Minichan

Topic: If slavery was still legal...

Anonymous A started this discussion 10 years ago #51,167

Would you own a slave?

Sheila LaBoof joined in and replied with this 10 years ago, 1 hour later[^] [v] #663,592

I can't stand to even have a fuckin dog around more than a few minutes. If it's bigger than a gerbil, then that's more than I can handle

Anonymous C joined in and replied with this 10 years ago, 8 hours later, 10 hours after the original post[^] [v] #663,612

No, I'm not a lazy, inbred, uncaring moron.

Anonymous D joined in and replied with this 10 years ago, 5 minutes later, 10 hours after the original post[^] [v] #663,613

Hell yea, I need to hang some ornaments from my tree on Halloween.

Anonymous E joined in and replied with this 10 years ago, 2 days later, 2 days after the original post[^] [v] #664,003

Yes, if they were white.

Metæ joined in and replied with this 10 years ago, 1 hour later, 2 days after the original post[^] [v] #664,026

What I wonder is: would it be economically viable?

I think, if the civil war and 14th amendment never happened (or if the South had won), slavery would have died out by the mid 20th century as agriculture became mechanized and internal combustion engines and electricity replaced draft animals and manual labor. A farmer with tractors and combine harvesters is going to outproduce a farmer with slaves.

Also with slaves you have to take over all their care and needs, not only that but you have to prevent them running away and productivity will be poor (because you're forcing them to work against their will).

It's counterintuitive but I really do think by the '50s most slave owners would be all too eager to free their slaves and buy a tractor. Perhaps a few rich weirdos would keep domestic slaves (just like rich weirdos keep horses and go on foxhunts) but it would limited to the plantation aristocracy (who would have long since mechanized their actual plantation work — keeping a slave would be like playing polo or yachting, a rich people anachronistic thing).

(Edited 4 minutes later.)

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