Southern pride gone wrong!

[princessmom29]

If a slave got up and left, he would be hanging from a tall tree by the end of the day, along with his friends and family.


So you are telling me that 1st generation Slaves weren't split from their families, children torn from their mother's arms? Wives torn from the arms of their husbands?

Sure the 2nd and 3rd Generation slaves had Families but they had no way of connecting with their roots, they didn't know their history.

The labor conditions in the North were undoubtedly horrendous but to compare it to slavery is preposterous. White Immigrant workers made the choice to come here, African and Native American Slaves had no choice.

Whit immagrant workers for the most part had the choice of coming here or starving to death. Not much of a choice if you ask me.

 

[LuvsDragonflies]

If a slave got up and left, he would be hanging from a tall tree by the end of the day, along with his friends and family.


So you are telling me that 1st generation Slaves weren't split from their families, children torn from their mother's arms? Wives torn from the arms of their husbands?

Sure the 2nd and 3rd Generation slaves had Families but they had no way of connecting with their roots, they didn't know their history.

The labor conditions in the North were undoubtedly horrendous but to compare it to slavery is preposterous. White Immigrant workers made the choice to come here, African and Native American Slaves had no choice.

Again, that was just as much the fault of the Africans selling other tribes members into slavery as it was the Confederate States.

And again, slavery was not what the Civil War was all about, it was a component. A very useful component used by the Union to rally the troops and crush the Confederate States.

Slavery is wrong, on any level.

You can pretend that paying someone a pittance to work long hours is paid labor. But in truth, it's just as bad, if not worse. Because you foster the illusion of freedom where there is none. Those people in the North were as tied to their long hours and meager pay as the slaves were to their plantations. If you can't see that there is an awful lot the same, then you are right, we should end our discussion.


Yes, they came of their own free will. Yet once they got here they were as shackled to the place as if they had iron around their legs.

You say the immigrants had "legal rights". While that may be true, they couldn't afford to pay anyone to represent them, and gold hearted attorneys were few and far between.

 

[metalis4ever]

Whit immagrant workers for the most part had the choice of coming here or starving to death. Not much of a choice if you ask me.

There is the key word choice, white immigrant workers had the choice to begin with, they had the choice to walk away. They had the choice to immigrate to another Country besides the United States. Slaves did not have any choice in the matter but to bow down and obey their owners.

why did the poor white immigrant population "break out" eventually? A labor movement that resulted in either them being able to save enough money to get out to someplace better or earning an education and finding a better job.

Why did slaves "break out"? either due to desparation to escape their bleak lives (and those are the ones who didn' get caught, tortured, and/or killed, mind you) or due to federal law outlawing slavery. Even after the laws were passed, it took well over 100 years for many of their descendants to eek out a better life.

There is no equating the two......

 

[Geoff_M]

No. It wasn't.

Next up, I predict we'll hear about the myth of the "Happy Slaves"!

 

[luvsJack]

The south owned slaves--that was horrible. The north did the same thing but hid behind the few pennies they paid the workers and called it paid labor.

You can spin it any way you want to but those two facts are going to remain the same.


I don't think anyone is foolish enough to believe in the "happy slaves". That is not what the pp is trying to say.

 

[badblackpug]

I agree with everything you said except...I don't think she crossed the line by raising the flag. I think the neighbors crossed the line when they pooled the neighborhood's money together and built fences on either side of her property so they wouldn't have to see the flag. They provoked her.

Let's use one of your examples, the rainbow flag, for gay pride. Had that been a rainbow flag that was offending the neighbors and they had built a fence to keep from having to see it those neighbors would have gotten flamed, protested and harassed by ppl for even BEING offended at the gay pride flag.

There are always going to be things that offend ppl. You gave some good examples. But nobody is responsible for how other ppl feel about things. It is not illegal to fly a Confederate flag. Black ppl take offense to it because they associate it with the SOUTH during the civil war. That also falls back on ppl's misconception that the Civil war was started so that the South could keep their slaves.

By your logic, if my neighbors kept a junky yard strewn with rusted out cars and I built a privacy fence so I wouldn't have to look at it every time I used my pool, they should pile their junk up high enough so I could see it over the fence?

...and are people seriously defending slavery? ....and using an excuse that I won't even accept from my children? "Billy did it, too!" Really? Human bondage is morally reprehensible regardless of who perpetrated it and why. It is wrong. W.R.O.N.G.

I always question the morality of people who "do it because they can." It is truly selfish that one would sacrifice an entire community just "because they can." There are so many other ways to embrace your heritage that won't be hurtful to others.

 

[Geoff_M]

I don't think anyone is foolish enough to believe in the "happy slaves". That is not what the pp is trying to say.

I dunno... anyone that can equivocate being in hock to the company store or working for a company that pays no more than poverty wages to a situation whereby you are literally owned by someone else, cannot vote, can have you spouse and/or children ripped away and sold to someone else, aren't considered a full citizen, and have few civil rights, etc., etc. shouldn't have any problem with trying to claim that blacks were really happier working on plantations than after they were set "free" and became poor sharecroppers. It's not that far of a stretch!

 

[badblackpug]

Again, that was just as much the fault of the Africans selling other tribes members into slavery as it was the Confederate States.

And again, slavery was not what the Civil War was all about, it was a component. A very useful component used by the Union to rally the troops and crush the Confederate States.

Slavery is wrong, on any level.

You can pretend that paying someone a pittance to work long hours is paid labor. But in truth, it's just as bad, if not worse. Because you foster the illusion of freedom where there is none. Those people in the North were as tied to their long hours and meager pay as the slaves were to their plantations. If you can't see that there is an awful lot the same, then you are right, we should end our discussion.


Yes, they came of their own free will. Yet once they got here they were as shackled to the place as if they had iron around their legs.

You say the immigrants had "legal rights". While that may be true, they couldn't afford to pay anyone to represent them, and gold hearted attorneys were few and far between.

Really? a lot of people sell crack... I don't have to buy it. ...and if, in all honesty, there was no market for slaves (or crack) no one would sell them (or it)

 

[DisneyLoverUSA]

By your logic, if my neighbors kept a junky yard strewn with rusted out cars and I built a privacy fence so I wouldn't have to look at it every time I used my pool, they should pile their junk up high enough so I could see it over the fence?

...and are people seriously defending slavery? ....and using an excuse that I won't even accept from my children? "Billy did it, too!" Really? Human bondage is morally reprehensible regardless of who perpetrated it and why. It is wrong. W.R.O.N.G.

I always question the morality of people who "do it because they can." It is truly selfish that one would sacrifice an entire community just "because they can." There are so many other ways to embrace your heritage that won't be hurtful to others.

We're not talking about junk and rusty cars, we're talking about a flag. Apples and Oranges. It's usually against city code to have a junk yard on your property with old appliances and rusty cars so you would have legal recourse to make a complaint to the city to remedy that situation. All this woman did was fly a flag. A flag that happens to be the Mississippi state flag.

 

[luvsJack]

I dunno... anyone that can equivocate being in hock to the company stock or working for a company that pays no more than poverty wages to a situation whereby you are literally owned by someone else, cannot vote, can have you spouse and/or children ripped away and sold to someone else, aren't considerd a full citizen, and have few civil rights, etc., etc. shouldn't have any problem with trying to claim that blacks were really happier working on plantations than after they were set "free" and became poor sharecroppers. It's not that far of a stretch!

I think the comparison is in how the people were treated, not the freedoms that they had in theory.

The fact is there were many people treated in many horrible ways during that time. Arguing isn't going to change that fact.

There is no way in the world to justify slavery. There is just no reason for anyone to assume their ancestors to have better morals or humanity because they were in the North. They just called it by a different name.


All of this over a flag that doesn't fly to represent slavery. It represents the South. It represents a proud people who picked up their arms and defended what they thought was right.

 

[metalis4ever]

Really? a lot of people sell crack... I don't have to buy it. ...and if, in all honesty, there was no market for slaves (or crack) no one would sell them (or it)

exactly it's like saying that it was Poland's fault for WWII.

 

[Toad_Passenger]

I think the comparison is in how the people were treated, not the freedoms that they had in theory.

The fact is there were many people treated in many horrible ways during that time. Arguing isn't going to change that fact.

There is no way in the world to justify slavery. There is just no reason for anyone to assume their ancestors to have better morals or humanity because they were in the North. They just called it by a different name.


All of this over a flag that doesn't fly to represent slavery. It represents the South. It represents a proud people who picked up their arms and defended what they thought was right.

...or who were enlisted on the false premise that they were being given the shaft by their government, and were going to be living in a better environment. Just as the slaves were pawns of the landholders, the poor Confederate soldiers were used as pawns by politicians. (Not that it is any different from any other war).

 

[badblackpug]

I dunno... anyone that can equivocate being in hock to the company stock or working for a company that pays no more than poverty wages to a situation whereby you are literally owned by someone else, cannot vote, can have you spouse and/or children ripped away and sold to someone else, aren't considerd a full citizen, and have few civil rights, etc., etc. shouldn't have any problem with trying to claim that blacks were really happier working on plantations than after they were set "free" and became poor sharecroppers. It's not that far of a stretch!

You should also mention that slaves were considered 1/3 of a HUMAN, and that was adult male slaves only.

We're not talking about junk and rusty cars, we're talking about a flag. Apples and Oranges. It's usually against city code to have a junk yard on your property with old appliances and rusty cars so you would have legal recourse to make a complaint to the city to remedy that situation. All this woman did was fly a flag. A flag that happens to be the Mississippi state flag.

Actually it's the same thing, their neighbor had something in her yard they found bothersome to look at, so they built a fence ON THEIR OWN PROPERTY so they didn't have to look at it.

...but I will phrase it this way....

suppose my neighbors filled their yard with garden gnomes and all the little buggers creeped me out every time I tried to relax in my pool. If I built an 8ft privacy fence around my yard so I didn't have to stare at them, and them at me, does that mean my neighbor should put them up on 10ft platforms so I am forced to stare at them over my fence?

 

[PeterPan09]

You should also mention that slaves were considered 1/3 of a HUMAN, and that was adult male slaves only.



Actually it's the same thing, their neighbor had something in her yard they found bothersome to look at, so they built a fence ON THEIR OWN PROPERTY so they didn't have to look at it.

...but I will phrase it this way....

suppose my neighbors filled their yard with garden gnomes and all the little buggers creeped me out every time I tried to relax in my pool. If I built an 8ft privacy fence around my yard so I didn't have to stare at them, and them at me, does that mean my neighbor should put them up on 10ft platforms so I am forced to stare at them over my fence?

ok, now that's creepy...I can hear the violins from Psycho as they stare at you with their beady little eyes.....

 

[CPT Tripss]

If a slave got up and left, he would be hanging from a tall tree by the end of the day, along with his friends and family.


So you are telling me that 1st generation Slaves weren't split from their families, children torn from their mother's arms? Wives torn from the arms of their husbands?

Sure the 2nd and 3rd Generation slaves had Families but they had no way of connecting with their roots, they didn't know their history.

The labor conditions in the North were undoubtedly horrendous but to compare it to slavery is preposterous. White Immigrant workers made the choice to come here, African and Native American Slaves had no choice.

Yeap! Also, many of the slaveowners sold units of their property regardless of whether said property unit had children, parents or spouse living with them on the slaveowners premises.

Whit immagrant workers for the most part had the choice of coming here or starving to death. Not much of a choice if you ask me.

Convenient that you present only part of the story. And neglect the freedoms available to many of the immigrants that came here willingly (neither as slaves nor indentured to someone).

 

[TLSnell1981]

To set a few facts straight:

99% of the people who fought for the south in the civil war never owned a slave nor did they fight for slavery. They fought because a foreign army invaded their home states. States were much more important than the "nation" back then, in fact, most people didn't consider themselves "American" in our modern sense of the word - they were Virginians or New Yorkers or <insert state here>. "America" didn't really become "The United States of" until after the Civil War. If a foreign power decided to invade your area today you might defend it as well. Even if you lose the subsequent war your future ancestors may still be proud of your actions.

The Civil War was fought over money. Just like most politics in modern life it all comes down to the almighty dollar. The Federal government was doing things that made the north wealthy and the south less-so and yes, that included slavery, but the real issue was money. The Southern states decided that if the US Gov was doing things that harmed them they should seceed. The states had voluntarily joined the union, ergo they should be allowed to voluntarily leave the union. If I sign up for a gym membership today I shouldn't be held to it for life if the gym does things I don't like. Maybe I'll get a Bowflex in my house instead.

Just because a very small percentage of people use a Confederate battle flag as a symbol of racism does not make all southerners racist, not does it make anyone who is proud of the actions of their southern ancestors to be racists or bad people.

News flash: there are and were racists in the north as well. Where did the Underground Railroad mostly stop? Canada. Why? Because excaped slaves often had such a bad time of things once in the northern states it was safer to go to Canada.

When Lincoln passed the Emmancipation Proclimation (a useless document at the time, by the way) there were riots in the north and near mutinies in the northern armies by those who wanted nothing to do with a war about or for slavery.

There is racism everywhere. Racist whites, racist blacks, racist Asians, etc. To think otherwise is pure ignorance and to focus so intently on just white southerners is no better than the racism itself.

It is possible to be both proud of one's southern heritage and the action of one's Confederate ancestors and not be racist.

And one reason so many still keep the South "alive" today is that many of the same issues still exist politically - is the Federal government too powerful, infringing upon our rights, doing things they shouldn't be doing? I think many today, regardless of political party, would say yes. Just as the Tea Party invokes the spirit of the American Revolution there are others who look to Southern secession as the same spirit (indeed it was considered by many to be the Second American Revolution, not a Civil War, at the time).

Worth repeating.

They wanted to secede from the nation - something that was totally legal at the time. They went through the legal process and made it happen. Then the Union decided to change the rules. The Southern states never would have considered joining the union without the right to secede. In fact, none of the states would have.

Too many Americans are simply ignorant when it comes to American history.

The Civil War was a bit more complex, than most will admit.

You have obviously been brainwashed by the government into thinking that the War Between the States was about slavery. It was rather about the intrusive nature of big government and how the South was against it. However, you are correct when you state that "we" (and I mean all of us) lost. Just look at the oppressive government that we have today. Talk about being on the losing side!!

Lincoln used slavery, as a bargaining chip, and to gather foreign support for the Union.

Let them spew their hate and bigotry. They don't get it because they don't want to get it.

Hate, unfortunately, is alive and well. While, compassion, respect and tolerance have fled the building.

Now, back to the original post... I don't think, the woman is racist, but very insensitive. On the other hand, some may be a bit too sensitive.

 

[princessmom29]

Really? a lot of people sell crack... I don't have to buy it. ...and if, in all honesty, there was no market for slaves (or crack) no one would sell them (or it)

and if no one was offering it for sale in the first place, no one owuld be buying.


In all seriousness, slavery was wrong, no question, but I don't see how anyone can say that an immigrant worker paid pennies a day and chained to life and death in a factory had it any better. Their choices were taken form them just as much as slaves choices were taken. They simply did not have the resources to change their way of life or the opportunity to do so. I realize the North wants to hold the moral highground here, but as MANY of us have pointed out, they really don't have a leg to stand on. They were JUST AS BAD. At the time, the worknig class in general was simply looked upon as subhuman, period, regardless of color and it took a LOT longer to emancipate the factory workers.

 

[princessmom29]

Convenient that you present only part of the story. And neglect the freedoms available to many of the immigrants that came here willingly (neither as slaves nor indentured to someone).

What freedoms??? Free to work in factory for pennies a day or choose to starve? Free to be locked into said factory and left to die?? Free to be bound body and soul thier entire life by debt?? Free to be treated as subhuman by those they work for??No, not so free at all.

 

[DisneyBamaFan]

...In all seriousness, slavery was wrong, no question, but I don't see how anyone can say that an immigrant worker paid pennies a day and chained to life and death in a factory had it any better. Their choices were taken form them just as much as slaves choices were taken. They simply did not have the resources to change their way of life or the opportunity to do so. I realize the North wants to hold the moral highground here, but as MANY of us have pointed out, they really don't have a leg to stand on. They were JUST AS BAD. At the time, the worknig class in general was simply looked upon as subhuman, period, regardless of color and it took a LOT longer to emancipate the factory workers.

The world, in the time being discussed, had three classes of people:

The rich - they owned EVERYTHING.
The poor - there were many types, from share croppers, to indentured servants, to people with real skills (craftsmen). But they lived and died poor, with almost no exceptions.
The slaves - no question in my mind that it was worse to be a slave with three square meals/day than to be an indentured servant. Freedom has always had value, even if the life of a free man is less pleasurable than that of a slave on a day to day basis.

IMO, you are dabbling in moral revelency by trying to compare the daily lives of these people without including the value of freedom.

 

[DisneyBamaFan]

What freedoms??? Free to work in factory for pennies a day or choose to starve? Free to be locked into said factory and left to die?? Free to be bound body and soul thier entire life by debt?? Free to be treated as subhuman by those they work for??No, not so free at all.

By today's standards, you are correct - but not by the standards of the poor in that time. They lived hard lives. Hard in ways that most Americans will never understand. They accepted the work in those conditions because, well, such was life.