Who's rights are greater. The master or the slave?

So, regardless of weather or not you think that black people are humans, we can all agree this is about human rights in some form or another. Rights for the slave owner. Rights for the slave. So on and so forth.

My viewpoint is that it is impossible to have this debate without recognizing that one persons rights are trampling on another no matter what.

If a white slave owner inherits his black slaves from his father, and is forced to feed and provide for them, the slave's rights have trampled on the owner's.
If a slave owner has his slave killed, his rights have just trampled on the slave.

So for me, the real question comes down to. Whos rights are greater? A distinction must be made here.

Personally, I would always assign the greater rights to the slave owner. In my mind, his property, his plantation, etc belongs to him, and not the slave. The slave is just a parasite (I do not mean that in a derrogative term, thats just the nature of the relationship at that point in time, seeing as the slave is dependent on him for food and shelter) So the slave owner should have greater rights than the slave, if he wishes to take him out and shoot him.

 

Don't forget that the slave has a reduced level of intelligence, which is just not comparable to a white slave master.
In fact, the slave is not even a human being, and can't really think for itself, so whatever the master chooses to do — say for example attack the slave with a vacuum cleaner fitted with a sharp nozzle — is okay.

Sure the slave has a human-like appearance, but that does not mean it is a person. Brain waves mean nothing because the slave brain is a smaller size.





Let's remember that even though we may never agree about what a woman's rights actually are, a human being's right to live is indisputable.

 

IMO there are always two sides and because of differing views on morality and ethics it is possible for both sides to be completely convinced that they are in the right. I see this all the time here on the forum and in public politics. I have seen this time and again in my life where a dispute is not so much about right and wrong, but more about differing morals and ethics and how they shape our views. For example I do not have a problem with a woman being braless... but I sure know many who do.

As for the whole slave thing, not sure where you are going with this or how it is relevant as slavery has long since been abolished. With that said I would side with the slave and demand their freedom.

 

Think you posted this in wrong forum. Stormfront members would agree with you and thats where this belongs.

 

It's a parody on abortionist logic - that must've gone over your head.

 

For those who may be confused, this thread was originally posted in the abortion section and was an obvious ridicule of another thread, "Whos rights are greater. The woman or the fetus?", before one of the moderators (probably a pro-choicer) moved this thread into the race relations section.

 

Went over my head also. I was thinking "what the hell is he taking about?" This is a failed analogy.

 

On way too many levels

 

I don't know if you realize this or not, but slavery isn't voluntary.

 

It is for the slave master.

 

The sentiments underlying the OP, with all due respect, are disagreeable to me.

I reckon life forms should be extended social rights in accordance to their qualities of personhood, so although a child / fetus / whatever you prefer to label it in the womb of its mother is human life, it is also far from being one that is fully developed and does not share in common many of the interests, abilities, and mental faculties possessed by adults or even children. I feel it is more appropriate to treat unborn human beings as one ideally would certain other species of animal.

By the third trimester, however, the unborn has enough of the qualities of personhood I consider relevant to merit the gift of additional rights. Despite being very permissive on most social issues in general, I cease to be pro-choice after the second trimester with exceptions made only for major defects in the unborn which seem likely to have a hugely detrimental impact on her or his quality of life and for deadly risks to the life of the mother (who still in my opinion has more qualities of personhood and is more valuable than the unborn).

Unlike the unborn early on, who by their very nature are dependent on their mothers for survival and can only be parted with via termination if the mothers do not consent to their relationships, slave dependency must be conditioned and even then the slave does not actually need a master’s patronage any more than a viable fetus needs the body of its mother or child needs its biological parents to survive and flourish. You see, there are other options which do not obstruct the ability of any of the parties involved to subsequently pursue happiness and enriching, satisfactory lives.

A master can give away or sell their slave, teach it skills for self-sufficiency, or perhaps place it into the care of the state or a charitable organization willing to provide assistance. Likewise, the parents of a child can put her or him up for adoption. But the mother who has not yet given birth cannot withdraw her consent to the relationship she has with the unborn without resorting to an abortion. Without that option she does not get to decide whether to assume career, health, or life related risks and responsibilities - making her the slave of an unborn master.

If a mother is not ready to bring a new life into this world and responsibly care for it, and can get the procedure performed early enough and in a reasonably humane fashion, having an abortion is perhaps the most commendable course of action available to her. Merely requiring her to make up her mind prior to the third trimester is the compromise I deem to be fair in balancing her interests against those of the developing human being(s) inside of her.

 

Te scenario presented was a case of the slave owner inheriting the slave which is not voluntary.The slave master could also let the slave to, nobody said he had to shoot the slave that came into his possession. The analogy also doesn't address a disputed point where nobody today says the slave Ian a cognitively and biologically developed human, but the point at which this applies to an unborn fetus is contested. Does it happen before conception, after concepion, and at what point after. The analogy glosses over this.

We could try another classic analogy. A man wakes up one day to find a famous violin player attached to him. The violin society did this to you to save the violin player from a failing kidney. The violin player will recover in 9 months. Does the violin player have a right to life? Sure, but does that mean he has right to the man's body? Under what scenario does the player have the right to his body? If the player takes efforts to prevent his body from being used, like locking his doors but the violin society still gets through, does that give the violin player the right to his body? If a woman takes efforts to prevent conception like use of birth control or condoms, but they still fail, does that give the zygot a right to the mother's body?

 

What if the abortion fails and she ends up giving birth. Should she have a right to kill the kid after birth? She didn't voluntarily agree to it, so why does it have a right to drain her finances and resources?

 

That's a question that applies to all live births. Where the child is viable and has all the uncontested rights of any other living, viable child, the child has the same rights to his parent's resources as any other child, which in many cases is none in those states where the child can be immediately given to the state. The mother has no right to kill a child that is viable without her body.

 

Slavery is not legal and has not been for over a century, so your arguement is moot, and if you are a slave owner you are a criminal and lose all your rights.

 

Slavery is legal in Africa.

Sex with 9 year olds is legal in Saudi Arabia. So is beating your wife.

etc

 

Feel free to move to either, or learn to live by American laws.

 

Then if we just made a law that made slavery legal again, all of a sudden you'd be okay with it.

 

Nope, first off it will never happen and secondly there are plenty of us that would have the pleasure of putting an end to any attempt to make it legal. On the other hand you seem to have dreams of such a world returning, tell me I am wrong.
Curious, why didn't your poll include "Neither"?

 

I'm still waiting for a law that says it's ok to someone to attach themselves to my kidney to survive and I have to put up with it, be it my child or a random stranger. Such might be an act of kindness, but I've never heard of one suggesting such a legal requirement for the use of my body.

 

Except that "someone else" didn't attach themselves; the fetus became attached by the woman's own actions.

Here, let me try to explain...


When a woman spreads her legs...






she essentially signs a contract...






because if she gets pregnant...





There are only two options:



or...





Since it is wrong to kill, the woman should realise that if engages in sexual intercourse she may have to go through a pregnancy.

A woman does have a choice whether to have a baby or not.
But once a she engages in risky activity, then finds herself knocked up, she has a responsibility to carry the pregnancy to completion, provided of course it is a healthy baby and she was not raped.

Don't forget that the vast majority of these women never even bothered to use protection. I say what they themselves have sowed, they must now reap.

 

Sometimes I wonder if you’re just doing a bit of leg-pulling here SpaceCricket.
But assuming not….
One’s persons rights can’t trample on another person’s rights. They might bump into one another but that’s about it.
If the slave owner doesn’t feed, water and shelter his slaves, he’s going to lose them. Same for livestock. It’s not about right, it’s about maintaining your assets.
If a slave owner has a slave killed then he hasn’t traduced the slave’s rights, the slave, by definition, had none. Just like if the farmer slaughtered a beast.
So you answered your own question. In a society with a slave economy the slave has no rights.
Therefore the slave owner has no greater rights than the slave, he or she has rights; the slave has none.

 

Now I get it.

Well there you are SpaceCricket. The pregnant woman has rights. The foetus has no rights. QED.

Well done.

 

Why should there be a rape exception - human life is human life, why should a baby suffer because of the sin of a father? I'm curious.