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My Family’s Slave

theatlantic.com

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Re: My Family’s Slave

#471

Post by kelnos »

MrLeap wrote: post #148
MrZongle2 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish I could upvote you more. When this story hit HN earlier today, I was taken aback by how so many of the responses basically were of the hand-clasping, oh-what-a-touching-story nature. This is fucking slavery . There is nothing to admire. Treating slaves-in-all-but-name nicer after the fact does not make it any less repellent. One human being owned another, and had final say regarding all aspects of their lives.…

Phew thanks for making yourself known. This could be bias, but the blob of people on the internet seems to have become a lot more casually sociopathic over the last 15 years. Sure back when folks used to troll for laughs, but it always seemed like a mask to get a rise out of people. I've only noticed people recently openly talking convincingly and casually about weird shit like this. Either A) The world has always be…

I sympathize with the idea that we don't know what's going on, even based on that guy's post, so it might be a bit premature to point fingers and declare that, without question, this is an instance of slavery. Because really, that's the case. We don't know enough. And maybe the guy who visited his friend doesn't know enough to call it either.

However, the thing that gets me is that this guy had a moral responsibility to find out more, promptly, and he hasn't done it. I'm glad that some of his follow-up posts suggest that he's going to do so soon, but it's waaaaaaay overdue, and that's pretty messed up.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#472

Post by vacri »

Mz wrote: post #265
vacri wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fine Article mentions a number of times where Lola was not allowed freedom of movement. She had no freedom of movement, no pay (or ability to direct money), no personal life, no say in what she did, and was kept in place by fear. It certainly wasn't the common role of a wife a hundred years ago to be kept from a dying parent, for example. The nature of her labour is not what made Lola a slave; it was the circumst…

I am not readily finding citations, but I recall one of my history professors stating that the veil was heralded as a vast improvement for women in terms of freedom in some parts of the world because, historically, women in a lot of places left the house twice in their life: Once to get married, a second time to get buried. The veil allowed them to at least leave the house. I don't think you know as much about the hi…

> I don't think you know as much about the history of women as you think you do.

Well, I know enough to know that 'women only left the house twice in their life' is an outlier, not a yardstick. You can just as easily point out nomadic herder groups where there is almost zero gender power imbalance, with the women and men sharing equal power, and it's just as wrong to suggest that that is somehow historically representative as 'normal'.

I'd call a woman that was kept to a house and never allowed out to be a slave anyway. Well, perhaps a 'prisoner' if not forced to do work.

> The role of a wife and mom is often not as different from Lola's as you seem to assume.

My point was that Lola was a slave not because of the kind of labour she did, but because she was forced into that labour and not allowed freedom of movement. The list of things I wrote wasn't meant to be a canonical description of what defines a slave, but parts of her life that defined it for her. Unlike wives (who by definition at least have a husband), Lola had no-one and no permission to even try. She didn't even have a bed to sleep in when the others did. But in history, some slaves were encouraged to have families, homes, beds. Some slaves historically did get some pay, and likewise direct money. The article even describes slaves that owned their own slaves.

The mistake the GP made was confusing role with circumstance. Just because Lola's role was mothering, doesn't mean that mothering is slavery.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#473

Post by vacri »

colechristensen wrote: post #259
vacri wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fine Article mentions a number of times where Lola was not allowed freedom of movement. She had no freedom of movement, no pay (or ability to direct money), no personal life, no say in what she did, and was kept in place by fear. It certainly wasn't the common role of a wife a hundred years ago to be kept from a dying parent, for example. The nature of her labour is not what made Lola a slave; it was the circumst…

It might not have been the nominal role of a wife, but shared characteristics of that life were not uncommon.

The heartache in Lola's story is not the bit about her caregiving.

You ask what the fundamental difference between Lola and last-century wife? Hiding her from public view and not letting her out of the house seems like a pretty big one. Refusing to let her visit sick and dying parents seems to be another. Expecting her to sleep on the couch or the laundry looks like another. Not letting her have friends outside the family seems to be yet another. There's tons of differences if you look beyond the kind of work she spent her life doing.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#474

Post by kelnos »

retube wrote: post #145
bflesch wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're trying to tell us that your feeling of uncomfortness is the only thing stopping you from growing a spine and standing up for such an inhumane treatment, that apart from you nobody else can witness? Have some decency and confront your so-called friend. How can people be rich and not have the decency to give the person feeding you and your family a freaking room. And I really had to constrain myself from usin…

In some parts of the world a lot of people make do with a spot on the floor. I stayed at a guest house in India recently and the staff all slept on the roof or in the kitchen. Places are poor.

Sure, and that sucks. But we're talking about someone wealthy who has a lot of space. Making your live-in housekeeper sleep on a mat when you have plenty of space to spare as at best being a horrifying asshole, and if this guy is truly a "friend", I would hope he'd find out what's going on.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#475

Post by abalashov »

kelnos wrote: post #449
dennisgorelik wrote: post #446

Lola was a servant, but not a slave. She was much closer to being a volunteer than to a slave.

Servants get paid and have the freedom to choose their own destiny. Lola had neither of those things.

If I had to read the grandparent's comment charitably, there is a formal distinction in that Lola's relationship to the family was not legally institutionalised. If they tried to stop her from leaving the house by force, they would be committing a crime.

Whether it amounted to de facto slavery is a different question, as I pointed out in another comment on this article.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#476

Post by abalashov »

MockObject wrote: post #321
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #48

I visited Hong Kong a year ago. It is famous for its night markets, its abundant partying, and the massive financial powerhouses that make their home here. I did all the tourist things, I partied, I explored, it was great. A couchsurfing host showed me around the city on a tram. She pointed out masses of ladies in plain clothing sitting around on the sidewalks and in streets. It was a Sunday. This was the "maids day"…

They aren't permitted to go back home and sleep on the weekends? Why not?

What is this home of which you speak?

Re: My Family’s Slave

#477

Post by kaybe »

Mz wrote: post #229
obstinate wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry. I must have misinterpreted "solve my financial problems." Typically that's a euphemism for giving money. Forgive me.

... the one thing I most need to get my life back is an online income adequate to support myself... I stated it as clearly as I know how, yet people routinely assume I am "panhandling the internet." Because prejudice etc.

Here is another viewpoint - it's not clear what you wish for when saying

> 'I assure you, no one on HN is valiantly trying to help me solve my financial problems.'

I gather you have financial problems and are working hard to fight them. There seems to be some relation with the people on HN that don't help, but how? Did you ask for help and nobody offered? Is it sarcasm and people are actively hindering you in your job? I am confused, and I can see how someone could understand that you're asking for money. (I'm female, in case that matters.) So, I also concur that your way of expression is a bit unclear.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#478

Post by emodendroket »

lacampbell wrote: post #350
emodendroket wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there argument here that literally nothing whatsoever could be better than the system we currently live under? The one where we're hurtling toward ecological catastrophe and essentially no mitigation is being done?

Is there argument here that literally nothing whatsoever could be better than the system we currently live under? Potentially, I suppose. The only alternatives I hear being peddled are socialist though. So I associate any petty wry remark about "in capitalism, so and so" as a socialist agenda pushing. In 2017, I don't think it should be considered at all acceptable to advocate socialism in polite company. We've faile…

Even if we accepted your view of the topic I don't think advocating a policy that has ruin as a consequence is the same as advocating a policy whose explicit goal is ethnic cleansing. Also, the reason you're seeing a resurgence in interest in alternatives to capitalism is that it's working out poorly for more and more people. Policies like for-profit medicine are equally capable of ruining people's lives or outright killing them.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#479

Post by glogla »

hueving wrote: post #458
hyperdunc wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rhetorical questions (that you've probably already asked yourself many times): Why are you letting this happen and what do you fear will happen if you do something about it?

Many people are hesitant to intervene in something that will likely destroy their own family. This should not be surprising at all. It happens all of the time in family abuse cases.

Family like this is worth destroying.

Re: My Family’s Slave

#480

Post by urbanj »

dracht wrote: post #443
Mz wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am the highest ranked woman on HN because women are generally not all that warmly welcomed here. So if you don't think women are asking you for money on the internet, maybe it is because you are mostly talking to men. It is hard to ask for anything at all when silenced by the general behavior of men online. I offend in part because I fail to shut up, in spite of the sometimes horrible treatment I receive through no…

You felt it was appropriate to interject in a conversation about slavery to wonder why none of these people online haven't helped you out financially, which a typical person would construe as asking for money, despite being a woman with the highest internet points (or something). Maybe I don't frequent HN enough to know who's who, but your replies to obstinate read like the ramblings of someone with mental problems (…

> but your replies to obstinate read like the ramblings of someone with mental problems (I don't mean that as an insult).

Regardless of whether or not one agrees with what Mz is saying, how is that not an insult?

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