You can be moral without being radical. It's just the radical ones that stand out.

Iraq and Afghanistan have nothing to do with American ideals as much as they do the $$$$ but I agree with the sentiment...

Malcolm X was largely muzzled by a Nation of Islam that did not want to get involved in politics, and after his break from the NOI, he spent most of his final year of life hiding away in Africa. There is no denying Malcolm X's incredible charisma and oratory skills, but his actual impact in the civil rights struggle was minimal compared to King's.

The main question here, Atom, is whether certain situations, if they are extreme enough, require radicalism.

Certainly William Lloyd Garrison was closer to the right thing to do than John C. Calhoun or some asshole like that. But did he go far enough?

There are a litany of angles to ponder this from. John Brown's legacy is still muddy in my mind.. from y'all's discussion I doubt it will be cleared up soon. But I still think from a certain angle you can argue that he was the only sane white in America back then.

Just as you can't really fault the Native Americans for raiding settlers' homesteads, can we really fault John Brown? Isn't he really just a failed Spartacus? Do we also condemn Spartacus? I certainly don't. It's instructive to look at similar examples that are further removed.

Tangent: I'm extremely curious what educated slave-holders thought of Spartacus, and of Rome's slavery in general.

Spartacus is a fascinating tale, but I think his actions were different from Brown's. John Brown had the right idea, in that slavery is morally wrong and must be ended, however he lost any claim to morality by hacking up innocent people with broadswords for their political beliefs at Pottawatomie Creek. This was a punishment that certainly did not suit the crime of agreeing with slavery.

They were slavery supporters, weren't they? And wasn't in a battle situation? I'd hesitate to call them innocent.

It was a hugely difficult problem, which the best minds of the era had trouble dealing with. The Founders couldn't figure out how to extricate the American economy from the institution of slavery, and neither could any of the brilliant men of the following generation--Clay, Webster, et al. Lincoln's brilliance lay in finding a path that both ended slavery and preserved the Union. The Civil War was a huge catastrophe, and yet there are so many ways that US history could have gone much worse.

I don't mean to put words in your mouth so I will equivocate - if you are saying that it was alright for the Founders not to abolish slavery because they couldn't figure a way to end it without undermining the economy, then fuck that.

Economics is just not a concern if you are talking about enslavement. If it meant that the crops would've rotted in the fields, so be it.

But since it's counter-factual it's better not to get into that. Suffice to say that the founding fathers' hands are not clean even if they expressed private misgivings about the institution. That is no excuse for doing nothing.

Let's crash the nation's economy, oh wait, yeah, the southern states wouldn't have stood for that, so the Union would have been dead at birth. The newborn nation would have become divided and never NEVER would have achieved anything. It would have fallen under the sway of European powers and would never have seen growth, would have been militarized and nothing close to freedom. The blacks of the south, if they didn't die in slave uprisings or incessant warfare, would never have seen emancipation.

Does that sound like a better outcome?

Exactly what I was saying earlier, dip... slavery may not have been right but it was a part of the economy that was necessary for the beginning of this nation. It's not like I agree with how it was done, nor did anyone ever say I agreed with the result, but the facts are there.

I'd like to bring up something about slavery that is rarely mentioned.

Slavery doesn't have to involve racism. In fact, in colonial America, a decent percentage of slaves and indentured servants were White. People didn't necessarily look down on slaves and they certainly weren't racists. There were free Blacks and no one seemed to mind. It wasn't until later Blacks started to be viewed as inferior and slavery became synonymous with Blacks.

Now, I'm not saying slavery isn't wrong, but the particularly evil version of slavery that took hold of the US is something different.

Yeah I'm aware WHY they did what they did lol, and that in their political context they did not have the ability to appease them.

This is getting back to my idea that you could say John Brown was the only sane one... the fact that the founders were even in the same room with slave owners treating them as if nothing was wrong smells of something in the first place.

Think of it instead from this perspective - you are born in colonial America - you learn what slavery is. Now it is up to you to have the moral intuition to realize: "Hey! That is really fucked up. That needs to stop right now. I'm going to do whatever I have to do to get that to stop."

So it's not a question of could they have formed the union, it's more a question of - why weren't they advocating against slavery as a full time job, or earning money to buy slaves and free them, or fomenting insurrection?

They don't get a pass. The blame game is pretty useless of course. They don't get a pass in the same way somebody who lived a valley over from Auschwitz doesn't. It's guilt by inaction.

In closing dipplayer, I ask you re-read Dr. King's quote with your excusals of the founders in mind:

"First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"""

"They don't get a pass in the same way somebody who lived a valley over from Auschwitz doesn't. It's guilt by inaction."

What exactly are you saying? Storming Auschwitz would not only be suicide, it would have accomplished nothing. Do you understand what Poland was like during WWII?

You're smarter than this, Thucy.

There is a time for the "damn the torpedoes" approach. There is a time to be a martyr, to fight against the system, no matter what the cost. But there is also a time for moderation, for sober judgment, and for careful calculation. I know when I was younger, I shared your desire to jump on the barricades and set the world ablaze. But thank goodness the firebrands aren't always in charge. They usually make a mess of things. Seriously, you're a poli-sci guy. Surely you've looked at the different revolutions of history.

Also, do you deal with normal human beings on a daily basis? You know, smelly, dishonest, lustful, selfish human beings? Do you overlook the foibles of your fellow humans, or do you demand perfection from everyone you associate with?

Wasn't saying they should storm Auschwitz lol not sure where you got that idea.

Join the resistance maybe though. Or try to work there to undermine or infiltrate it. Etc.

This is about ethics... so yes perfection is the ideal. Duh?

I'm not saying the "set the world ablaze" approach is always right. I would have thought *you'd* have been smart enough to see that I am not saying that, from my previous posts.

I am specifically talking about the case of American chattel slavery.

To prove to you that I'm not some kind of terrorist... or whatever you're implying, I'll give you a concrete example - I think it's an embarrassment and an outrage that there are people in the United States who must go hungry because of the demonization of the SNAP program. It's a huge problem - the idea that anyone in this country would be going hungry is repugnant to my idea of what a society, especially one this affluent, should be.

But you don't see me storming the grocery store and looting it for food.. or something. That's not how to fix that problem.

But let's change the picture a bit - now we're in North Korea, where people are systematically starved. There is no scope for peaceful reform, like there is in the SNAP case. So, consistent with the means available to me, I would agree with, advocate for, or participate in (again, consistent with the means) an attempt by the North Korean people to rebel and kill their masters, similar to the way I would have felt about a successful American slave revolt.

To the extent that, say, there is, was, will be, or could be a "John Brown" figure in the North Korean government, who does what John Brown did, with similar results, I say good on him.

Do you see what I mean now?

And saying "humans are imperfect" as an excuse for associating with slaveholders is a huge oversight.

I tolerate many, even most of people's imperfections, of course. But if I found myself in a situation where I realized someone I know is a human trafficker... you don't "tolerate" that in the name of stability. I'm shocked you think that's somehow excusable.

Again, the founding fathers thing is really not worth talking about because it's counterfactual. The point I was making though is there - they, along with just about everyone from back then, were complicit in a horrible thing, and should not ever be completely absolved of historical blame. This is like 8th grade American history - everyone my age knows Thomas Jefferson and George Washington et al were dirty rotten slave-owners, but the picture is mixed because though they did that, their actions also led to the country we love today.

I can condemn my ancestors who pushed Native Americans off the land I grew up on without forsaking the idea that I love that same land - a similar idea to the above.

No, perfection is not the ideal in ethics. That's where you are wrong. The Perfect can be the enemy of the Good. And in this world, if humans achieve the Good, that's doing extremely well.

Maybe I'll respond more in the morning, but I don't think I am getting my point across.

If you ask me, any ethical standard that does not rise above what people actually do is completely uninspiring. Morals are meant to spur us to do better and to show us where we fall short.

And perfection is simply described as meeting a moral standard, isn't it? So I don't see what you mean, distinguishing "good" and "perfect".

It's an old saying, "Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good." It means to not be so determined to see perfection in human endeavors that we fail to recognize the good that is there, the good that has been accomplished. It's a recognition of reality. Yes, the Ideals we have are there to spur us on. I have argued here that Absolute Goodness is real, but I also have argued that ours is an imperfect world, that we cannot achieve paradise here, no matter our efforts. It's not punishing ourselves when we fall short, as we will.

In another vein, and I'm sure to catch hell for this: Comparing American chattel slavery to North Korea's inhumanity is a failure of historical knowledge and perspective. Yes, the idea that some human beings are the property of others is wrong, and slavery was a great evil. Lincoln acknowledged in his Second Inaugural that America paid dearly for the offense of slavery, in the great trauma of the Civil War. But many slaveowners were humane. I just finished reading Andrew Jackson's biography, and I visited his home, The Hermitage. The slaves were members of the family--such as the nurse to the children, or Jackson's trusted and devoted manservant, Alfred (who is buried very near him). Jackson's slaves were allowed to form families, and had many children. I don't think Jackson was unique in all this. None of it makes slavery right, but it also is markedly different from the crushing inhumanity of North Korea or other similar regimes.

Unfortunately, slavery was nearly essential to establishing the southern colonies--the cheap labor was vital to the tobacco and cotton production, and the norms of the time saw Africans as a lesser human race. These are unpleasant truths, but there they are. Again, we have to deal with reality, not what we'd like the world to be. Once the system was in place, do you really think the best outcome would have been a revolt? You really think a Haiti writ large in the Southern US would be preferable? You really believe that the Northern whites would have gone along with that? Again, I feel you are ignoring actual history and preferring your idealized version. What would have been the situation in the South after your righteous revolt? Would the blacks and whites have lived together in peace? How? In what way would racial relations have better in that scenario, than they were under the reality in which Northern whites were the ones to dismantle the institution?

Seriously, Thucy, read some Alternative Histories. Use your imagination. And quit demanding that the world conform to your ideas. It won't. You're just going to get frustrated. Take it from an old guy who did the same when he was a young man.

@Thucy

Joining the resistance likely meant you'd die as well. I don't think it's right to judge the weakest and most vulnerable for their inaction.

In this modern age, why does location matter at all? Are you working 24/7 to liberate North Korea? No. And yet, I wouldn't consider you an amoral person.

Does anyone else find it profoundly ironic that Tolstoy, the supposed guardian of liberty and the bane of oppression consistently defends the most oppressive institution in our nations history?

Can you please point out in this thread where I "defend the most oppressive institution in our nations history"?

"In another vein, and I'm sure to catch hell for this:"

Fucks right you will, because it is an inane and disgusting misrepresentation of history made by someone with obviously little grasp on it.

"But many slaveowners were humane."

Humane, define humane? Is humane concocting a system that through oppression gives a human being no other choice but to cede any sliver of freedom he is entitled to? I assume by Humane you mean refrain from the use of the lash and of violence. Some might have been able to truly claim this although much fewer actually practiced it than actually did. Southern Patriarchy, after all was hardly based in fact but in a giant societal circle jerk that allowed men who enslaved others to feel as though they were performing a service.

But lets pretend that your wildly presumptive statement is true. Does sparing the lash make slavery at any level humane. If Alfred, that devoted manservant (with a master so devoted he kept him as a slave his whole life) had tried to run away, what would have happened to him? What would have happened if the slaves refused to work. Thankfully history is not all conjectures and fantasy's that idiots like you dream up, history is documented as it is at this link.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/48645995/Andrew-Jackson-describes-a-necessary-flogging-of-a-runaway-slave-1823

"Cyrus began gradually toretreat, M
r
Parsons says he saw from his conduct he meant to run & thought he would seize him,made the attemp, Cyrus avaded his grasp & runaway. M
r
Parsons assures me he had nothingmore in view than to let him know he must obey – this he must be taught to, or he is worthnothing to you, & still less to me, & it is such an example as cannot be tolerated by me, it wouldruin all my Negroes; but one thing you may rest assured of, Cyrus shall not be abused, but hemust be taught subordination & this Mr Parsons will do

~Andrew Jackson 1823, describing why flogging is necessary.

So humane, much like the runaway ads he posted or the militias he led to intimidate slaves from resisting their masters and by extension the power of the state. Jackson's Biography, and the Hermitage sold you a bill of goods, but then again, you were keen on buying it.

"ain, we have to deal with reality, not what we'd like the world to be. Once the system was in place, do you really think the best outcome would have been a revolt? You really think a Haiti writ large in the Southern US would be preferable? You really believe that the Northern whites would have gone along with that? Again, I feel you are ignoring actual history and preferring your idealized version. What would have been the situation in the South after your righteous revolt? Would the blacks and whites have lived together in peace? How? In what way would racial relations have better in that scenario, than they were under the reality in which Northern whites were the ones to dismantle the institution? "

Your assumption in this line of questioning is that, of course, that there was never a large scale slave revolt in North America. If there was, your assumption continues, it would be like Haiti (you are more like a slaveowner than you know).

The truth is that you are completely wrong. There were 3 large scale slave revolts in the period from 1775-1865. The first lasted from 1776-1783, the second lasted from 1812-1815, the fourth lasted from 1862-1865. In all three of these revolts thousands of slaves revolted against the institution of slavery and fought for their freedom or supported the armies that did. There was no frenzy of massacres as you prognosticate, in fact most rebelled with their feet and did not turn to violence at all. Many did feel that force was necessary and supported or fought with the British or Union Armies against their former masters. However they rebelled they illustrated a simple truth. Where the coercive power of the slave holders was counteracted with another equal or greater power, Slaves in the south chose freedom in large numbers. It wasn't Haiti, it wasn't a race war, and when slave holders made it that it was blood on their hands, not the slaves.

In conclusion John Brown was a violent man, who used violence to combat a system predicated on violence and the threat of violence. Instead of demanding that Thucy learns his history, why don't you put down the Star-fucking Jackson Biography and stop listening to your tour guide at the hermitage and learn history your self.

"It's a good thing none of those evil 19th century white people believed that,"

Seems alot to me like you are mocking the idea that slave holders were morally responsible for what they do. For anyone keeping score, in Tolstoy's mind TSA employees are less redeemable figures than slaveholders. Then again in your mind I'm sure TSA bag checks are a more detestable institution than slavery

Let me know when you want to have a serious conversation, Santa. Good night!

Last time I tried to have a "serious conversation" with you you rejected it off hand twice, something like "anarchy is not lawlessness, and shame on you for suggesting so" when I had never suggested. So like others on this board (Krellin) I've classified you in the catagory where I hardly want any "serious conversation" because you are incapable of it. Instead I am quite content in exposing the ridiculous nature of your claims as you slink away. Good Night!