How do you think slavery arose?

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No, you choose what you BELIEVE. Of course beliefs, ideas, etc. are inherently subjective. Many things are subjective.

To live an objective, rational life means that you take so many things that are subjective and translate them into reality. The “idea” of a fusion propulsion rocket engine versus actually building one. The idea of love, or an emotional attachment, versus buying someone flowers and chocolate. It is impossible to objectively love someone when you do nothing to show it. You cannot have objective faith in God if you don't do anything good for others or obey God’s commands.

Objectivity is about observing things and doing things, not simply thinking things or feeling things.

Some philosophies thrive on the subjective, such as Zen and postmodernism, particularly with regard to postmodern deconstruction.

Who claims that we invented slavery??? Can point to some examples of people claiming this on the web?

European colonists in the Americas certainly did not invent slavery, but did practice a very brutal form of slavery involving vast numbers of people.

True. Americans didn't invent slavery. We just perfected it into an art form. It's still alive and well, it's just changed form. If you blink, you'll miss it.

Slavery was invented.....almost as soon as Man emerged (maybe even WHEN man emerged).

The US had (and maybe has) many forms of slavery---some of them seemingly benign; others barbaric in the extreme.

The whole practice of "selling people" and forcing people into unpaid labor is barbaric.

tell that to the psychopaths who enslave people today.

I used to think we invented it before I did much thought about it and research on it from the internet. I am not alone.

I would like to see some numbers. Like I said I think 1,000 acres equals about 6 slaves which include 2 child , a grandpa and a grandma.

Someone could do the figures given population density. How many white people have an ancestor that owned slaves? It is simple things with missing facts. No white people on this forum have ancestors that had slaves?

I think scalping heads, living in huts, ripping out beating hearts is brutal. It seems counterintuitive to think that brutality went done with time. It seems dumb to me.

It is one thing to just contradict someone by stating a dominant narrative, and another thing to show some reasoning.

I think they did live in well built houses and were not under lock and key. They lived in the equivalent of $100,000 to 200,000 houses and the slave owners house was about 250,000. That is something someone could contradict but they will not for some reason. I imagine it is because they can’t because their ideas are half backed.

I have no reason to promote anything. I just have some random ideas and see some errors in other people’s thinking.

You for instance think I am saying your political party is saying America invented slavery. They probably would if they could get away with it but that is another story. If you actually talked to people over the last fifty years you would know lots of people think the world began 3,000 years ago and black people were the only people to be slaves.

It arose by selfishness primarily.

That being said, it's hard to tell when it arose as the circumstances that started it are impossible to decipher. I think primarily abusive people had slaves but simultaneously slaves might have been owned by people indebted or wrong by the "slaves". Slaves in quotations and some might genuinely have deserved it.

Even today slavery does have a legitimate and fair purpose to an extent. This could be in the form of "community service", aka a punishment set by the courts here in the UK for wrongdoings.

Slavery can be for every and any reason and it makes it difficult to know how it arose as a result.

Slavery is and should still be a thing in modern society. It has a legitimate purpose. I just mentioned that it comes in the form of punishment for crime but I also think it should extend to people of low to no financial means who have maliciously caused financial harm to others.

I always thought it was wrong and unjust for a person of low financial means to effectively be immune to civil punishments for financial harm to others while someone who's wealthier who does the same can get slammed by the civil courts.

An entire facet of law (and very substantial) should apply to everyone, not just people with money. People with no money should be forced to work for free, even for years of they been a dick to someone else.

I have trouble with understanding that but will keep trying. To me choosing to believe something in context of a religion is picking a side for political reasons, or fear, or anticipation of gain regardless of how someone perceives reality.

It is like, yes I am with this group and it is silly and wonderful because being a part of a group is great. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy. People literally have illusions from having cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias.

To quote the French philosopher Albert Camus, “It is philosophical suicide”.

And the huge market for African slaves in the Americas ensured that this happened a lot, thereby totally ruining West African society.

Before the rise of the Atlantic slave trade, there were civilizations in West Africa that were roughly equivalent to medieval Europe in their overall level of technological and civilizational development. (For example, Timbuktu had a university.)

But then, once the massive slave-raiding got started, civilization of any kind became impossible. Imagine what it must have been like to live in constant terror of being captured by people from neighboring kingdoms, or even from neighboring villages, and then shipped off to God-knows-where.

EDIT: Some history of the Atlantic slave trade here, here, and here.

I'm quite frankly shocked to hear this.

I've known since elementary school that slavery has existed since ancient times. This fact is well-known to anyone from a Christian or Jewish religious background who was taught the story of the Exodus, for example. I would have assumed it would be mentioned at least occasionally in public middle-school history courses too, but maybe not? The existence of slavery in ancient times would also be evident to anyone who has ever watched movies that took place in ancient times.


Some were better built than others, and, obviously, any slave dwellings that still stand today are among the best-built ones. (Otherwise they would have fallen down long ago.) Here's an article about the variety of styles of slave dwellings. However well-built they were or weren't, they were usually rather crowded.


What is your source for this claim?


Or because they're under no obligation to, if you haven't provided any evidence for your own claim.


I thought that you might perhaps be echoing some right wing propagandist's straw-man argument about the ridiculous alleged beliefs of left-wingers.

It never occurred to me that anyone ever actually believed that Americans invented slavery.


I don't see how it's in any political party's interests to claim that America invented slavery.


Actually they think the world began more like 6000 years ago, and any of those people who ever bothered to read their Bibles would know that Black people were not the only people to be slaves.

What made American slavery so awful was not any purported originality thereof, but rather its vast scale -- the sheer number of people who were cruelly removed from their homes and transported such a huge distance away.

Obviously, as I have implied I am going by anecdotal experience with my locality which I find ironically within the ball park range of Hamilton.

One point someone could easily make is that Slavery included not only the Southeastern U.S. but the Caribean, Mexico, Central America and South America as well Europe, Africa, ect... I imagine someone applying my observations to their own locality would think it is off base. I also have an interest in Latin American history. Any discussion of the matter is obviously incomplete without including that. Let's just say I like tacos, fiestas, siestas and saying manana.

As far as putting a dollar value on buildings, Mount Vernon is not a good example but I am sure many people have been there. It is George Washington's house and it is small. They have recreated the buildings surrounding it. I would be interested to know how many acres were farmed, and how many people lived in the various buildings. You can actually look at a census. That information is obviously available. Perhaps, if people looked at the data they would see what I am talking about or maybe not. I have read census data for the various little farms in my area. You can also ride around and know they lived in little houses and the slaves were not chained to a tree. I imagine it helps if you know about the ones that were demolished or rotted. It looks like people living on a frontier to me with frontier homes and buildings.

It is also clearly in the bible belt which does not lend itself to overt abuses. You can argue that one if you want. I know that the catholic church murdered people who did not convert. That would be Latin America.

As far as people being crowded. White share cropper children lived half a dozen to room as far as the 1950s before birth control and smaller families. How do you think free people live in current day cities in India, Japan or a Brazilian favela? Crowded and being a slave is not mutually inclusive. But to my point on my anecdotal evidence from population densities and buildings involved slaves don't seem to have been crowded in my locality. Did Hamilton crowd them? Everybody knows so much about him; they could answer.

Perhaps, if you are from New York City it looks different. As in a previous point, I don't understand someone taking on a person for life to do housework unless someone was incredibly wealthy. That person would eventually get old and you would be taking care of them eventually. I'm just stating some ideas I have about the subject.

As far as what I did learn or didn't learn in grammar school, I learned reading, writing and arithmetic: not critical race theory or my right and need for a sex change operation and hormone therapy. How is that for my right wing conspiracist part of the post. I added it just for you, ha, ha. It is interesting that you think children should be expected to learn a lot in grammar school.

In many cases, slaves used to live in shacks, while slaveowners used to live in substantial houses, or even mansions.

Ok, but not at Mount Vernon with George Washington. I suspect Hamilton was an outlier. I know my one possible ancestor out of 15 great great great great great grandpas was not taking cruises to France with his lover while someone else worked the farm.

I think the haciendas would be an interesting topic. That is obviously a different historically cultural backdrop. They are all mixed partly I imagine because it was acceptable to have mistresses.

One should research slave quarters in other locales other than Virginia. They were probably worse than in Virginia…..and they weren’t that great in Virginia.

One doesn't need to be upset to have a strong opinion. Dismissing opinions one can't argue against as emotional is a common but dishonest canard.