Abraham Lincoln

The real reason behind the slavery debate wasn't ethics, it was whether the North or South would have more power.

The less slaves there were, the lower the population of the South was, and therefore, the less influence they had over the House of Representatives.

carmen510 wrote:

@Zealot: Might be true, but I've been brought up with rather untraditional views of history and am still rather uncomfortable with this forum.

Well, I didn't say that you were taught with traditional views of history, just probably that you had been traditionally taught views that conflicted with what was protrayed here.

WWW wrote:

For a political radical, I'm actually not a big fan of alternative history.

I'd like to know what you mean with "alternative history". I would even argue that the term "alternative history" doesn't make much sense since history relies on a series of evidence that can be universally traced back - it's not like some people can just make up things and get credibility on historical matters...

So, what I'd argue here is that history is often taught from the point of interpretation of certain historians, with some make up to achieve bias, or with blatant omisions of certain aspects and/or deprivations of the necesary contextualization to fully understand a certain event.

There's where I think the teaching of history may have real variations.

Twisting history is an important part of cultural hegemony. And worldwide we can see terrible examples of the implications of this - just look at Israel.


Now, in regards to dislike for blacks. Well, wasn't it part of the American Culture for yet more than a century after Lincoln's death to treat African-Americans as if they were second class citizens?

Hell, even as per material conditions, blacks are still treated as second class citizens by many in the US. It's not uncommon to hear the idiotic rant "They're not slaves anymore, they even got one of them in the white house... what's their excuse to be poor and often a bunch of criminals now? There must be something else there and it's not our (whites') fault".

Or how the police tends to love to prosecute black people being a fact that it's much esier to prosecute a black man than a white one.

Seems like the words of Lincoln still echoing inspite of a Blackman with arabic lastname governing the US.

That speech does reveal Lincoln as an utter racist.

Besides, abolishig slavery? It'd be interesting to compare as per definitions wage-based labour and slavery.

Lincoln was a racist, that is true. I believe that instead of integrating blacks into society, he felt they wouldn't fit in with whites, and thus wanted to deport them to Africa, in particular Liberia.

carmen510 wrote:

Lincoln was a racist, that is true. I believe that instead of integrating blacks into society, he felt they wouldn't fit in with whites, and thus wanted to deport them to Africa, in particular Liberia.

Was that him with the Liberia thing? Oh lolz.
So why did he want to abolish slavery if he was a racist?

CoolKidX wrote:

Was that him with the Liberia thing? Oh lolz.
So why did he want to abolish slavery if he was a racist?

It was actually a black man who started the "back to Africa" movement.

And like I said, he freed the slaves as a publicity stunt.

CoolKidX wrote:

carmen510 wrote:

Lincoln was a racist, that is true. I believe that instead of integrating blacks into society, he felt they wouldn't fit in with whites, and thus wanted to deport them to Africa, in particular Liberia.

Was that him with the Liberia thing? Oh lolz.
So why did he want to abolish slavery if he was a racist?

I touch on this in my post; it was a politically-motivated move.

So ataully Lincoln was a huge asshole, a racist, and a scumbag who wants the people to love him. Damn, and America kids get to learn he rocks. Right? I need a confirm on that.

CoolKidX wrote:

So ataully Lincoln was a huge asshole, a racist, and a scumbag who wants the people to love him. Damn, and America kids get to learn he rocks. Right? I need a confirm on that.

Welcome to the real world

Ah that disqusts me, I learned that Lincoln is arsehole and kids get to learn he is great, like, damn... sad.

Lincoln wanted to send blacks back to Africa, because he wanted to keep America for the whites. It was segregation, but he believed that black COULD NEVER be integrated into American society, due to racial relations and such.

This was probably one of the least racist attitudes towards blacks at the time, so you could say he was still progressive.

CoolKidX wrote:

Ah that disqusts me, I learned that Lincoln is arsehole and kids get to learn he is great, like, damn... sad.

Now you know what we socialists feel like when peope who are not capitalist (and even actual capitalists) do engage in apologies of capitalism.

CoolKidX wrote:

Ah that disqusts me, I learned that Lincoln is arsehole and kids get to learn he is great, like, damn... sad.

Well, I have educated at least one person here!

Liche wrote:

CoolKidX wrote:

Ah that disqusts me, I learned that Lincoln is arsehole and kids get to learn he is great, like, damn... sad.

Well, I have educated at least one person here!

And I am very glad that I know it know! Thx Mr.Liche *thumps up*. Imagine that .

carmen510 wrote:

This was probably one of the least racist attitudes towards blacks at the time, so you could say he was still progressive.

Blacks were even allowed to form part of the Russian nobility decades before that, not to mention that the Russian empire was forged by the principle of respecting the great ethnic diversity of the territorsi that conformed it.

Not to mention the hundreds of non racist communities that existed even since millenia before...

So, nope, I don't think his posture was particularily progressive considering that by comparison lots of people were far less racist.

In fact, racism per say, was as well an effective tactic of cultural hegemony to prevent lower class whites to unite with blacks.

CoolKidX wrote:

Yea he sucks.
The American Civil War were about state rights, not slaves.
Lincoln probably needed a good reason to go war with the South.

lincoln needed no reason to go to war with the south

the south got tired ofthe north pushing them around and said enough isenough we can be happyer without you (not unlike the american revolution)

so the south left the union and formed the confederate states of america.


it is my personal belief that the south should have won that war

the south has to this day not recoverd from the civil war and is still exploited by the north

Quote :

it is my personal belief that the south should have won that war

It's at least interesting to think about. What would've happened to the slave-owners had chattel slavery continued? Hanged? Gutted? Ironically enslaved?

Black_Cross wrote:

Ironically enslaved?

Lol I love irony.

Pretty awesome, black people fighting whole Europe. And then the Asians unleash robots to kill the white people!