Slavery Good?

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
181

[quote]Elkhntr1 wrote:
Pretzel, you are an ignorant racist ass.

Rainjack, highly disappointing! Not that you care what I think, but more and more you are showing your true colors.

You smack of a politically correct racist who attempts to rationalize a totally sickening and barbaric period in the history of America. [/quote]

No elk. You are missing my position completely. It happened. It was horrible. I have never said otherwise. To treat any human being as nothing more than livestock is reprehensible. Because I have not framed my arguments around these obvious truths does not make me a revisionist. I am a realist in the matter.

It happened. It wasn’t just a part of American History. Most of of Imperialist Europe was doing the exact same thing. As were the Africans. Yo hold my head and apologize for something I didn’t even have a hand is revisionist. To try and change what happened 250 years after the fact is indeed revisionist.

What colors do you see truly showing?

[quote]It doesn’t matter if there were black slave traders! That doesn’t wash away the culpability of the thousands of white Americans who took part in what is purely EVIL behavior.

You sound like the “woe is me” white American who thinks “what happened to those blacks wasn’t that bad!.. what the hell are they crying about?” “Why their rap stars and basketball players now… damn cry babies”! [/quote]

Re-read my posts. Pull out one thing that suggests that I ever espoused the view that “what happened to those blacks wasn’t that bad”. I don’t think you will be able to because I never said that. But nice try. I would just ask that if you want to argue - let’s argue about what I did say, and not what you have made up.

Not being a revisionist makes you want to vomit? Not being PC causes nausea?

Stating the truth about what happened, and not getting caught up in changing history so that no one is offended except for the WASP’s is what I am doing. If you have a problem with that, please tell me why if you can do it without expelling your Grow shake.

182

Rain, thanks for the clarification. I think, I see somewhat where you are coming from. Agreed it wasn’t just white America taking part in this. I am no expert on the topic, but I would say white European man (as well as some Asian races) has been one of the most brutal, greedy, conquering, races on the planet.

I come from Spanish and German descent on my dads side of the family and I feel the Spaniards were horribly brutal and ruthless when it came to their treatment of the native peoples of the new world.

Is that just ambition and if you are the strongest it is your duty to go and domesticate the weaker races to be used as cattle and livestock?

You oppose revisionists right? But, wouldn’t you agree that the treatment of Black Americans brought here in bondage has resulted in the poverty and decay that is so obvious today.

To use an analogy take two kids who start out bodybuilding at the same time. One has access to a five star gym with all of the finest equipment. He has access to the best nutritional supplements and quality food that money can buy. He also has access to the best bodybuilding educational resources in the field.

The other kid has one easy curl bar with a few ten pound plates almost nonexistent nutrition and food and no bodybuilding education resources at all.

Who is going to make the best progress by the time they are twenty five yrs. old? Easy to figure that one out huh?

That is how I compare the majority of white America to black America. Does that comparison hold true down to every last individual? No! But, it holds true to enough of each population for it to have credence.

The black population in America by virtue of it’s skin color alone has been subjected to inadequacies that unless you have lived through them are incomprehensible!

I am not one who believes “this group of people has been treated badly, so lets give them reparations” But, by the same token to pretend this experience has not affected this group of people deeply, traumatically, and negatively, is ignorance.

If you truly care about your fellow man and follow the principles that Jesus set forth in the Bible you would agree that steps can be taken not too further cripple a people (unrealistic welfare programs) but rather to help empower a people to rise to a level of success and prosperity that everyone should experience.

Is there a solution to this situation? I don’t know, but I would like to think so.

183

e-hater wrote:

"Pretzel, you are an ignorant racist ass.

Rainjack, highly disappointing! Not that you care what I think, but more and more you are showing your true colors.

You smack of a politically correct racist who attempts to rationalize a totally sickening and barbaric period in the history of America.

It doesn’t matter if there were black slave traders! That doesn’t wash away the culpability of the thousands of white Americans who took part in what is purely EVIL behavior.

You sound like the “woe is me” white American who thinks “what happened to those blacks wasn’t that bad!.. what the hell are they crying about?” “Why their rap stars and basketball players now… damn cry babies”!

I read about half of this read and saw that the majority of posters are able to see this topic for what it is but their are a few that made me want to vomit."

The majority of this post was completely unjustified. Why don’t you actually read what Rain wrote. Don’t infer/guess/extrapolate.

Anyone else think e-hater owes Rain an apology?

News flash: Slavery IS a human problem. It always has been.

Example: slavery in the United States. Let’s follow along here. African tribes capture, drag, and deliver captives to the slavers on the coast. Transportation to North America for the purpose of slavery.

Translation: Everyone involved is guilty. White and Black. What kind of jackass argues that it’s a mostly “white” problem?

Let’s walk through this. Slavery practiced in Africa before the White Man arrived. Anyone care to argue this?

Europeans arrive and open a market for exporting slavery.

Africans feed that market.

You tell me, how can anyone be more/less guilty?

Would there have been slavery in Africa (hell, there still is in 2005!!!) without the White man?

Yes.

Did the White man make the problem worse?

Yes.

I think it would be wise to remember the 600,000 men who gave their lives (White and Black) to eradicate this scourge from our country.

Oh, nothing about slavery is remotely good or helpful.

JeffR

184

Way off. Arabs were the first to use it for artillery, from everything I have read. They used ceramic grenades in 1168 AD, rockets were used against the french in the seventh crusade, by 1291 AD rockets, trebuchets firing gunpowders projectiles, and arrows with attached charges were used heavily. By the early 1300s, the Arab world had already developed artillery, and it’s believed it was introduced to the christian world via spain. This was not european technology, and europe did not have superior artillery, with the exception of about a decade after the introduction of cheap iron artillery.

I think you need to look at the timeline again. Europe’s “superior metallurgy” seems to come in the 19th century, with the advent of steel in 1856. If you’ve been paying attention, it is about this time that europe finally became superior on land, with the use of breech-loading rifles, the development of clip-fed firearms, and the invention of the machinegun, not to mention light horse-drawn artillery and large professional armies.

Why were the 1800s so good for europe, and not everyone else? Because of the trade dominance the ability to travel at sea brought. They advanced naval fleets were owned by private companies, but doubled as war ships until the 19th century (I think, could have been late 18th, but I doubt it). This allowed europe to establish and protect trade routes, and raid foreign vessels (state-backed piracy was the norm). It is through these trade routes that europe got much of its foreign technology, and generated enough wealth to eventually develop its own technology.

There is a reason why, before europe’s navies, the Arabs had the most advanced technology in many spheres (they controlled the trade routes).

185

[quote]rainjack wrote:
The Europeans had it and used it before the Africans did. They had it and used it ON the Africans - from their superior Naval vessels.[/quote]

No, they didn’t. Why do you guys keep forgetting that egypt is part of africa?

186

[quote]Elkhntr1 wrote:
Rain, thanks for the clarification. I think, I see somewhat where you are coming from. Agreed it wasn’t just white America taking part in this. I am no expert on the topic, but I would say white European man (as well as some Asian races) has been one of the most brutal, greedy, conquering, races on the planet.

I come from Spanish and German descent on my dads side of the family and I feel the Spaniards were horribly brutal and ruthless when it came to their treatment of the native peoples of the new world.

Is that just ambition and if you are the strongest it is your duty to go and domesticate the weaker races to be used as cattle and livestock?

You oppose revisionists right? But, wouldn’t you agree that the treatment of Black Americans brought here in bondage has resulted in the poverty and decay that is so obvious today.

To use an analogy take two kids who start out bodybuilding at the same time. One has access to a five star gym with all of the finest equipment. He has access to the best nutritional supplements and quality food that money can buy. He also has access to the best bodybuilding educational resources in the field.

The other kid has one easy curl bar with a few ten pound plates almost nonexistent nutrition and food and no bodybuilding education resources at all.

Who is going to make the best progress by the time they are twenty five yrs. old? Easy to figure that one out huh?

That is how I compare the majority of white America to black America. Does that comparison hold true down to every last individual? No! But, it holds true to enough of each population for it to have credence.

The black population in America by virtue of it’s skin color alone has been subjected to inadequacies that unless you have lived through them are incomprehensible!

I am not one who believes “this group of people has been treated badly, so lets give them reparations” But, by the same token to pretend this experience has not affected this group of people deeply, traumatically, and negatively, is ignorance.

If you truly care about your fellow man and follow the principles that Jesus set forth in the Bible you would agree that steps can be taken not too further cripple a people (unrealistic welfare programs) but rather to help empower a people to rise to a level of success and prosperity that everyone should experience.

Is there a solution to this situation? I don’t know, but I would like to think so.

[/quote]

Good post.

187

[quote]Aleksandr wrote:
rainjack wrote:
The Europeans had it and used it before the Africans did. They had it and used it ON the Africans - from their superior Naval vessels.

No, they didn’t. Why do you guys keep forgetting that egypt is part of africa?[/quote]

It is part of Africa - I don’t think anyone is denying that, or forgetting. BUT - It is not the part of Africa that is central to the discussion. Had North Africa allied with the coastal areas that exported their own natives into slavery, and come to their defense, then maybe Egypt would be part of the discussion. But they were too busy building their own sphere of influence throughout the middle east, and not really concerned with their fellow Afrikaners.

I think you are grasping at straws to prove an untenable argument. At least that is how it appears to me.

188

[quote]rainjack wrote:
Aleksandr wrote:
rainjack wrote:
The Europeans had it and used it before the Africans did. They had it and used it ON the Africans - from their superior Naval vessels.

No, they didn’t. Why do you guys keep forgetting that egypt is part of africa?

It is part of Africa - I don’t think anyone is denying that, or forgetting. BUT - It is not the part of Africa that is central to the discussion. Had North Africa allied with the coastal areas that exported their own natives into slavery, and come to their defense, then maybe Egypt would be part of the discussion. But they were too busy building their own sphere of influence throughout the middle east, and not really concerned with their fellow Afrikaners.

I think you are grasping at straws to prove an untenable argument. At least that is how it appears to me.
[/quote]

First, I don’t think many tribes were selling “their own natives”, it seems to me it was mostly enemy tribes.

Secondly, the discussion has shifted, based on my assertion that Europe was not superior on land, to whether I am correct or not. My pointing out how egyptian technology was ahead of european is central to that argument.

Thirdly, the slave trade had very little to do with the ability of europeans to win in a war, it was more an assertion of economic power, and an exploitation of pre-existing rivalries to benefit europe. At least that’s my take on it.

And I don’t think “Afrikaner” means what you think it means.

189

[quote]Elkhntr1 wrote:
I come from Spanish and German descent on my dads side of the family and I feel the Spaniards were horribly brutal and ruthless when it came to their treatment of the native peoples of the new world. [/quote]

I think that the Spanish ‘conversion’ of South and Central America has proven to be even more brutal and ruthless than the entirity of the world slave trade. Entire cultures were completely wiped off the face of the earth in the name of ‘God’.

That is not what I said. I think that we as a human race - for the most part - have evloved past the point where we must subjegate peoples, and take away their humanity.

But it is a part of our history. There is no reversing the events that occur during the course of our evolution.

I’m going to be crucified for my answer, but WTF - I’m going to answer it honestly. I think that the mistreatment of black americans that has caused so much poverty, and decay as you put it, is a direct result of emancipation without preparation. Talk about no exit strategy - the emancipation of a couple of million (my estimates - I have no idea what the real number is) slaves without any fore thought as to how to handle the the new influx of a suddenly freed people was criminal.

Don’t misunderstand this as a support of slavery, I think that slavery was criminal in its own right. But the resentment and hatred towards blacks - especially in the Rural South - is a result of emancipation without preparation.

The second most offensive thing that has happened to propegate black powerlessness was the Great Society of 1967. But that is another debate for another time.

[quote]If you truly care about your fellow man and follow the principles that Jesus set forth in the Bible you would agree that steps can be taken not too further cripple a people (unrealistic welfare programs) but rather to help empower a people to rise to a level of success and prosperity that everyone should experience.

Is there a solution to this situation? I don’t know, but I would like to think so.
[/quote]

I really doubt that there is anyone with a properly functioning brainstem that could disagree with this.

However - and this is my colors showing through again (I’d really like someone to tell what those colors are - I don’t want to clash with my shirts)- I don’t think that wagging the finger of blame in the face of Southern white males accomplishes anything.

Everyone alive today knows that slavery, and the subsequent mistreatment of black America, was wrong. Where to go from here is anyone’s guess.

190

[quote]Aleksandr wrote:
And I don’t think “Afrikaner” means what you think it means.[/quote]

My apologies. I knew when I used it that it was probably wrong, but Africanites doesn’t look right. And I thought I need something besides African.

As to your assertion the friends didn’t sell their friends into slavery - I’ll agree. But you seem to be using the Egyptians as though they were allied with all of the rest of Africa - they weren’t. Isn’t Egypt actually geographically closer to Southern Europe than the coastal areas from where the slaes were taken?

191

[quote]Aleksandr wrote:

hedo wrote:

The large scale production of gunpowder, not the invention, was the catalyst to military development. This occured only in Europe. The Chinese and Arabs viewed it more as an amusement not a weapon of war. Precise manufacturing capability allowed reliable ignition and the calculation of ballistic tables. This lead to the development of firearms and artillery. The chinese did not advance between unguided wood rockets until after the development of siege artillery. The Arabs were slow to pick up on artillery as well. They had no hand in it’s development.

Way off. Arabs were the first to use it for artillery, from everything I have read. They used ceramic grenades in 1168 AD, rockets were used against the french in the seventh crusade, by 1291 AD rockets, trebuchets firing gunpowders projectiles, and arrows with attached charges were used heavily. By the early 1300s, the Arab world had already developed artillery, and it’s believed it was introduced to the christian world via spain. This was not european technology, and europe did not have superior artillery, with the exception of about a decade after the introduction of cheap iron artillery.

Combined with advanced metallurgy, and the ability to produce weapons that could use the reliable gunpowder being manufactured, is why Europe swept the field. Naval Technology was in addition to not the reason why.

I think you need to look at the timeline again. Europe’s “superior metallurgy” seems to come in the 19th century, with the advent of steel in 1856. If you’ve been paying attention, it is about this time that europe finally became superior on land, with the use of breech-loading rifles, the development of clip-fed firearms, and the invention of the machinegun, not to mention light horse-drawn artillery and large professional armies.

Why were the 1800s so good for europe, and not everyone else? Because of the trade dominance the ability to travel at sea brought. They advanced naval fleets were owned by private companies, but doubled as war ships until the 19th century (I think, could have been late 18th, but I doubt it). This allowed europe to establish and protect trade routes, and raid foreign vessels (state-backed piracy was the norm). It is through these trade routes that europe got much of its foreign technology, and generated enough wealth to eventually develop its own technology.

There is a reason why, before europe’s navies, the Arabs had the most advanced technology in many spheres (they controlled the trade routes).[/quote]

Yes no doubt those Dhows were the scourge of the med and the Atlantic…weren’t they?

Certainly no match for a British Ship of the line. Your lack of knowledge of almost excusable but your linking together these absurd ideas is truly comical.

British Naval Ships owned by private companies…good God son does Admiral Nelson ring a bell with students anymore? Any idea when the hero of Trafalgar passed? Whom he was fighting and what weapons were used?

I will disagree with almost every point you made but trying to teach a close mind is an excercise in frustration.

Clearly there is a differnece between those educated in the traditional sense and those under a culture of political correctness as can be seen from our discussion.

Learn the facts before you twist them into politcally correct ideas. It will be the scourge of your generation.

192

[quote]rainjack wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
Rainjack, this doesn’t prove anything. You are right that slaves weren’t valued for their intellectual capacity. But VIEWING the slaves as animals and in terms of how much work they could do speaks to nothing of actual breeding. Up until imporation of slaves stopped, there was no control of sexual intercourse among slaves. Once it stopped, there was very little regulation of sexual intercourse and reproduction among slaves. Show me something that says otherwise.

It proves that slaves were bred like animals, not for their brains, but for the work they were expected to perform. I have been told at least one time to look it up myself on this thread. Search for some of Alan Keyes’ writings. I’m not sure why I need to be your research source.
[/quote]

Ok-if I have time I’ll take a look at Alan Keyes. But there nothing in your reference that talks about breeding of slaves. All it says it that slaves were valued for their ability to perform physical labor. Which I agree with and is obviously ture.

193

[quote]hedo wrote:
…

Learn the facts before you twist them into politcally correct ideas. It will be the scourge of your generation.

[/quote]

Well said.

194

[quote]rainjack wrote:
Professor X wrote:
You forgot to mention how dirty the early settlers played…like giving infected bed sheets to the native americans without telling them as a trade. It was all out early chemical warfare on those people. He is blaming the native Americans for not playing dirty enough?

Honestly - don’t you guys find it more than just slightly hypocritical to sit here and look down you noses at what happened in our formative years - especially in the West - while you relax in the comfort of your house that was once the sovereign land of the American Indian.

You have no place talking, unless you are willing to give everything back that you took from the Indians. Then maybe you would look like something other than a Hate America First hypocrite.

You are all enjoying the benefits of our takeover of this land. You guys are embarassingly self-righteous. How much of your wealth have you returned to a Native American? Short of turning everything you have back, you are all hypocrites.[/quote]

No, it’s not hyprocritical. Most of us here benefited from the exploitation and displacement of the Indians. That’s just a fact. Does that mean we should go live on reservations? No. But it doesn’t mean that we can’t be cognizant either of the great injustice done to them. America is a great country, but we have our share of skeletons in the closet and have committed our share of atrocities. Acknowledging this does not diminish our greatness or the many positive things we’ve done.

195

I will say this. Rainjack is certainly right about one thing. It absolutely does not make it right and atrocities remain atrocities no matter what the outcome, but I can’t think of a single dominant civilization that has not committed horrible acts and stepped on the toes of indiviuals and civilizations.

196

[quote]jsbrook wrote:
Ok-if I have time I’ll take a look at Alan Keyes. But there nothing in your reference that talks about breeding of slaves. All it says it that slaves were valued for their ability to perform physical labor. Which I agree with and is obviously ture.
[/quote]

http://zmagsite.zmag.org/Jan2005/johnson0105.html

The person you should be looking up is Pamela Bridgewater. Keyes references her work in some of his abortion speeches.

[i]?Slavery has instructed the U.S. on reproductive politics,? asserts Bridgewater, who has done extensive research on ?slave breeding,? the slaveholders? policy of forced reproduction as both a method of maintaining their slave populations and as an independent industry.

?Some plantations stopped producing commodities and focused on breeding humans,? she explains. ?The law allowed for this, since slaves and slaves born were the property of the owner.? According to Bridgewater, slave breeding became ?more prominent than cotton? and was written about in newspapers and farming journals as a type of animal husbandry.

?You?d see a piece in a farming journal that would say, ?Such and such got a good yield by doing X,?? says Bridgewater, who notes that slaveholders would experiment with such techniques as locking slave women in a room with many slave men. Slave women of ?good breeding stock? were highly valued, a point illustrated by one advertisement Bridgewater found for a slave woman who could ?breed like a cat.?
[/i]

Her research shows that not only were slaves bred for work, they were bred as a commodity to be sold and traded like draft animals.

197

[quote]jsbrook wrote:
No, it’s not hyprocritical. Most of us here benefited from the exploitation and displacement of the Indians. That’s just a fact. Does that mean we should go live on reservations? No. But it doesn’t mean that we can’t be cognizant either of the great injustice done to them. America is a great country, but we have our share of skeletons in the closet and have committed our share of atrocities. Acknowledging this does not diminish our greatness or the many positive things we’ve done.
[/quote]

But for you to look down your noses in judgement while reclining on the dead bodies that built your standing in society is horrible hypocritical. Everyone shares the guilt. Everyone. Therefore there is no room for judgement.

If you have a magic potion that will go back in history 300 years and erase all the wrongs perpetrated on the Indians, then you may have something worth crowing about. But to see only the bad that the evil whiteman has done is hypocritical.

198

Well, rain, I think, I have a little better understanding of where you are coming from. Not saying, I agree with it, but a little better understanding of your view.

I don’t feel angry about the following view I’m going to express for me it’s just acceptance for the way things are, I do have the white blood I speak of flowing through my veins. most of us do to some degree.

I feel the white man from his earliest European roots is a very ambitious, driven, power oriented, conquering, breed of man.

Much to the detriment of other races of people through history.

He has a feeling of superiority over the darker skinned races and if you look at basic Aryan or even Klu Klux Klan dogma he feels that the other races or subhuman and that he is a superior breed of man.

This behavior isn’t to the level of what it was two to three hundred years ago, but it still exists in an evolved covert form.

The current powers that be in America have an agenda to keep it that it way. Oh, it’s not out in the open and can’t be easily seen as racism, but it is there in the political process that keep the ghettos across America growing.

I will also say that as someone from a latino descent, I see examples of my own race that do nothing to help reverse this and could be called their own worst enemy.

Poverty breeds ignorance and frustration and frustration breeds dependence on the system as well as drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, sex, anything to keep reality at bay and dull the pain of a bleak sorry existence in this world.

Have you ever noticed how in a higher income area where due to education you hardly see people that even smoke cigarettes, but in poverty stricken areas nearly everyone you run into smokes? Why? because it’s anesthesia it dulls the pain!

Why do ghetto moms have ten kids by ten different fathers? Because drinking and drugging and sex are escapes from a world of despair.

I read my hometown paper on a regular basis and it is filled with examples of criminal behavior, murders, child abuse, domestic violence, and who are the ones committing these acts? Minorities, latinos, blacks.

It’s sad very sad and it almost seems hopeless for a whole generation of kids being raised by totally ignorant and self destructive parents.

Wow, I just realized, I went off on a rant here! Well, I’m curious to see what some thoughts are on my ramblings?

199

{quote]No, it’s not hyprocritical. Most of us here benefited from the exploitation and displacement of the Indians. That’s just a fact. Does that mean we should go live on reservations? No. But it doesn’t mean that we can’t be cognizant either of the great injustice done to them. America is a great country, but we have our share of skeletons in the closet and have committed our share of atrocities. Acknowledging this does not diminish our greatness or the many positive things we’ve done.
[/quote]

jsbrook, just wanted to say that, I like your viewpoint here and on a variety of other threads on a wide range of topics. You are a smart guy and pretty good one as well!

200

[quote]hedo wrote:

Yes no doubt those Dhows were the scourge of the med and the Atlantic…weren’t they?

Certainly no match for a British Ship of the line. Your lack of knowledge of almost excusable but your linking together these absurd ideas is truly comical.

British Naval Ships owned by private companies…good God son does Admiral Nelson ring a bell with students anymore? Any idea when the hero of Trafalgar passed? Whom he was fighting and what weapons were used?

I will disagree with almost every point you made but trying to teach a close mind is an excercise in frustration.

Clearly there is a differnece between those educated in the traditional sense and those under a culture of political correctness as can be seen from our discussion.

Learn the facts before you twist them into politcally correct ideas. It will be the scourge of your generation.

[/quote]

…

When I said the Arab-controlled trade routes, I ment the silk road. I’m the one that has been mentioning european naval dominance, remember? And yes, british war ships were often owned by private companies befroe the advent of the steam ship, and armour plating. Look it up if you are in doubt. I checked with P.D. Curtin, The World and the West, 2000.