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History is embarassing

Having a 1/50 chance of escape.

I guess you missed the several instances where I wrote something like this; "...the idea of escape is so alien to them that they will not make the attempt even when their captors are not in the vicinity."

The idea that all the slaves in the UK are sitting around taking comfort from some vague statistical titbit that they could not possibly know about in the first place is too ridiculous for words.
 
I guess you missed the several instances where I wrote something like this; "...the idea of escape is so alien to them that they will not make the attempt even when their captors are not in the vicinity."

The idea that all the slaves in the UK are sitting around taking comfort from some vague statistical titbit that they could not possibly know about in the first place is too ridiculous for words.

I didn't suggest that they were taking comfort in it. I suggested that it's an objective fact that someone who has a 1/50 chance of escape is better off than someone who doesn't, regardless of whether or not they are aware of that chance.
 
I didn't suggest that they were taking comfort in it. I suggested that it's an objective fact that someone who has a 1/50 chance of escape is better off than someone who doesn't, regardless of whether or not they are aware of that chance.

I refer you back to my original statement and conclude.

Pretty much equivalent as far as the victims are concerned, yes.
 
Pretty much equivalent as far as the victims are concerned

Even if so, quite different in terms of understanding the history of a country where legal slavery was one of the driving forces for revolution and demographic change. After all, the context of this discussion is American History being taught to 10 and 11 year olds.
 
To the victim of a random senseless murder, the effect (being like all dead and stuff) is pretty much the same as it is to the victim of state sponsored miscarriages of justice such as Joe Hill's execution or any number of other politically motivated murders.

Nicole Brown Simpson is just as dead as Joe Hill. The point is that society, except in the loosest terms, could not have prevented the former, but we can do something about the latter.

Criminals dealing in people traffic are willfully breaking the law(s). This is quite different from state-authorized chattel slavery and licensed people-breeding programs as the USA had in the early 19th century.
 
Yeah, thanks FMW, we were going pretty far afield there. The point really is that while slavery as it exists today is a very meaningful issue whose relevance (in my opinion) is under appreciated, it is a very different issue from slavery as it existed as an institution.

And the fact that it is no longer sponsored by the state is a real and important advance.
 
Yeah, thanks FMW, we were going pretty far afield there. The point really is that while slavery as it exists today is a very meaningful issue whose relevance (in my opinion) is under appreciated, it is a very different issue from slavery as it existed as an institution.

And the fact that it is no longer sponsored by the state is a real and important advance.

To progress from the previous circular argument, whilst slavery is not legal anywhere in the world there are many countries in which it is legal for all practical purposes, some of whom are friends the West, e.g. Saudi Arabia. Slavery occurs with the full knowledge of the authorities. Escaping from slavery in Saudi won't do you much good, you'd simply be punished for having no documents then sent back to your masters.
 
To progress from the previous circular argument, whilst slavery is not legal anywhere in the world there are many countries in which it is legal for all practical purposes, some of whom are friends the West, e.g. Saudi Arabia. Slavery occurs with the full knowledge of the authorities. Escaping from slavery in Saudi won't do you much good, you'd simply be punished for having no documents then sent back to your masters.
Does that mean that if the authorities in Saudi Arabia were overthrown, and replaced by a more democratic administration committed to the suppression of slavery, which didn't send slaves back to their masters, that would make no difference?
 
Does that mean that if the authorities in Saudi Arabia were overthrown, and replaced by a more democratic administration committed to the suppression of slavery, which didn't send slaves back to their masters, that would make no difference?

What?
 
In this context I referred specifically to pre-1861 Russian peasants and pre-1799 Scottish coal miners, whose status as chattels is doubtful, but who were certainly under legal and other constraint in the matter of leaving their employment. They were slaves.
Yes, serfdom and indenture are regarded as forms of slavery. Chattel slavery is just the most far-reaching and most clear-cut subclass of various forms of slavery.

Well, I'm not a teacher (although the rest of my family were) but I'm a great believer in setting the scene before looking at the detail. This may be simply an awareness of the broader picture, it doesn't need to be a three week course, but I maintain it should be done.
I disagree. First of all, this was an American history class.

Secondly, as this thread shows, the concept of what slavery is and implies is not straightforward and uniform. If you want to discuss with 10/11 years old what slavery is, it's far easier to take the chattel slavery of the South as a starting point; that's a clear-cut case, and they may have already read about it in novels like Uncle Tom or Huck Finn. From that, you can discuss other forms like serfdom, or indenture (Jacob and Laban?), or illegal slavery as it's still present today.
 
Yeah, thanks FMW, we were going pretty far afield there. The point really is that while slavery as it exists today is a very meaningful issue whose relevance (in my opinion) is under appreciated, it is a very different issue from slavery as it existed as an institution.

And the fact that it is no longer sponsored by the state is a real and important advance.

well said
 
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