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> The pro- slavery rigid society that somehow values individual liberty? Would anyone be able to explain how that works? It only valued individual liberties fo

by danans 7y ago

> The pro- slavery rigid society that somehow values individual liberty? Would anyone be able to explain how that works? It only valued individual liberties for free individuals, like slave owners. Slaves are by definition not free individuals, so the right to individual liberty by definition didn't apply to them. It's practically tautological if you substitute the word "liberty" with "freedom".

lordgrenville 7y ago
I agree with you, but it's not a tautology. It's saying that free individuals (slave-owners) should have freedom to do stuff they want, e.g. own slaves, without having a government stop them from doing it.
- TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
  That's the basis of the model - "I do what I want, and you also do what I want." Obviously, it fails as a universal. Freedom that operates on the basis of economic, political, or physical coercion of others isn't freedom at all. Which would be fine in a more mature system, because the basic question in any political organisation is where to place the trade-off between individual freedom and personal responsibility to others. The US model is all for individual freedom, but has real issues with the concept of personal responsibility to others - which it fails to solve by pretending the problem has never existed, and is irrelevant.
  - lordgrenville 7y ago
    One way out of this is by narrowing your definition of morally relevant others - which historically has excluded women, or slaves, or people of other races (and currently excludes non-human animals, but that's a broader debate...)
iguy 7y ago
No, it's far from a tautology. A strong belief in individual liberty was a distinguishing characteristic of that society. And especially of that political society, which meant landowners. Having lots of slaves was another characteristic. The useful comparison is just up the coast, Massachusetts was almost the opposite, a theocracy of busybodies. Where a town council could re-arrange people's living arrangements if they thought X was a bit of a loner wanting to be out in the woods. And of course enthusiasm for every detail of the approved religion was not optional.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- danans 7y ago
  The tautology is that non-free people (slaves) do not have freedom (AKA individual liberty).
  - iguy 7y ago
    > non-free people (slaves) do not have freedom Yes, that's what being a slave is. > The tautology is I still don't know what you're trying to say here. Do you think that all slave-holding states had a strong belief in individual liberty? Saudi Arabia is a good counter-example, not much tradition of writing tracts about the virtues of greek democracy there. No, the princelings sure jump when the big man says jump. When people say that the Cavaliers were into individual liberty, they aren't saying the blindingly obvious fact that non-slaves generally preferred not to be enslaved.
    - danans 7y ago
      I was responding to the original comment a few steps up which said: > The pro- slavery rigid society that somehow values individual liberty? Would anyone be able to explain how that works?
VLM 7y ago
The definition of freedom depends on what you value, and what you value varies with time and place. Were sweatshop workers in New York City free? Ranch hand employees out west? Chinese railroad workers in the USA? Are starving workers freer than well fed slaves? Theres a big push underway now to get rid of all American civil rights in favor of security theater, will we be free once we eliminate the Bill of Rights? Kinda unclear what this "free" thing is and who has it.
- ninkendo 7y ago
  > Theres a big push underway now to get rid of all American civil rights in favor of security theater Huh?
  - stallmanite 7y ago
    4th amendment, 2nd amendment. You really don’t see this?
    - ninkendo 7y ago
      No, I really don’t. Could you elaborate? 2nd amendment rights are stronger than ever. 4th amendment rights issues kinda peaked about 10 years ago, and although Snowden certainly shined a bright light on some shady things, I would hardly call it a “big push”, given the backlash and the fact that the public doesn’t seem to be going along with it. I’m much more concerned about the entire public’s outright willingness to broadcast every facet of our lives right out in public for anyone to see (what the IC would call “open source” intelligence) than any spying the government is doing on our private information.
      - stallmanite 7y ago
        2nd amendment is doing ok I’ll walk that one back. 4th amendment is dead and buried. Totally agree that the public not giving a fuck is a severe problem. Cheers
- danans 7y ago
thelittlenag 7y ago
If you want a great explanation then I recommend reading this book review: https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/04/27/book-review-albions-seed/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/04/27/book-review-albions-se... The short story is that they valued the unlimited freedom for a single individual more than the general freedom of all individuals. In a sense, it's the finding and feeding utility monsters on the theory that that will maximize utility for society.

by danans 7y ago

lordgrenville 7y ago

I agree with you, but it's not a tautology. It's saying that free individuals (slave-owners) should have freedom to do stuff they want, e.g. own slaves, without having a government stop them from doing it.

TheOtherHobbes 7y ago
That's the basis of the model - "I do what I want, and you also do what I want." Obviously, it fails as a universal. Freedom that operates on the basis of economic, political, or physical coercion of others isn't freedom at all. Which would be fine in a more mature system, because the basic question in any political organisation is where to place the trade-off between individual freedom and personal responsibility to others. The US model is all for individual freedom, but has real issues with the concept of personal responsibility to others - which it fails to solve by pretending the problem has never existed, and is irrelevant.
- lordgrenville 7y ago
  One way out of this is by narrowing your definition of morally relevant others - which historically has excluded women, or slaves, or people of other races (and currently excludes non-human animals, but that's a broader debate...)

iguy 7y ago

No, it's far from a tautology. A strong belief in individual liberty was a distinguishing characteristic of that society. And especially of that political society, which meant landowners. Having lots of slaves was another characteristic. The useful comparison is just up the coast, Massachusetts was almost the opposite, a theocracy of busybodies. Where a town council could re-arrange people's living arrangements if they thought X was a bit of a loner wanting to be out in the woods. And of course enthusiasm for every detail of the approved religion was not optional.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
danans 7y ago
The tautology is that non-free people (slaves) do not have freedom (AKA individual liberty).
- iguy 7y ago
  > non-free people (slaves) do not have freedom Yes, that's what being a slave is. > The tautology is I still don't know what you're trying to say here. Do you think that all slave-holding states had a strong belief in individual liberty? Saudi Arabia is a good counter-example, not much tradition of writing tracts about the virtues of greek democracy there. No, the princelings sure jump when the big man says jump. When people say that the Cavaliers were into individual liberty, they aren't saying the blindingly obvious fact that non-slaves generally preferred not to be enslaved.
  - danans 7y ago
    I was responding to the original comment a few steps up which said: > The pro- slavery rigid society that somehow values individual liberty? Would anyone be able to explain how that works?

VLM 7y ago

The definition of freedom depends on what you value, and what you value varies with time and place. Were sweatshop workers in New York City free? Ranch hand employees out west? Chinese railroad workers in the USA? Are starving workers freer than well fed slaves? Theres a big push underway now to get rid of all American civil rights in favor of security theater, will we be free once we eliminate the Bill of Rights? Kinda unclear what this "free" thing is and who has it.

ninkendo 7y ago
> Theres a big push underway now to get rid of all American civil rights in favor of security theater Huh?
- stallmanite 7y ago
  4th amendment, 2nd amendment. You really don’t see this?
  - ninkendo 7y ago
    No, I really don’t. Could you elaborate? 2nd amendment rights are stronger than ever. 4th amendment rights issues kinda peaked about 10 years ago, and although Snowden certainly shined a bright light on some shady things, I would hardly call it a “big push”, given the backlash and the fact that the public doesn’t seem to be going along with it. I’m much more concerned about the entire public’s outright willingness to broadcast every facet of our lives right out in public for anyone to see (what the IC would call “open source” intelligence) than any spying the government is doing on our private information.
    - stallmanite 7y ago
      2nd amendment is doing ok I’ll walk that one back. 4th amendment is dead and buried. Totally agree that the public not giving a fuck is a severe problem. Cheers
danans 7y ago

thelittlenag 7y ago

If you want a great explanation then I recommend reading this book review: https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/04/27/book-review-albions-seed/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/04/27/book-review-albions-se... The short story is that they valued the unlimited freedom for a single individual more than the general freedom of all individuals. In a sense, it's the finding and feeding utility monsters on the theory that that will maximize utility for society.