(August 18, 2019 at 3:49 pm)Acrobat Wrote:(August 18, 2019 at 12:16 pm)Grandizer Wrote: This assumes that slavery could ever increase the wellbeing of slaveholders in such a significant way as to override the decrease in wellbeing of the slaves. Perhaps this may be so in fantasy scenarios, but I'm not convinced this has ever been the case in real life.
Also note that you have not yet given a rational basis as to why slavery would be wrong. If it's not to do with wellbeing, then what is it then?
Because it denied slaves their humanity, sustained through hatred, cruelty and lies, such as blacks were less than whites. It required the denial of black people as people no less than you or I. It wasn’t wrong because people calculated that it would be harmful for the wellbeing of society in the long run, it was seen as wrong inspite of such a consideration.
You can reword what you just said in terms of wellbeing. Denying slaves their humanity is akin to saying it's disregarding their wellbeing. There is no need to calculate in this case anyway. It's clear it's wrong.
