"You Black People Were Lucky To Be Our Slaves"-Patrick Buchanan

[IgnoreMe 5,000+ posts]

Quoted from IGNOREME

1) wow you are an ignorant son of a ***** eh? stop robbing and shooting? you really think its that easy? these people live in the ****ing slums. cant afford housing, running water, transportation to work, clothes for work, nothing. so you're saying if you had to support and feed you're family you wouldn't rob or sell dope? these people have no ****ing options, and it just so happens to be that they're surrounded by others of their kind (which happens to be black in these neighborhoods) so when the shit hits the fan its gonna be another "black on black" crime.
why do you think there is less violent crime in white suburbs? people will do what it takes to survive, and when its as easy as going to our steady jobs to make a living

So you are saying that there is no other viable solution to their situation and poverty level other than robbing and stealing? Go ahead and give someone else an excuse, usually that is all people need not to better themselves.

Racial Diversity exemplifies itself in our colleges. Another thing i believe that brings up hostility between cultures is the governments handouts. I know i have student loans out the a$$, while others will graduate with the same degree as me scott free of debt.

jason

no, im saying if i was stuck in a place like that since birth, i dont think i would be any different. i would probably steal, sell drugs and all that shit to actually have something i could call mine. whether it be hooptie or the months rent. i agree with flips comments here. yes there are opportunities, but if you dont know about them, its as if there never were.

I think it is the responsibility of those better off to communicate those opportunities to those who are blinded from them because of percieved socio-economic barriers.

 

[dbman150 5,000+ posts]

we gave the kings money and in return we brought you to a better country gave food and shelter for work. not saying that was the right thing to do

 

[thegreatestpenn 5,000+ posts]

Explain the rapid industrialization of the Northeast around the turn of the century? Explain of rapid innovation in the divison of labor in our factories....the value is created by the division of wealth. Henry Ford's ideas of division of labor by the moving assembly line (not the assembly line in which he is often given credit for, developed by Oldsmobile 20 years prior) was not based on the slave trade...Silicon Valley was not based on the slave trade. The moving assembly line which revolutioned and propogated the industrial revolution is based off how they slaughter animals in the Chicago Stock Yards...and had little to do with the effeciencies (or lack thereof) of the plantation system. I would argue that slave labor actually set us back as the incentive to innovate mechanically is limited because of the artifical low price of labor. Had labor been correctly priced, producers would be forced to innovate with greater vigor.
To say that wealth in America today is based on the slave trade of suspect at least. How do you explain the wealth provided in industries not connected to slavery? Furthermore, in countries where people work as near-slaves, wouldn't they experience even greater capital abundance than in the United States? Economically, slavery is good for none of the agents. It is a temporary crutch for those not creative enough to compete.

actually its easy to explain. Without a need for doing menial agricultural labor, there was time to invent all the great inventions of the industrial age. Where do you think Northerners got their food from? Farms. Who worked most farms? slaves. If you don't have to physically plant and cultivate your food you can do something else. Besides, you are mentioning things that came about way after slavery was over and the industrial revolution had already taken place. Besides, slave labor was more than just working in southern fields. If you don't have to cook, clean, or watch your kids, you have plenty of time on your hands to do other things. And when you don't have to pay for that labor, even better. That's why people had slaves, to do what they didn't want to do or were not able to do. Why do you think there are so many colleges in America? people had nothing to do with all the slaves doing menial labor so they had time to educate themselves and not only work great jobs, but create all kinds of inventions that are used today.

 

[Flipx99 5,000+ posts]

actually its easy to explain. Without a need for doing menial agricultural labor, there was time to invent all the great inventions of the industrial age. Where do you think Northerners got their food from? Farms. Who worked most farms? slaves. If you don't have to physically plant and cultivate your food you can do something else. Besides, you are mentioning things that came about way after slavery was over and the industrial revolution had already taken place. Besides, slave labor was more than just working in southern fields. If you don't have to cook, clean, or watch your kids, you have plenty of time on your hands to do other things. And when you don't have to pay for that labor, even better. That's why people had slaves, to do what they didn't want to do or were not able to do. Why do you think there are so many colleges in America? people had nothing to do with all the slaves doing menial labor so they had time to educate themselves and not only work great jobs, but create all kinds of inventions that are used today.

Even the father of the cotton gin claims that neccessity is the mother of invention. Furthermore, many of the inventions that pushed the Industrial Revolution were invented by common people without a college education.

Ask any farmer which would they rather have, a combine or 1,000 slaves...they'd much rather have the combine. A combine is far cheaper in the long run to maintain and is more effecient. The South's reliance on slave labor is part of the reason they lost the Civil War. They simply were not as productive.

You argument that inventions of the industrial revolution only holds water if you can prove a causal relationship between the ownership of slaves and the propensity of one to invent. You can't because there is a statistically significant (hell even a a p-value of .10) relationship between the two.

As for the college comment, explain how the "best" colleges are located in states that held slaves for the briefest period of time.

For example:

School , State , Years allowed slavery before development of institution

Penn PA 101

Harvard MA 7

Dartmouth NH 124

Yale CT 62

Brown RI 112

Cornell/Columbia NY 239/128

Princeton NJ 119

See, the numbers are all over the place. And if you want to count early southen states such as North Carolina (Wake Forest), Tennessee (Vanderbilt), and Floria (Miami) you argument looks even worse.

I think you have been doing too much listening to philosophy and not enough math to back it up.

 

[97gp 5,000+ posts]

 

[thegreatestpenn 5,000+ posts]

Even the father of the cotton gin claims that neccessity is the mother of invention. Furthermore, many of the inventions that pushed the Industrial Revolution were invented by common people without a college education.
Ask any farmer which would they rather have, a combine or 1,000 slaves...they'd much rather have the combine. A combine is far cheaper in the long run to maintain and is more effecient. The South's reliance on slave labor is part of the reason they lost the Civil War. They simply were not as productive.

You argument that inventions of the industrial revolution only holds water if you can prove a causal relationship between the ownership of slaves and the propensity of one to invent. You can't because there is a statistically significant (hell even a a p-value of .10) relationship between the two.

As for the college comment, explain how the "best" colleges are located in states that held slaves for the briefest period of time.

For example:

School , State , Years allowed slavery before development of institution

Penn PA 101

Harvard MA 7

Dartmouth NH 124

Yale CT 62

Brown RI 112

Cornell/Columbia NY 239/128

Princeton NJ 119

See, the numbers are all over the place. And if you want to count early southen states such as North Carolina (Wake Forest), Tennessee (Vanderbilt), and Floria (Miami) you argument looks even worse.

I think you have been doing too much listening to philosophy and not enough math to back it up.

One person's claim that necessity is the father of invention doesn't hold weight either. That's one person's philosophy (something you just said I shouldn't be looking at). Most inventions are found because there is time to come up with them. Need is a factor, but if there is no time to develop something that is needed then it cannot and will not be developed. You know why the cotton gin could be created? Because the inventor wasn't on the field picking cotton. He had TIME to come up with the invention. You think the inventor of the locomotive was spending his time transporting things here and there? no of course not. In order for ideas to be cultivated and developed there needs to be TIME to do it. Slave labor provided that time. I will say that slavery itself was not the only cause for the time being there, but how many people had hired help in those times? Most would rather have slaves because they were cheaper. We still see this today. Why does all these 3rd world countries make everything in wal-mart? Labor is cheap and its cheaper to have it made there and shipped here than to make it in the US.

As for the education aspect, don't just look at where the best schools are or enrollment. If you want to look at numbers, look at where these students came from. not only that, but who is paying for them to go to school and what industry supported their family. School enrollment does not paint a clear picture. AS I said initially, in all things, every aspect must be considered. Every student at Yale was not from the north. Even if they were, I'm sure some of those students were able to go there because their parents had a business that benefited from slave labor. So here is a scenario: A student's parents is able to send them to Harvard because they have the means to do so. They have the means because the father is part of a flourishing export business for cotton lets say in New York. The cotton is shipped from Alabama plantations that just so happen to use slave labor. Now you could say "well the father isn't the one with the slaves" but he is still benefiting. If the labor for picking that cotton was paid say hourly, it would cost much more for the New York business to pay for hurting prophets and making the exporter not as wealthy. Lack of wealth and their son may not be able to go to college because he needs to get a job. So instead of going to harvard and being able to learn and growing intellectually to be creative and prosperous in a white collar industry, the child has to dig into the real world and start working most-likely a blue collar job to get the bills paid. Its all related

Now understand something, I'm not pointing the finger at anyone or anything directly. I am simply saying lets look at the bigger picture. Look at my original post, I blame Africans just as much as anyone else for the African slave trade. But at the same time, if there was no need for slaves (need being created by europeans, persians, and asians, etc) then the slave trade wouldn't have happened. Its all connected. The reason people get up in arms about this kind of issue is because they want to place blame or justify injustice. When all the info is out there its better to just learn from history's mistakes than dwell on the past and be mad about it. Being human, we have the capacity to learn from our missteps. The more we do that, the more we as a whole will get along and grow. But turning a blind eye to the whole picture only stunts our growth as humans and the past inevitably repeats itself.

 

[Flipx99 5,000+ posts]

I am not going to quote you, not out of disrespect, but out of conciseness.

I see your point that slavery provided the "time" for invention, I never considered this as mich before as I am now. If that is the case, wouldn't there be more inventions during slavery then afterwards, even adjusting for lags (ie meaning that slavery's direct benefits lasted longer than the institution itself"

For your argument to hold, wouldn't there have to be a greater influx of innovation during the period of slavery, than after or before? Or are you arguing that the brief period of time (in the grand scheme of things, US Slave Trade was brief...300 years is not very much time) slave trade existed allowed enought TIME to set in motion a seemingly pepetual chain of events that create greater disparity between those with TIME and those without. Intuitively, there is some validity to this claim. Consider the widening of the gap between the rich and the poor...it continues to widen...is this a function of this TIME...perhaps, there really is something to think about there. I typically consider this widening due to access to capital and perpetually increasing social opportunity...ie once you befriend one rich banker, it is far easier to befriend another...thus exponentially increasing your social class, thus access to capital and opportunities.

My argument is an empiracal one. It is not related to the North American slave trade specifically. My argument is that slavery hurts an economy in the long run due to its reliance on cheap slave labor versus being forced to innovate and industrialize....as it cheaper to purchase a slave than develop the combine. But only in the short run.

This argument is also relevant today in two ways, one our reliance on crude oil as an energy source and our dependance on foreign labor to manufacture goods. I honestly believe that cheap crude for much of the century has stifled our progress toward innovation to alternative eneregy uses, just as cheap labor in China has stifled our progress and innovation in the manufacturing on consumer goods.

But this TIME...perhaps there is something valuable there. But that begs the question...it seems that cheap Chinese labor allows us more TIME, ie I only have to spend 30 minutes of my workday to earn enough money to buy a shirt...thus allowing more TIME for other things. What are we, as society, doing with this TIME? I think I am, to put it crassly, sitting on my ***...instead of trying to compete.

 

[thegreatestpenn 5,000+ posts]

I think we are on the same page now. I too find your arguments very valid. I just wanted to clear up some things, the main being the time issue. the crazy thing with time is how its used. YOu would think that since we have such advancements and luxuries today we as humans would be doing better. But with advancement also comes complacency. Most people are comfortable enough with how things are going that they don't feel the need to come up with more advancements. And others still are not able to because they are too busy working. And others are just too lazy to make a difference. For instance, I bet if more people were diagnosed with cancer, say 50% of the population, there would be a greater urgency to find a cure (same thing happened with the flu virus). Same thing with industry. If things are comfortable for most people, the creativity and inventive spirit usually goes down. You know why we're having an oil crisis right now? because people are comfortable with the modern automobile. We could be doing much better, but nobody wants to take the time to create something better. We have become complacent with cars. I know I wandered off the slavery subject, but its all related.

 

[Flipx99 5,000+ posts]

I think we are on the same page now. I too find your arguments very valid. I just wanted to clear up some things, the main being the time issue. the crazy thing with time is how its used. YOu would think that since we have such advancements and luxuries today we as humans would be doing better. But with advancement also comes complacency. Most people are comfortable enough with how things are going that they don't feel the need to come up with more advancements. And others still are not able to because they are too busy working. And others are just too lazy to make a difference. For instance, I bet if more people were diagnosed with cancer, say 50% of the population, there would be a greater urgency to find a cure (same thing happened with the flu virus). Same thing with industry. If things are comfortable for most people, the creativity and inventive spirit usually goes down. You know why we're having an oil crisis right now? because people are comfortable with the modern automobile. We could be doing much better, but nobody wants to take the time to create something better. We have become complacent with cars. I know I wandered off the slavery subject, but its all related.

It is very related....

I find it amazing how we come to very similar conclusions from completely different angles. It reminds me of arguing with my girlfriend...

 

[thegreatestpenn 5,000+ posts]

that's what life is all about, we're all different and we need other people's points of view to broaden our mind. We're communal beings for a reason, if we all thought the same life would be quite boring

 

[tsenfw 10+ year member]

Nice to see a civil intellectual discussion on a touchy subject on ca.com.

I'm gonna pop in and add my opinion. I think you two are forgetting one thing though. Technology is theorized to be exponential. It's quite an assumption to argue either way whether slavery sped up innovation or not. Especially with no data to back it up. Another thing to think about is slave owners of the time were at least well off if not wealthy. If the slave trade were not present they may not have been as wealthy but they certainly wouldn't have been working in the fields themselves. They would have found other less cheap labor like they had done before slavery. So debating about free time to invent is really a moot point.

 

[Flipx99 5,000+ posts]

Nice to see a civil intellectual discussion on a touchy subject on ca.com.
I'm gonna pop in and add my opinion. I think you two are forgetting one thing though. Technology is theorized to be exponential. It's quite an assumption to argue either way whether slavery sped up innovation or not. Especially with no data to back it up. Another thing to think about is slave owners of the time were at least well off if not wealthy. If the slave trade were not present they may not have been as wealthy but they certainly wouldn't have been working in the fields themselves. They would have found other less cheap labor like they had done before slavery. So debating about free time to invent is really a moot point.

The data is there, just too time consuming to research for free.

One might posit the question as follows:

Is there a structural shift in the number of patents granted after the instution of slavery in America?

Furthermore, I think the effect slavery had on innovation is a perfectly legitamate topic for discussion.

Concerning wealth, we were not discussing the merits of owning slaves as increasing wealth, we were discussing did it afford slave owners (and other benefactors) time to invent. I argue that they sat on their *****, he argues the used this time for intellectual growth. How and where would the find this cheap labor? Early experimentation of the slavery of Native Americans proved they were unfit for hard slave labor? Enslave other whites...hard to do very long...the fact that blacks are "different" provides some legitamacy to the institution.

 

[thegreatestpenn 5,000+ posts]

Nice to see a civil intellectual discussion on a touchy subject on ca.com.
I'm gonna pop in and add my opinion. I think you two are forgetting one thing though. Technology is theorized to be exponential. It's quite an assumption to argue either way whether slavery sped up innovation or not. Especially with no data to back it up. Another thing to think about is slave owners of the time were at least well off if not wealthy. If the slave trade were not present they may not have been as wealthy but they certainly wouldn't have been working in the fields themselves. They would have found other less cheap labor like they had done before slavery. So debating about free time to invent is really a moot point.

I wouldn't say time is a moot point, more that its only one factor in a much bigger picture. Slave-based businesses had great prophet margins because the lowest level of work essentially free. There was an initial payment for the slaves (like we pay for equipment today) and nothing else, just some scheduled maintenance in the form of food. When a business makes big prophets, they stick to what they're doing, they don't rock the boat until the prophets go down. These places were building capital so the money was there to do other things with their time. Young lads were afforded the opportunity to go to school and educate themselves. Education produced great thought and ideas leading to great innovations in all walks of life. So its a chain of events. If the slave-based businesses weren't making any money, nobody would have done them. Or if the prophet margins weren't high enough, they would not have wanted to supply the demand and (as we see now with walmart) the demand would have had to have been supplied somewhere other than america. But since the prophet margins were so high, the americans as a society were able to bring a lot of money into this country.

 

[IamDeMan 5,000+ posts]

Bring back the racists because this thread got way too technical too fast. In fact just lock it.