The Future of Slavery

Great Debates
1

It’s not cool to post a contentless OP aside, I’ll have to go back through the following clip again to decide what all comments I would want to make about it. But I’d like to post it for others first. And being a short video clip, I don’t think there’s too much of a TLDR issue here:

2

That was a waste of 2 minutes. I can come to any conclusion I want, too, if I just make up a bunch of assumptions not grounded in facts.

3

.
Too lame, didn’t read?
Faulty premise, flawed conclusion, irrelevant hypothetical.
.

4

I really don’t get it. And that guy’s sibilant S sounds like a mangled tape reel on a Todd Rundgren recording. I could hardly bear it.

5

I don’t get it. So when people who aren’t Americans or Europeans work, it’s slavery? Is that it?

“And the beauty of this system of slavery is that the slave doesn’t have to be enslaved!”

Huh?

6

Well I was thinking more about some of the things he brings up than his overall point when I started the thread. The speech is intended as satire I believe, so debating the end point is pointless, I agree.

But, would slavery have been able to last versus outsourced labour as time went on? Would slavery be something that your average American might enjoy the prospect of if they had no moral disinclination against it, or would they simply view a slave as being more cost than they were worth? Would the average American be able to afford a slave to live in their residence and/or receive enough work in payment to pay for the “upkeep”? And so on.

7

It’s hard to really evaluate what he’s saying when the video cuts him off mid-sentence.

8

It made sense to me. The key points are:

  1. There are countless slaves all over the world even if they don’t know it.
  2. The 3rd World has some really cheap housing costs and kick-ass thrift stores.
  3. The Civil War really should be called the War of Northern Aggression.
  4. Finnish accents are remarkably similar to those in San Francisco.

It all seems self-apparent to me.

9

I thought most slaves in the Western world were imported as agricultural workers, especially in cotton and sugar plantations. How do you outsource that? If your economy is agriculturally based, you need workers on-site. It’s not like locating your help desk in India.

If the question becomes “would slavery died away on its own as the economy shifted from agriculture to manufacturing and then to post-industrial”, possibly.

The video’s idea that all cheap labor is slavery is kind of goofy.

Regards,
Shodan

10

The whole point is that it’s goofy. This is the Yes Men.

11

I’ve not heard of the Yes Men.

Regards,
Shodan

12

Wow. It’s all crystal clear now! :slight_smile:

13

Yea, I was kind of curious where he was going, but we never get to hear what his actual point was.

14

Here’s their website:

They’re anti-globalization/anti-corporate performance artists/activists who pose as government or corporate officials and make satirical or shocking statements. That clip is from when they were pretending to be WTO officials advocating for a return to slavery.

They’ve also done things like posed as HUD officials in a press conference in New Orleans, saying that HUD planned to reopen public housing, crashed an oil conference claiming to be officials who were supposed to give a speech on oil production where as Wikipedia puts it:

15

Thanks, Captain Amazing.

Regards,
Shodan

16

Personally, I think their funniest stunt was their demonstration of future executive wear, the “Management Leisure Suit”, which consisted of a skin-tight gold lamé suit for personal climate control and a built-in monitor to keep an eye on employee operations, such monitor mounted to the suit on a large tube attached to the pelvis and resembling a giant phallus.

They’re the modern descendants of Jonathan Swift, modestly proposing things left and right. Large pdf file from 2003 explaining their mission to ridicule the WTO.