# Heritage? Nah, just hate. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 12, 2017, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487 "2017-08-12T23:49:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/281 "2017-08-16T04:24:24Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Well, it’s complicated. It doesn’t even work on the internet. I think part of it is people have a hard time accepting that someone else has a different point of view and they must be convinced of the errors of their ways. And I don’t feel empowered and useful unless I am peacocking my opposition to the world - from a position of safety of course. That way, even if they remain wrong at least everyone knows that I am RIGHT. Yeah, it’s awfully mature. > [@](#): > > Because racism isn’t and wasn’t a uniquely Southern thing. I lived in the Midwest. There was more racial animosity and de-facto segregation where I lived in the Midwest than where I live in the South. Blasphemy. Is there a stake handy? Northerners still do that right? Or is it hanging? ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/282 "2017-08-16T04:37:55Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > What I don’t get is the desire to claim your place amongst the worst of the worst and feeling somehow discounted when someone points out that, really, in the grand scheme of things, you weren’t so bad. > > Why the desire to insist that America’s sins even approach those of Pol Pot? BE fucking happy about it. > > “Hey, we were bad, really bad - but we weren’t that fucking bad. Now how can we fix what we did fuck up?” Would seem reasonable. > > “We were as bad as fucking Hitler and anyone who suggests otherwise is a…Nazi?” That makes no fucking sense. > > You guys already have the most wars trophy, you’re probably approaching the top 5 of most innocent civilians killed, why do you need to compete for worst internal atrocities? Ego. It’s a dangerous thing. Some Americans can’t stand being not first in anything. Even genocide. That’s why this fight between 2 mobs has spawned 100+ threads and the stuff happening in Syria, N. Korea, Venezuela barely registers a response. Let a fanatical Muslim drive a truck into a crowd and you might get two threads. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/283 "2017-08-16T04:38:45Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > Look, I provided numbers from The Root of all places saying that throughout the 341 years of New World slavery under 400,000 were transported to America. The 400,000 number referes to those transported to the United States. 12 million is the number transported to the U.S. plus the Caribbean islands, plus Brazil, plus several other locations. I am not sure what point you are hoping to make, but you need to get your figures correct or you will be dismissed. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/284 "2017-08-16T04:48:16Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > My thoughts on Confederate Monuments, since nobody bothered to ask… > > 1. Given the desires of the Confederacy was to no longer be a part of the United States, the continued existence of monuments to these men is obviously a slap in the face of their lifes ambition. Therefore, if you want to honor the Confederacy, petition for the removal of Confederate monuments within the United States. True enough. So now go and scrub the names of the volunteers that died in Vietnam of off the memorial. They fought for something and lost too. I guess Korea too - if there are any monuments. Leave the names of the conscripts - they were mostly poor and or black. > [@](#): > > 1. By design and choice, the Confederacy is an entity separate and distinct from the United States. By definition, their history is not United States history. Therefore, until we start installing monuments to the histories of, say, Senegal, Bolivia, and Khazkastan, we should remove Confederate monuments as their history is not American history. Are you really saying that the civil war is not a part of US history man? Or that they weren’t a part of US history until the war and then ceased to be a part after? Mississippi is as much a part of the 'States as Senegal? > [@](#): > > 1. It can be argued that a Confederate monument is little more than a glorified participation trophy for White male snowflakes who needed their self-esteem coddled because they lost a war. As these people are now dead and buried, they no longer need coddling. Yeah, cuz their mothers, children and grandchildren didn’t give a fuck about them. Again - since the confederacy was Senegal then take out the Vietnam Memorial since that was a pointless proxy war fought for nothing other than international nutsize rights - and ya lost… same as the Confederacy. > [@](#): > > 1. The Confederacy was a hostile power that killed hundreds of thousands of Americans. We do not have monuments to Vietnamese generals, Nazi tank commanders, or notable Britons from the War of 1812. Since we do not honor other personages who took up arms against the United States, we should strive to do the same with the Confederates. Wow, ummm, I dunno. Here we have a statutory holiday in honour of a guy that fought 2 rebellions against our country and multiple statues in his honour. > [@](#): > > 1. For all arguing about the importance of heritage and rememberance in the face of societal and government opposition, to avoid having this appear to be a imprecisely applied principle, I’m sure all of those who support Confederate monuments will also support the Native Americans in North Dakota in their fight to preserve their heritage and homelands against the oil pipeline. I’ve never said the statue should stay or go. I’ve argued about the approach and rhetoric and behaviour of the left (I’m on the left) but I’ll say that some people might take umbrage at the comparison of confederate generals with natives at Standing Rock. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/285 "2017-08-16T04:55:37Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The 400,000 number referes to those transported to the United States. > 12 million is the number transported to the U.S. plus the Caribbean islands, plus Brazil, plus several other locations. > > I am not sure what point you are hoping to make, but you need to get your figures correct or you will be dismissed. I said that 12 million killed in the holocaust outweighed less than that killed etc during American slavery. **Iandyiiii** said that there were more than 12 million killed etc. during American slavery. I asked for a cite. Then I found and provided a cite - which no one has disputed given it’s source. I also provided a direct quote from that source that gave the same numbers you just did. I’m sorry man, is this moving too quickly for you? So now, when you say dismissed are you saying ignored? If so are you going to ignore me for providing the information and source that gave the same numbers you are now coming at me with? Or do you mean dismissed as in banned? In which case are you threatening to ban me (or have me banned) for providing the source for the numbers I gave that are the same exact ones that you are currently coming at me with? Just curious what your intent was. Aren’t you the one that got busted for fucking with someone’s post a while back in order to make yourself look better? Do I need to double check that my original cite - complete with relevant quoted text - is still there? Or are we cool? ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/286 "2017-08-16T05:05:26Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The 400,000 number referes to those transported to the United States. > 12 million is the number transported to the U.S. plus the Caribbean islands, plus Brazil, plus several other locations. > > I am not sure what point you are hoping to make, but you need to get your figures correct or you will be dismissed. Actually - before you have a chance to disappear it- here you go you fucking widget: [Post 253](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20416403&postcount=253) "Between 1525 and 1866, in the entire history of the slave trade to the New World, according to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, 12.5 million Africans were shipped to the New World. 10.7 million survived the dreaded Middle Passage, disembarking in North America, the Caribbean and South America. And how many of these 10.7 million Africans were shipped directly to North America? Only about 388,000. That’s right: a tiny percentage." But I guess that wasn’t clear enough. Oh, hey… turns out I referred to it AGAIN in post 267 with a stated referral back to The Root. So I guess two separate times wasn’t enough. So a mod comes in to threaten me with “dismissal” for using numbers in exactly the way he did. Don’t mods always say that failure to fully read a thread is no defense? I guess I’m going to ATMB. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/287 "2017-08-16T05:18:13Z")
Sorry, Zeke, but all the people who have been butthurt about the Confederacy losing in their lifetimes are now dead and no longer need to be coddled or put in their safe spaces by the presence of a Robert E Lee statue. Get rid of the damned monuments. Their purpose has been served. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/288 "2017-08-16T05:45:11Z")
Holy fuck monkey. I’ll say it again, louder, for the cheap seats: I WAS REPLYING TO A POST MADE BY **MUFFIN** REGARDING A DOC THAT HE LINKED TO. I WAS SPEAKING, THROUGHOUT, TO THE HATRED AND VIOLENCE EVIDENCED BY THE LEFT TOWARD THE RIGHT AS EVIDENCED IN THAT DOC. THE CONVERSATION MOVED ON FROM THERE. I’VE NEVER REALLY TALKED ABOUT MONUMENTS EXCEPT AS TERTIARY TO THE OVERALL POINT. I DON"T GIVE A TINKER’S FUCK WHAT YOU YANK MONKEYS DO WITH YOUR FUCKING STATUES. KEEP THEM, WRECK THEM, OR STUFF THEM UP YOUR ASS! I DON’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT YOUR STATUES. Lordy thundering Jesus! Maybe you and **tomndebb** ought to get a tutor and get a remedial reading group or something going. You are now in the same group as **Smegma Pusfuck** and **Whathisnuts-The-Orc-Slayer** Maybe after your remedial rading session you can join up with those other two slobber-monkeys and fall off the swings together. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/289 "2017-08-16T07:02:49Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Because I’m not jumping in with the let’s bash and murder people crowd? Your sense of morality and reason is warped. **Because you are defending Nazis.** ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/290 "2017-08-16T07:50:23Z")
The total number of slaves in the American Colonies, strictly speaking, is not really accurately estimable. The actual number of slaves transshipped to the American colonies has been estimated variously at 3.6%(where the 388,000 comes from ) to 6.45%. So say ~400,000-700,000 if we accept a figure of ~10.5 million that survived the Middle Passage. That’s survivors that arrived as slaves. Multiply by some number to include those lost on the middle passage, usually estimated at 15-20%. So 460,000 - 840,000 that actually departed Africa. Multiply that by “wastage” in Africa( losses incurred while gathering slaves and holding them for transport ), usually estimated at 40-50%. So 644,000-1,260,000. That is total lives subtracted from African populations. But that still doesn’t account for natural increase. As noted the slave population in 1860 was ~3.9 million. In 1800, shortly before the slave importation ended( in 1808 ), it stood somewhere over a million( official numbers are 893,000, but census information is missing for a few southern states like Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia ). How how many individual slaves may have lived and died as such in the U.S. is pretty difficult to parse. “Millions”, however, is a fair guess. 12,000,000 is perhaps too high, I imagine that that number sticks in peoples head because it is the usual cited figure for importation to ALL of the Americas. A “few million” probably isn’t. And splitting hairs between the two seems to me a little nitpicky if we’re all we’re doing is ranking outrage. They’re both pretty fucking awful, full stop. The Holocaust and American Chattel Slavery may have been awful in different ways, but I’m perfectly happy throwing them into the same general hat of ‘worst human atrocities’. Raped and brutalized? Slavery is inherently a state of brutalization, so let’s say 100% there. Rape? High enough for your average African-American to have about a quarter European ancestry. Not ALL of that is a result of rape by any means, but a great deal was. It was common enough. Finally yes the KKK has definitely killed more _Americans_ than the Taliban or ISIS. ISIS because we’ve really barely engaged them, losses are negligible. Losses in Afghanistan can stand in for the Taliban, so running at about ~2,390 right now. The KKK almost certainly killed many more than that in their first incarnation alone( 1865-1871 ), when they were functionally a paramilitary militia fighting a low-level targeted insurgency( mostly notably armed voter suppression ). ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 9:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/291 "2017-08-16T09:20:19Z")
I must say I mostly agree with **Zeke N. Destroi** and feel he is mistreated in this thread. One side shows respect for their great-great-great-great grandfathers who owned slaves. (I even found myself agreeing with Trump — there is already a liberal backlash against slave-owner/rapist Thomas Jefferson: when do we pull _his_ statues down?) Another side supports (in the minds of some) baby killing and other abominations. _Both_ sides have what they consider to be legitimate grievances. _I do not know how we can ever put America back together again, but this thread isn’t it._ > [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > It didn’t read, “For those who died for slavery.” It was a monument to those who died for their way of life… > > Treating these monkeys (nazis) like they are vile beyond tolerance only serves to reinforce their beliefs and will only give the disaffected a place to call home. While I largely agree with you, **Zeke** , the first quoted sentence appears to overlook that “their [Southern] way of life” is a euphemism for slavery and racism. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/292 "2017-08-16T09:34:30Z")
> [@Chisquirrel](#): > > … Why the fuck are we attempting to communicate with a Holocaust denier and Nazi apologist, again? I have reported this ( I missed it the 1st time around.) I’ve never denied the Holocaust. I’ve repeatedly affirmed that it happened and was beyond atrocious. The closest I’ve come to denial is asking why the usual number of reported victims is 6 million (Jews) when if you take the total of everyone (including Jews) it is closer to 12 million. In this very thread I’ve repeatedly referred to the Holocaust, the barbarity and the 12million dead. Please, stand under a poison tree during a rain shower. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/293 "2017-08-16T09:48:51Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > Look, I provided numbers from The Root of all places saying that throughout the 341 years of New World slavery under 400,000 were transported to America. > > Do you REALLY think that 400,000 slaves (that translates into an average of 1173 per year bloomed into 12 million - especially given the incredibly harsh conditions under which they lived. > > For fuck sake they are humans not rabbits. > > American slavery and the holocaust are not even fucking CLOSE to equivalent. > > American slavery and The Great Leap Forward are not even CLOSE to equivalent. > > American slavery and the Stallinist atrocities are not even CLOSE to equivalent. > > American slavery and the Japanese campaign in Asia are not even CLOSE to equivalent. > > To suggest that they are is to intentionally and knowingly minimize the suffering of hundreds of millions of people in the egotistic desire to believe that America has managed something on that scale. > > It is ridiculous, and vile. > > American slavery was grotesque. It was an affront to human dignity and the after effects are nothing but deplorable. > > But in terms of global atrocities you guys don’t hold a fucking candle. > > Now, unless you are willing to argue that 400,000 victims of American slavery were murdered, starved, raped and brutalized is somehow worse than the hundred or so million that were killed in these butcheries -or you are willing to argue that the victims of these butcheries are gently euthanized in the most humane way possible - it is the height of American egotism to compare American slavery to any fucking one of them. > > Compare this shit to the Holocaust - my fucking God. The numbers aren’t that mysterious. There are now well over 30 million black people in America, almost all descended from those small number brought over in the slave trade. By the Civil War, there were already millions - googling says about 4 million (recorded). Doing some basic math with life expectancy and child mortality estimates, that’s more than 12 million people altogether having been enslaved in America at some point between slavery beginning in the colonies and ending at the end of the Civil War. I don’t know why you have any interest in minimizing their suffering, but it’s totally ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/294 "2017-08-16T10:11:38Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > How about if you see an armed and genocidal group how about engaging from a safe distance instead of encroaching with weaponry of your own. If they close the gap and attack it’s 100% obvious who the aggressor in that situation is. Otherwise, it looks like mutual mob combat to me. > > Each of these groups has a history of violence and they each had a reasonable fear of the other. Nazis because they are Nazis. Antifa because they have a history of attacking groups who merely want to hear a speaker. The vast majority of the counter-protesters were not antifa (not that they’re comparable to white supremacists in any case). If you want to quibble about tactics, fine. But I’ll place much, much more of the blame on the group with a history of violence, with an inherently violent message, that _actually killed people last weekend_, etc., than the group that came to oppose them. > [@](#): > > Was it ok for the Germans to tear down Nazi monuments? Of course. Working to rid Germany and Japan of symbols to rally around after the most destructive war in history was useful. We needed productive vassal states to hedge against communism and there was enough shame in defeat and the US and allies waged an effective war unlike today that there wasn’t much appetite for resistance anyways. > > Why, when you just got nuked and firebombed would you be less than compliant? > > The Confederate statues are more complex. They don’t mean pro slavery and pro secession to everyone who likes them anymore. Hell, I was in Oregon and I saw many Confederate flags. I was in British Columbia and I saw may Confederate flags. On clothing, on motorbikes, and on people’s property. Do each one of these people fly or display these flags because they are desiring to own people? > > Maybe. > > Let’s concede for the point of this discussion that everything you say about the history and intent is 100% accurate. The time to have blocked it would have been when they were going up expressly to spite others. But there obviously wasn’t public support to do so. And there isn’t public support in these areas to do so now. If there was the public would pass a law or an ordinance doing so. > > Are these people wrong? The ones who don’t want them down? Some want them up for the wrong reasons some want them up for harmless reasons. But in a democracy you can’t tell people they must think a certain way or speak a certain way. This is all fine. It appears you agree with me that sometimes it’s okay to remove monuments and memorials. So the only disagreement is about in which cases it’s okay or wise to do this. I hold that it’s wise and reasonable to remove most or all public confederate memorials. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/295 "2017-08-16T10:14:07Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > The numbers aren’t that mysterious. There are now well over 30 million black people in America I don’t doubt that at all. On this I trust your numbers. But you claimed “a few tens of millions of slaves” and that I disputed. Slavery, as slavery effectively ended in 1865 (though it wasn’t finally abolished until around 1995 when Mississippi finally took it off the books) > [@](#): > > almost all descended from those small number brought over in the slave trade. By the Civil War, there were already millions - googling says about 4 million (recorded). Just to be clear… we are discussing - to my mind - the absolute numbers of victims of American slavery vs. the Holocaust and, by extension, other horrors that have occurred in living memory. > [@](#): > > Doing some basic math with life expectancy and child mortality estimates, that’s more than 12 million people altogether having been enslaved in America at some point between slavery beginning in the colonies and ending at the end of the Civil War. Since it is basic math and you have the numbers at your fingertips, please show your work. Look man, if I’m wrong then I’m wrong. Ignorance fought and I’ll be happy (not really the right word given the context) to admit it. > [@](#): > > I don’t know why you have any interest in minimizing their suffering, but it’s totally ridiculous. I said exactly the same thing to you when you claimed that American Slavery was as bad or worse than the Holocaust. I’ve shown my numbers (including an egregious math error that I copped to in my pitting ((Omnibus Troll Thread))) and corrected shortly after I made it. I’ve shown my work and provided cites. Please do the same. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 10:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/296 "2017-08-16T10:52:46Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > The 400,000 number referes to those transported to the United States. > 12 million is the number transported to the U.S. plus the Caribbean islands, plus Brazil, plus several other locations. > > I am not sure what point you are hoping to make, but you need to get your figures correct or you will be dismissed. Alright **SpongeNuts** would you care to explain to me how exactly what I said is in any way different than what your exalted self told me I ought to say? Please. Please pour forth your brilliance upon this little one who lacks the abilty to discern the difference between there were 400,000 slaves transported to America and 400,00 slaves were transported to America. Did the USA control all of the Americas? Most of them or only a couple of islands? Now, I don’t know, but it seems to me that a respected black journalist writing for a respected black magazine on the topic of slavery in America might possibly know what he is talking about when he specifically says that only 388,000 slaves were transported to America. See, I was under the clearly mistaken impression that when I said that 400000 were transported to America during the 341 years of the trade I meant the continental United States… you know…America. Excluding the 400,000 that we agree on, of the roughly 11,600,000 other victims ended up in American colonies or protectorates? Since I clearly misunderstand 400,000 people were transported to America as meaning 400,000 people were transported to America, please enlighten me. Or if you can’t can anyone else. Or was it just you being your standard, baseline patronizing, smarmy, **Spongenut** self stepping in it. Come on chum, inquiring mind wants to know. ---
**Author:** ![Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/4af34b/32.png) [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeke_N.Destroi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/297 "2017-08-16T11:07:38Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > The vast majority of the counter-protesters were not antifa (not that they’re comparable to white supremacists in any case). So it’s okay for Antifa go punch a thoroughly non-violent Nazi in the face because Nazis are that deplorable that they are fair game. Cool. If reprehensible ideology is enough to earn you an assault there are some Christians (and I AM Christian, just not Paulist) that are going to need dental work today. See I loathe Pro-Lifers and I loathe the Anglicans in my town (they oppose gay marriage) I truly consider them reprehensible and beyond vile. So, when I go out and cold-cock the fucking water-heads I have your blessing? By the way, despite your assurances to the contrary I’ve yet to see you bust someone for libtart, bitch, whore etc. on this board. You promised me you would. Remember? ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/298 "2017-08-16T11:12:47Z")
Very rare experience. Who is this fucking nutjob, I’ve never noticed him before? December, 2003 join date, huh. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/299 "2017-08-16T11:48:46Z")
Zeke is on my ignore list for this shit. So I guess you’ve been lucky not to see him. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2017, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487/300 "2017-08-16T11:52:37Z")
> [@Zeke\_N.Destroi](#): > > I don’t doubt that at all. On this I trust your numbers. > > But you claimed “a few tens of millions of slaves” and that I disputed. Slavery, as slavery effectively ended in 1865 (though it wasn’t finally abolished until around 1995 when Mississippi finally took it off the books) > > Just to be clear… we are discussing - to my mind - the absolute numbers of victims of American slavery vs. the Holocaust and, by extension, other horrors that have occurred in living memory. > > Since it is basic math and you have the numbers at your fingertips, please show your work. > > Look man, if I’m wrong then I’m wrong. Ignorance fought and I’ll be happy (not really the right word given the context) to admit it. > > I said exactly the same thing to you when you claimed that American Slavery was as bad or worse than the Holocaust. > > I’ve shown my numbers (including an egregious math error that I copped to in my pitting ((Omnibus Troll Thread))) and corrected shortly after I made it. > > I’ve shown my work and provided cites. Please do the same. > **[Slavery in the United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_United_States#Distribution)** > > The legal institution of human chattel slavery, comprising the enslavement primarily of Africans and African Americans, was prevalent in the United States of America from its founding in 1776 until 1865, predominantly in the South. Slavery was established throughout European colonization in the Americas. From 1526, during the early colonial period, it was practiced in what became Britain's colonies, including the Thirteen Colonies that formed the United States. Under the law, an enslaved pe... > **[Mortality of Slave Children](http://usslave.blogspot.com/2013/02/mortality-of-slave-children.html)** > > From  Digital History   --  Slaves suffered extremely high mortality. Half of all slave infants died during their first year of life, ... These links are my starting point. It’s a pretty rough calculation, and requires some estimation, but here’s how I did it: Life expectancy in that era overall was about 40 or so. Based on the extreme brutality and harsh conditions, I’m estimating that life expectancy for slaves was about 10 years less. So on average, I’m estimating that every 30 years, most of the last group of slaves had died and the new population was “new” slaves. So let’s start in 1780: about 500,000 slaves (based on a very basic extrapolation from the numbers in the 1st link). 30 years later (1810): ~1.2 million. 30 years later again (1840): ~2.5 million. And 30 years later again (1870 - just after the slaves were finally all freed): 4.8 million. I could do calculus to get a smoother estimation for the “area under the curve”, but I’ll just add these up (which gives us a lower number than calculus would) – basic arithmetic, this adds up to ~9 million. Again, this is a low estimate, since I’m using arithmetic and not calculus (at least if my memory from college math is correct). But then we look at child mortality (the second link) – literally _half of all babies born enslaved died before they were 1_, plus many more older children. I think it’s very unlikely that most of those were recorded in census data, so I think this number can reasonably be doubled, or near doubled, for the total number of people (including babies) that were at one point enslaved in America. But with the difficulty of combining both child mortality and life expectancy numbers, I’ll use just 1.5 as a multiplier, giving us around 14.5 million or so. And then you can add to that the slaves who died in slave ships during transport – so perhaps about 15 million total, very roughly (and this doesn’t include all the slaves from before the US broke away from England. That’s a very rough estimate. Maybe my “many more than 12 million” was the wrong language – I’ll strike “many” and say that it can reasonably be estimated that more than 12 million people were enslaved in the US, and were raped, brutalized, and died under incredible brutality and harsh conditions. Maybe this is a bit of a silly argument. But say you looked at (literally imagine them occurring in your head) two circumstances: in one, a Nazi lines up 10 Jews and shoots them in the head. In the other, a slave master has 10 slaves chained, whipped, beaten, and raped for 30 years (along with a total lack of care for any babies born, such that half of them die). They’re both as bad as humanity gets. I don’t understand how one can be looked at and judged as morally in another plane of evil, or another order of magnitude of cruelty, than the other. So there’s my basic math, and why I judge the entirety of American slavery as on the same moral plane as the Holocaust or any other moral atrocity in human history. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487.md?page=14) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/heritage-nah-just-hate/793487.md?page=16)