EDIT: I think I misstated myself. I’m going to be crossing some stuff out.
But they did though. Robert E Lee, Jefferson Davis, Alexander H Stephens, plus countless slaveowners all just… surrendered, and went back to owning the exact same plantations their slaveowning had provided the startup capital for.
Was it right? Hell no! Their plantations should have been given to their slaves. We would live in a better country if they had.
But it’s worth repeating that people who blew out their chest and blustered about how it was better to die than to lose this fight just went right back to comfortable lives after a heinous, sadistic, brutal form of capital exploitation was abolished right out from under them.
If you can abolish slavery without killing Dolly Sumner Lint or Jefferson Davis, then it stands to reason that even after sending Pinkertons, cops, and bootlickers to die by the thousands, [EDIT: at least some of] these billionaires will surrender at the first sign of blood on their doorstep.
Meaning you can abolish capital without killing Jamie Johnson OR Jeff Bezos.
[EDIT: Meaning, in the course of abolishing capital, you will not necessarily need to kill every, single Jamie Johnson and every, single Jeff Bezos.]
Which in turn means the killing of those particular people – [EDIT: those who surrender] – ends up peripheral at best.
They [EDIT: At least some of them] will not throw their bodies in front of the bullets aimed at their orphan killing machines.
As much closure as they would bring, as good as that would feel. [EDIT: Not all of them will make it that easy.] It’s just not going to happen.
And then, at that point – when they have surrendered – it’s like torturing a serial killer. We gain nothing. It doesn’t bring anyone back to life. It doesn’t put the aerosolized carbon back underground or bring the temperature back to livable levels. It doesn’t give back all of the years robbed from people by stressed and missed medical treatments. All it does is introduce a little bit more pain to the world.
Again: at best.
At worst it could potentially set a precedent that anyone perceived as “aligned” with billionaires deserves the same death inflicted on those billionaires.
In other words, at worst, it could turn the person holding the guillotine into the de facto capitalist controlling all of the factories, all of the land, and all of the equipment single-handedly. Because who is going to stop them? Anyone who challenges that person can be easily labeled a “reactionary capitalist counter-revolutionary” and punished according to that label.
Yes. And it’s horrible! And we should have done more!
We should – like I said – have stripped property from the slaveowners. They surrendered unconditionally! The North could have done with them as it liked.
It should have confiscated the property of everyone who profited from slavery prior to the war, and given that property to the slaves. And yes, the North should have killed as many people (be they slaveowners or bootlickers) as was necessary to carry out that transfer of property.
Station troops on the plantations. Shoot everyone who shows up with torches to burn them down and deprive former slaves of their newfound wealth.
But what I’m trying to say is: no more than that number. No more killing than is absolutely necessary to achieve that goal.
We should be imagining Jeff Bezos in prison, not dead. You don’t want to make allies out of the people who want him dead. Those people are not good friends.
How do you think Jim Crow was established? With violence.
It was not simply due to congressional reconstruction that programmatic land reform wasn’t attempted in the south. People were actively pursuing campaigns of violence during reconstruction.
Perhaps because even after they lost the slaves they were still rich as fuck and powerful. And then they passed laws to still enslave black people and fuck them over so shit didn’t really change all that much. Think about how much better life would be today if every slave owner and klansman were put to death for their heinous crimes instead of slapped on the wrist and given back control of their slaves
You replied to my accidentally deleted comment (which probably isn’t deleted on your instance.) I really wish Liftoff didn’t put the edit button right next to the delete button. But oh well.
Did the children abuse and own slaves? No? Then who the fuck said kill the kids too. Imagine fucking defending slave owners and saying they don’t deserve to be out to death. Imagine defending the most evil atrocities imaginable. Do you think the Nazis shouldn’t have been put to death? Because the slave owners did worse than the Nazis ever did.
Edit: also no one fucking stepped aside. They fought a fucking war over it remember. You don’t get to start a war to enslave humans and then cry peace I surrender when you start to actually suffer the consequences.
Try defending black people like you defend slave owners.
I believe in life sentences, not death sentences. I would have been fine if the Nazis had been thrown in prison to serve non-commutable life sentences for their crimes. I would have preferred it.
But the entire reason the Civil War didn’t stick was because slaveowners kept their property. Not because they kept their lives.
who the fuck said kill the kids too
Dude. Their kids grew up and enslaved black people using “prisons” and Jim Crow laws. And they were able to do this because they wielded the power they inherited from their slaveowning parents. If you leave the kids this power, then you’re going to need to kill them eventually for committing the same crimes.
Just take away their power! Imprison as many of the slaveowners if you can. And then leave it at that.
The South surrendered unconditionally. If I had a time machine, and could influence the North’s decisions, I would take their property because that would actually accomplish something. But I would not take any more lives than were absolutely necessary.
Because I don’t want to be on the side that kills more people than is necessary.
I accidentally deleted my comment right after writing it. I’m going to write it again.
If you killed them, their property would have passed to their heirs.
Option 1: maybe you lack the tools to stop this inheritance. Maybe your only choice is to kill those heirs.
But to do so, you must now kill children. And crucially, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing children.
Your new country will be a vicious, cold, brutal place.
Option 2: you figure out some way to take control of the legal system enough to strip their heirs of their wealth without killing those heirs.
Now, you’ve got a tool that can be wielded to separate people from their property without killing them. Which makes the first killing (the killing of the parents) optional.
Once again, to kill those parents, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing when it has become optional.
The real solution with option 1 is to gain the power to make option 2 possible. The real solution with option 2 is to align yourself with those members of your movement who believe killing should be avoided whenever killing is optional.
I think the slaveowners of the south should have been stripped of their property. I think the plantations should have been given to the slaves as reparation.
I think klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But only use bullets when they show up with pitchforks to burn down one of these plantations newly transferred into black hands. Don’t go seeking out former slaveowners to kill. Just kill the ones currently trying to burn down the former plantation.
At any rate, you must make a choice between aligning yourself with people who err on the side of killing (even when it’s no longer necessary), and aligning yourself with people who err on the side of sparing lives (even when it causes problems.)
You don’t want to alienate the latter. You don’t want to give power to the former.
Deciding whether or not to kill people is not about who deserves death: it’s about choosing your allies. And you don’t want your allies to be the ones erring on the side of unnecessary violence.
if every slave owner and klansman were put to death for their heinous crimes
Their property would have passed to their heirs.
If your only available tool was killing people, then maybe you could have followed it up by killing their children?
But then you have to contend with the fact that your movement (and the people you have handed weapons to) are now a very specific subset of communists – “communists who are okay with killing children.” You can’t build a country off of that!
If on the other hand you have some way of stopping slaveowners’ heirs from receiving their fortunes without killing those heirs, then you clearly have some tool that can void the property of the slaveowners themselves without killing them.
Which means, once again, you are building a movement using people who are fine with killing the slaveowners despite possessing such a tool.
I’m other words, “people who are fine with killing when it’s no longer necessary.” After that, it’s no surprise when that movement starts blowing up a bunch of human beings who are members of Hungarian soviets – the very people the movement claims to protect – with tanks.
Yeah, I think their plantations should have been taken from them. Yeah, I think Klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But once you’re powerful enough to do that, you’re also powerful enough to do that without killing them.
If they throw their bodies in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine, don’t let that stop your bullets. But if they step aside, you have a choice: align yourself with people who kill when they don’t need to, or align yourself with people who avoid killing whenever possible.
Did the children abuse and own slaves? No? Then who the fuck said kill the kids too. Imagine fucking defending slave owners and saying they don’t deserve to be out to death. Imagine defending the most evil atrocities imaginable. Do you think the Nazis shouldn’t have been put to death? Because the slave owners did worse than the Nazis ever did.
Edit: also no one fucking stepped aside. They fought a fucking war over it remember. You don’t get to start a war to enslave humans and then cry peace I surrender when you start to actually suffer the consequences.
Try defending black people like you defend slave owners.
What an absurd sweeping generalization of incredibly complex events and context.
Just say you’re another bootlicker and get on with your life. Please oh PLEASE don’t hurt those that exclusively exist to make our lives worse keep us poor dumb and sick!!!
You sayin the French were fools? Fuck off with your neat little bow on top of a simple little “just threaten them and they will play nice”, life isn’t that simple, that’s not how this works, the civil war and what we have now is incomparable. These billionaires are international and actually play as a united team against us poors.
But yeah just a drop of blood and Bezos gives up his fortune and union breaking and insane net worth and lives a subservient life after that. Yeah that sounds realistic
Which expressed certainty in something that is uncertain. My bad. It might happen. Billionaires might throw themselves in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine when we open fire on that thing. My words were poorly chosen.
However, we still don’t want to alienate people who believe in sparing life whenever possible. (Those are the people whose side we always want to be on.) And we also still don’t want to align with people who believe in taking life even when it’s unnecessary. (Those are the people whose side you never want to be on.)
Be mindful of the movement you are building. Be mindful of the allies you are choosing.
Reconstruction was ended through assassination. This was hardly a resounding conclusion to slavery but a re-systemization of oppression. For starters, the slaves never received compensation, whole many of the previous slave owners did. Same goes for the GI Bill.
EDIT: I think I misstated myself. I’m going to be crossing some stuff out.
But they did though. Robert E Lee, Jefferson Davis, Alexander H Stephens, plus countless slaveowners all just… surrendered, and went back to owning the exact same plantations their slaveowning had provided the startup capital for.
Was it right? Hell no! Their plantations should have been given to their slaves. We would live in a better country if they had.
But it’s worth repeating that people who blew out their chest and blustered about how it was better to die than to lose this fight just went right back to comfortable lives after a heinous, sadistic, brutal form of capital exploitation was abolished right out from under them.
If you can abolish slavery without killing Dolly Sumner Lint or Jefferson Davis, then it stands to reason that even after sending Pinkertons, cops, and bootlickers to die by the thousands, [EDIT: at least some of] these billionaires will surrender at the first sign of blood on their doorstep.
Meaning you can abolish capital without killing Jamie Johnson OR Jeff Bezos.[EDIT: Meaning, in the course of abolishing capital, you will not necessarily need to kill every, single Jamie Johnson and every, single Jeff Bezos.]
Which in turn means the killing of those particular people – [EDIT: those who surrender] – ends up peripheral at best.
They[EDIT: At least some of them] will not throw their bodies in front of the bullets aimed at their orphan killing machines.As much closure as they would bring, as good as that would feel. [EDIT: Not all of them will make it that easy.]
It’s just not going to happen.And then, at that point – when they have surrendered – it’s like torturing a serial killer. We gain nothing. It doesn’t bring anyone back to life. It doesn’t put the aerosolized carbon back underground or bring the temperature back to livable levels. It doesn’t give back all of the years robbed from people by stressed and missed medical treatments. All it does is introduce a little bit more pain to the world.
Again: at best.
At worst it could potentially set a precedent that anyone perceived as “aligned” with billionaires deserves the same death inflicted on those billionaires.
In other words, at worst, it could turn the person holding the guillotine into the de facto capitalist controlling all of the factories, all of the land, and all of the equipment single-handedly. Because who is going to stop them? Anyone who challenges that person can be easily labeled a “reactionary capitalist counter-revolutionary” and punished according to that label.
Removed by mod
Yes. And it’s horrible! And we should have done more!
We should – like I said – have stripped property from the slaveowners. They surrendered unconditionally! The North could have done with them as it liked.
It should have confiscated the property of everyone who profited from slavery prior to the war, and given that property to the slaves. And yes, the North should have killed as many people (be they slaveowners or bootlickers) as was necessary to carry out that transfer of property.
Station troops on the plantations. Shoot everyone who shows up with torches to burn them down and deprive former slaves of their newfound wealth.
But what I’m trying to say is: no more than that number. No more killing than is absolutely necessary to achieve that goal.
We should be imagining Jeff Bezos in prison, not dead. You don’t want to make allies out of the people who want him dead. Those people are not good friends.
How do you think Jim Crow was established? With violence.
It was not simply due to congressional reconstruction that programmatic land reform wasn’t attempted in the south. People were actively pursuing campaigns of violence during reconstruction.
There was no alternative to violent resistance.
There is no alternative to violent resistance.
Perhaps because even after they lost the slaves they were still rich as fuck and powerful. And then they passed laws to still enslave black people and fuck them over so shit didn’t really change all that much. Think about how much better life would be today if every slave owner and klansman were put to death for their heinous crimes instead of slapped on the wrist and given back control of their slaves
You replied to my accidentally deleted comment (which probably isn’t deleted on your instance.) I really wish Liftoff didn’t put the edit button right next to the delete button. But oh well.
I believe in life sentences, not death sentences. I would have been fine if the Nazis had been thrown in prison to serve non-commutable life sentences for their crimes. I would have preferred it.
But the entire reason the Civil War didn’t stick was because slaveowners kept their property. Not because they kept their lives.
Dude. Their kids grew up and enslaved black people using “prisons” and Jim Crow laws. And they were able to do this because they wielded the power they inherited from their slaveowning parents. If you leave the kids this power, then you’re going to need to kill them eventually for committing the same crimes.
Just take away their power! Imprison as many of the slaveowners if you can. And then leave it at that.
The South surrendered unconditionally. If I had a time machine, and could influence the North’s decisions, I would take their property because that would actually accomplish something. But I would not take any more lives than were absolutely necessary.
Because I don’t want to be on the side that kills more people than is necessary.
I accidentally deleted my comment right after writing it. I’m going to write it again.
If you killed them, their property would have passed to their heirs.
Option 1: maybe you lack the tools to stop this inheritance. Maybe your only choice is to kill those heirs.
But to do so, you must now kill children. And crucially, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing children.
Your new country will be a vicious, cold, brutal place.
Option 2: you figure out some way to take control of the legal system enough to strip their heirs of their wealth without killing those heirs.
Now, you’ve got a tool that can be wielded to separate people from their property without killing them. Which makes the first killing (the killing of the parents) optional.
Once again, to kill those parents, you must now build your movement out of members who are okay with killing when it has become optional.
The real solution with option 1 is to gain the power to make option 2 possible. The real solution with option 2 is to align yourself with those members of your movement who believe killing should be avoided whenever killing is optional.
I think the slaveowners of the south should have been stripped of their property. I think the plantations should have been given to the slaves as reparation.
I think klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But only use bullets when they show up with pitchforks to burn down one of these plantations newly transferred into black hands. Don’t go seeking out former slaveowners to kill. Just kill the ones currently trying to burn down the former plantation.
At any rate, you must make a choice between aligning yourself with people who err on the side of killing (even when it’s no longer necessary), and aligning yourself with people who err on the side of sparing lives (even when it causes problems.)
You don’t want to alienate the latter. You don’t want to give power to the former.
Deciding whether or not to kill people is not about who deserves death: it’s about choosing your allies. And you don’t want your allies to be the ones erring on the side of unnecessary violence.
Their property would have passed to their heirs.
If your only available tool was killing people, then maybe you could have followed it up by killing their children?
But then you have to contend with the fact that your movement (and the people you have handed weapons to) are now a very specific subset of communists – “communists who are okay with killing children.” You can’t build a country off of that!
If on the other hand you have some way of stopping slaveowners’ heirs from receiving their fortunes without killing those heirs, then you clearly have some tool that can void the property of the slaveowners themselves without killing them.
Which means, once again, you are building a movement using people who are fine with killing the slaveowners despite possessing such a tool.
I’m other words, “people who are fine with killing when it’s no longer necessary.” After that, it’s no surprise when that movement starts blowing up a bunch of human beings who are members of Hungarian soviets – the very people the movement claims to protect – with tanks.
Yeah, I think their plantations should have been taken from them. Yeah, I think Klansmen should have been stripped of everything they owned.
But once you’re powerful enough to do that, you’re also powerful enough to do that without killing them.
If they throw their bodies in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine, don’t let that stop your bullets. But if they step aside, you have a choice: align yourself with people who kill when they don’t need to, or align yourself with people who avoid killing whenever possible.
One of those is better than the other.
Did the children abuse and own slaves? No? Then who the fuck said kill the kids too. Imagine fucking defending slave owners and saying they don’t deserve to be out to death. Imagine defending the most evil atrocities imaginable. Do you think the Nazis shouldn’t have been put to death? Because the slave owners did worse than the Nazis ever did.
Edit: also no one fucking stepped aside. They fought a fucking war over it remember. You don’t get to start a war to enslave humans and then cry peace I surrender when you start to actually suffer the consequences.
Try defending black people like you defend slave owners.
What an absurd sweeping generalization of incredibly complex events and context.
Just say you’re another bootlicker and get on with your life. Please oh PLEASE don’t hurt those that exclusively exist to make our lives worse keep us poor dumb and sick!!!
You sayin the French were fools? Fuck off with your neat little bow on top of a simple little “just threaten them and they will play nice”, life isn’t that simple, that’s not how this works, the civil war and what we have now is incomparable. These billionaires are international and actually play as a united team against us poors.
But yeah just a drop of blood and Bezos gives up his fortune and union breaking and insane net worth and lives a subservient life after that. Yeah that sounds realistic
I see. I said, “that’s just not going to happen.”
Which expressed certainty in something that is uncertain. My bad. It might happen. Billionaires might throw themselves in front of the Orphan Crushing Machine when we open fire on that thing. My words were poorly chosen.
However, we still don’t want to alienate people who believe in sparing life whenever possible. (Those are the people whose side we always want to be on.) And we also still don’t want to align with people who believe in taking life even when it’s unnecessary. (Those are the people whose side you never want to be on.)
Be mindful of the movement you are building. Be mindful of the allies you are choosing.
Reconstruction was ended through assassination. This was hardly a resounding conclusion to slavery but a re-systemization of oppression. For starters, the slaves never received compensation, whole many of the previous slave owners did. Same goes for the GI Bill.