The bright side of slavery

Discreet wrote:

Again i am not saying slavery was right. I think in general America has brought some of the worst attrocities onto the world but i just want to see if i can argue the other side. Often times ill argue things for the sake of an argument....Yesterday i nearly got kicked out of history class for saying a similar thing "That we actually helped the indians." My argument was we brought them sanitation where as they pooped in the nearest hole and had no sanitary laws. Also now indians are rich of owning casinos. WHICH I KNOW IS A SMALL PERCENTAGE MOST INDIANS ARE ACTUALLY REALLY DEPRESSED AND YOU ALWAYS HEAR ABOUT INDIANS BEING ALCOHOLICS CAUSE HONESTLY I THINK THEY WERE TREATED WORSE THEN SLAVES

Oh. You're just a kid that likes to start ****. Okay.

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Ok fine, I'll give my pov...

The only way I can reconcile Discreet's views with my own is to look at it amorally (which is admittedly difficult).
Think of it in terms of a disease: the bubonic plague wiped out one third of europe's population. No one could ever make a case that the existence of the bubonic plague was directly helpful to the europeans.
However, since the remaining europeans now had disease resistance it gave them a huge advantage when colonizing new parts of the world (ie: their diseases could wipe out the native populations for them). In this sense the bubonic plague could be considered a "good thing" in the long run...

So in a purely amoral sense, the subjugation of a people and the resulting selection of healthier, stronger individuals could be beneficial to those that survived. But I don't think many people believe that slavery is an amoral act.

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As re: the links -- these are about the legal ramifications of paying reparations, not a balance sheet of whether slaves themselves were conferred any benefit by their coerced participation in American society. Two very different kettles of fish.

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Now just someone that likes to use the beautiful wonder of free speech. Why not question what they teach you in history books. I guess when dealing with these topics feelings and emotions are always at stake but try to look at it a lil differently. Would you agree that life in United States was better then Africa.

We ll start with the general sanitary conditions were better
In general slaves were fed more in the US then Africa
Africa has always been a country made up of tribes and if i may ask what is considered to be the only successful part of Africa? South Africa which has been colonized into an industrial state. There are still many problems but look how far they have come compared to Rwanda for example.
I will agree some of my theories are off base and i do not want to offend anyone i just enjoy people thinking both sides out instead of being taught "slavery was bad" and immediately accepting it. The freedom of speech gives me the ability to say what i posted lol but obviously from no on im gonna stay on the majority side of the fence

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Discreet wrote:

Again i am not saying slavery was right. I think in general America has brought some of the worst attrocities onto the world but i just want to see if i can argue the other side. Often times ill argue things for the sake of an argument....Yesterday i nearly got kicked out of history class for saying a similar thing "That we actually helped the indians." My argument was we brought them sanitation where as they pooped in the nearest hole and had no sanitary laws. Also now indians are rich of owning casinos. WHICH I KNOW IS A SMALL PERCENTAGE MOST INDIANS ARE ACTUALLY REALLY DEPRESSED AND YOU ALWAYS HEAR ABOUT INDIANS BEING ALCOHOLICS CAUSE HONESTLY I THINK THEY WERE TREATED WORSE THEN SLAVES

You should learn some things, kid. What sort of "sanitation" do you think white folks brought to the shores of this continent in the 17th century? Laughable, that is.

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I know. Don't you just love it when children think they know everything and want to school you?
Go back to your history book, kid. You sound like a fool.

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Yeap - and South Africa's industrialisation started centuries before the one's in the Netherlands or the UK.

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As for the holocaust which i think is terrible we watched a video last week made by the russians who don't edit it like american films that nearly brought me to tears. Dead, naked bodies, by the hundreds being bulldozed into pits, because there was just no where to put them. The video also showed nazi officials reactions to these camps and no one seemed to notice the evilnesss of it.Its easy for us but as the underlying plot of 1984 society can be manipulated by politics to beliieve whatever they are told to believe.

But yes i think you can say the holocaust benefited our world today. We know what power one human being can envoke on the world. We know how much you need to question what your government is doing and how it is important to have free press and not papers that are payed for by the government to spread propaganda. In that sense yes something was learned from the holocaust.

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eoe wrote:

I know. Don't you just love it when children think they know everything and want to school you?
Go back to your history book, kid. You sound like a fool.

Sanitation may be a bad use of words. When settlers came here there were social standards and laws. People were considered to be "civilized" how ever you wanna take that. Do you think that US would be as powerful as it was if Indians still ruled the land or if slavery had never occured. Im not saying the ends always justify the means, but a country has to go through hardships and things that when you look back on you say oh that was wrong, but because of these hardships we learned from them and are what we are today. Slavery was the main driving force of the United States economy and cheap labor allowed for farmers to grow vast amounts of "cash crops." That allowed the US to come onto the market and trade with other countries

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patiodog wrote:

Discreet wrote:
Again i am not saying slavery was right. I think in general America has brought some of the worst attrocities onto the world but i just want to see if i can argue the other side. Often times ill argue things for the sake of an argument....Yesterday i nearly got kicked out of history class for saying a similar thing "That we actually helped the indians." My argument was we brought them sanitation where as they pooped in the nearest hole and had no sanitary laws. Also now indians are rich of owning casinos. WHICH I KNOW IS A SMALL PERCENTAGE MOST INDIANS ARE ACTUALLY REALLY DEPRESSED AND YOU ALWAYS HEAR ABOUT INDIANS BEING ALCOHOLICS CAUSE HONESTLY I THINK THEY WERE TREATED WORSE THEN SLAVES

You should learn some things, kid. What sort of "sanitation" do you think white folks brought to the shores of this continent in the 17th century? Laughable, that is.

Discreet,
We brought them sanitation which is why most of them got sick and died when we got there, right? Rolling Eyes

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C'mon, dude...

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In general slaves were fed more in the US then Africa

Any evidence? I've seen dietary analysis of a couple of traditional African diets, and they stack up very well against what we eat today -- and for only a few hours' labor a week in a small social unit (e.g., a clan). And that's not even addressing the question of the energy budget of a plantation slave vs. their counterpart back home.

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the general sanitary conditions were better

Yeah, yu've said this. You've got no evidence for it. I've never seen any nice shiny toilets in the slave quarters or in the big house in visiting American plantations, and in some locations (around Charleston, SC, for instance) malaria was quite common. Course, master and family went away for mosquito season. The slaves didn't.

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Africa has always been a country made up of tribes and if i may ask what is considered to be the only successful part of Africa?

Africa's a continent, not a country. And "success" is an incredibly loaded word...

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I will agree some of my theories are off base and i do not want to offend anyone i just enjoy people thinking both sides out instead of being taught "slavery was bad" and immediately accepting it.

Hey, that's fine. But if you're not going to tust your history book, perhaps you should seek out some books that you can trust, instead of jus relying on your intuition and very limited experience. After all,

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Every intelligent thought has already been thought out by men of the passing ages all we can do is try to rethink them

...before you can rethink a thought, you have to know what the thought was.

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Discreet wrote:

Now just someone that likes to use the beautiful wonder of free speech. Why not question what they teach you in history books. I guess when dealing with these topics feelings and emotions are always at stake but try to look at it a lil differently.

I agree with you about the importance of free speech. This is why I strongly disagree with what you are saying -- and even think it is offensive-- but I have never questioned your right to say it here.

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Would you agree that life in United States was better then Africa.

I don't understand this question-- are you asking about now? Are you wanting to compare slaves here with slaves there (there were slaves there at the time but most people were free)? Are you comparing whites here with free people there? Please clarify?

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We ll start with the general sanitary conditions were better

I doubt it. Are you making this up or do you have a reason for saying this. Please tell me where you are getting your information.

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In general slaves were fed more in the US then Africa

Again, the vast majority of the people in Africa at the time were not in slavery. Even so... it seems like you are just making stuff up. What evidence do you have to back this up.

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Africa has always been a country made up of tribes and if i may ask what is considered to be the only successful part of Africa? South Africa which has been colonized into an industrial state.

This is one of the stupidest things you have said (and I reserve my right of free speech to say so).

Africa is a continent not a country. It is a very big continent. It is made up of many different countries. Most of them consider themselves "successful" and most of those I would agree with. They range from South Africa (which is its own country) to Egypt to Kenya in the East and Cameroon in the West. All of these are successful countries. They are also all very different.

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I will agree some of my theories are off base and i do not want to offend anyone i just enjoy people thinking both sides out instead of being taught "slavery was bad" and immediately accepting it. The freedom of speech gives me the ability to say what i posted lol but obviously from no on im gonna stay on the majority side of the fence

Let me explain a bit about free speech.

It is very good that you are questioning things. Asking questions is, of course, a very important part of being an educated thinking human being.

However, freedom and intelligence come with responsibility. You have very clearly not done your homework. Your ideas are based on things that are very easy to show are false. You can't just make things up to support your ideas. Why don't you do some research before you jump to these conclusions.

You should also understand that ideas hurt. I am a strong proponent of free speech, but I also understand that there is a danger.

That is why I will never stop you from saying anything... but I may be very angry when you say it. I will oppose what you are saying even while I defend your right to say it.

I can't stop you from saying that the Holocaust never happened. You can say that women deserve to be raped. You can say that Jews are demons or any of the awful things that have been said over the years.

I am just saying that if you want to be intelligent and responsible you will refrain from saying things that are clearly false and hurt others.

In this case, if you were willing to do a little work to learn a bit about what you are talking about you would understand why I am reacting to what you are saying this way.

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just read the infamous, not famous, diatribe, not article, by Horowitz. his ninth & tenth points are especially ludicrous:

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Nine What About The Debt Blacks Owe To America?

Horowitz actually expects African-Americans to show gratitude for the Euro-Americans and Englishmen that created an anti-slavery movement, completely ignoring slave revolts, runaway slaves, freed slaved turned abolitionists like Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman. since when are victims supposed to thank criminals for returning what was stolen from them? perhaps Englishmen deserve thanks for pulling out of the slave trade, but that doesn't absolve Euro-Americans one iota. and Union soldiers sacrificing their lives to free slaves is a canard: the first Civil War skirmish took place in April of 1861, and the Emancipation Proclamation, which incidentally didn't free slaves in the union state of Missouri, didn't go into effect until January of 1863. the Civil War was about keeping slavery out of western territories, and not about abolishing it in the south.

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Ten The Reparations Claim Is A Separatist Idea That Sets African-Americans Against The Nation That Gave Them Freedom

No, nobody gave African-Americans freedom; it was restored to them, grudgingly, about a century after they were supposedly emancipated. African-American fought for their rights at lunch counters, voting booths, and

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yit, I am trying to separate the Horowitz article from the claims that Discreet is making. They are quite different.

I disagree with the Horowitz piece too.

But I am quite sure that Horowitz would distance himself from the arguments that Discreet is making.

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yitwail wrote:

No, nobody gave African-Americans freedom; it was restored to them, grudgingly, about a century after they were supposedly emancipated. African-American fought for their rights at lunch counters, voting booths, and

Fought and died and were arrested and were lynched and were spit at and were harassed...oh the list of atrocities could just go on.

I gotta say I agree with you....giving someone something doesn't usually entail beating them almost to death before giving it to them.

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ebrown_p wrote:

yit, I am trying to separate the Horowitz article from the claims that Discreet is making. They are quite different.

I disagree with the Horowitz piece too.

Same with me.

Discreet, if you don't trust history books, try some primary sources, e.g. read some travel reports from the European 'conquerors' of Africa and learn about the situation there in 15th/16th/17th century.

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eb_p, agree with you, but the Horowitz piece may have *inspired* him, in which case i wanted to debunk it a bit.

and B D, thanks for finishing my thought; i clicked on the reply button too soon.

while i'm here, may as well add something about the treatment of native americans. not only did Euro-Americans steal all their land & slaughter the buffalo, they also passed out small-pox contaminated blankets & shot women & children in the back. white americans provided ethnic cleansing, not sanitation.

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Re: The bright side of slavery

Discreet wrote:

United States would have never been so successful if it wasnt for the cheap method of using slaves as workers was a reason why the US was able to grow into what it is today.

Slavery might have been cheap for the slaveholders. It certainly wasn't cheap for the slaves, and it was also a loss for the state governments who enforced the slavery laws. On net, I'm sure that slavery was expensive for the population as a whole. You seem to disagree, so how do you explain that it turned out impossible to recreate the conditions of slavery under freedom of contract?

Discreet wrote:

Slaves had a very hard lifestyle but it was no worse then if they had been left in Africa.

Then how do you explain the large 19th century outflow of black emigrants to Liberia?

Discreet wrote:

In today's world blacks have equal rights just like everyone else and if not for slavery there would not have been so many blacks with the privelllege and opportunities that they have in the US.

How is that an argument for slavery, as opposed to voluntary immigration from Africa for example?

Discreet wrote:

I also think that african americans take everything too personally. You cannot make any joke or comment without worrying someone might take it offensively.

I am impressed by your apparent ability to read the minds of 40 million African Americans simultaneously. While you're at it, which number am I thinking of right now?

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Nothing is given.

There are no rights.

Freedom is NOT a right. It is a result
... of fighting for it, claiming it, and enforcing it ... every day of our lives.

If you haven't WORKED to hold onto it and keep your freedom in the last few days, somebody somewhere has already crept in and taken a small bit of it from you. Sorry.

(The preceding has been a personal opinion sponsored by the Darwinists For Interdependent Consumption and Leverage).

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This is nothing but a tired retread of an argument made by many wacko conservatives including Rush Limbaugh.

Discreet,
If you had any critical thinking skills it might be worth pointing out your errors in logic. But the mere fact that you make claims and then feel you can ignore the questions about the most basic assumptions you made to create this logical falacy tells me I might as well piss into the wind as argue with you.

Let me try though.. See if you can answer these questions.

Define "wealth" then tell us why it only means money as you used it.

Provide any evidence that more than 50% of Africans were slaves in the 1600s and 1700s since that is what you appear to claim.

Tell us how an African playing US Basketball proves that slavery was better than those left in Africa. Doesn't it prove the exact OPPOSITE? That those left in Africa have the same opportunity as those that are descendants of slaves in the US. Mutombo was born in Congo.

Explain why almost all other European Countries had outlawed slavery before the US civil war and why it affects your argument that no other country would have civil rights because they didn't go to war to get rid of slavery.

Explain how it can be "critical thinking" to question history books but you have no facts to back up what you are questioning.

We'll start there. Let me know if you need help with the answers. Its obvious no one has taught you much so far.

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The bright side of slavery

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