[Samseau]

(06-18-2014 01:04 PM)Tuthmosis Wrote:  

Quote:

3. THIS COUNTRY WAS BUILT ON SLAVERY

Yeesh, this old trope. Some rich Southerners had slaves. Then there was a civil war and America’s bank account dropped to zero. After that the country was rebuilt from scratch without slavery. As Pat Buchanan put it, we didn’t start slavery. We ended it. And don’t get me started on reparations. We’ve already paid them.

To see slavery as a institution only benefiting the direct owners is short-sighted, historically inaccurate, and--frankly--stupid. Northern banks, insurance companies, and shipping companies--for starters--were built and indeed thrived on financing, insuring, and transporting massive cotton exports grown and picked by Southern slaves. The entire Southern economy was structured around its agricultural production of cash crops. The South's selective notion of "states' rights"--for instance, simultaneously asserting its right to not be held to federal tariffs but then demanding a national fugitive slave law--was directly related to slavery and was a major factor in precipitating the Civil War. This is to say nothing of a social hierarchy in which a permanent, and immovable, underclass benefits even the poorest and lowliest members of the greater society by always having someone who is "below" them.

Nothing is more dangerous and irritating than a partially educated person. McGinnis gets several things wrong in this list, using several half thought-out premises to support his "conclusions." He should stick to what he knows.

This is the kind of shit that discredits red-pill writing. It makes all of our assertions sound as half-baked and ignorant.

If I were McInnes, I would have just pointed out that slavery was used, but it wasn't necessary. Fact of the matter is that slaves are less economically productive than regular indentured servants or just poor farm hands. I cannot find the source right now, but during my Lincoln seminar in Grad school one of the more interesting things I learned was that Kansas was divided between being half-slave, half-free, and the free side was far more economically prosperous than the slave side.

In fact, the north had plenty of farm land that produced cash crops, on top of all the other trade and commerce. Slavery is an insanely expensive, inefficient system that produces very little wealth - except for the slaveholders. The fact of slavery's terrible economic efficacy is why the South lost to the North - because the North was just far more rich and prosperous. This was also the case in the Peloponnesian War - the slaver Spartans could not keep up with the less-slaver Athenians.

So McInnes is correct - the USA was NOT built on slavery. Slavery was holding the USA back from becoming a true economic superpower. Slavery was part of the aristocratic southern class that kept their power entrenched over other poor whites while fueling hatred and racism toward the slave class. It bred ignorance and poverty not just for blacks, but for everyone involved.