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I mean, we do have for profit prisons and use our immense prison population as slaves.

• janalsncm 3y ago
  That doesn’t make all of us slaves
  • diob 3y ago
    I think given the existence of debtor prisons that becomes arguable. And some do utilize the laws and systems in our country to increase the amount of slaves though. This is likely just the tip of the iceberg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal I'm not going to argue for the hyperbole of us all being slaves though.
  • jbverschoor 3y ago
    Taxation: income tax is a relatively new re-invention. Even more for other types of taxation like VAT or capital gains. I’m all for paying for services though. But this is basically stealing or claiming from a person’s fruits of labor. Passports/citizenship: Although most people will see a passport a sa travel document, you could also see it as a certificate of ownership. In many countries it is illegal to have multiple passports which supports this argument. Try resigning from the United States. It’s very difficult. Also, passports and border patrol have been used to prevent people from leaving a country in order to exploit their labor, and slavery: > During World War I, European governments introduced border passport requirements for security reasons, and to control the emigration of people with useful skills. These controls remained in place after the war, becoming a standard, though controversial, procedure Lastly, if you do not comply or pay taxes to your owner, you will be taken by force and sometimes with the result of injury of death.
    • gamblor956 3y ago
      Income taxes, transaction taxes, and customs duties are thousands of years old. It's always been how kings and governments raised the money to pay their armies.
      • jbverschoor 3y ago
        Taxes on certain goods, yes. Incometax, nope. It’s little over 100 years old. VAT I think about 75. And the list goes on. In the uk it started around 1800, a few years before ending slavery. Could it just be a substitute?
        • deleted 3y ago
          [deleted]
        • nooron 3y ago
          In American chattel slavery, women were kidnapped, stuffed into boats where malnourished strangers died around them, beaten, forced to change their names and religion, and raped. The children of those rapes were routinely sold at auction, and their parents would never see them again. If the children were caught secretly learning to read, they would be beaten. Income taxes are annoying, but they are not slavery.
          • jbverschoor 3y ago
            Of course. That’s a whole different aspect and I wouldn’t want to compare to that part of it.
          • beaeglebeached 3y ago
            Meanwhile we still rip custody from many (disproportionately) black dads, auction their children to foster homes, compel them to come up with certain amount of money and if they don't do it for the whip crackers we toss them in jail where they may be raped and malnourished and legally chained in work gangs.
        • JumpCrisscross 3y ago
          > Incometax, nope Sharecropping taxes are income taxes. There weren’t formal income taxes because peasants didn’t have incomes. They paid a tax to their lord that was fixed as a function of the productivity of the land they farmed.
          • 3y ago
    • janalsncm 3y ago
      I have heard people claiming that taxation is theft. I have never heard anyone claim that taxation makes us slaves. Income tax is even less coercive than previous forms taxation, where people were taken from whether or not they could afford it. With income tax, people who do not work do not pay it. In fact many people who do work do not pay income tax.
      • jbverschoor 3y ago
        That’s exactly the difference between upper and lower class. You need money. If you work, you give half to the gov. If you earn “passive”, it still happens, but rates are a lot lower
        • refurb 3y ago
          So rich people are still “slaves” by that definition.
          • janalsncm 3y ago
            In fact the President is even a slave by this definition.
      • Geisterde 3y ago
        The arguement goes that theft is retroactive slavery, the thief stole time from me. Not sure if I can make the logical leap between those myself, though I do consider them roughly morally equivalent.
    • mjan22640 3y ago
      > But this is basically stealing or claiming from a person’s fruits of labor. It is actually the opposite. It all belongs to the rulers, and they generously gift you a portion of it.
    • refurb 3y ago
      Slave has a very specific meaning. Paying taxes does not make you a slave.