When does dependence become slavery?
We're socializing creatures. We're better when we come together to feed, clothe, shelter, and defend one another. When does this dependence become slavery?
I was thinking about the human body: how liver cells spend their whole lives being the liver, skin cells are skin, heart cells beat from birth to death. None of them are acting by choice are they? Even if the heart is struggling because it belongs to someone who became very overweight... it never gives up. It never goes out on strike to get better conditions. It just goes until it can't go anymore and at the very end it will go into overdrive trying to compensate for its own failure.
A human society is different from that. The idea of slavery causes revolts and revolutions. I'm trying to find the beginning of that. Is it something that's done to us? Or is it something we're all collectively creating?
ArguingWAristotleTiff:When what you are doing is not by choice and you begin to build up resentment, against those whom are making you do it, including but not limited to yourself.
I was thinking about the human body: how liver cells spend their whole lives being the liver, skin cells are skin, heart cells beat from birth to death. None of them are acting by choice are they? Even if the heart is struggling because it belongs to someone who became very overweight... it never gives up. It never goes out on strike to get better conditions. It just goes until it can't go anymore and at the very end it will go into overdrive trying to compensate for its own failure.
A human society is different from that. The idea of slavery causes revolts and revolutions. I'm trying to find the beginning of that. Is it something that's done to us? Or is it something we're all collectively creating?
Comments (34)
Hello, thanks for your post. Interesting topic, imho. I'm just trying to follow the train of thought, concerning dependency and slavery. Could you define what you mean any further? I think i might know, but it's safer not to assume. There is also the concept of interdependence, as some kind of middle ground between dependence and independence. Though i am hard pressed to come up with an example of anything that is absolutely independent, needing nothing from nor giving anything to anyone else. As for people having to do difficult, dangerous, or dirty jobs; as long as they are compensated very well for it there seems to be less of a problem. Although kids probably will never dream of becoming a sewer cleaner. :D
I think the first order of business here is deciding whether slavery is in itself wrong, which I'm not so sure. I find myself wondering if the pedagogus of ancient Greece or Rome had it so bad, seeing as he/she could climb the social ladder just as well as any ordinary citizen. Additionally, a distinction that's worth mentioning would be between voluntary and involuntary slavery. The African slave in 19th century America might find involuntary slavery to be a heinous sin (as I would), but not the pedagogus of antiquity. Furthermore, I'm unsure if the debt slaves of Rome or ancient Mesopotamia, in contrast, thought their voluntary servitude was petty or unduly constraining.
Consider homelessness in America, for a moment. Most who find themselves homeless arrived at their predicament involuntarily, as a generalized result of the corporate capitalist economy. Yet, there are a staggering amount of homeless citizens in the US who have voluntarily chosen "houselessness" as a particular lifestyle. On one hand we have people who fall through the cracks, so to speak, and are in the doldrums not of their own volition, and on the other, we have people who very much choose to fall through the cracks. Are both of these people in the wrong?
Quoting Mongrel
If I don't want to work at McDonalds in order to cloth, shelter, and feed myself, am I voluntarily falling through the cracks because I don't want to do what society deems that I must?
Quoting Mongrel
I might like being forced to be a poet and accompany someone's child to and from school, seeing as I'd be doing what I want (be a poet, perhaps), and am given my basic needs, like food, shelter, and clothing.
Society creates more immoral involuntary slavery than it does potentially moral voluntary slavery.
Also, who/what decides if society in fact "better" provides for one's necessities? It seems like society decides, otherwise you'll be put in prison.
I think the beginning of it starts with a sense of being forced to comply and this depends a lot on our awareness of our environment. In the more well off societies the compensation we get for labour can be seen as a trade off for freedom (doing something against ones own volition with the idea of reaping a benefit at a later time in being able to provide for a family / self actualisation etc.
I feel most can see some sort of logic / rationale behind a judicial system and can also notice that there's usually a majority view on having certain laws which make it such a force it's not regarded as something forcing someone to comply but more like the weather. The way basic needs like food, shelter, health are seen as a right or as needs which need to be met on a daily basis makes a lot of difference in what people will tolerate and this also depends on the environment. A tribe somewhere in a pristine jungle would not see it as self evident that they'll be fed if hungry, someone living among people who are all considerably wealthy might.
Religion also plays a big role, the way the caste system works in India gives people an excuse to comply. I've read theories that the way Christianity was eventually implemented in Europe served as an excuse to have a few "chosen ones" be able to pass their wealth along generations without too much repercussions from the "serfs" paving the way for feudalism.
I think I'm quite fortunate to be somewhat unaware how the immediate threat of violence comes into play in all this.
(And if you could consider awareness playing a big part in the degree to which people feel forced to comply, this article might be of interest: http://harvardmagazine.com/2015/05/the-science-of-scarcity)
Quoting Mongrel
Slavery existed for a long time within Greek and Roman culture without causing any (successful, at least) revolutions. And slavery in Greece and Rome wasn't all about pedagogues (??????????) teaching children poetry. The model of slavery in Rome may not have been as implacable as slavery in America.
Marxists speak of wage slavery. In harsher capitalistic societies if you do not work, you do not eat and that is "your problem, not mine". Marx (or maybe the American socialist DeLeon) noted that in America it was cheaper to hire an Irish worker to fix a roof than use a slave. If the Irish worker fell of the roof and died, the largest possible cost would be the day's wages before he died. If a slave fell off the roof and died, one would be out a good deal of money.
Capitalism has moderated; crumbs are dropped on the chronically unemployed -- General Assistance (like, $250 a month). Unemployment helps short term unemployment. Disability programs help those who can't work. But still, if you don't work, you get very little. This isn't an accident.
It takes visibly impoverished unemployed people, slums, shelters, food shelves and such to make millions of people drag themselves into their dreary jobs, spend the day being managed by overseers, getting paid too little for the value produced (the key to capitalism), and then drag themselves back home for whatever is left of the day.
Only a small proportion of hourly wage workers are engaged in labor that is not alienating. A good share of salaried workers aren't doing anything very fulfilling either. A relatively small minority of workers are engaged in labor that provides personal satisfactions. (Maybe 15%? 20%?)
It's pretty much wage slavery for most of us,
I've been spinning yarn, which for me is a hobby. For Gandhi it was about self-sufficiency which provides the power to stand up with dignity. Why was power and dignity lost to begin with? How did India become an object of exploitation? They were conquered during a window of weak political power. So doesn't it come back to defense? If you don't invest in the ability to kill, you may never pay a price for it but your descendants might.
I'm suggesting that it really isn't so much a slow insidious loss of self-direction. Violent subjugation comes first. True or deluded?
Why are there cracks to fall through in the first place?
Exactly. Cool article, thanks.
And recently the crowd mourns that there isn't more of this kind of work. "Provide more wage slavery" is basically the Trump mandate, right?
There is no intention within the power elite to reorganize society so that people who do not want alienating labor can find a path to something better.
Some people, in some situations, are happy doing alienating labor. I've been there a couple of times doing fairly simple shit work that had absolutely no value to me, but the setting was interesting. (It was reboxing old, water-damaged trust files for First Bank and Trust (now US Bank). What made this task moderately interesting was that most of the other people working on the project were patients from Hazelden Drug Treatment and we were free to talk while we worked. It was practically a graduate seminar on drug abuse and drug treatment.)
Another thing that made this crap job OK was that the management didn't care what we were doing as long as there was a steady flow of unboxed, sorted, reboxed, labeled, and cataloged boxes to be shipped out to a storage company--and the bank hoped, never to be looked at again.
Those aren't cracks. What you call "cracks" is the grating in the bottom of the machine.
More generally, because of the world. More specifically, because of society. If you try and survive outside of society, you'll probably be arrested or shot for farting around on someone's lawn. Is it their lawn? No, but you don't have the power to resist an enforced authority unless you're okay with the consequences.
I'm currently reading a book by a Dutch author (https://www.amazon.com/Utopia-Realists-Universal-Borders-Workweek/dp/9082520303/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8) and it has some interesting notes.
I already knew it was a form of indoctrination (with which I'm indoctrinated to some degree also) but the book is making some nice observations on "deserving poor" vs. "undeserving poor" where the undeserving bit seems to follow the prejudiced notion most have of conservative doctrine: "every one is an individual responsible agent", "you can make it if you try hard", you create your own success", "losers lack attitude", etc.
I was somewhat stunned to hear it was Nixon not so long who came close to providing the whole of the US with a basic income scheme. (article from the author of the book: https://thecorrespondent.com/4503/the-bizarre-tale-of-president-nixon-and-his-basic-income-bill/173117835-c34d6145).
It also has some interesting titbits about how Harrah's Cherokee casino does wonders for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and other stuff which appears to make a good case against the doctrine most of us are familiar with. Not to mention the well known concerns about the future where more and more jobs will become automatized.
Though I have some doubts still, there's a correlation to be drawn with our "age of reason" in which everything needs to be quantified for people to be (mistakenly) assured they have a handle on it. If the common doctrine is that people will become bums if they don't have the incentive we're all familiar with (wage slavery) and there's little means to quantify what actually will happen if people are left to their devices and also very little historic precedent.... it comes down to trust in humanity...
It's also worth noting that, what you might consider wage slavery, is utopia for many, many people around the globe and there are also a lot of people who are still very, very ideological, whereas a lot of people in secular "advanced" societies might be suffering from a distinct lack in ideology. (Where I would consider myself a cynical humanist when it comes to ideology).
And that's exactly why I equate the difference between dependency and slavery with our perceived notions of choice / awareness.
Enter Foucault, stage left. Each of us is complicit in the framework of power we find ourselves in, indeed I oppress myself, I self-censor, I apologise when I don't need to, I accede when I could have asserted. This does seem to me something in us - each of us spends years accepting parental / institutional authority, before each of us breaks out in our own way, with all sorts of residual obedience to habit / instruction / people.
Not that I'm disagreeing with BC. There are elaborate skeins of structures in which we are entangled and to which we often acquiesce. Systems that elaborate.
Quoting Hanover
Gilbert and Sullivan mention liquified livers in one of their songs...
A more humane Mikado never
Did in Japan exist;
To nobody second,
I’m certainly reckoned
A true philanthropist.
It is my very humane endeavour
[b][i]To make, to some extent,
Each evil liver
A running river
Of harmless merriment.[/i][/b]
God forbid!
Quoting mcdoodle
Yours is a succinct summation of our situation.
Just as there is no government without the consent of the governed (a statement which is generally true if not applied too literally), everyone in the workplace gives daily assent to the rightness of the bosses (of no special merit) telling many people (who the bosses don't need to know much about) what to do--when, where, and how.
Quoting Gooseone
Indeed they might.
It takes clear ideology, along with strong solidarity, to successfully challenge the dominant paradigm. Do it alone and you will be kicked out the door. Do it together with vague understanding and you'll find all of your wages docked.
Maybe it's the same doctrine I'm (we?) criticizing but: "No risk, no reward".
If you were to sum up the ideology behind any revolution....
...I do get kicked out of the door at the times, I'm self employed though ...so I suffer for it.
Less than an ideology, "No risk, no reward" is more a truism, but one well worth remembering.
An ideology would be "The role of a capitalism is to extract maximize profit from the productive process." Or oppositely, (but related) "Labor produces all wealth." Following the wrong ideology can lead to autofucktative results. When labor thinks that it is just fine for capitalists to extract the maximum from their work, they are fucking themselves. Capitalists don't usually make the same kind of mistake because they have clearer class consciousness. Capitalists understand which side of the bread is buttered.
Workers tend to think that with hard work, gumption, a couple of bright ideas, "no risk, no reward", and so on they too will become rich capitalists. Workers who lack accurate information about class structure and operation are not sufficiently aware that hard work will tire them out without making them rich. Add gumption, a couple of bright ideas, and so on -- and they will still be tired out and be no richer than they were before.
If workers want to get rich, they have to do more than merely emulate capitalists: They have to seize the property of the capitalists and operate it for their own benefit. Former capitalists become workers like everybody else (but like as not an unusually resentful, bitter, hateful, and unhappy batch of workers). That's OK. If they don't work, then they won't eat very well. If they do work, they'll get the same rewards as everybody else. If they don't like this deal, there is always a one way ticket to the scenic Aleutian Islands.
I suppose Gilbert's and Sullivan's work could count as "show tunes" even though The Mikado was written in 1885 and counts more as operetta (or opera to some people).
You might be one of those unfortunates that rushes into a theater without reading the marquee first and doesn't know whether he is watching Parsifal or Pinafore.
Agreed. Livers, nor their cells can think or compare/contrast or choose to put their job into perspective.
Again I suggest that slavery involves a build up of resentment towards that which or whom they are enslaved by.
When the Sun comes back
And the first quail calls
Follow the Drinking Gourd,
For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom
If you follow the Drinking Gourd
The riverbank makes a very good road.
The dead trees will show you the way.
Left foot, peg foot, travelling on,
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
The river ends between two hills
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
There’s another river on the other side
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
When the great big river meets the little river
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
For the old man is a-waiting for to carry to freedom
If you follow the Drinking Gourd.
"The Drinking Gourd" references the big dipper constellation. The edge of the cup (two stars furthest from the handle) point toward Polaris, the north star, which is the first star in the handle of the little dipper. So, "follow the north star" north.
I'm most familiar with Pete Seeger's performance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgakshXwosA The Drinking Gourd was popular with American folk groups back in the 50s and 60s. Seeger, Weavers, New Christy Minstrels, etc. Seeger, the Almanac Singers and the Weavers were all far left. Pete Seeger and the Weavers were big radio hits (pre TV era), which is surprising considering the post WWII right wing backlash in the 1950s.
It is slavery when the dependence is sustained by fear instead of by love.
I'm not familiar with Foucault. Does he talk about self-oppression?
True. And I guess simply abandoning fear is a kind of emancipation.
I've always wondered how one does that. If fear were like a pair of shoes, one could easily leave it by the roadside, but alas, I find it is more like a pair of feet.
Fear is paralyzing when it takes over. Any self-directed action is a sign that fear is diminished. And then action leads to further diminishment. Gandhi spun fibers to relieve fear of going without clothes. The Samurai studied Zen so they could fight with no fear of death. If you go into healthcare someone will share ways to overcome fear when someone is dying in front of you and it's your job to do something about it.
Or you could do it like MLK... have faith in people.
It's a while since I've read him, since I'm in an analytic phase..Foucault would begin with power, as a relation (indeed it's interesting that your op leaps from mutuality to slavery without saying 'power' or 'status'). Then power is (historically situated and ) distributed through social relations, not just through institutions but in the smallest and most intimate areas of our.lives. We exert or accede to power in many small ways which are part of the structure of discipline, including ways in which we discipline ourselves, feel guilt and contrition. It's extremely hard at any historical moment to 'step outside' such disciplinary structures for we are embodied within them. The 'self' is a performing thing that is subject to discipline great and small but also tries to create their own life, aesthetically. Hope that makes sense and doesn't offend any Foucault fans!
What I note is that it never really seems to end. People rise up, things change for bit, and then slavery appears again in some other form. Is that because it's part of our basic nature? Do we have to die and be replaced by something else for slavery to finally end?
Slavery is in the first place a word we use to name a special social status, for instance as defined by law. By United States law, by Roman law, by Sharia law, and so on, from one time and community to another.
Do we have a single concept of slavery as a special social status across all such legal definitions and across all communities in which there is no legal system in place or no laws that pertain to slavery? It may be difficult to articulate such a concept precisely in a way that's suitable for all cultural contexts. This difficulty expands into a broader one, concerning the use of the concept of slavery as a metaphor for various socioeconomic conditions in which the freedom of individuals is arguably restricted unjustly.
One way to bring out the difficulty: Someone might want to argue that one or another group in the U.S. or in similar Western nation-states are currently "enslaved": farm animals, pets, children, the elderly, incarcerated felons, the institutionalized insane, the disenfranchised, the proletariat, the 99%.... It's far from clear how to adjudicate disputes about whether the relevant conceptions of "slavery" are appropriate or inappropriate conceptions. Accordingly, one might prefer to avoid use of the term in such contexts, to wave off disputes about such use of the term as insignificant, and to focus conversation on facts about the relevant groups, facts about the relevant abridgements of rights or liberty, and arguments about the justice or injustice of the relevant facts.
[quote="ArguingWAristotleTiff]When what you are doing is not by choice and you begin to build up resentment, against those whom are making you do it, including but not limited to yourself.[/quote]
By this standard, all or nearly all communities would be communities that have "slaves"; and whether or not a member of the community counts as a slave would vary from one moment to the next along with his social contexts, choices, and emotions.
If my friends pressure me to dance when I don't feel like it, and I do it and then resent them and myself for it, am I a "slave"? What if I refuse to dance, but resent them and myself anyway?
Taken one way, this seems a frivolous definition that should offend anyone with an historically informed sense of what literal slavery has and still does entail for literally enslaved human beings.
On the other hand, we do speak metaphorically about being a "slave to your own impulses", a slave to ambition, a slave to gluttony, a slave to the esteem of others....
Accordingly, it should be specified what sense of "slavery" is at issue in the present conversation. Slavery as a formal social status, slavery as a metaphor for oppression, slavery as a metaphor for akrasia, or what?
Quoting Mongrel
My heart is my heart, it's not my slave. There's no reason to think of the parts of an organism as "slaves" of the organism. In general there's no reason to think of parts of a whole as "slaves" of the whole.
I am not a slave to myself, but I have my own limits. Some of these limits are limits of action imposed by my body in each environment. Under normal conditions, I can't fly, I can't run beyond a certain speed, I can't lift more than a certain weight. I can train up my speed and strength only at a certain rate, with certain effort, and with certain limits to my progress. I must take in air, and water, and food if I'm to flourish or survive....
There's no reason to say I am a "slave" to these limits of mine. They are conditions of my existence and conditions of my freedom. I would not be myself without them, and I would not be anything without some such limits. To exist is to have limits. Having limits does not entail being a slave.
I'm not sure it makes any sense to speak literally of slavery except where sentient agents are enslaved by other sentient agents. This is only a necessary, not a sufficient, criterion for a clear conception of slavery.
One way to flesh out that conception might emphasize the concept of property: A slave is the property of a slave-owner. Another way might emphasize the subordination of will: According to relevant social norms, the will of the slave is in principle subordinate to the will of the slave-owner, which can mean, among other things, that the owner is held responsible for the actions of the slave. Details of property rights and responsibility pertaining to slaves have varied across cultural contexts in which slavery has been treated as legitimate; that's one reason it's difficult to produce a generic conception of slavery that suits all cultural contexts.
Quoting Mongrel
I have the impression that literal slavery begins after human communities develop resources sufficient to hold captives -- typically including members of alien communities captured during raids or combat -- while giving those captives enough freedom of movement to perform tasks assigned to them by their captors. I hope it's obvious how and why this might cause revolts of the enslaved and their sympathizers.
Isn't there a middle ground between a clear conception of literal slavery, on the one the hand, and any old metaphorical use of the term? Can we agree that "oppression" and "coercion" are terms that figure prominently in this middle ground?