Slave?

I think the best part was I wasn't even trying to argue it was humane or moral to own another human being... I was simply trying to make sure our friend PVS here knew the difference between abusive slave owners and non-abusive. Obviously, he just makes general assumptions.

Originally posted by Hornyman
Alot of them had fair masters who were kind people.

thats the point i was arguing. "fair" and "kind"
but you dont care do you? just interested in pecking as always 😬

obviously, janus just likes to talk about people he follows around and flames in the third person, because he's completely full of himself.

oh i can sense your vigorous typing of yet another flame 😂

PVS this and PVS that....i cant wait

Originally posted by PVS
thats the point i was arguing. "fair" and "kind"
but you dont care do you? just interested in pecking as always 😬

obviously, janus just likes to talk about people he follows around and flames in the third person, because he's completely full of himself.

But you weren't arguing, you were just stating your opinion and insulting anyone who disagreed. You cannot say with any degree of certainty that there were slaveowners who -weren't- fair or kind or both, because you don't know. And since you don't have any proof, you are relying on a generalization and popular opinion on slavery and calling it the truth.

And as for "following you around and flaming you in the third person", you must be incredibly full of yourself. I don't follow you around, much to your dismay, and my interest in this thread began long before you showed up to give use your two cents. And remember who started the flame war here... Oh wait, that would be you, huh?

you finished?

ok, let me be brief: i dont care what you think of me. lets just get that out of the way.

anyway, human beings being owned as property and thus denied basic human rights by default is neither fair nor kind. if you cant see that, then i pity you. not in a "i dont like you" kind of way, but genuine pity.

thats all i have to say. have your last nonsensical word and that'll be the end of it.

go on then...

So you're basically saying that anyone who either a) owned of slavery or b) approved of slavery could be neither kind nor fair, even if in other fields of life?

Wow, talk about narrow minded.

Well, of course, slavery as a whole is a terrible thing, something that should never be supported. And PVS, if you read carefully, no one here supported slavery. They merely took what you said about "everyone who possessed slaves was terrible" and corrected it; they may have used the service that was slavery, but that does not automatically put them in the category of the cruel, disgusting, prejudiced masters that too many beings were.

Originally posted by Darth Faunus
Well, of course, slavery as a whole is a terrible thing, something that should never be supported. And PVS, if you read carefully, no one here supported slavery. They merely took what you said about "everyone who possessed slaves was terrible" and corrected it; they may have used the service that was slavery, but that does not automatically put them in the category of the cruel, disgusting, prejudiced masters that too many beings were.

Exactly.

"everyone who possessed slaves was terrible"

dont misquote me. its no way to prove a point.

i merely stated that slavery was in no way "fair" and "kind".
just because someone didnt face abuse, doesnt make it ok.

and yes, it DOES automatically make them prejudicial bigots to be slavemasters. to own another human being is to believe that you are better than them, above them, more human than them.

ffs i can believe im actually arguing this. this is just disturbing.

Originally posted by Darth_Janus
You have such a set view of everything, and it's incredibly negative.

Countrary to what you'd like to believe, there were well treated slaves in Roman times, and oftentimes it was in their benefit to be "bought" by a patron family who could pay for their lifestyles. In a civilization where everyone was two weeks away from starvation, such a system worked and flourished. So the problem here is that you are projecting your bias onto the situation and viewing it in a negative light.

This was what I said, to which you replied:

"you are an ignorant screwball if you would dare argue that it was humane in any way to own another human being. thats all i have to say to you. good day sir"

Initially, I thought you were saying well-treated slaves could not exist. To which you apparently thought I meant slavery was humane. We were both wrong on those assumptions. Fair enough for you?

Originally posted by Darth_Janus

"you are an ignorant screwball if you would dare argue that it was humane in any way to own another human being. thats all i have to say to you. good day sir"

correct

Originally posted by Darth_Janus

Initially, I thought you were saying well-treated slaves could not exist.

i did say that. they dont exist and never did. the very act of owning a slave is the commiting of a grave injustice. you seem to think that since they didnt abuse them, then it was ok. well im saying it wasnt. maybe those people didnt know that what they were doing was evil, but it was. the evil: denial of basic human freedom.

i hope thats clear enough, because thats what i believe down to my core. i hope that suits your pallet, because i wont compromise that view just to avoid a conflict.

Never asked you to compromise your view, but at least try not to distort mine. There is a difference between well-treated slaves and poorly treated slaves; it's that issue that made this thread pop up. And you are seeming to make no distinction between the two when there is... I'm not arguing either case is morally right. They're not. But I am arguing that there is a difference and to stereotype everyone who believes in slavery or practices it as evil is a bit too simple.

You should admit it IS possible for people who are otherwise good to have bad moral judgment on singular issues. Many people who advocate good will and even religion advocate the war in Iraq. They may be good people outside of that decision, but in that regard they show flawed logic. That's not making them entirely bad people; it's showing that people can believe in contradictions, even if they shouldn't.

And lots of people even today believe in contradictions of sorts, they just don't recognize them as contradictions. Not everyone is introspective and enlightened enough to question the moral grounds of their actions or the actions of others. For many, what the society thinks must be right for some reason or another. It's sad but true.

So my point is that while slavery itself is evil, not every person who practiced it was inherently evil. It would be like saying war is evil, thus every person who fights is evil.

Originally posted by PVS
maybe those people didnt know that what they were doing was evil, but it was.

Sir, I am sorry to bother you. However, I think that the point, this being the only crucial point, is that perhaps the ignorance of those people, or any other number of variables, having to do with the time. Thus, if a man is taught that owning slaves is all right and he still treats them in a manner befitting of a human being, then that man is ignorant of his crime. Not every man can see past the morals of the time and realize that something that is being done as a common practice is wrong - not all men question the right and wrong of their society like that. Eventually, people did, but those who did not can't be blamed for transcending the morals of all other men of the time. They can't be blamed for not being visionaries. If someone is raised to think that slavery is acceptable, then he can't be expected to question that - it is good if he does question whether that is right or wrong, but some people just take such things at face value - if their community says it's okay, it's okay by them, and they think nothing more of it. There are millions of men like that today. They cannot really be condemned for that quality. That, I think, is really the point, Mr. PVS, sir. No offense meant to you, sir, but I think that it is less personal than it is (or should be, when discussed nowadays about slavery in the past) objective.

I hope that that does not sound ignorant in any way, sir.

Originally posted by Darth_Janus
So my point is that while slavery itself is evil, not every person who practiced it was inherently evil. It would be like saying war is evil, thus every person who fights is evil.

thats all well and good. but i never implied that slaveowners were inherently evil. i said that by owning another human being, they are DOING evil. i also made a point to stress that they may not have been in the mindset to acknowledge that it was evil. observe:

Originally posted by PVS
maybe those people didnt know that what they were doing was evil, but it was. the evil: denial of basic human freedom.

but is that even an issue to bother with? that way of thinking can be stretched to it's extream. for example: SS troops murdering jews didnt know that they were doing evil. they were following orders and reacting to brainwashing and a genuine feeling that what they were doing was right. so does that make it ok? does history give a shit whether they were good people deep down? do you give a shit? whatever the intentions or perspective of those commiting evil are superficial. common sense tells us that they were commiting evil in the simple act of owning a human being. so many of them were good people who didnt know any better. fine. not that i ever argued that, but fine

Well, this has gotten a bit off my original topic, but that's cool. Maybe I didn't explain my point very well initially, but if you're going to make Anakin a slave in the movie, show some scenes that make him look like he actually is a slave.

Sorry people, but a person with no money is not going to be able to build a racing machine capable of competing with the best in the galaxy. Maybe Watto had some stuff laying around, but enough to build that fast of a machine? Not to mention the tools, the machine shop, and the jet fuel needed to run the thing. All of this stuff is available to a slave???

Storywise, I still say that Anakin needed to take some mental abuse from Watto feeding his disdain for those in power. Watto could have seen him racing a Tatooine equivalent of a go kart and decided to back him financially in the pod racing. He was doing so miserably that Watto would gladly bet his freedom with Qui Gonn.

obidad, its all about effect.
we are supposed to be amazed by anakin's abilities.
not only is he the only human who can race a pod, and a child also,
but he created that winning pod with NO money and nothing more than scrap
parts. its SUPPOSED to be unbelievable, thats the whole point. anakin is the galaxy's ultimate prodigy.

and he is also supposed to be the sweetest kindest child possible, to stress the idea of the path to the darkside. the idea that nobody is trained enough to resist it. fear turned anakin, so it can turn anyone and everyone.

Originally posted by PVS
thats all well and good. but i never implied that slaveowners were inherently evil. i said that by owning another human being, they are DOING evil. i also made a point to stress that they may not have been in the mindset to acknowledge that it was evil. observe:

but is that even an issue to bother with? that way of thinking can be stretched to it's extream. for example: SS troops murdering jews didnt know that they were doing evil. they were following orders and reacting to brainwashing and a genuine feeling that what they were doing was right. so does that make it ok? does history give a shit whether they were good people deep down? do you give a shit? whatever the intentions or perspective of those commiting evil are superficial. common sense tells us that they were commiting evil in the simple act of owning a human being. so many of them were good people who didnt know any better. fine. not that i ever argued that, but fine

Thank you for acknowledging me, sir. Much appreciated. However, I do think that the ignorance is an issue. The Nazis who murdered Jews were either very easily brainwashed or maybe bad people, but I can't have any idea what was going on in their minds, so I won't try to think about it. The benefit of the doubt is extremely important here, I think, because, for example, the Nazis who fought on the front line were not, I think, necessarily bad men. They often, I believe, did not know that Jews were being slaughtered, and they were just fighting for their country - they cannot be generalized into the group of vindictive men in Germany because they fought for a cause they perhaps did not understand. Your example of the SS troopers who killed Jews directly is more connected to the slaveowners who were in fact cruel, though sometimes people can be bred to believe that another race is below them, and if they can't see beyond that simply because of their lack of perceptivity, I don't think they should be condemned. I think a more useful approach would be to see what caused them to act like that and then make sure it never happens again rather than simply punishing them and making them more and more into negative, disrupting anomalies. However, this is controversial and only speculative, so, again, the benefit of the doubt is important: to a slaveowner, owning slaves might have been as natural as keeping a dog is to me. I don't think they thought of slaves exactly as they did their peers. If, in fifty years, dogs are found to be sentient and take over the world, I don't want to be condemned for "owning" a dog. Then my name would be stained, and unjustly so. I just don't think any group, no matter what their purposes, should be generalized in its entirety.

Thank you again for considering my point, sir. Peace be with you.

but you're not seeing the point

the point is this: nobody knowingly does evil.

'evil' is pretty objective in the face of history, but to the individual it is subjective. in nazi germany, they thought that the ends justified the means.
so, they thought that however brutal they were, they were ultimately doing good. obviously they were being evil, but they didnt KNOW it. you and i cannot fathom the idea of murdering innocents and feeling good about it, so we call them evil, the same as you nor i could ever imagine owning another human being.

so back to the point which started all this: slavery was neither fair nor kind.
a slave who is not beaten is still a slave. people argue that they were treated kindly by not being beaten. thats like saying i'm a kind person for not beating you. how is not beating someone an act of kindness?

Originally posted by PVS
[B
the point is this: nobody knowingly does evil.
[/B]

he disagreed with it, but it doesnt necessarily mean he viewed it as 'evil'.
you made that deduction, not him. he could have viewed it as negative, outdated, but not something so disgusting and evil as we view it today.
they subscribed to the idea that white people were more human than black people. jefferson began to object to slavery, but he didnt believe in equality.
so the core of such an evil mentallity was not realised, only the symptom, which was slavery.
and yes, he was a coward and a hipocrite...just to spiral more off topic 😛