Slavery

[FlashDangerpants]

That's a long story.
Experience suggests you want to be fed in McNuggets and will reject anything else as overcomplicated.
So there's not much likelihood of this working out.

Oh, I'm sure, with your vast wisdom and mighty intellect (not to mention your infinite patience), you could find some way to educate a man with my obvious limitations.

Please, tell me why slavery is wrong.

It's wrong under the terms of normal moral reasoning as applied by all people I would ever consider moral peers. Which way you conduct that reasoning can be arranged in many ways. But any time that somebody says today that a good slave ought to perform his slavely duties to the very best of his ability, which is the sort of thing Socrates and Jesus might have said, we would reject that person as a moral peer. That includes you, me, cin and more or less anybody else, even though we do our stated moral reasoning very differently from each other.

The act of reasoning, in any domain, comes with a surface level of expressed statements arranged in organised form, which is the only bit that laymen ever think about... and an underlying set of motives and assumptions that define what makes sense in that context. Moral philosophy is difficult because it mostly happens in that second area which is murky to say the least.

I'll offer one example. One of the main purposes of morality is predictability. As social animals we want to know what reactions to expect of one another, it's very important to all that transacting that you enjoy so much, transacting becomes difficult if you don't know how the other guy is thinking and what he is thinking about doing. The scope of morality isn't just about murder rape and slavery, it meanders off into manners, codes and convention. In all of these areas, anything that is surprising automatically acquires the quality of wrongness at least for those of a conservative disposition.

I would like to point out in advance that I absolutely did not just make a claim that slavery is wrong because it is surprising. Anybody tempted to hit reply and make such an assertion is incapable of reading and will be treated as an imbecile.

[MikeNovack]

I would like to point out in advance that I absolutely did not just make a claim that slavery is wrong because it is surprising. Anybody tempted to hit reply and make such an assertion is incapable of reading and will be treated as an imbecile.

LOL. As one who has the same problem with material I post being taken entirely out of context, not sure how effective this warning will be. But I think it s more matter of "blindness" than being imbeciles.

BTW -- I am prepared to argue that "slavery" cannot (should not) be defined in terms of "property". Too easy to give examples where the relationship A owns B (B is a slave of A) is not a transferable right (A cannot sell/transfer ownership to any C). << I suggest the religious here read the Bible >>

[CIN2]

Usually bad could mean occasionally good , yes?

Yes. You could have a society in which the rich keep slaves and look after them well, while the free people who are poor are starving.

Also, what's the measure of bad? Just physical discomfort or deprivation? Some folks choose spare, harsh, living but would take a dim view of such living being forced on them.

Other things can be bad, e.g. grief and depression.

If you have physical discomfort forced on you, you have two unpleasantnesses at once: the unpleasantness of the discomfort, and the unpleasantness of having it forced on you. If you choose the physical discomfort yourself, you have one unpleasantness — the unpleasantness of the physical discomfort — and one pleasantness — the pleasantness of feeling free to make your own choices.

People usually seem to think that being free is good in itself. I don’t think that’s true, I think it’s just that for most humans, feeling free is pleasant, and feeling unfree is unpleasant. It’s not just humans that feel that, a lot of animals do too.

[Impenitent]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJktf4aTNvk

...I can walk down the street, there's no one there
Though the pavements are one huge crowd
I can drive down the road, my eyes don't see
Though my mind wants to cry out loud
I feel free...

-Imp

[CIN2]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJktf4aTNvk

...I can walk down the street, there's no one there
Though the pavements are one huge crowd
I can drive down the road, my eyes don't see
Though my mind wants to cry out loud
I feel free...

-Imp

Exactly (and BTW, excellent taste in music).

[Iwannaplato]

Please, tell me why slavery is wrong.

Because it diminishes and undermines the abilities, self-confidence, strength and intelligence of the slave-owners. They become dependent, just like any receiver of welfare, on the work of others. The moment they own a slave, they start atrophying and slide towards decadence at best.

[Gary Childress]

Please, tell me why slavery is wrong.

Because it diminishes and undermines the abilities, self-confidence, strength and intelligence of the slave-owners. They become dependent, just like any receiver of welfare, on the work of others. The moment they own a slave, they start atrophying and slide towards decadence at best.

Good point.

[Immanuel Can]

Please, tell me why slavery is wrong.

Because it diminishes and undermines the abilities, self-confidence, strength and intelligence of the slave-owners. They become dependent, just like any receiver of welfare, on the work of others. The moment they own a slave, they start atrophying and slide towards decadence at best.

Good point.

The case is a little hard to make, though.

For example, apparently one of the reasons black slaves were preferred in the early South of the States was because of their inherited resistance to malaria, which made them better able to survive exposure to swampy farming conditions. It's not apparent that such a slave-owner would be "atrophying" or "sliding to decadence" in avoiding labour that was likely to issue in his sickness and death. So you'd have to convince him that the detriments on his character of sending slaves into the field was worse than getting sick and dying himself. And I think you'd find that a hard sell. Given secularism, and given his interests in having a slave are very practical, and your objections are only moral (which, as a secularist, he has to believe are delusory anyway) why should he believe you?

I recognize the argument, though...where did you get it from? I think I just read a similar bit from somewhere. I even remember somebody trying to sell the view that being a slave made one wiser, more perceptive and more in-control than the master...as I recall, because the slave is supposed to understand both the conditions of freedom and of oppression, wereas the master is only supposed to know freedom -- a clever bit of sophistry, to be sure, but not a case that's likely to be believed, I think, and not one that will encourage any of us to seek to become slaves in pursuit of epistemic privilege of that sort.

[Iwannaplato]

Because it diminishes and undermines the abilities, self-confidence, strength and intelligence of the slave-owners. They become dependent, just like any receiver of welfare, on the work of others. The moment they own a slave, they start atrophying and slide towards decadence at best.

Good point.

The case is a little hard to make, though.

For example, apparently one of the reasons black slaves were preferred in the early South of the States was because of their inherited resistance to malaria, which made them better able to survive exposure to swampy farming conditions.

This assumes that those white people have to work in those specific conditions in that industry. That's not the case. They chose a specific way of making money that left them dependent on the suffering death and torture of other people, rather than as creative adults finding way to make money that did not require that. The self-hate and lack of self-confidence in such an assumption is already causing atrophy and again is a form of welfare where you are getting income off the back of others' labor. Again, atrophy and dependence, all the while claiming it is based on superiority when it is based, this specific choice of industry and solution, on inferiority in this resistance to malaria.

Further this is an example of the Fallacy of Single Causation: these slaves were doing all sorts of work that did not require malaria resistance while ALSO working the fields: Household Operations: This included cooking, cleaning, laundry, and tending fires. The "Big House" required constant maintenance. Personal Service: Enslaved people served as valets, lady’s maids, and nurses. They were responsible for the most intimate aspects of the enslavers' lives, including childcare and elder care. Skilled Trades: Many were highly trained artisans, working as blacksmiths, carpenters, bricklayers, coopers (barrel makers), and tailors. These skills were often "hired out" by owners to other businesses for profit.
Infrastructure: They built the South’s roads, bridges, and railroads, and worked as stevedores on docks and deckhands on riverboats.
Urban Labor: In cities like Charleston or New Orleans, enslaved people worked in factories, ironworks, and mills, or served as draymen (delivery drivers) and vendors. And they were on call 24 hours a day for ANYTHING the atrophying owners needed.

So you'd have to convince him that the detriments on his character of sending slaves into the field was worse than getting sick and dying himself.

The validity of an argument is never dependent on how well it convinces people steeping in ideology and tremendous suppressed fear.

And I think you'd find that a hard sell.

Ibid - a metaphorical ibid. And, of course, Christian theology was a very strong core of the abolitionist movement and, yeah, this didn't sway many slave owners, it took an army. That didn't make the Christian arguments invalid. Though this is not on the topic of my post. I could bring in my theism, but I somehow doubt this would have swayed the slave owners and not just because they are dead. Note: see how you framed my argument as if I was trying to convince dead people to change their minds? and implicitly contrasted my argument with religious arguments that were not effective either. I mean, your rhetorical garbage is just piling up. I can hardly keep track of it...the layers, the leaps and confusion.

I recognize the argument, though...where did you get it from?

See if you can find your assumption here, asserted without qualification.

I think I just read a similar bit from somewhere.

And this is the basis of your assumption.

I even remember somebody trying to sell the view that being a slave made one wiser, more perceptive and more in-control than the master...as I recall, because the slave is supposed to understand both the conditions of freedom and of oppression, wereas the master is only supposed to know freedom -- a clever bit of sophistry, to be sure, but not a case that's likely to be believed, I think, and not one that will encourage any of us to seek to become slaves in pursuit of epistemic privilege of that sort.

Wait. You associated your way to an argument I did not make as if it was relevant.
I've been away for a while, but you seem to be playing the same sophomoric games. I leave your fallacies, uncharitable reads, hijacking (oh, let's focus on whether one must believe in ICs version of God to make an argument, and associations to other interlocutors who tolerate this for some reason. On ignore.

[MikeNovack]

For example, apparently one of the reasons black slaves were preferred in the early South of the States was because of their inherited resistance to malaria, which made them better able to survive exposure to swampy farming conditions. It's not apparent that such a slave-owner would be "atrophying" or "sliding to decadence" in avoiding labour that was likely to issue in his sickness and death.

HOWEVER -- the special situation of the "Sea Island" slaves makes a good entry point to considering that we shouldn't really discuss "slavery:" as a single topic. Slavery was different in different times and places, and while the de juris situation of Sea Island slaves wasn't different, in practice it was different.

These particular slaves were bought WITH their already having background in tidal rice farming management and/or coastal fishing. It is why we have the Guleh speakers. They being left to their own devices about half the year (the farming ones) and all the time (the fishing ones). The boats were too small to have an overseer on board and the plantations too malaria mosquito infested for owners and overseers tom stay. To make this work, the owners had to trust their slaves. Mistreat them and figure the crop would be sabotaged (tidal gates mismanaged) or wife/kids loaded onto the boat and sail north. The easiest way (least costly to them) for owners to make their slaves feel less oppressed was to allow them their traditional African customs.

The Bible is another place to look at the range of things the term "slavery" covers. Some of those 613 commandments are about treatment od slaves. NOT simply "chattel".

[Immanuel Can]

Good point.

The case is a little hard to make, though.

For example, apparently one of the reasons black slaves were preferred in the early South of the States was because of their inherited resistance to malaria, which made them better able to survive exposure to swampy farming conditions.

This assumes that those white people have to work in those specific conditions in that industry. That's not the case. They chose a specific way of making money that left them dependent on the suffering death and torture of other people, rather than as creative adults finding way to make money that did not require that. The self-hate and lack of self-confidence in such an assumption is already causing atrophy and again is a form of welfare where you are getting income off the back of others' labor. Again, atrophy and dependence, all the while claiming it is based on superiority when it is based, this specific choice of industry and solution, on inferiority in this resistance to malaria.

See, here's the problem: you're presenting a moral argument. You're invoking terms like "self-hate," which you are asking us to assume is bad. You're using "lack of self-confidence," which not only is nothing you could know was driving their decision, but also would have to be known to be bad. You want us to think choosing "creative" paths is good. You want us to assume that people have a pre-existing right to their own labour, which is a good, and if they don't get it, it's bad...and of course you want us to agree with all that, because unless we do, your argument doesn't even make sense. So you're assuming a whole lot of moral polarities of goods and bads.

But secularists don't believe that morality is a real thing. In their view, it's just a feeling, or a social propensity or preference, with nothing objective behind it. So you can't argue that the slave owner is being debased, or his character is atrophying, because those are moral harms, not physical ones. And secularists believe only in the physical as real. The rest -- goodness, rightness, the soul, morality, along with badness, wrongness and evil -- is less real than candy floss.

You can't assume the immorality of slavery, either, if what you're trying to show is the immorality of slavery. That's called "assuming the conclusion," and it's a fallacy in argument.

So how do you argue, using only secular worldviews and no gratuitous assumptions, that slavery is wrong? You can't appeal to moral harms. Secularism doesn't have a category for those. And you can't ask your interlocutors to assume your conclusion for you. You need to prove it.

[Immanuel Can]

Slavery was different in different times and places...

It sure was. But most people don't know about slavery perpetrated against whites, or about the far more massive trans-Saharan slave trade, or about slavery in Asia.

But I was only pointing out one minor case, just to show that it's not easy sailing to prove it is wrong, from a secular perspective.

[MikeNovack]

But I was only pointing out one minor case, just to show that it's not easy sailing to prove it is wrong, from a secular perspective.

Really? How about asking a person to decide if slavery is right or wrong under the assumption that they do not know if they will be in the role of master or slave/

[Immanuel Can]

But I was only pointing out one minor case, just to show that it's not easy sailing to prove it is wrong, from a secular perspective.

Really? How about asking a person to decide if slavery is right or wrong under the assumption that they do not know if they will be in the role of master or slave/

The problem with that is that they do. We always know what role we're aiming at...and if we don't get it, we're surprised.

As for that strategy, the "veil of ignorance," it's not as if Rawl's heuristic will work in real life. It requires us to believe a whole bunch of things Rawls gives us no reason to believe.

One thing is the idea that equality is a virtue. Some of us might think it is, and some not; but how do we prove that equality, rather than, say, meritocracy, is the right moral solution? It's certainly not obvious that treating others as equals when they're not, in some respect, is the right thing to do. That would take some justification, surely. It's not just. But then, there's another problem: secularism has no explanation of morality, so how can we be bound to any standard -- whether equality or merit -- when no moral imperatives are objectively obligatory? And then there's the practical problem: people don't aim at equality, but at advantage. And that is as true for the "oppressed" as it is for the "oppressor," for the slave as for the master; but Rawls wants us to believe we should forego the advantage in favour of some merely abstract, heuristic procedure? That's another hard sell, for sure. And what if people are fine with the risk? What if they assume it's pretty likely they'll end up on the "master" side, given their situation, and don't worry about ending up on the "slave" side? Is risk-taking of that sort, instead of fearing the veil, a bad or immoral thing for them to do? Or is it simply courageous?

And there are more critiques of the veil, of course. But you can look those up as easily as listen to me tell you, and probably believe them better for that.

[Wizard22]

*Is slavery (the treatment and use of one's fellows as property) wrong?

*If so: why?

In Postmodernity, Western Civilization doesn't want private Citizens owning slaves, although it was commonplace for centuries and millenniums, because that over-empowers private citizenry to compete directly against the State or Church.

This was the basis of the Civil War in the United States, to deprive private citizenry of such social, cultural, and economic power. As Western Civilization continues to decline and decay, Slavery may once again rear itself, especially as Neo-Liberalism and the "World Liberal Order" loses cultural power.