You see how there’s a difference between saying slavery was good and saying that slaves developed skills that could be applied for their personal benefit?
Those are absolutely not the same positions.
@volkris
Um, they are not the same, obviously, but the one logically entails the other.
If you argue that there was a benefit to enslaved people of being enslaved, then you are also committed to saying that slavery is at least in part, good.
My advice to you is not to try arguing the merits of enslavement, especially to a population that includes the descendants of slaves.
Well no. Just because one receives a benefit doesn’t mean it’s overall for the best. There are examples all throughout life where a person benefits from one thing even though it is on the whole for the worse.
It is entirely reasonable to say that slavery is bad even though there were some minor benefits to individuals in the course of that overall terrible institution.
The two statements are not mutually exclusive, and it’s apparently very worthwhile for our education system to point that out, since so many people on here seem to overlook that.
@volkris @mloxton @InkySchwartz @cadenza
What were the benefits of slavery? The ones that are *so important* that we tell kids about they need to be outlined in the state mandated curriculum?
Why is it important that young people know that slavery "had benefits?"
@futurebird
Excellent questions.
May I also add - what possible decision would such an argument hope to inform?
Like would this be used to say that we should do slavery again, since there were these supposed benefits?
