Slavery
 

Mmm...slavery.....<3

It's a southern United States thing. Prewar South is just about as romantic as a fucking lynch mob. Oh yeah, they had those too. Gotta love racism.

not that i really feel like gettin into this right now,...slavery in the pre war south was more about tending your crop than it was about race,.....there were just as many poor whites workin those fields as there were blacks,....
also,..i'm astounded you wouldnt think a lynch mob is romantic,....after all, everyone looks better in bon fire light, and there was normally one of those around,......not that i would know

Slavery was always about exploitation. What sort of connection are you making between poor white people and black slaves? Where is the data that says there were just as many poor white people working the fields? Were the black slaves payed, or does the room and board count as payment? Is slavery just a different kind of social system?

you are right, slavery is always about exploitation,...HOWEVER i dont think its always about race, which is what people wanna jump to first

ok,...so y'all may lynch me for sayin this myself,....but yep, for the time period,.....i see slavery as a different kind fo social system, and one that was implimented for agricultural purposes,......yes, there were just as many poor whites workin fields as their were black,....do you think black people are the only folks out there who know how to pick cotton? if you read more about the king cotton south you'll learn that there were all different races doing this work, that information is compiled through old journals and the like of the time,......room and board counting as payment,.....yes, in my mind, in that time, i feel that it did,.....

sure is slavery is wrong, but it happened, and its not the end of the world like people wanna make it out to be

Someone get the tar and feather!:laughing:

Ok, first of all, slavery in the American south was always inextricably tied to racism. It was based on the notion that black people were inherently inferior to whites and therefore can become property. Those poor white people you talk about were never anyone's property and could always stop picking cotton if they wanted to.

Also, I'm sure you know that black people were actually brought to the United States for the specific purpose of being used for labor. They were forcibly removed from their homes in Africa where they were perfectly able to fend for themselves and brought to a strange new continent.

And lastly, slavery is considered one of the worst things you can do to a person for a good reason. And it's actually still present, only it's not government sanctioned. Trafficking.

ok,......first of all, you have to understand that the victor writes the text book, SO,.....historically the south is gonna come out lookin 'evil' due to the slavery issue,.....i honestly believe that slavery was more about field hands than black skin,.....it just happened to work out that way,....





i mean, if you wanna blame someone, lets blame the dutch who brought them here,...its not like southern colonial americans said to themselves 'self, lets take a long as boat ride all the way to this africa place we've never even seen before,...and while we are there lets wrangle us up some black folks because they are black and we are better than them,....and lets make them our slaves'........no i dont think thats quite what happened,......slave owners saw them as a cheep effective way to tend their crops,........they didnt just hope up and go get them,.......




sure, its horrible,......but i didnt do it,....and the fact that i have a respect, intrest, and affection for the culture of the precivil war south doesnt make me a racist anymore than the next fella, and the comment made due to my cultural answer is rediculous,.....to single one bad thing out of a whole way of life and condem it is absurd, as all cultures have their own atrocities

So how do you account for racism?

I blame both actually, the ones who created the demand and those who satisfied their need for free labor. The fact that they weren't the first to think of enslaving people doesn't exonerate them from anything.

I have to agree on the last bit, most cultures have known of slavery in one form or another. I could have said I would have liked to have lived in ancient Rome and no one would have jumped on me about the fact that their entire civilization was based on slavery.

There's a time and a place for everything, and this argument isn't. But don't labor about misguided delusions. Slavery was the worst thing that ever happened to America, next to the intentional liquidation and genocide of Native Americans. And the after-effects of both tragedies had devastating consequences that still plague their populations today. Please, don't try to pretend it wasn't about race, because it was. That's all it was ever about.

I'm sorry I don't share your romanticism about the South. I like bonfires, just not when they're at the expense of some poor soul's life. =/

I just want to poke in here and say that had another continent been found with another group of people that could have filled the role of African slaves, they would have been used just the same. It was not a matter of finding black people and saying "lets use these black people for slaves". It was a matter of finding a group that could be exploited and doing just that. Slavery was not about race, it was about the ability to effectively exploit a large group of people regardless of race. It could have been anyone, it just happened to be Africans.

Although the subject of slavery has raised plenty of debate can we get back on topic please. If an exclusive thread is needed or wanted for this issue then PM please.

Yet the southerners perpetuated the system after ALL of Europe agreed it was a barbaric practice. The US was one of the last nations in Western culture in order abolish slavery, and it took a war to do that.

Ack sorry didn't see that last post, you want I should delete?

Are you deaf?

No, blind :rofl:

I think the posts related to slavery should be moved to another thread. It is a pretty good debate.

Are you sure?

The lighter skinned Africans went for a higher price during auctioning..

a lot of the exploitation surrounding the Africans was the assumption they were dumber and more primitive.

They captured the slaves and forced them into Christianity, shoving the supieror "white jesus" down they're throat.

Blacks were used in circus' for amusement.

Those whites you were talking about where labeled as "blacks" so that they could be legally enslaved. Same goes for other non-white ethnicities. In fact most of those "white slaves" where European immigrants who weren't 'property of the slave owners, and after 5 years were free. Even the white convicts from Europe who were shipped over were only slaves temporarily. None of them were owned like the Africans.

The Chinese railroad workers were given the term "Heathen Chinee", or "less then blacks".

To think racism had nothing to do with slavery in the U.S. is ridiculous

Edit:

my bad jackhammer, need to look at all posts before commenting :<

Sure, the pre-war South was about tending to the crops...using black slaves. The "poor whites" you say that worked the fields were NOT slaves, they're not even comparable. Also, there were "just as many"? I'd like to see what statistic you heard that leads you to believe that poor whites were used just as often as black slaves.

Even the indentured servants had a choice to work, and were treated far better than slaves given the fact that they were actually white themselves. Not to mention the fact that once slaves became the laborers of choice, white indentured servants were all but done away with.

Also, you joking about a lynch mob isn't funny in the slightest. Are you going to joke about how funny the Holocaust is next?

It is about race. Why were black slaves used and not white slaves? Because to white Southerners black people were "lesser" than they were.

A social system? Are you retarded? You can't have a social system in which entire groups of people (yes, I agree that other races were treated just as poorly as blacks, but that doesn't mean that suddenly white Southerners weren't bad because they were equal opportunity racists) has virtually no rights. That's the whole point of slavery, it ISN'T a fair social system.

Yes, it isn't bad at all that white Southerners used, and treated, entire groups of people as nothing more than tools for their own personal benefit, and that the only way to stop them was to have a bloody civil war. Slavery is always wrong. Period.

Of course they're going to look evil, THEY USED SLAVES! It doesn't matter who writes the textbook, you can't deny that. I'm not saying that all Northerners were better, but to say that slavery isn't "evil" is completely ridiculous.

Also, whether Southerners singled out black people or not, that's who they happened to choose, and that's who had to endure years of mistreatment at the hands of white plantation owners.

Why is this topic limited to just the American use of slaves?

Because the original post was about the prewar South.

Because it was the most widespread and solidifying usage of slavery in world history. Other cultures have employed slavery during tragic times, but America was the first to use it to build an economy and build a stratified system of procuring and utilizing Africans for labor. Most of us are aware of the enslavement of Eastern European peoples ("slave" is actually a derivative of "Slav") during the sixteenth century and earlier. However, it was not as widespread and for the most part, it was domestic slavery, much like an unpaid civil servant (no I'm not condoning it). Africans were viewed as prized possessions, objects which confirmed the owner's wealth.

When the New World was settled, the white invaders tried and failed to use labor from native peoples. I do not know if Africans were that much stronger or more "fit for physical labor," but that was the stigma. And so, Africa was raped of her culture and heritage as millions upon untold millions were shipped from west African nations because the white man assumed he was the superior being. And there they toiled for three hundred years under the burning sun.

The thing that sets the United States apart from all those other countries that legalized slavery is the fact that the American economy was built upon slave labor.

OMG youre so right,...thank you so much for makeing me see that and saveing me from my evil southernness,......i might as well change my name to,......scranton, or something and start wearing blue,........how could i have been so blind,....OMG

I'm just asking, *clears throat* whats with all of the periods? Wouldn't a single comma suffice?

already asked her =/

There were plenty of civilizations that based their economy on slavery, Rome being the most prominent example among the ancient civilizations. The major difference between slavery in the ancient world and "modern" slavery in the Americas was that the former did not make a distinction based on race and slaves could move upward socially.

Also, slavery in Brazil was equally important to the economy as it was in the American south. In fact, 37% of all traded slaves ended up in Brazil (as opposed to some 5% which ended up in the American south). Brazil was also the last country in the western hemisphere that abolished slavery in 1888. But again, the major difference was the distinction based on race which was the most prominent in the American south and which made the integration a much more difficult process than it was in other countries.

Oh, I see, it's ok for you to sit there and voice your idiotic, historically inaccurate views, but when people actually start questioning them suddenly it's time to hit the ignore button. :rolleyes: I'm not really surprised, though, if that's what you believe about slavery than I guess I shouldn't have really expected a fruitful discussion.

Maybe if you actually paid attention to one of those revisionist, anti-Southern, "Northern" textbooks you'd actually learn a thing or two.

its not that i'm ignoring you,....ok,..well maybe i am ignoring you,.....

i never said we just start enslaveing people again,....i'm just sayin that the south gets a bad wrap because if it, that pisses me off,......i didnt do it,....and because i dont demonize it doesnt mean i'm an ignorant backwoods hillbilly

Kind of inflammatory, don't you think? Let's try to keep it civil here.

Actually it does to most civilized people. The fact that you fail to understand why so many people here have such an issue with slavery and racism in the South just shows how little you understand about American and, to be more specific, Southern, history.

I don't hold slavery against any Southerners, there's enough to complain about the South for already, but my problem with this sort of romantic "Oh, pre-war South wasn't so bad...if you were white hehe" ideal is almost sad.

Also, as for the fact that lots of other societies had slaves, I wouldn't have even cared about savannah's comment if she hadn't gone out of her way to make it known that she would have wanted to be a slave owner, or if she hadn't continued to basically defend slavery. Not to mention the fact that, as far as I'm aware, no other society in modern history actively continued to oppress their slaves on the basis of racism for 100 years after slavery had been abolished.

I don't think so. I don't think people in the South are inherently evil or racist, and to take that tone is to offer an unfair prejudice. And ninety-nine times out of one hundred, you gonna hear the Southerner echo back, "a Southern man don't need him around anyhow."

So according to you, Southern slavery wasn't inherently prejudice or racist, but I am for claiming (rather correctly, I might add) that it was?

Like I said, I don't continue to hold slavery against Southerners, if I still did I might as well just hate all Americans for what was done to the Natives. But we're not talking about my feelings on Southerners, we're talking about whether or not slavery was or was not racist, or worth "demonizing."

Hmmm, sounds like I need to explain this. Or, wait...

As you can see, I completely agree with you. But you need to stop making personal attacks on other members.

I'm going to take this one even though a few people have already commented on it; I'll try not to make my post too redundant.

No one is jumping on you because you like the south. You're proud of where you come from, there's nothing wrong with that. But what IS wrong is the way you refuse to acknowledge the horror that slavery was. Not being apolagetic for it is one thing, but refusing to even acknowledge it is entirely different. In my humble opinion, yes, you ARE ignorant and backwards in your views on this issue. Tough words, but so is saying that slavery was merely an economic neccesity or a social class system.

Yes the south gets a bad wrap for it, and I believe that the main reason for this is that racism is to this day a more prominent issue in the southern states than it is in other areas of the US. The reason that the south continually gets a "bad wrap" for slavery is that there are still people there, like you apparently, who don't seem to understand why a widespread subjugation and trafficking of a single race is such a black mark in history.

This is not to say that the US is alone in this issue. Obviously there are MANY other civilizations and nations that have had similar histories, but as the topic of conversation is pre-war south, and it was you who first initiated it, this is the one that's up for debate.

I can honestly say that it's just as bad where I live, in the middle of the Rust Belt. No, the racism isn't outspoken; there are rarely instances of derogatory epithets fired over racial borders. But in and around a fairly large metropolis, there is a phenomenal disparity in the demographic representation of whites and minorities. And no one seems to care.

look,...i conceded that its wrong,....and even that it was ahorrible period in our history,......but it happened,....i didnt do it,.....lets move on

This is the most trivial and absurd conversation I have ever seen on here. Does anyone really think Savannah does not think Slavery was a horrible thing?

How dare someone suggest it was money and not just skin color that motivated the slave owners in the American South and world wide.

Clearly the people of that time were evil and not just ignorant and obviously everyone was a racist, no one was opposed to slavery.

It's factual accurate to say that there were white slaves, native American Indian slaves, Mexican\Latin American slaves etc.

Of course the Black culture is the greatest victim of American slavery, no one denied that.

I love how people get on a moral pedestal and jump to accuse anyone who doesn't pity another culture as much as they do. Like anyone alive today has any concept of the potential horrors and atrocities of slavery. It's arrogant and pompous and those who do it know who they are.

Also enough with this America is a racist society BS. This (America) is by far the least racist country on earth. 90% of what we call racism in this country is BS, money is always the true motivator. Racial lines are drawn by individuals not collectives. If you think otherwise your far more bigoted and prejudice then you'd like to accuse others of being.

Also just out of curiosity why would anyone consistently post degrading statements about a person they never have and never will meet? What motivates that?

If this board had a rep system, I would give you all mine for a month for that.

What does that mean?

Really? Not fifty years ago was legislation enacted to prevent others from being denied the pursuit of happiness on account of race. True enough, as a whole, America is indeed a far less racist country than China, South Africa, or a derth of other backwards nations. But she is far from pure. What I call racism is the absence of equality, the dichotomous society in which we live. What I call racism is the fact that African-Americans account for less than 15% of the gross population but more than 50% of the prison population. What I call racism is the fact that crack cocaine and heroin possession charges are given more stringent sentences than those of cocaine (thus discriminating against the poorer addicts). And if you think that the huge economic disparity between white and nonwhite is BS, then perhaps you should question yourself where your own prejudices lie. As for me, I am sick of playing the devil's advocate, but I leave you this:

Racism is still a very real problem in America.

Some forums have a reputation system. The way most work is that when you read a post, you have the option of leaving feedback. You can either agree or not agree with what is said. Agreeing adds reputation, disagreeing takes away reputation. Most of the time, you are limited on the amount of rep you can give. I was saying that I would have given every reputation point I had to you for making a post that seemed to have some brains behind it.

I guess it would have been easier to just say;

^^I Agree^^

Assuming a distinction in prison population and\or financial inequality suggests racism is a huge leap. You'll find a much higher correlation in terms of the financial background of those incarcerated then you will in terms of race.

50 years is two generations, it's also the vast majority of my lifetime. When my family first started coming to America at the turn of the century they experienced intolerance for their Irish heritage, forced to live in squalor and work the same jobs for less wages. The world my parents and I grew up in 50-60 years later was very very different. African-Americans and other Black Americans still do deal with discrimination as do, all races on occasion when dealing with ignorant or bigoted people. There are more interracial married couples per capita in the US then any other nation. Almost all of the most diverse Cities and Universities of the World are in the United States.

White people make up the vast majority of the wealthiest and poorest segments of America.

People who are incarcerated or stuck in a low pay dead end job\unemployed are also extremely more likely to come from single parent homes or to have less then a high school education.

The drop out rate and the rate of children born out of wedlock in the African American and Latino communities is dramatically higher then in Asian-American or Anglo-American populations.

It's easy to assume we are a racist country because there is no shortage of people who want it to be a racist country. There are, as I previously conceded still issues of racial inequality and prejudice in the US and likely always will be. However it's indisputable that all the evidence suggests we're moving in the right direction and have been since the 1960's.

Above all else I use m own life experiences as an example. Growing up in Detroit, mostly post riots during white flight albeit, but even then at the most hateful and tense time between blacks\whites I've and anyone born after 1980 in the US has ever experienced the majority of both races were cordial to each other. It was a small percentage of both blacks and whites who insisted on being violent and divisive.

Still Detroit today is a perfect example of how a few divisive racist can destroy a community, it's not a cultural thing it's much more an independent prejudices thing. But because both communities (now city\suburbs) are made to believe the other dislikes them neither will do what's necessary to strengthen both. This is perhaps racism but even at it's worst it's passive and spiteful more then hateful. There are plenty of blacks in the suburbs (apx 22%) and there is no division at all.

I don't know one person who I believe is a racist and I taught in a mixed ethnicity community for several years meeting a lot of people young and old. I know a lot of harmless ignorant people, and a few stubborn a-holes for lack of better term but they don't differentiate in how poorly they treat based on skin color, they are insufferable human beings all the time.

All my blathering aside, the greater is point is that I believe a lot of the still present division that exists between races\cultures in the US stems from the constant accusations or racism in our media. How often do you experience racism in your life?, I guarantee not daily, yet there are multiple allegations of it in the newspaper and on TV everyday. Reminding us it exists.

People like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson etc. cry racism anytime an incident involving a black victim of injustice occurs. They draw a line in the sand and tell people if you don't agree with them you are racist. They exploit and undermine their victims for their own personal benefit. That's real racism and it never gets labeled as such.

The fact that she doesn’t believe it should be “demonized,” in her words, as well as her several attempts to defend it because it wasn’t “really racist” shows that she doesn’t understand the full extent of slavery or its after effects in the South.

Of course money was what motivated slave owners, but it was the belief that whites were somehow “superior” that kept black people oppressed for 100 years after. It’s easy to say that slaves were only used for plantation owners to make money (which is horrible enough, no matter what race), but it’s not easy to ignore what happened afterwards. Whether or not white Southerners were racist to begin with, you can’t deny that they certainly turned out that way.

So slavery and racism are ok, because Southerners didn’t really mean it, they were just ignorant? So of I murder someone because I didn’t know it was against the law, I suddenly don’t have to go to jail?

As for whether or not they were opposed to slavery, it certainly doesn’t seem that they were, given the amount of laws that were passed leading up to, during, and after the civil war. Or did you not notice when the states, and those with the highest amount of slaves did first, seceded from the Union?

That is factually accurate. However, it’s factually inaccurate to claim that somehow there were as many white, Native American, or Latino slaves. Or that the white servants used were on the same level as black ones.

God forbid people have morals!

Thanks, this was a really hilarious statement to wake up to this morning. Racism is very much alive in America, as it is all over the world. How on earth do you think that America is somehow the “least racist country on earth”? Nice turnaround with the claim that America isn’t racist, but if I think it is then I am!

America is very racist. Just look at immigration today, or at any other period in American history. Having lived in LA these past few years, I can assure you that the majority of the hostility towards Mexicans and other Hispanic immigrants is based solely on racism. They’re “different” from us and they’re coming here with their own cultures and customs to “steal” all of our jobs!

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty_calls.png

And you’ll also find a high correlation between financial background and race. Funny how that works.

When my family came here they found they weren’t allowed to go the same schools as white children or sit at the front of the bus, but I see how the two stories are similar.

Maybe that’s because white people make up the vast majority of America. The vast majority of minorities in America, however, are still stuck in the poorest segments, and are the ones stuck in lower class neighborhoods with a worse education, less of an opportunity to make something out of their lives, and more of an opportunity to turn to a life of crime.

You can read off statistics all day, but they aren’t going to make a difference if you fail to understand the climate that breeds such situations.

Moving in the right direction doesn’t mean we’re already at the right place. Racism is still very much alive in America. Just look at Obama. For every few hundred people who’ll say they’ll vote for him, you can still find a handful who say they won’t because he’s black.

So just because they’re “harmless” and “ignorant” they aren’t racist? Once again, I’m sure the majority of pre-war white Southerners were just ignorant, but that doesn’t make them any less racist.

All the time. Maybe you should come to LA, racism is still alive and kicking here.

Also, people blaming the media is probably just a minor pet peeve of mine, but did it ever occur to you that maybe the media writes about it because it’s still happening? Just because newspapers write about stories you don’t want to hear doesn’t mean there isn’t some truth behind them. Racism won’t just go away if you ignore it.

Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are annoying, sure, but just because a pair of nutjobs talk about racism all the time it’s suddenly safe to just ignore it? The Anti-Defamation League does the same thing all the time for the same reasons, does that mean that Anti-Semitism doesn’t still exist?