force me to go to class! I ditched quite a bit The consequences were, of course, grades that were lower than I should have been earning.

Now I can just imagine that a person, born and bred as a slave, after years of equating hard work with absolutely no benefit for himself, suddenly freed - and having trouble finding work, and knowing how to plan and save and build, and even (for some) just wanting to not work at all. The consequences would be really tragic. I'm sure there were many freed slaves who just dove into work with the joy of being free, but there must have been many more who were just dulled by years of abuse - what happened to them?

I really don't know what should have been done. I would hope that some former slaveowners DID help out their former slaves, but I imagine not too many did.

I raise my kids to realize how effort is tied to success, and how it is noble to work hard and well (and then work hard at fun, after the work is done!), and how to save up their allowance for big purchases, and things like that. We just started an allowance for the two youngest, and we'll get them a special bank like we did for the oldest - 1 section for savings (10%), 1 section for charity/church (10%), and the rest for whatever they want to do (80%). I imagine just the money-management end of things would be hard for freed slaves, and I imagine many were taken in by con artists.

Just some thoughts I was thinking ... actually, somewhat of a similar situation in Iraq ...

[HOBBIT]

I know what you mean, just wanted to know what slaves you were talking about..........

You defenitely saw that in African-American slaves being released...

When they were slaves, they had food and shelter - but when released no one would hire them. They had no money, no education, little food, poor shelter.........

There was still that slave mentality. People didn't want to have anything to do with them.


I was just confused as to how this relates to biblical slavery, but oh well.

[Rían]

Originally posted by HOBBIT
I was just confused as to how this relates to biblical slavery, but oh well.

Oh, was this one only on Biblical slavery? I didn't think so, but maybe I'm mixing up my threads

Actually, I was trying to bring up a non-Biblical aspect of slavery on purpose, as some people have been unhappy about some of my posts recently.

But YOU still like me, don't you, Hobbit?

I'll try to behave myself.

For awhile

[Ruinel]

Originally posted by Valandil
A formal education was a rare thing even for a white person in the mid-1800's. Especially in the frontier areas.

Even in the cities, where a school house was present, African-Americans were not allowed to attend with the white children.

[Guillaume le Maréchal]

Originally posted by Lief Erikson
Monarchies are one form of slavery, for example.

As a monarchist, I can’t allow this to stand without comment.

Slavery and the monarchial system of governance (including the various systems of economics and jurisprudence connected to monarchy) are two distinct realities, and by mingling them together runs the risk of watering down the terminology, and unfairly condemning monarchy.

Slavery is involuntary servitude whereby one person is owned as chattel by another, in the same way a person would own an inanimate object. It is the complete subjection of one person to another. Slavery does not involve a contract between the person owning and the person owned, and does not necessitate the observance of civil or human rights beyond what is defined by the will of the owner in accordance with established civil laws. In other words, the slave was equivalent to a piece of land that is used according to the will of the landholder and in accordance with existing zoning laws. While the good of the land or the slave may benefit the owner, that “good� is determined by the owner, not the owned.

While a monarchy presupposes a hierarchy of governance, it does not by its nature claim ownership of subjects under the definition of slavery. Monarchy depends significantly upon mutual support and contract. For example, medieval vassalage was a contract, both in material aid, and familial loyalty and affection. Both material aid and loyalty/affection were reciprocated between subject and suzerain. Medieval history points out that no suzerain could consolidate power without this mutual support and reciprocation between himself and his subjects. Thus a viable monarchy must be limited by this reciprocation in the practice of affording privileges and advantages as defined, not by the monarch, but by existing social mores (civil rights to use modern terminology), and the monarchy could even be forced to afford these privileges and advantages, which was the case with Magna Carta. Medieval monarchy was not without its checks and balances. Thus, monarchy as a method of governance can not by any stretch of the imagination be considered in the same way as owning slaves.

Monarchy is a perfectly viable form of governance (and the manorial system a perfectly viable form of social and economic life), and has the potential, if properly applied to given social mores and economic factors, to be just as, if not more, humane than democracy (and self-interested capitalism).

--Dave