SquirrelyOgre |
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Klara Meison wrote:
And what if they don't want your freedom? People growing up in the modern world often forget that for a long, long time serfdom was a thing, and nobody complained.Sorry, but...
Bwahahahaha - "nobody complained"!? - hahahahaha
Yeah... you haven't studied a lot of history.
The entire French Revolution was people complaining about it. (Admittedly - there weren't officially a lot of serfs by then, but France had kept a sort of semi-serf class.) As was the Polish revolt (which was basically put down by Russia because they didn't want a bunch of freed serfs giving their own serfs uppity ideas). And many X many more times.
Yeah... no.
Were there some people who didn't want freedom? Sure. After the civil war some ex-slaves stuck around and worked on the plantations too. But they were a minority.
One of the reasons that Russia eventually abolished serfdom (1860's) was to cut off the fomenting rebellion. Of course - the Marxists did it anyway a half century later, but that's a whole different ball of wax.
...pretty much this. I'm going to go ahead and include this as well:
Consider your table.
Slavery as a topic in RPGs can quickly veer into Creepy Guy territory. I've had to boot at least two guys when they started going on about the virtues of slavery, how Roman slavery was honorable, how most slaves LIKED their get, and by the way could one of them have a female slave?
Did I mention the women at the table, and many of the men, were creeped out?
Be careful with this topic. Even if you don't see it as creepy, arguing passionately for it at the table can easily label you as That Creepy Guy that No One Wants to Invite Back.
phantom1592 |
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The cotton gin doesn't change anything about the stoop labor nature of gathering and planting the cotton though. One thing worth noting.. one of the major industries of the aforementioned City of Paterson was Textiles. In 1825, the city had become known as "The Cotton Town" of the United States. Paterson was where most of the South's cotton became saleable goods.
Before the cotton gin, there was a realistic amount of cotton that could planted and harvested and actually picked clean to be profitable. It actually kept the slave trade low and the plantations smaller. Once they could process a 50 times the cotton they did the year before... suddenly they needed 50 times the slaves and cotton to shove through it.
That was one of the most ironic things in history. The cotton gin was designed to make a slaves job easier... and resulted in a massive push for MORE slaves >.<
Liz Courts Community Manager |
Alex Smith 908 |
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Why is there an extreme push-back against calling premodern societal norms evil? The whole point of an objective morality is that some things are good or bad regardless of cultural norms, though intent might mitigate those issues. D&D and by extension Pathfinder alignment operates on the assumption that morals are objective not subjective, hence having literal creatures composed of good or evil. If you want a subjective morality play another game instead.
Take for example the Greek practice of killing unwanted children via exposure. The Egyptians found this practice horrific and would regularly mount expeditions to known places where the children were left to die (usually manure heaps) so they could be adopted. This is a situation with fairly obvious good and evil people. This was even a period when the Greek city state system was really a slave state, and the Egyptians had few if any slaves*. The Greeks would be evil 100% in Pathfinder even without going into their treatment of women. The only possible exception being Thebes
*quick sidebar Egypt at the time had no formal currency so everyone was paid in food or beer, and said payment was usually organized by the state. If you consider that serfdom then Egypt had low level slavery throughout. It is however an awkward issue because there wasn't really an alternative.
Soilent |
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Male Halfling, Age 20, Missing one toe on left foot, Answers to name Ardin.
Looks like all the papers are in order.
Enjoy your new halfling slave, <Insert Player Name Here>
It all depends on what you do with the slave.
But here in Cheliax, we don't do much of anything with them, we have people who do those things for us.
The Raven Black |
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Why is there an extreme push-back against calling premodern societal norms evil? The whole point of an objective morality is that some things are good or bad regardless of cultural norms, though intent might mitigate those issues. D&D and by extension Pathfinder alignment operates on the assumption that morals are objective not subjective, hence having literal creatures composed of good or evil. If you want a subjective morality play another game instead.
Well the implied corollary is that modern societal norms are not Evil. And that they should be the yardstick for what Good and Evil are. Basically hubris that modern is innately better than ancient. Even though people in the future might call some of our casual practices Evil
Not to mention that there were likely Good ancient people who lived by their culture's societal norms even though we would call some of these norms Evil
In the end what matters is the GM's choice of which morality best suits his setting
Orfamay Quest |
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Why is there an extreme push-back against calling premodern societal norms evil?
A confluence of factors. On the 'left,' there is a general suspicion of criticism of other cultures, because that criticism has often (usually?) become the basis of imperialism an oppression. On the 'right," the same factors that lead to imperialism and oppression are generally accepted if not outright supported. (Conservative churches still send missionaries to baptize and civilize the "healthens." Check out The Book of Mormon sometime.)
The whole point of an objective morality is that some things are good or bad regardless of cultural norms, though intent might mitigate those issues. D&D and by extension Pathfinder alignment operates on the assumption that morals are objective not subjective, hence having literal creatures composed of good or evil. If you want a subjective morality play another game instead.
But there's also an assumption that good and evil are not merely meaningless game-defined terms (like Base Attack Bonus). We expect things that are labelled "evil" to actually be things we consider "evil."
I could easily write a game with objective morality, called Ghettos and Gas Chambers, where the members of a certain minority religion really are objectively evil and subhuman and it really is a public service to exterminate them. But that would cross a whole bunch of people's squick lines (mine included -- I lied when I said I could write that game 'easily.') Even Ars Magica, which I consider to be one of the finest games ever written, crosses a lot of people's squick lines because of the basic classism and sexism in the world it describes, along with the statement that this situation literally is (in universe) demanded by God. A close friend of mine has similar issues with Legend of the Five Rings -- it's too classist and sexist for him to feel comfortable with.
Just saying that "this is evil in game" doesn't make it evil out of game, and a lot of people are very uncomfortable with such absolutist judgments. Especially, if, in their opinion, the thing in question is not actually evil, either because they don't believe in evil or because they believe the practice to actually be good.
Alex Smith 908 |
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Well the implied corollary is that modern societal norms are not Evil. And that they should be the yardstick for what Good and Evil are. Basically hubris that modern is innately better than ancient. Even though people in the future might call some of our casual practices Evil
Not to mention that there were likely Good ancient people who lived by their culture's societal norms even though we would call some of these norms Evil
In the end what matters is the GM's choice of which morality best suits his setting
Except this very line of reasoning would claim that Nazi and the Imperial Japanese Army weren't evil. When your definition of evil does not include Nazis it is meaningless.
Just saying that "this is evil in game" doesn't make it evil out of game, and a lot of people are very uncomfortable with such absolutist judgments. Especially, if, in their opinion, the thing in question is not actually evil, either because they don't believe in evil or because they believe the practice to actually be good.
I don't have any problem making people uncomfortable if they think slavery wasn't evil. It's not like someone can call me a bad person for it unless there is some clear definition of bad person for them to fall back on.
Orfamay Quest |
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The Raven Black wrote:Except this very line of reasoning would claim that Nazi and the Imperial Japanese Army weren't evil. When your definition of evil does not include Nazis it is meaningless.Well the implied corollary is that modern societal norms are not Evil. And that they should be the yardstick for what Good and Evil are. Basically hubris that modern is innately better than ancient. Even though people in the future might call some of our casual practices Evil
Not to mention that there were likely Good ancient people who lived by their culture's societal norms even though we would call some of these norms Evil
In the end what matters is the GM's choice of which morality best suits his setting
There are a lot of people out there that believe the Nazis were, in fact, not evil. Proof is left as an exercise for your search engine. And Internet bulletin boards are breeding grounds for such people because of the protection anonymity brings.
Alex Smith 908 |
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There are a lot of people out there that believe the Nazis were, in fact, not evil. Proof is left as an exercise for your search engine. And Internet bulletin boards are breeding grounds for such people because of the protection anonymity brings.
Yeah and there are a lot of people who think vaccines cause autism, that there is a bat winged homosexual rapist demon stalking Africa, and that the earth is flat. There is a word for those people, wrong. There is no need to humor them.
thejeff |
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The Raven Black wrote:Well the implied corollary is that modern societal norms are not Evil. And that they should be the yardstick for what Good and Evil are. Basically hubris that modern is innately better than ancient. Even though people in the future might call some of our casual practices Evil
Not to mention that there were likely Good ancient people who lived by their culture's societal norms even though we would call some of these norms Evil
In the end what matters is the GM's choice of which morality best suits his setting
Except this very line of reasoning would claim that Nazi and the Imperial Japanese Army weren't evil. When your definition of evil does not include Nazis it is meaningless.
Orfamay Quest wrote:Just saying that "this is evil in game" doesn't make it evil out of game, and a lot of people are very uncomfortable with such absolutist judgments. Especially, if, in their opinion, the thing in question is not actually evil, either because they don't believe in evil or because they believe the practice to actually be good.I don't have any problem making people uncomfortable if they think slavery wasn't evil. It's not like someone can call me a bad person for it unless there is some clear definition of bad person for them to fall back on.
I'm perfectly happy condemning slavery as evil. And have done so in this thread.
It's a little more complicated when you look closer and realise you should probably also condemn serfdom and the treatment of women and pretty much all the cultures of the world up until modern times as evil.
Not only does that trigger the bias of assuming my cultural norms are good and everything else is evil, it also washes out differences that did exist.
When your definition of evil doesn't include Nazis, it's meaningless. It's also meaningless when it lumps Nazis in with everyone else, including those who fought against them.
Charon's Little Helper |
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On the 'right," the same factors that lead to imperialism and oppression are generally accepted if not outright supported. (Conservative churches still send missionaries to baptize and civilize the "healthens." Check out The Book of Mormon sometime.)
Because if you want to think what most Christian missionaries think, you should see a musical comedy about a group which many Christians consider a cult?
thejeff |
Well, it is easy to be fundamentalist about something you know is correct.
Word "slavery" will conjure up images of commonly known slavery that pretty much everyone identifies as evil. But word slavery is not always used to describe those concepts.
Wage slavery is not literal slavery for example.
True, slavery used as a metaphor is not always evil. Though the entire point of the metaphor is to link to the evil of slavery, so the closer to accurate it is, the closer to evil the condition becomes.
As "wage slavery" is sometimes used today essentially for any employment, probably not. As used to describe "company towns" of the bad old days where you were paid in company scrip that didn't quite cover your rent of the company housing and your food in the company store, it's a lot closer - even though you're technically free.
Weirdo |
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Orfamay Quest wrote:On the 'right," the same factors that lead to imperialism and oppression are generally accepted if not outright supported. (Conservative churches still send missionaries to baptize and civilize the "healthens." Check out The Book of Mormon sometime.)Because if you want to think what most Christian missionaries think, you should see a musical comedy about a group which many Christians consider a cult?
He used Mormonism as an example of a "Conservative Church," (a term that would also describe, say, worshipers of Erastil) not a representative example of Christianity. And I think he is also suggesting reading their holy text, The Book of Mormon, not watching the musical of the same name.
Orfamay Quest |
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Charon's Little Helper wrote:He used Mormonism as an example of a "Conservative Church," (a term that would also describe, say, worshipers of Erastil) not a representative example of Christianity. And I think he is also suggesting reading their holy text, The Book of Mormon, not watching the musical of the same name.Orfamay Quest wrote:On the 'right," the same factors that lead to imperialism and oppression are generally accepted if not outright supported. (Conservative churches still send missionaries to baptize and civilize the "healthens." Check out The Book of Mormon sometime.)Because if you want to think what most Christian missionaries think, you should see a musical comedy about a group which many Christians consider a cult?
Nope, I did suggest the musical -- it's more accessible than most other ways to learn about missionary culture, and it's also very accurate (Parker and Stone both grew up in Mormon country, although they're not Mormons themselves, and they did their homework as part of writing it.)
Goth Guru |
Nazis were evil, but Schindler could be considered a "good" nazi.
To be a non evil slave owner, you have to somehow undermine the entire practice of slavery.
There were pushers selling No-doze to addicts a while ago. It highlighted the idea that only harmful drugs are evil to sell. The drug laws where enacted to stop the sale of harmful drugs. Another pharmaceutical company quit making execution drugs for the prison system.
During prohibition, I imagine some churches sold sacramental wine by the bottle and made it look like a break in.
Weirdo |
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Weirdo wrote:He used Mormonism as an example of a "Conservative Church," (a term that would also describe, say, worshipers of Erastil) not a representative example of Christianity. And I think he is also suggesting reading their holy text, The Book of Mormon, not watching the musical of the same name.Nope, I did suggest the musical -- it's more accessible than most other ways to learn about missionary culture, and it's also very accurate (Parker and Stone both grew up in Mormon country, although they're not Mormons themselves, and they did their homework as part of writing it.)
Fair. I prefer primary sources as a rule but it's quite plausible that in this particular case the musical comedy is accurate enough.
Drahliana Moonrunner |
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Why is there an extreme push-back against calling premodern societal norms evil? The whole point of an objective morality is that some things are good or bad regardless of cultural norms, though intent might mitigate those issues. D&D and by extension Pathfinder alignment operates on the assumption that morals are objective not subjective, hence having literal creatures composed of good or evil. If you want a subjective morality play another game instead.
Take for example the Greek practice of killing unwanted children via exposure. The Egyptians found this practice horrific and would regularly mount expeditions to known places where the children were left to die (usually manure heaps) so they could be adopted. This is a situation with fairly obvious good and evil people. This was even a period when the Greek city state system was really a slave state, and the Egyptians had few if any slaves*. The Greeks would be evil 100% in Pathfinder even without going into their treatment of women. The only possible exception being Thebes
*quick sidebar Egypt at the time had no formal currency so everyone was paid in food or beer, and said payment was usually organized by the state. If you consider that serfdom then Egypt had low level slavery throughout. It is however an awkward issue because there wasn't really an alternative.
Alignment for the purposes of Pathfinder is a game mechanic. It's for a game based on heroic escapist fantasy. I would no more use it in a conversation about real world history, or real world people, than I would use the game's acrobatic skill to analyze an Olympic performance.
I have very little interest in labeling the things we do in the real world "good" "evil" or whatever. My only concern whether it is something I should tolerate, actively support, or actively oppose.
Orfamay Quest |
Orfamay Quest wrote:Fair. I prefer primary sources as a rule but it's quite plausible that in this particular case the musical comedy is accurate enough.Weirdo wrote:He used Mormonism as an example of a "Conservative Church," (a term that would also describe, say, worshipers of Erastil) not a representative example of Christianity. And I think he is also suggesting reading their holy text, The Book of Mormon, not watching the musical of the same name.Nope, I did suggest the musical -- it's more accessible than most other ways to learn about missionary culture, and it's also very accurate (Parker and Stone both grew up in Mormon country, although they're not Mormons themselves, and they did their homework as part of writing it.)
Secondary sources are usually substantially more accessible, and they give you a starting point for understanding primary sources. <shrug>
Ckorik |
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Kobold Cleaver wrote:Guys come on we just had this thing.Maybe Paizo should take it as a hint that they're writing slavery as a touch too acceptable and ubiquitous in vast, huge swaths of Golarion.
This. Tired of this topic - tired of seeing people try to justify the very worst of humanity in some manner like they suddenly found some clever logic bomb that turns a topic on it's head.
Fergie |
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This. Tired of this topic - tired of seeing people try to justify the very worst of humanity in some manner like they suddenly found some clever logic bomb that turns a topic on it's head.
From my reading of the thread, absolutely no one has tried to justify the worst aspects of slavery (especially American slavery). And it should be noted that there are almost no aspects of real world slavery that are decent. However, slavery is just one of many arrangements or contracts that people formed societies around. Like virtually every other type of hierarchical structure, there are endless examples of horror perpetrated in it's name. If we removed every type of government, economic system, religious institution (such as marriage) that had bad deeds associated with it, there would be nothing left.
I would encourage people to remember that we are NOT talking about the real world when we discuss fantasy settings. We are talking about a world with a bizarre universe of entire planes of existence based on the Good-Evil axis and Law-Choas axis. Unlike the real world, these axis are not at all theoretical to the populations of the settings. They can commune with creatures made purely of these philosophies, and perhaps even meet them in their daily lives. They can visit these planes and return, and even return from the dead! When you think about what type of arrangements exist between individuals and groups of such a society, you need to remember that it is VERY DIFFERENT from the real world.
I would also encourage everyone to crack open their core rule books and read the section on alignment again. It is VERY DIFFERENT then real world assumptions about morality. For example, in the real world, most people associate freedom with goodness. However in the game world, that association does not exist.
thejeff |
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Ckorik wrote:This. Tired of this topic - tired of seeing people try to justify the very worst of humanity in some manner like they suddenly found some clever logic bomb that turns a topic on it's head.
From my reading of the thread, absolutely no one has tried to justify the worst aspects of slavery (especially American slavery). And it should be noted that there are almost no aspects of real world slavery that are decent. However, slavery is just one of many arrangements or contracts that people formed societies around. Like virtually every other type of hierarchical structure, there are endless examples of horror perpetrated in it's name. If we removed every type of government, economic system, religious institution (such as marriage) that had bad deeds associated with it, there would be nothing left.
I would encourage people to remember that we are NOT talking about the real world when we discuss fantasy settings. We are talking about a world with a bizarre universe of entire planes of existence based on the Good-Evil axis and Law-Choas axis. Unlike the real world, these axis are not at all theoretical to the populations of the settings. They can commune with creatures made purely of these philosophies, and perhaps even meet them in their daily lives. They can visit these planes and return, and even return from the dead! When you think about what type of arrangements exist between individuals and groups of such a society, you need to remember that it is VERY DIFFERENT from the real world.
I would also encourage everyone to crack open their core rule books and read the section on alignment again. It is VERY DIFFERENT then real world assumptions about morality. For example, in the real world, most people associate freedom with goodness. However in the game world, that association does not exist.
Though oppressing others is evil and it's generally difficult to remove freedom from people who want it without straying from good and into evil.
I'm also a little disturbed by your apparent merging of all types of institutions together, along with slavery, and saying they all have bad things, like slavery did and thus implying they're all somehow bad or not bad.
Quark Blast |
Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:thejeff wrote:Hell, does modern prison labor not prove you can basically force people to do at semi-skilled manufacturing?What's done as prison labor is tolerated because of the american perception on how crime should be punished. Trying to impose the same conditions on the general population, however isn't nearly as workable, nor as profitable.No, but if we still had slavery and a slave population, the rest of the population would tolerate those conditions. If you're willing to tolerate slavery and the abuses that go along with it, it's far from clear to me that you can't make it work for at least early industry.
Or even modern industry - the parts of it we're currently outsourcing to third-world sweatshops, for example.
It's a little more complicated when you look closer and realise you should probably also condemn serfdom and the treatment of women and pretty much all the cultures of the world up until modern times as evil.
Up until modern times? Really? And as for modern serfdom.
Just look at the difference in standard of living between say, the late Steve Jobs and the Chinese workers* making product for his company. The disparity is immense.
*I use Jobs as an example for another reason. In the end we're all equal. "Sucessfully" suicidal Chinese workers and Steve Jobs are both equal now and always will be.
Quark Blast |
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I would also encourage everyone to crack open their core rule books and read the section on alignment again. It is VERY DIFFERENT then real world assumptions about morality. For example, in the real world, most people associate freedom with goodness. However in the game world, that association does not exist.
The Internet is perhaps the most free construct of human endeavor to date, but "goodness" is not a blanket term that applies.
Just imagine what a ####-fest these boards would be without the constant moderation of Paizo staff.Unfettered human freedom is not good and never will be.
thejeff |
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thejeff wrote:Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:thejeff wrote:Hell, does modern prison labor not prove you can basically force people to do at semi-skilled manufacturing?What's done as prison labor is tolerated because of the american perception on how crime should be punished. Trying to impose the same conditions on the general population, however isn't nearly as workable, nor as profitable.No, but if we still had slavery and a slave population, the rest of the population would tolerate those conditions. If you're willing to tolerate slavery and the abuses that go along with it, it's far from clear to me that you can't make it work for at least early industry.
Or even modern industry - the parts of it we're currently outsourcing to third-world sweatshops, for example.
thejeff wrote:It's a little more complicated when you look closer and realise you should probably also condemn serfdom and the treatment of women and pretty much all the cultures of the world up until modern times as evil.Up until modern times? Really? And as for modern serfdom.
Just look at the difference in standard of living between say, the late Steve Jobs and the Chinese workers* making product for his company. The disparity is immense. [/i][/smaller]
Let's say I posit there may be exceptions and improvements in modern times, not that that I was saying we're now entirely beyond that.
Ckorik |
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Ckorik wrote:This. Tired of this topic - tired of seeing people try to justify the very worst of humanity in some manner like they suddenly found some clever logic bomb that turns a topic on it's head.
From my reading of the thread, absolutely no one has tried to justify the worst aspects of slavery (especially American slavery).
The thread title does. Perhaps you are reading a different thread?
And it should be noted that there are almost no aspects of real world slavery that are decent.
So close - remove almost from your sentence and you would have had it. Slavery is one of those things you can replace with another word - like 'And it should be noted that there are almost no aspect of real world torture that are decent.' - note here that torture is a lightly offensive term I used to avoid upsetting entire classes of people other words could be used to hurt in this context. Slavery has no aspects that are or were decent.
However, slavery is just one of many arrangements or contracts that people formed societies around.
In what universe do you inhabit where buying a human that has no choice in the matter equal a contract or 'arrangement'. We also have ritual sacrifice (even now!) in the world are we going to argue the possible merits of that? Does the blessing of the sun god and the greater good produced make up for the heart of a child you had to cut out? Some things shouldn't be debated.
Like virtually every other type of hierarchical structure, there are endless examples of horror perpetrated in it's name. If we removed every type of government, economic system, religious institution (such as marriage) that had bad deeds associated with it, there would be nothing left.
I rather like horror and have no issue with the game having slavery - however every place it's legal should be labeled evil - end stop. That includes Absalom where the 'centerpiece' of the organized play happens. There was a PFS guy just last week wanting to play a slaver for a weekly wage roll. A roll with dozens of options all mechanically the same that earns you a little gold - and because the campaign is set in an area where slavery is tolerated and it's not given a big fat EVIL by Paizo in every place it's located there was disagreement over if that'd be allowed by the venture captains.
This is a problem and it doesn't help the hobby.
I would encourage people to remember that we are NOT talking about the real world when we discuss fantasy settings. We are talking about a world with a bizarre universe of entire planes of existence based on the Good-Evil axis and Law-Choas axis.
Look you may not talk about the real world - however I'm old enough to remember the 'demon-scare' of the early 80's - a bad Tom Hanks movie and being threatened to be tossed out of my high school for having a dungeons and dragons book in my backpack (this was the early 90's!). This *game* is played by kids as well as us old people and while having concepts that are adult in the game is good there is no reason to play 'moral ambiguity' - it's not interesting and turns more people away from the hobby than it includes.
Lastly I'm going to take this argument closer to home as while the game is played worldwide it's made here in the U.S.A. For those of you who haven't been paying attention racism isn't exactly a solved issue here in the country and has gotten worse in the last few years. Frankly giving one of these nitwits a way to use the game as another way to hammer people they don't like disgusts me in ways I can't articulate.
Quark Blast |
Quark Blast wrote:Let's say I posit there may be exceptions and improvements in modern times, not that that I was saying we're now entirely beyond that.thejeff wrote:Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:thejeff wrote:Hell, does modern prison labor not prove you can basically force people to do at semi-skilled manufacturing?What's done as prison labor is tolerated because of the american perception on how crime should be punished. Trying to impose the same conditions on the general population, however isn't nearly as workable, nor as profitable.No, but if we still had slavery and a slave population, the rest of the population would tolerate those conditions. If you're willing to tolerate slavery and the abuses that go along with it, it's far from clear to me that you can't make it work for at least early industry.
Or even modern industry - the parts of it we're currently outsourcing to third-world sweatshops, for example.
thejeff wrote:It's a little more complicated when you look closer and realise you should probably also condemn serfdom and the treatment of women and pretty much all the cultures of the world up until modern times as evil.Up until modern times? Really? And as for modern serfdom.
Just look at the difference in standard of living between say, the late Steve Jobs and the Chinese workers* making product for his company. The disparity is immense.
*I use Jobs as an example for another reason. In the end we're all equal. "Sucessfully" suicidal Chinese workers and Steve Jobs are both equal now and always will be.
All this has happened before. All this will happen again.
You can pass me off as hipster-cynical but modern societies just relabel the same old prejudices and biases we've had since the species walked upright and started talking.
Slavery is evil (in game and out) and so are a host of other social norms.
Free press is arguably our best social invention and even that has limits.
thejeff |
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We also have ritual sacrifice (even now!) in the world are we going to argue the possible merits of that? Does the blessing of the sun god and the greater good produced make up for the heart of a child you had to cut out? Some things shouldn't be debated.
Just to derail, I've seen several very interesting fantasy works that played around with ritual sacrifice and settings that actually worked the way some of those cultures believed. Max Gladstone's excellent Two Serpent's Rise was the most recent.
It really is a different world if the sacrifice does make the sun come up in the morning and keeps everyone from dying. Or if it keeps the volcano from erupting and destroying your civilization.
thejeff |
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All this has happened before. All this will happen again.You can pass me off as hipster-cynical but modern societies just relabel the same old prejudices and biases we've had since the species walked upright and started talking.
Slavery is evil (in game and out) and so are a host of other social norms.
Free press is arguably our best social invention and even that has limits.
You're a Cynical hipster.
Slavery is evil, but if you're arguing that everything else is as well, that really becomes a meaningless statement.
Everything's evil. No social or economic system is better, they're all evil. Might as well bring back slavery, since we're all evil anyway.
Quark Blast |
Quark Blast wrote:All this has happened before. All this will happen again.
You can pass me off as hipster-cynical but modern societies just relabel the same old prejudices and biases we've had since the species walked upright and started talking.
Slavery is evil (in game and out) and so are a host of other social norms.
Free press is arguably our best social invention and even that has limits.
You're a Cynical hipster.
Slavery is evil, but if you're arguing that everything else is as well, that really becomes a meaningless statement.
Everything's evil. No social or economic system is better, they're all evil. Might as well bring back slavery, since we're all evil anyway.
Thanks for the acknowledgment! :D
And close.
I'm saying that things are a little better now, due to freedom of speech/free press, than they were in the past.
Though today we outsource our slavery to China and pay our nobility absurd wages. And if our nobility fail us, we pay them an absurd sum (Golden Parachute) anyway to help them along to their next absurdly-paid position of rulership.
Additionally, I'm saying just because it's better now doesn't mean it will stay better.
Fergie |
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Though oppressing others is evil and it's generally difficult to remove freedom from people who want it without straying from good and into evil.
I would agree that "oppression" is generally associated with evil (or Evil) because it involves injustice and often cruelty. The idea that it is difficult to remove freedom from people without straying into evil would not really be a problem in the Pathfinder world. Unlike the real world, you would have the assistance of various magics, and also the most important thing - gods specifically dedicated to those same concepts. Those gods, along with entire planes of existence populated by various outsider races literately composed of their alignments, and legions of worshipers. This Host of whatever alignment interact with the world on a daily basis.
I'm also a little disturbed by your apparent merging of all types of institutions together, along with slavery, and saying they all have bad things, like slavery did and thus implying they're all somehow bad or not bad.
Hmmm, I have reread what I wrote several times, and I can't see where I implied that they were somehow equal. Allow me to try again:
In the real world:
All various social power structures exist solely between humans*. Various systems produce common results (i.e. power corrupts), but I would contend that those results are usually because of how those result are in the real world, vs the theory that produced them. The theoretical ideal of something like communism, or democracy, or prostitution will always be very different then what it looks like among real humans.
[* We will leave human-animal, or -plant relationships out of this for now]
In the classic D&D/Pathfinder world:
Almost all social power structures exist, but they would exist with the filter of all the gods, planes, outsiders, worshipers, and perhaps most importantly, the wide variety of races that exist in-game. Often, those races have an alignment associated with most of their members. Unlike some settings, in Pathfinder, you can count of most elves being Chaotic Good, and most drow being Chaotic Evil. Every demon you encounter is CE, unless there was some serious divine intervention. Anyway, when you take a system like feudalism, for example and apply it to a group like LG Dwarfs, it is going to look very different then in our world. Likewise marriage between a blue dragon and a devil would be unbelievable to most humans (insert divorce lawyer joke here).
To bring this back to the topic, slavery is an extreme form of forcing another to obey you. The slaves free will is subsumed to the will of the master. Among humans, this had predictably horrible results. Among a race like archons, who are composed of both Good and Law subtypes, absolute obedience is baked into their very fiber. The hierarchy among them is unquestionable, and benign subservience would be hardwired by their very nature. Humans would find such a structure untenable and prone to abuse, but that would be to humanities failure to implement a theoretical ideal.
Alex Smith 908 |
In the classic D&D/Pathfinder world:
To bring this back to the topic, slavery is an extreme form of forcing another to obey you. The slaves free will is subsumed to the will of the master. Among humans, this had predictably horrible results. Among a race like archons, who are composed of both Good and Law subtypes, absolute obedience is baked into their very fiber. The hierarchy among them is unquestionable, and benign subservience would be hardwired by their very nature. Humans would find such a structure untenable and prone to abuse, but that would be to humanities failure to implement a theoretical ideal.
Except by their very nature as good aligned outsiders archons would never have slavery. their order is no subservience of servant and master imposed downward but the reciprocal support a well trained military unit. A roof is not the "master" of its walls although it is held aloft by them. Archons very nature of beings of perfect good and order means that their relationships do not contain subservience because that implies a lack of mutual respect, the exact thing needed to make their hierarchy work. If in a military the officers do not respect their troops you are left with the chaos of the early red army in WW2, needing commissars with machine guns to keep the soldiers from running and even then they lost 2 soldiers for every 1 nazi they killed.
Even beings of lawful neutral do not exhibit anythin we would recognize as slavery. The inevitables simply execute their perfect law as independent agents. There is no need for one inevitable to command another because if multiple inevitables are needed for a task they will simply join together naturally as soon as all of the needed inevitables are aware of the issue.
Fergie |
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Again, since we are talking about Pathfinder alignment issues, I would encourage everyone to re-read the alignment section again.
"Law: Law implies honor, trustworthiness, obedience to authority, and reliability. "
"Chaos: Chaos implies freedom, adaptability, and flexibility. "
A creature composed of Law, is going to exhibit a fanatical amount of obedience to authority, while likely lacking (perhaps actively fighting) the traits of Chaos.
Alex Smith 908 |
If we're going to be quoting dictionaries at eachother.
Good: Good implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings.
Evil: Evil implies hurting, oppressing, and killing others.
Slavery which is again forcing someone to serve you and removing their personhood is oppressing them. Which is again stated as evil. This does not take into account someone's own alignment or desire to serve. It is entirely on the part of the person in power as to whether or not they are evil, as to quote the dictionary at you again.
to oppress: keep (someone) in subservience and hardship.
It does not matter if someone wants to serve you or not. It is inherently evil to remove their choice in serving because it is oppressing them. Which is evil.
Edit: Law as you said is obedience to authority, not forcing others to obey. Law is enforced upward not downward, as even CE are able to enforce order by beating others into submission as demon society is portrayed.
Fergie |
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Well, I was quoting the Pathfinder alignment section, but if we are quoting the dictionary, let's do it fully:
op·press
əˈpres/
verb
gerund or present participle: oppressing
"keep (someone) in subservience and hardship, especially by the unjust exercise of authority.
But we are not talking about hardship or injustice, so oppression is not really an applicable word.
We are talking about subservience:
"Subservient means "compliant," "obedient," "submissive," or having the qualities of a servant. Something that's subservient has been made useful, or put into the service of, something else."
Given peoples willingness to proudly declare themselves servants of religions, governments, philosophies, etc. I'm just not seeing the inherent Evil oppression of being a servant.
Fergie |
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"Non-voluntary" does not equal oppression or Evil. If people want to do Evil things, or don't want to do Good things, making this behavior compulsory, is Lawful. Allowing people the freedom of choice is Chaotic.
EDIT: Please note capitalization of alignment terms indicates Pathfinder definitions, not a statement about real life morality.