The bright side of slavery

Discreet wrote:

extra medium wrote:
Discreet wrote:
A) could you cite your source on that 999,000 slaves out of 1 million being raped murdered etd

That was not an actual number. I was trying to illustrate to you that while there may indeed have been a very few slaves that were somehow supposedly better off, the vast majority were not.

And why should I cite anything?

I still haven't seen any of your cites for how slavery benefitted the slaves and their native nations.

Been waiting some time on that. You have some nerve asking for cites after you ignore request for same.

Ive listed a few cites earlier....They may have sucked one or two i found to be interesting though if your too lazy to search the thread heres a few

http://law.gsu.edu/federalist/Horowitz.htm

http://mondediplo.com/1998/04/02africa

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/01/0131_030203_jubilee2.html

http://www.eh.net/encyclopedia/?article=wahl.slavery.us

Nice. Now we are assuming I am lazy? Who is the hostile on here?

In any event, thanks for the links. I see that some of them do have some decent info on how slavery helped the US economy (temporarily), and how it might have enriched a few selected slave-traders in Africa.

But I see nothing regarding how slavery helped the average slave or the slave's family or the slave's African community as a whole.

***

By the way, getting back to how it has benefitted the US economy:
The Civil War did not benefit the US economy as a whole. Ghettoes don't do much for our economy. Slavery had a negative hangover which had a negative impact on our economy for years. Add it all up, and I doubt there was little if any net gain for the economy.

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A very salutory attitude for you to have Discreet . . .

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Discreet wrote:

NO its cool heres something you may want to dwell on I mentioned it in another thread. I am not claiming to be an intectual but i think questioning common beliefs is good. And it is not good to get too attached to an idea that you cannot be open about it and only argue because you are emotionally attached.

"An intellectual is someone whos mind watches itself" (Camus) .Meaning they are critical about what they are learning and skeptical avoiding developing too much emotional attachment to beliefs misleading them so that when something is discovered that goes against what they think they reject it and don't listen to the other side. They deliberate on their reasoning in order to discover flaws or errors which would undermine the facts of their beliefs.

I agree with totally in this.

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Yeah em i cant find something to back up that comment because i assumed life in africa was worse. Maybe i was racist in doing so. Ive been learning alot about rwanda recently so i just stereotyped that as life in Africa. Where people were being sold and even if they stayed in Africa there was genocide and one;s family members were being sold of to the US and other countries so maybe in a sense they wanted to go....lol i don't know

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Discreet wrote:

NO its cool heres something you may want to dwell on I mentioned it in another thread. I am not claiming to be an intectual but i think questioning common beliefs is good. And it is not good to get too attached to an idea that you cannot be open about it and only argue because you are emotionally attached.

"An intellectual is someone whos mind watches itself" (Camus) .Meaning they are critical about what they are learning and skeptical avoiding developing too much emotional attachment to beliefs misleading them so that when something is discovered that goes against what they think they reject it and don't listen to the other side. They deliberate on their reasoning in order to discover flaws or errors which would undermine the facts of their beliefs.

This is so weird.

Now you have me thinking..."I'll be darned, maybe slavery wasn't so bad after all...."
Just for a split second.

Then...NOT! Anyway, thanks for waking me up, that was better than espresso!

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haha well im supposed to do yard work for my dad this weekend one experience the life of a slave??? and tell me about it

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ill feed you....

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Discreet wrote:

Yeah em i cant find something to back up that comment because i assumed life in africa was worse. Maybe i was racist in doing so. Ive been learning alot about rwanda recently so i just stereotyped that as life in Africa. Where people were being sold and even if they stayed in Africa there was genocide and one;s family members were being sold of to the US and other countries so maybe in a sense they wanted to go....lol i don't know

Okay, now I can see your reasoning here.

I'm in Rwanda, going to get shot in the head, along with my family. I have a chance to be a slave in USA...hmmm...which should I do? Of course I'll be the slave if that is the choice.

***

I think one of the major differences here is that many of the countries the slave-traders worked with in the past, in the 18th & 19th centuries when it was big in USA, many of these countries were peaceful and nothing like what you see in Rwanda.

A lot of the situations were not unlike if someone just came to my or your family's house and just took all the people in a certain age range, say 12-30 or whatever, and left or killed the rest. These people were living peaceful, happy lives in Africa.

And yes there may have been a few Africans who were slave hunters and human hunters who would help the European slave-traders find slaves. But these were like the equivalent of some American crimminals going around scouting for Americans to sell as slaves. Just because a few Americans might be making big bucks and helping foreigners collect slaves in the USA, could someone say "well thats okay because the Americans are involved too, I guess they kind of want to be slaves"?

Because that is what you implied when you said some Africans helped find & sell slaves...

In any event, I do see some of your reasoning. If someone is sitting in Rwanda and is going to get shot this instant, s/he might be a bit better off becoming a slave....I'll grant you that.

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Discreet wrote:

ill feed you....

LOL.

Well, actually I think I might like some of that slavery stuff that was mentioned on another slavery related thread here, but I won't go there! Twisted Evil

Be warned, I'm a high-priced slave, alriggggghttt? Twisted Evil

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Thats what harriet tubman said.....lol bad joke i have weird sense of humor

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it's good to see that Discreet has seen the light, but next time he hears his teacher, or anyone else, claiming that white men died by the thousands to end slavery in the Civil War, so African-Americans should feel grateful toward white Americans, remind them that just as many white Confederate soldiers died trying to preserve slavery.

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Yeah but look at it in this way:

If the south had won and somehow we had slavery today this very forum might be the same but your statement might have been the exact opposite. You might have said that the north died trying to save frees in a bad sense. The only reason we have deemed slavery as bad is because we are taught to believe it. Make sure you understand what i mean and don;t take this to be saying slavery is good. I m just saying as easy as we say it is wrong the outcome of the war could have been different and are opinions could have been the exact opposite

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No, the outcome of the war could not have been different. The reasons for such a statement are detailed and complex, but one stands out among all others, and that is the disparity of men and resources between the North and the South. Throughout the war, until he appointed Grant to command the armies, Lincoln repeatedly said: "I need to find someone who understands the numbers."

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Discreet wrote:

The only reason we have deemed slavery as bad is because we are taught to believe it. Make sure you understand what i mean and don;t take this to be saying slavery is good.

you haven't said it's good, i'll grant you that. all you've said is, it's not bad. the only other possibilities are, it's good, or it's neither good nor bad. since you don't want to be taken as saying it's good, then you're saying it's neither good nor bad. if that isn't what you mean, you'll have to rephrase your first statement to say what you mean.

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Im just saying that the only reason we find slavery wrong is because soceity deems it to be wrong. It would have been just as easy to grow up in a racist enviroment and talk about the greatness of slavery.

Whether you think it is right or wrong IMO is just based on what society tells you what to think

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If that's your meta-point, I think it's an interesting one. Certainly there were non-slaves during slavery who thought slavery was fine and dandy.

It's definitely a good idea to step outside of things and think, "Am I thinking this because society tells me to or because it is empirically the right thing to think?"

The thing is to then start gathering your empirical evidence and see where it points you. Where does it point you in this one?

And not to cross threads, but where does it point you when it comes to the wrongness of homosexuality?

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Discreet wrote:

Im just saying that the only reason we find slavery wrong is because soceity deems it to be wrong. It would have been just as easy to grow up in a racist enviroment and talk about the greatness of slavery.

Whether you think it is right or wrong IMO is just based on what society tells you what to think

then it would be wrong in every culture that observes the golden rule--in western europe, for instance, it would violate Matthew 7:12,

Quote:

Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

the only way to rationalize slavery, on this basis, is to claim, as you have tried to claim, that either slavery is no worse than freedom, or instead to maintain that certain races of human beings are not truly human. the second claim is essentially the racist position. i'm not aware of too many people that make the first claim, besides you, Discreet, but if you have any sources, do us a favor and provide references.

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I don't have any resources i just came to this conclusion. Man is constantly changing its outlook on the world. All that matters is what you are taught you either agree with it or disagree with it based on the facts or information you have learned/been taught

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i'll ask for one more clarification, so i can have the "facts or information" as you put it to agree or disagree with your conclusion. are you talking about just slavery, or about every question of right & wrong, or something in between those extremes?

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Everything i talked a bit more about this in the A choice or a curse thread

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The bright side of slavery

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