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If slavery were legal and accepted throughout the world today...

Would you own slaves today?

  • Total voters
    25
library?

The raid’s official record is sparse. As Montgomery wrote soon after,


I have the honor to report that, in obedience to your orders, I proceeded up the Combahee River, on the steamers John Adams and Harriet A. Weed, with a detachment of three hundred (300) men of the Second South Carolina Volunteer Regiment and a section of the Third Rhode Island Battery, commanded by Captain Brayton. We ascended the river some twenty-five (25) miles, destroyed a pontoon bridge, together with a large amount of cotton, rice, and other property, and brought away seven hundred and twenty-seven slaves, and some fine horses. We had some sharp skirmishes, in all of which the men behaved splendidly. I hope to report more fully in a day or two.

The Confederates knew that the raid was coming, and that it was intended to liberate slaves. The local slave owner William C. Heyward reported that at dawn on June 2 “the driver, who was with the hands at work in lower fields, sent up word that there were three Yankee boats coming up the river. Immediately got up and sent word to him to bring up the hands and take them back into the
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http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/06/07/harriet-tubmans-great-raid/


That is where I had the idea of Tubman leading a small army
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Would you own any slaves? Why or why not?
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Slavery is a severe violation of the natural rights of the individual. Besides, if I were to hold slaves, I would live in constant fear for slave rebellion (even if slavery was legal). And free men work better than slaves.
 
jamesrage said:
If this is something that just became legal I say no to owning slaves. If this is something that has been legal our whole lives and we grew up with the mind set that this is just something acceptable then who knows how any of us would answer that question. Because we would all like to think that we are all decent human beings who oppose such things. But many decent people 150 years ago and before either condoned slavery or even participated in owning slaves because that was something back then that was acceptable and done. I would like to think that because of one of the reasons I oppose outsourcing,illegal immigration, unrestricted immigration and worker visas because they hurt the wages of Americans that I would also oppose slavery(if slavery was legal then there probably wouldn't be those things) since that is something that also hurts the wages of Americans.
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One interesting parallel to your argument:

Significant numbers of people chose not to engage in slavery, even centuries before it became illegal in most places. The first world-famous abolitionist was, believe it or not, the prophet Mohammed.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
The question is asked at face value. Any other "point" you see is only you reading more into it.
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If anyone happens to believe you, please refer them to my real estate business.
 
I would continue to actively fight against slavery.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
One interesting parallel to your argument:

Significant numbers of people chose not to engage in slavery, even centuries before it became illegal in most places. The first world-famous abolitionist was, believe it or not, the prophet Mohammed.
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glad you gave a choice, because I'll choose NOT to believe it. and whoever put that thought in your head should be drawn and quartered(much like the wife-beating Prophet himself).
 
JoeTrumps said:
glad you gave a choice, because I'll choose NOT to believe it. and whoever put that thought in your head should be drawn and quartered(much like the wife-beating Prophet himself).
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I'm guessing you choose not to believe in greenhouse gases, either.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
One interesting parallel to your argument:

Significant numbers of people chose not to engage in slavery,
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Was this because that significant number of people couldn't afford to own slaves and didn't own any businesses?


even centuries before it became illegal in most places. The first world-famous abolitionist was, believe it or not, the prophet Mohammed.
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BBC - Religions - Islam: Slavery in Islam
The legality of slavery in Islam, together with the example of the Prophet Muhammad, who himself bought, sold, captured, and owned slaves, may explain why slavery persisted until the 19th century in many places (and later still in some countries). The impetus for the abolition of slavery came largely from colonial powers, although some Muslim thinkers argued strongly for abolition.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Muhammad#Ownership_of_slaves
Rodney Stark argues that "the fundamental problem facing Muslim theologians vis-à-vis the morality of slavery is that Muhammad bought, sold, captured, and owned slaves", though he states that Muhammad did advise that slaves be treated well: "Feed them what you eat yourself and clothe them with what you wear...They are God's people like unto you and be kind unto them". In addition, Stark contrasts Islam with Christianity, implying that Christian theologians wouldn't have been able to "work their way around the biblical acceptance of slavery" if Jesus had owned slaves like Muhammad did.[35]
 
I would declare my own personal war against slave owners.

I could probably shoot a slave owner and sit down to a cold beer a few minutes later with no regrets.
 
Legal? Accepted? Hey, that grass ain't gonna cut itself.

Honestly, a few have hit on the one main issue...we wouldn't know any better. If slavery were an accepted part of society, we wouldn't have a fraction of the white-knighters on here saying they'd "fight it," or "kill the slavers." Bullchips. You'd see slaves as we see yachts today. Too expensive for anyone but the 1%. We'd love to have one, but can do without.

Also, I think with the advancement of society, slaves would be treated much better than they were in the 1800's (and prior). They'd be treated either like formal workers (but without the pay), or pseudo members of the household (of which many slaves were). Hell, they'd probably be given medical insurance, allowances for personal expenses, etc. They just couldn't leave the household.
 
In a world postulated by the OP, where slavery is widely accepted, it begs the question of where moral objections to slavery would come from. How is it that all these fine people would reject slavery in such a world? Where would they get the idea that slavery is wrong? I'm sure people will have no trouble thinking of a widely accepted institution that is immoral in today's real world. People seem to have no trouble going along with what is immoral as long as most others accept it. That's assuming they even recognize the immorality of it.
 
LowDown said:
In a world postulated by the OP, where slavery is widely accepted, it begs the question of where moral objections to slavery would come from. How is it that all these fine people would reject slavery in such a world? Where would they get the idea that slavery is wrong? I'm sure people will have no trouble thinking of a widely accepted institution that is immoral in today's real world. People seem to have no trouble going along with what is immoral as long as most others accept it. That's assuming they even recognize the immorality of it.
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Not quite true: People have a much easier time going along with immoral stuff if they don't need to see it or hear about it much. For example, anti-abortion rhetoric aside there's nothing as strongly and obviously immoral as chattel slavery occurring (and widely accepted) in modern developed democracies, whereas some international policies/actions might come close (though even then, as media and the internet bring them closer to home it'd often be a stretch to call them widely accepted).

If it were common and legal, slavery would presumably be fairly evident and in everyone's faces - which obviously makes it a fairly absurd hypothetical to say it would be widely accepted in the 21st century, when it wasn't even more than a hundred years ago! But even assuming many did somehow accept it (there's evidently enough folk around who believe that one group or another are inherently inferior to make that at least possible), there'd undoubtedly be many others who would not - just as in the 19th century, and even earlier.

The only requirement for such a rejection is empathy, the ability to have some sense of others' pain and imagine yourself in their position. (Which is why distance makes such a big difference in the first place.)
 
Mithrae said:
Not quite true: People have a much easier time going along with immoral stuff if they don't need to see it or hear about it much. For example, anti-abortion rhetoric aside there's nothing as strongly and obviously immoral as chattel slavery occurring (and widely accepted) in modern developed democracies, whereas some international policies/actions might come close (though even then, as media and the internet bring them closer to home it'd often be a stretch to call them widely accepted).
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Again, assuming the world postulated, in which slavery is widely accepted, on what basis is it "obviously" immoral? From history we know that there is no empathy for slaves among slave holders.
 
LowDown said:
Again, assuming the world postulated, in which slavery is widely accepted, on what basis is it "obviously" immoral? From history we know that there is no empathy for slaves among slave holders.
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Not necessarily true; some slave owners were undoubtedly very cruel and callous, others obviously less so, and to say that owning slaves, regardless of how they are treated, must indicate a lack of empathy would make your statement merely a tautology (those who had empathy would have freed theirs). But as others have pointed out, slave ownership was and would be likely the province of a tiny fraction of the population, so even if it were true that owners could have no empathy for their slaves, that wouldn't preclude it being seen as obviously immoral by many others. The slavery of American history was compounded by the fact of it occurring primarily if not exclusively across a racial divide, with many white people believing black people to be inherently inferior, thus making it that much harder to imagine themselves in their place. While that attitude still exists, as we've seen from some posters' comments even on this forum, it's generally more muted and much less prevalent; and the OP didn't specify a racially-based slavery institution in any case. So I think we could safely imagine that even if it was legal and relatively common, even many of those who 'accepted' it would consider it distasteful at best and many would strongly consider it immoral.

Let's face it, if both Britain and the northern American states (and plenty of other countries besides) got rid of their domestic slavery by the early 19th century, the only possible way we could imagine it to be more widely accepted in those countries almost two centuries later is as a hypothetical: But since the hypothetical obviously doesn't dictate universal acceptance, there would probably be a substantial minority of abolitionists, and therefore no particular reason to assume that those who said they would be amongst that number are incorrect.

Maybe we just have a remarkably high proportion of compassionate, enlightened individuals on the forum :lol:
 
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Velvet Elvis said:
Legal? Accepted? Hey, that grass ain't gonna cut itself.

Honestly, a few have hit on the one main issue...we wouldn't know any better. If slavery were an accepted part of society, we wouldn't have a fraction of the white-knighters on here saying they'd "fight it," or "kill the slavers." Bullchips. You'd see slaves as we see yachts today. Too expensive for anyone but the 1%. We'd love to have one, but can do without.

Also, I think with the advancement of society, slaves would be treated much better than they were in the 1800's (and prior). They'd be treated either like formal workers (but without the pay), or pseudo members of the household (of which many slaves were). Hell, they'd probably be given medical insurance, allowances for personal expenses, etc. They just couldn't leave the household.
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Actually, there are many people who could easily afford - to take your example - a yacht, but choose not to because keeping track of the paperwork and the maintenance (or even hiring someone to do so) is too much trouble. If they want to party on the water, it's much easier for them to charter a yacht.

Which might suggest that in this hypothetical scenario, some people could be in the "rent-a-slave" business... :D
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Which might suggest that in this hypothetical scenario, some people could be in the "rent-a-slave" business... :D
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Hell, by that matter I rent a slave every 12 days or so. He's 17 and cuts my grass.
 
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