A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018) • Hacker News Board

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#51

Post by SaintGhurka » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:45 PM UTC

youdontknowtho wrote: post #45

humanrebar wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not attack straw men. It's also barbaric to ban medically necessary procedures. Besides, frequency of an event isn't a defense against charges of barbarism. Lobotomies, the Tuskegee Experiment, and eugenic sterilization weren't all that common, but they were barbaric.

It's easy to make abortion seem barbaric in a HN comment thread. The lives of people are complicated and messy. Your opinion about how other people should conduct their personal lives shouldn't extend to family planning. Period. If we are being honest, open heart surgery is barbaric. They cut people open and then break all their ribs. It's not assault or murder, for a variety of reasons that I'm not going to go into.…

"Your opinion about how other people should conduct their personal lives shouldn't extend to family planning."

So the poster shouldn't have an opinion?

"Further, experience tells me that granting good faith in these arguments is usually a bad idea."

Isn't granting good faith to others' arguments one of the cherished ideals on HN?

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#52

Post by ceautery » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:46 PM UTC

wholepointofcc wrote: post #44

ceautery wrote: post #12

> I wonder if any of our current practices will be viewed as barbaric. The US jailed 70,000 migrant children this year. I doubt history will smile on that.

What responsibility is bore by the parents who willingly took them into a country where they know they would have a high likelihood of being mistreated?

Q) "Why did you come here if you knew it would be risky?"

A) "I had no way to provide food for my family, and didn't want to be killed by drug cartels."

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#53

Post by MrGLaDOS » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:48 PM UTC

reportgunner wrote: post #21

Ma8ee wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the way we treat animals today will be viewed as very barbaric within a generation or two. We are everyday learning more about how much intelligence and consciousness something like cows posses.

> We are everyday learning more about how much intelligence and consciousness something like cows posses How can I join this learning ?

Try this (and other) book(s) by primatologist Frans de Waal:

https://books.google.it/books?id=vhmZCgAAQBAJ&redir_esc=y

"A passionate and convincing case for the sophistication of nonhuman minds." —Alison Gopnik, The Atlantic

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#54

Post by wholepointofcc » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:50 PM UTC

thomk wrote: post #48

wholepointofcc wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What responsibility is bore by the parents who willingly took them into a country where they know they would have a high likelihood of being mistreated?

Can you be sure their parents brought them over? Also, if they did, you can be sure their motivation wasn't to antagonize American citizens.

I didn't say it was. I'm saying migrating illegally to the USA is a terrible choice. Hell, legally migrating is already a questionable choice. There are better places to fight for your life.

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#55

Post by wholepointofcc » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:52 PM UTC

ceautery wrote: post #52

wholepointofcc wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What responsibility is bore by the parents who willingly took them into a country where they know they would have a high likelihood of being mistreated?

Q) "Why did you come here if you knew it would be risky?" A) "I had no way to provide food for my family, and didn't want to be killed by drug cartels."

Ok, you took a gamble, to illegally go into a place that ostensively doesn't want you. The gamble didn't pay off, tough luck.

What the USA is doing is inhumane (news at 11) but I have very little sympathy for people who put their children at risk like that.

I'd turn into a criminal before putting my children at risk like that. Maybe this makes me a worse person. It certainly makes me a person whose children are not in involuntary semi-permanent detention.

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#56

Post by TeMPOraL » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:55 PM UTC

dublin wrote: post #46

xorfish wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clean in vitro meat might be the technology that ends factory farming. An interesting question is how future generations will look at us if they still eat clean meat.

Describing lab-created genetically-modified "Frankenmeat" as "clean" might be one of those things not looked on favorably in the future... Bill Joy is quite likely right that genetic engineering is probably the most dangerous technology ever created, and the one that almost certainly has the highest probability of killing us all.

It may be the most dangerous of technologies currently on the horizons, but it can also have the biggest payoff - it's not just about things like curing diseases, test tube babies, or selective pathogens - it's also the first stop on the way to building living machines, living materials, and cracking molecular nanotechnology, which life is nothing but.

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#57

Post by wholepointofcc » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

ceautery wrote: post #12

> I wonder if any of our current practices will be viewed as barbaric. The US jailed 70,000 migrant children this year. I doubt history will smile on that.

Here's a list of countries Mexicans (just an example, I know there are people from elsewhere coming in thru y'alls southern border) don't need Visas to enter: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Visa_req...

It literally includes all other countries in the American continent except for Guyana.

Immigrate to these countries instead. Thank me later.

Why would someone illegally immigrate to the USA in this day and age is beyond my comprehension.

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#58

Post by Consultant32452 » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 1:57 PM UTC

youdontknowtho wrote: post #50

Consultant32452 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A universal property of state run schooling is that schools are literal prisons for children and for many people is the only place they'll experience violence first hand. The finer details will vary by location.

I've been to multiple prisons for children to visit people, they aren't like schools. Also, many children are sent to adult prison and those aren't like school either. Both public and private schools can be places where people experience violence, but many more people experience violence at home first. Rein it in, minuteman.

Students are not free to leave and will literally be thrown in a cage for truancy if they do. They don't choose the curriculum, don't get to choose who they work with, and are frequently submitted to dehumanizing treatment like having to ask permission to use the restroom.

What more could you ask for in a prison?

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#59

Post by MrGLaDOS » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:01 PM UTC

praptak wrote: post #3

Makes one reflect on how much do we take for granted when it comes to ethics. I remember a (googleable) exchange of letters between the former owner and an ex-slave. The former was genuinely hurt by slave's betrayal and urged them to go back. There were people for whom owning other people was so normalized that they were actually angry at their former slaves. I wonder if any of our current practices will be viewed as…

Ethical philosopher Peter Singer presents and expands on the following argument in his book:[1]

"First Premise: Suffering and death from lack of food, shelter and medical care are bad.

Second Premise: If it is in your power to prevent something bad from happening, without sacrificing anything nearly as important, it is wrong not to do so.

Third Premise: By donating to aid agencies, you can prevent suffering and death from lack of food, shelter and medical care, without sacrificing anything nearly as important.

Conclusion: Therefore, if you do not donate to aid agencies, you are doing something wrong."

[1] https://www.thelifeyoucansave.org/the-book/

They bought back the publishing rights, so it is freely downloadable.

Re: A Database of Fugitive Slave Ads Reveals Thousands of Untold Stories (2018)

#60

Post by Pigo » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 2:07 PM UTC

kaffeemitsahne wrote: post #37

praptak wrote: post #3

Makes one reflect on how much do we take for granted when it comes to ethics. I remember a (googleable) exchange of letters between the former owner and an ex-slave. The former was genuinely hurt by slave's betrayal and urged them to go back. There were people for whom owning other people was so normalized that they were actually angry at their former slaves. I wonder if any of our current practices will be viewed as…

> I wonder if any of our current practices will be viewed as barbaric. Here we go again, everyone posts their pet not-actually-barbaric thing under the moral authority of people from the future.

By so many metrics our lives are incredible compared to every other period of human history. Of course it's not perfect, there's always room to improve, but there's a stark contrast between how things actually are and how many perceive it to be.

Very few problems are as unambiguous as slavery. A lot of our problems are much more nuanced.