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Mississippi conservatives

Started by Hydra009, May 14, 2014, 01:47:23 PM

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Savior2006

Quote from: SGOS on May 18, 2014, 06:18:17 AM
It may have been around 30 years ago when the idea that the Civil War was not about slavery became fashionable.  I actually considered the possibility that it might be true, although I felt like I had to take liberties with reason.  Usually, it was simply stated, "It was not about slavery!"  You had to then fill in your own explanations.

Eventually, it was frequently stated, "It was not about slavery.  It was about economics!"  OK, I guess you could make a case for that, being that the economics of the South were viewed as being dependent on slavery.  But it was still about slavery.

Now, the issue of state's rights seems to often be used as the explanation for the Civil War.  It's the best alternative yet to slavery, because many of the western states also complain about their state's rights, and they are not advocating slavery.  However, this does not mean that southern state's right issues were not about slavery. 

The Civil War was an important and necessary war because it wiped out the gross inhumanity of slavery.  Many southerners now understand that slavery was a barbaric act of inhumanity, and they would like to forget that part of their past, so they come up with other explanations for the Civil War.  However, I have met Southerners that openly admit they fully support making black people slaves, even today.  But I think some Southerners that have a less barbaric attitude still wave their confederate flags because that's a popular thing to do in the South.  It probably means different things to different people.

But I don't buy that the Civil War had nothing to do with Slavery.

I did a fair amount of arguing with Confederate apologists in high school and it's always the same excuses.

Apologist dumbass: "It wasn't about slavery, it was about economics."
Me: Economics like "labor" for instance?

Dumbass: The North had slaves too.
Me: The north also had a considerable anti-slavery movement. Tell me all about the anti-slavery movement in the South.=D

Dumbass: Lincoln said if he could preserve the Union and keep slavery he would.
Me: Which makes the Declarations of Secession and the South's perception that he hated slavery all the more mystifying. Actually, no it doesn't. It was obvious by the 1860s that slavery would tearing the country apart, and Lincoln also said he'd get rid of slavery, if that preserved the Union.

Dumbass: Most of the South didn't own slaves.
Me: That's not the same thing as being anti-slavery.

It took science to do what people imagine God can do.
--ApostateLois

"The closer you are to God the further you are from the truth."
--St Giordano

Hydra009

Quote from: Savior2006 on May 18, 2014, 06:47:07 PMDumbass: The North had slaves too.
Me: The north also had a considerable anti-slavery movement. Tell me all about the anti-slavery movement in the South.=D
It did exist, especially in the Upper South, but yeah, it didn't do so well and Southern abolitionism basically died out in the years before the Civil War.  It didn't help that laws were passed that restricted slavemasters' ability to free their own slaves (which seems like a terribly unjust restriction on one's freedom *tongue-in-cheek*)

QuoteDumbass: Lincoln said if he could preserve the Union and keep slavery he would.
Me: Which makes the Declarations of Secession and the South's perception that he hated slavery all the more mystifying. Actually, no it doesn't. It was obvious by the 1860s that slavery would tearing the country apart, and Lincoln also said he'd get rid of slavery, if that preserved the Union.
Lincoln stated that he wouldn't interfere with slavery in the territories where it existed, but it's pretty clear that Republicans, including Lincoln, opposed the westward extension of slavery and generally favored a plan of containment and gradual erosion of slave states with a few calling for immediate abolition.

The timing of the Confederate secession was remarkably prescient; Lincoln (and successive Republican presidents) would've surely curtailed slavery in new territories and gradually weakened slave states' power.  Secession wouldn't have fared nearly as well as it did if they had waited.

QuoteDumbass: Most of the South didn't own slaves.
Me: That's not the same thing as being anti-slavery.
That part is actually true.  Though with the number of families owning slaves ranging up to 49%, that's a pretty damn sizable minority.

Berati

Quote from: Hydra009 on May 18, 2014, 10:32:09 AM
Yep.  And now, it's apparently all about independence and freedom.  How very noble.  (And comical, considering the actual motivation)

And the old standby is that it's the war of "Northern Aggression" with no particular acts of aggression named.  You simply had to imagine that the North was bullying the South and Southerners were just defending themselves.  The actual history paints a very different story.
There has to be a psychological reason for denial of the ridiculously obvious.
Carl Sagan
"It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring."

Nam

Quote from: Berati on May 15, 2014, 08:09:24 AM
Yah, it was over states rights... States rights to own slaves. If it was just southern pride, how come I don't see any black people from the south saying that crap?

So, every soldier on the Confederates side, most of whom did not own a slave let alone could feed themselves regularly, were fighting for slavery?

QuoteI've heard this revisionist stuff before but the fact is the southern slaves states formed the confederacy strictly over the issue of slavery. They were the bad guys.
I am not saying we should continue to point fingers at people from the south, in the same way that we should not blame all Germans for Nazism. However, assholes who wave around the swastika or the confederate flag should be reminded that they are the bad guys.

This is the first flag of the Confederacy:



Is that a flag of hate? The war lasted for 4 years. This flag was flown from was flown from March 4, 1861 to May 1, 1863.

This was the second but not technically the last flag of the Confederacy:



This is Georgia's current flag:



Look familiar?

What should be noted is that these two flags were national flags of the Confederacy; each state had different flags, and in turn, each division had a different flag. Which means, by your logic any flag of the Confederacy can be concluded to be a flag of hate, right? Like this one:



The only flag that you see as a flag of hate is the Battle Flag -- why not all these other flags? And, is not the US flag a flag of hate to Native Americans? The British flag to Americans? etc.,

What people like you fail to realize is they are just flags. They do not represent hatred or peace, they are inanimate objects. Only people represent those things; and their convoluted viewpoints.

I'm not saying people can't use objects as a vehicle to drive their ideological point-of-view what I am saying is: any object, like a flag,  can be seen as hatred to certain people.

How, as stated, is the American flag not a flag of hate by your logic?

QuoteI think this just shows how easy it is to get people to act against their own self interest if you blind them with ideology.

Yes, ideology not objects.

-Nam
Mad cow disease...it's not just for cows, or the mad!

Hydra009

Quote from: Nam on July 10, 2014, 12:42:25 AMThe only flag that you see as a flag of hate is the Battle Flag -- why not all these other flags? And, is not the US flag a flag of hate to Native Americans? The British flag to Americans? etc.,

What people like you fail to realize is they are just flags. They do not represent hatred or peace, they are inanimate objects. Only people represent those things; and their convoluted viewpoints.

I'm not saying people can't use objects as a vehicle to drive their ideological point-of-view what I am saying is: any object, like a flag,  can be seen as hatred to certain people.

How, as stated, is the American flag not a flag of hate by your logic?
Well... the battle flag is far and away the most symbolic of the Confederacy and its goals of secession and defense of the institution of slavery, and I'd imagine other Americans might have a pretty understandable problem with either/both.  It's also important to bare in mind that the confederate battle flag was enthusiastically adopted by southerners opposing reconstruction, segregationists, and your garden-variety racists (most notably, the KKK).  Lots of really nasty associations that just happen to cluster around opposition to any form of Black enfranchisement.