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In reply to the discussion: "American by birth southern by the grace of God" [View all]Uncle Joe
(58,361 posts)124. We agree on this.
Both genocide and slavery are evil.
We also agree on the scale having increased during the TransAtlantic Slave Trade era, as a singular source of travel, although slavery via other other routes to Asia accounted for at least as much if not more slave trading but stretched over a longer period of time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_slave_trade
The Atlantic slave trade was not the only slave trade from Africa, although it was the largest in volume and intensity. As Elikia Mbokolo wrote in Le Monde diplomatique: "The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth).... Four million enslaved people exported via the Red Sea, another four million[20] through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean."[21]
Internal slave trading did continue but not with anywhere near the attrition rate of the TransAtlantic voyage, and I'm not trying to mitigate the barbarity of the practice, but dead slaves brought no profit.
Whipping, rape and the breaking up of families was evil, there is no dispute there.
We agree on this as well.
Maybe we can agree that slavery was the most barbaric and repulsive legacy of the U.S. that operated just up to the point of genocide because profit was more important than hate.
Here is where we have some disagreement, I do agree with the bolded parts.
However, the mistreatment and "slavery by another name" did not end after slavery was officially abolished, or even after the 19th c. ended. Chain gangs, forced labor, trumped up false charges, collusion between law enforcement and white business owners, refusal to convict a white man for a crime against a black man, lynching parties... the history of the U.S. is simply repulsive in regard to treatment of African-Americans - and, for me, that treatment is symbolized by that vulgar confederate flag.
So, if you can walk right up to the edge of genocide but not murder thousands on your own soil... I guess that disqualifies a nation as a genocidal nation.
And it is this entire legacy that makes me wonder how anyone can be such a stupid dipshit that this person would fly a confederate flag, and that other people, that person's friends, would not kick his teeth in if he didn't remove it. Or simply shun him, in the non-violent way that I actually live, while my temper on the page does not.
Slavery for all practical purposes and racial abuse didn't end after the Civil War but the North dominated the nation politically for the next fifty years after the war.
Every President other than Andrew Johnson's one term until Woodrow Wilson in 1913 came from the North. The Presidents; of that era some of them were even civil war veterans nominated the Supreme Court Justices and the Northern Republican dominated Congress approved those justices.
These justices would make up the courts that started us down the path of corporate supremacy and Plessy vs Ferguson which enshrined "seperate but equal" Jim Crow Laws.
Symbols mean different things to different people and not just people opposed to your ideals but to people that believe in all other respects the same as you.
300,000+ thousand Condeferates died and countless numbers were gravely wounded during our nation's greatest conflict, the vast majority of them were not slave owners, believing they were defending their home, family, friends and neighbors from invasion.
In regards to the Confederate Flag it has multiple meanings, depending on the person flying it.
As for that man flying it in front of the White House, I have no doubt he is a racist.
For whatever its' worth the only flag I own is the U.S. Flag which had draped over my father's coffin.
Slavery was the primary issue of the day, but regionalism fanned the flames and intensified the fighting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederacy_(American_Civil_War)
Many southern whites had considered themselves more Southern than American and would fight for their state and their region to be independent of the larger nation. That regionalism became a Southern nationalism, or the "Cause". For the duration of its existence, the Confederacy underwent trial by war.[7] The "Southern Cause" transcended the ideology of "states' rights", tariff policy or internal improvements. It was based on lifestyle, values and belief system. Its "way of life" became sacred to its adherents. Everything of the South became a moral question, commingling love of things Southern and hatred of things Yankee (the North). Not only did national political parties split, but national churches and interstate families as well divided along sectional lines as the war approached.[8]
In no states were the whites unanimous. There were minority views everywhere and the upland plateau regions in every state had strongholds of Unionist support, especially western Virginia and eastern Tennessee. South of the MasonDixon Line voter support for the three pro-Union candidates in 1860 ranged from 37% in Florida to 71% in Missouri.[9] It was an American tragedy, the Brothers' War according to some scholars, "brother against brother, father against son, kith against kin of every degree".[10]
(snip)
Motivations of soldiers [edit]
The great majority of young white men voluntarily joined Confederate national or state military units. Perman (2010) says historians are of two minds on why millions of men seemed so eager to fight, suffer and die over four years:
Some historians emphasize that Civil War soldiers were driven by political ideology, holding firm beliefs about the importance of liberty, Union, or state rights, or about the need to protect or to destroy slavery. Others point to less overtly political reasons to fight, such as the defense of one's home and family, or the honor and brotherhood to be preserved when fighting alongside other men. Most historians agree that, no matter what he thought about when he went into the war, the experience of combat affected him profoundly and sometimes affected his reasons for continuing to fight.[90]
The total population of the Confederacy was only aproximately 9 million people of which only 5-6 million were white.
No other war in U.S. History comes close to this casualty rate.
This war and Reconstruction left an emotional and physical scar across the South for well over half a century.
Going back to your comparison of the Confederate Flag to the Swastika and leaving aside the issue of genocide vs slavery, there are two other major distinctions between the Confederacy and Nazi Germany.
The Confederacy was a democracy at least for its day every bit as much as the Union, of course African Americans and women weren't allowed to vote, but the same held true in the North.
Hitler burned the Bundestag or German Parliament, making himself dictator.
Also the Confederacy never had desires on invading other nations in an attempt to conquer the world for the sake of the white race.
I have learned much from our discussion and I know this hasn't been easy for either of us.
Peace to you, RainDog.
We also agree on the scale having increased during the TransAtlantic Slave Trade era, as a singular source of travel, although slavery via other other routes to Asia accounted for at least as much if not more slave trading but stretched over a longer period of time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_slave_trade
The Atlantic slave trade was not the only slave trade from Africa, although it was the largest in volume and intensity. As Elikia Mbokolo wrote in Le Monde diplomatique: "The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth).... Four million enslaved people exported via the Red Sea, another four million[20] through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean."[21]
Internal slave trading did continue but not with anywhere near the attrition rate of the TransAtlantic voyage, and I'm not trying to mitigate the barbarity of the practice, but dead slaves brought no profit.
Whipping, rape and the breaking up of families was evil, there is no dispute there.
We agree on this as well.
Maybe we can agree that slavery was the most barbaric and repulsive legacy of the U.S. that operated just up to the point of genocide because profit was more important than hate.
Here is where we have some disagreement, I do agree with the bolded parts.
However, the mistreatment and "slavery by another name" did not end after slavery was officially abolished, or even after the 19th c. ended. Chain gangs, forced labor, trumped up false charges, collusion between law enforcement and white business owners, refusal to convict a white man for a crime against a black man, lynching parties... the history of the U.S. is simply repulsive in regard to treatment of African-Americans - and, for me, that treatment is symbolized by that vulgar confederate flag.
So, if you can walk right up to the edge of genocide but not murder thousands on your own soil... I guess that disqualifies a nation as a genocidal nation.
And it is this entire legacy that makes me wonder how anyone can be such a stupid dipshit that this person would fly a confederate flag, and that other people, that person's friends, would not kick his teeth in if he didn't remove it. Or simply shun him, in the non-violent way that I actually live, while my temper on the page does not.
Slavery for all practical purposes and racial abuse didn't end after the Civil War but the North dominated the nation politically for the next fifty years after the war.
Every President other than Andrew Johnson's one term until Woodrow Wilson in 1913 came from the North. The Presidents; of that era some of them were even civil war veterans nominated the Supreme Court Justices and the Northern Republican dominated Congress approved those justices.
These justices would make up the courts that started us down the path of corporate supremacy and Plessy vs Ferguson which enshrined "seperate but equal" Jim Crow Laws.
Symbols mean different things to different people and not just people opposed to your ideals but to people that believe in all other respects the same as you.
300,000+ thousand Condeferates died and countless numbers were gravely wounded during our nation's greatest conflict, the vast majority of them were not slave owners, believing they were defending their home, family, friends and neighbors from invasion.
In regards to the Confederate Flag it has multiple meanings, depending on the person flying it.
As for that man flying it in front of the White House, I have no doubt he is a racist.
For whatever its' worth the only flag I own is the U.S. Flag which had draped over my father's coffin.
Slavery was the primary issue of the day, but regionalism fanned the flames and intensified the fighting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederacy_(American_Civil_War)
Many southern whites had considered themselves more Southern than American and would fight for their state and their region to be independent of the larger nation. That regionalism became a Southern nationalism, or the "Cause". For the duration of its existence, the Confederacy underwent trial by war.[7] The "Southern Cause" transcended the ideology of "states' rights", tariff policy or internal improvements. It was based on lifestyle, values and belief system. Its "way of life" became sacred to its adherents. Everything of the South became a moral question, commingling love of things Southern and hatred of things Yankee (the North). Not only did national political parties split, but national churches and interstate families as well divided along sectional lines as the war approached.[8]
In no states were the whites unanimous. There were minority views everywhere and the upland plateau regions in every state had strongholds of Unionist support, especially western Virginia and eastern Tennessee. South of the MasonDixon Line voter support for the three pro-Union candidates in 1860 ranged from 37% in Florida to 71% in Missouri.[9] It was an American tragedy, the Brothers' War according to some scholars, "brother against brother, father against son, kith against kin of every degree".[10]
(snip)
Motivations of soldiers [edit]
The great majority of young white men voluntarily joined Confederate national or state military units. Perman (2010) says historians are of two minds on why millions of men seemed so eager to fight, suffer and die over four years:
Some historians emphasize that Civil War soldiers were driven by political ideology, holding firm beliefs about the importance of liberty, Union, or state rights, or about the need to protect or to destroy slavery. Others point to less overtly political reasons to fight, such as the defense of one's home and family, or the honor and brotherhood to be preserved when fighting alongside other men. Most historians agree that, no matter what he thought about when he went into the war, the experience of combat affected him profoundly and sometimes affected his reasons for continuing to fight.[90]
The total population of the Confederacy was only aproximately 9 million people of which only 5-6 million were white.
No other war in U.S. History comes close to this casualty rate.
This war and Reconstruction left an emotional and physical scar across the South for well over half a century.
Going back to your comparison of the Confederate Flag to the Swastika and leaving aside the issue of genocide vs slavery, there are two other major distinctions between the Confederacy and Nazi Germany.
The Confederacy was a democracy at least for its day every bit as much as the Union, of course African Americans and women weren't allowed to vote, but the same held true in the North.
Hitler burned the Bundestag or German Parliament, making himself dictator.
Also the Confederacy never had desires on invading other nations in an attempt to conquer the world for the sake of the white race.
I have learned much from our discussion and I know this hasn't been easy for either of us.
Peace to you, RainDog.
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Those who profess their loyalty to the south (region over nation) are the least American.
Dawson Leery
Oct 2013
#3
NO Brer, our Souther DUers have to DEAL with that climate. They don't condone it.
Tigress DEM
Oct 2013
#9
" northern/western politicians using the southern right wing voters to enhance their power."
IrishAyes
Oct 2013
#24
That's what I've heard racists say when using the N word in front of an African American; that
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#38
I meant Letterman's Program which is based in New York, personally I have no problem with it, only
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#41
What the FUCK??? I grew up in northwest butt-fuck OHIO and New York City IS
madinmaryland
Oct 2013
#47
The South as a whole fought for a multitude of reasons, "regionalsim" being the prime reason.
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#90
I just presented a neutral source supporting my contention and you have no rebuttal other
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#93
The problem is even when the South changes and it is, "regionalists" don't want to take yes
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#95
Having lived in the South, I see Southerners as victims of their own narrow culture.
JDPriestly
Oct 2013
#79
You should be very proud of your son. It's really tough being a liberal in the South.
JDPriestly
Oct 2013
#82
It's not a thing in the deep South. It's just one more swipe at the region with a
cordelia
Oct 2013
#53
Not sure about the site itself but these numbers agree with what I have read over the years.
Fastcars
Oct 2013
#23
You've got a good point there. But I guarantee you the yoemen are dead serious. & deadly.
IrishAyes
Oct 2013
#35
People just do NOT want to believe this shit....They have no idea how often that Confederate Battle
VanillaRhapsody
Oct 2013
#57
How often is it seen and how many people fly it considering there are nearly 115 million people
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#67
Both are most definitely evil but they're not equivalent by a long shot. If the U.S. or South had
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#68
As my first sentence stated, they were both most definitely evil but the people weren't taken away
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#73
Yes, Leopold II committed genocide and slavery of that I don't disagree and he came to power
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#89
My point is that Athens is a progressive place and there are plenty of progressive ...
dawg
Oct 2013
#98
Carter is hardly a traditional liberal compared to the great northern liberals.
wilt the stilt
Oct 2013
#107
Do you mean this election in 1948 when 7 of the 11 former Confederate States voted for Democratic
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#115
All I did was post how the nation voted in the Presidential Elections from 1932-1956
Uncle Joe
Oct 2013
#120
American by birth, Gay by the Grace of God, Southern Gentleman by loving parents. NT
William769
Oct 2013
#100