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The context is important: southern states were fighting specifically for the right to continue to enslave people. Any argument that doesn't focus on slavery in

by sidlls 4y ago

The context is important: southern states were fighting specifically for the right to continue to enslave people. Any argument that doesn't focus on slavery in the context of the civil war we had isn't valid, or at least is incomplete, because it elides the reason for the war in the first place.

kneebonian 4y ago
So I've been a big fan of studying warfare in all it's dimensions throughout my life, including the causes of various conflicts, one thing I gave come to realize is that we talk about "the reason" for a war or "the cause" but there really isn't a single cause or reason, because for a war to happen you have to have thousands of people willing to march off and die and each of them have their own reasons and their own cause they were fighting for. I mean for Johnny Scott who marched off to war the reason for the war for him was to win a medal so Size Bradshaw will finally love him. Or the Crusades there were probably plenty of people who the war was about going and fighting for absolution of their sins by reclaiming the holy land. At the end of the day there are as many causes for the war as there are people participating, there can be various factors that led to the outbreak of the war, and sometimes we are lucky and they are clear cut, but often there will be several different prominent factors and trying to attribute the war to any one of them is just historical masturbatory navel gazing, or more insidiously trying to rewrite history to fit an agenda. So those who claim the Civil War was only about slavery are just as disingenuous as those who claim the Civil war was only about states rights. Ultimately these were both major contributing factors and trying to attach primacy to one of them is unproductive and pointless. If you want a perfect example go ahead and tell me what caused WW1.
- sidlls 4y ago
  You're conflating a number of completely unrelated items, at least: individual motivations, catalysts, and the broad-strokes reasons a group fights in a war. The civil war was fought because the southern states wanted to maintain their slave economy. It is as clear, cut and dried as that. Individual southerners may have fought for glory, for Suzy to love them, for money, or for any other reason, but the prosecutors of the war effort for the south did it because their economy was dependent on slaves and they wanted that to continue. It's not disingenuous to state that.
  - kneebonian 4y ago
    Your wrong. The Civil war was fought because the confederate states of America fired on Fort Sumter, the establishment of the confederacy the freeing of the slaves all of those happened as a consequence or prior to the actual war. If you want to get that reductive than I am right. The Civil war happened because the Confederate States of America fired on Fort Sumter and everything else was ancillary. Just like WW1 happened because the Archduke Franz Ferdinand got assassinated. Youre argument is overly reductive and your ignorant of history

by sidlls 4y ago

kneebonian 4y ago

So I've been a big fan of studying warfare in all it's dimensions throughout my life, including the causes of various conflicts, one thing I gave come to realize is that we talk about "the reason" for a war or "the cause" but there really isn't a single cause or reason, because for a war to happen you have to have thousands of people willing to march off and die and each of them have their own reasons and their own cause they were fighting for. I mean for Johnny Scott who marched off to war the reason for the war for him was to win a medal so Size Bradshaw will finally love him. Or the Crusades there were probably plenty of people who the war was about going and fighting for absolution of their sins by reclaiming the holy land. At the end of the day there are as many causes for the war as there are people participating, there can be various factors that led to the outbreak of the war, and sometimes we are lucky and they are clear cut, but often there will be several different prominent factors and trying to attribute the war to any one of them is just historical masturbatory navel gazing, or more insidiously trying to rewrite history to fit an agenda. So those who claim the Civil War was only about slavery are just as disingenuous as those who claim the Civil war was only about states rights. Ultimately these were both major contributing factors and trying to attach primacy to one of them is unproductive and pointless. If you want a perfect example go ahead and tell me what caused WW1.

sidlls 4y ago
You're conflating a number of completely unrelated items, at least: individual motivations, catalysts, and the broad-strokes reasons a group fights in a war. The civil war was fought because the southern states wanted to maintain their slave economy. It is as clear, cut and dried as that. Individual southerners may have fought for glory, for Suzy to love them, for money, or for any other reason, but the prosecutors of the war effort for the south did it because their economy was dependent on slaves and they wanted that to continue. It's not disingenuous to state that.
- kneebonian 4y ago
  Your wrong. The Civil war was fought because the confederate states of America fired on Fort Sumter, the establishment of the confederacy the freeing of the slaves all of those happened as a consequence or prior to the actual war. If you want to get that reductive than I am right. The Civil war happened because the Confederate States of America fired on Fort Sumter and everything else was ancillary. Just like WW1 happened because the Archduke Franz Ferdinand got assassinated. Youre argument is overly reductive and your ignorant of history