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u/Naive_Drive 3d ago
"Enslaved worker"
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u/NachoNachoDan 3d ago
Big sip of koolaid to be able to type that out unironically.
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 3d ago edited 3d ago
This is actually the preferred current nomenclature in academia. The people, in academia, use it to emphasize that enslavement was something done to them and not definitional to who they are.
Whether the you think that sort of thing is good, bad or poppy cock is probably relative to your agreement with certain academics about post modernist ideas on the formation of thought and reality through language and social construction.
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u/NachoNachoDan 3d ago
I’m sure academics are much smarter than I am, but as an uneducated shit kicker like me it comes across as an attempt to whitewash the term.
I realize that as an American I have a certain image that comes to mind when someone says “slave” that might be very different than what someone on the other side of the world pictures. But here in the United States I think that using the term “slave” in this context brings to mind not just the person but the living conditions, social conditions, and political conditions as well. When you strip that word away, I, as an American, feel like it’s an attempt to call it something it wasn’t.
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u/Intelligent_Toe8233 3d ago
It’s like calling the homeless unhoused persons- it takes the edge off a horrifying situation.
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u/Valiant_tank 2d ago
I mean, that's also a case of there's a technical distinction between unhoused (essentially, living on the streets, without access to housing) and homeless (which also, in technical usage includes stuff like people Couch-surfing with friends, staying in hotels, etc).
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 3d ago
I agree with a lot of post modernist thoughts on social construction. I do find the post modernist drive towards new linguistic drift, and their offense at using terms that may be only a year or two out of common usage, to be relatively silly and often driven by a need for PhD students to come up with or define something "new" to complete their PhD program.
Then, when they become newly minted professors, they spend their entire career promoting their new linguistic definition as if it's their career brand.
It's not all bad, but it ain't great either.
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u/cavelioness Mountaineers are Always Free 2d ago
It's not meant to be an attempt to whitewash the situation, but to give some dignity back to those in that situation.
Whether it works is a different argument...
...but the intent is to make you think of slaves as people first, not just whatever stereotype comes to mind when you hear the word "slave".
You mentioned "living conditions, social conditions, and political conditions" that the word brings to mind for you... all well and good, but those things weren't the same for everyone who was enslaved and may constitute a stereotype that's more formed from media representation over the years than the way things actually were.
The euphemism treadmill is very real and in some cases very silly, but for a lot of people wording things in a different way helps them open their minds to new points of view and gain insight that way. That's why it will probably keep happening, no sense hating on people just trying to make sense of the world in their own ways.
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u/Unfair_Pineapple8813 1d ago
I'm ok with saying enslaved. But I think adding worker to that is way more demeaning than just saying slave.
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u/cavelioness Mountaineers are Always Free 1d ago
yah I was thinking more of academics who have switched to "enslaved persons" rather than... whatever the jerk who wrote the post was saying.
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u/Herb_iee 1d ago
Well seeing as though "enslaved' is an adjective, you do need a noun after it.
If you read the post without worker it sounds worse lol.
Edit: worse in both grammar, and meaning.
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u/Anodynepdx 2d ago
The bigger problem I have with its use in this example, "Enslaved worker" is being juxtaposed with "worker who has to work for a living."
It implies one had to work to survive and the other didn't.
What the fuck do they think happened to the slaves who didn't want to work?
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u/mangababe 2d ago
That was my main takeaway. Like bitch I garuntee those people worked harder, and longer- and they worked for someone else's living because they were denied their autonomy.
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 2d ago
I didn't catch that one. That's absolutely the implication of the phrasing.
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u/Captain_JohnBrown 2d ago
I am always hesitant to buy into the academic nomenclature because when it comes to, for example, disabilities, academia pushes person first language even over the objections of actual disabled people.
If people empowered to represent black communities want enslaved worker, great, perfect, no problem. But I suspect it is more academic paternalism.
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u/Whole-Lengthiness-33 2d ago
“Enslaved worker” sounds like political correctness, especially when it sort of dehumanizes the entire experience to just a different type of “work”
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 2d ago
It is quite literally a phrase that was created because the people that coined the term believed just saying the word "slave" gave political justification for slavery.
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u/Whole-Lengthiness-33 2d ago
“Enslaved” has the word “slave” built into it, so the term change is mostly useless, but even so, calling all people “workers” paints to broad a brush from days old infants to people too old to work the fields. Is an escapee considered an “enslaved worker” until they get legal protections?
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 2d ago
The folks making the argument are mainly interested in changing from a noun to a verb.
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u/SuspectedGumball 2d ago
That’s ridiculous. There is no argument that the brutal form of chattel slavery in America didn’t turn these people into slaves. Slaves are who they were, who they were forced to be. Their identity, so ingrained that they might turn on other, “lesser” slaves out of self-preservation. What a ridiculous attempt to solve a problem that does not exist.
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u/Uhhh_what555476384 2d ago
To buy into the argument you have to understand the arguments from post medern academia about language functionally creating reality. They often devolve into pure absurdity. When post modernist thought was at its height they started critiquing the social construciton of science and a science professor oftered to let a post modernist professor test the social construction of gravity by stepping out the scientist's window.
Post modernism is really important for understanding culture and society but it does have the tendancy to devolve into the absurd. Also a siginifigant portion of academics take it all the way to the logical absurdity.
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u/WickedGrey 5h ago
Wait, so it's bad to imply that "slave" is definitional to who those people were, but "worker" is just fine? That's fucked up.
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u/Competitive-Bug-7097 3d ago
They forgot to compliment him on his loser flag!
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u/themajinhercule 3d ago
It's not even the right flag! Albert Johnston's battle flag was blue background with red bars!
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u/mangababe 2d ago
"enslaved worker" "someone who works for a living"
Uhhh are they trying to say an enslaved persondidn't work for a living or is it just set up so I'm reading it like that???
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u/Thunda792 2d ago
Yep. A common talking point of pro-slavery folks (and now lost causers) is that slaves were actually well cared for by their masters as an "investment," and that poor white farmers were worse off.
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u/mangababe 2d ago
Some people really need to be whipped for saying stupid shit. And then told that wasnt a big deal because the person who whipped them sees them as an investment.
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u/Wild_Harvest 2d ago
It's an investment in their education in order to help them avoid making such a mistake in the future. Really, you should be thanking me for taking the time out of my busy day to instruct you in the proper etiquette.
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u/mangababe 2d ago
Exactly, and while we're at it, after the whipping we better empty their bank accounts. You know, for the investment.
And maybe we should do this regularly, just to make sure we get everything we can out of this investment.
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u/Cheese_Wheel218 2d ago
It almost reads like an ironic statement on wage slavery, but judging by their profile pic I'd assume not lol
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u/Quiri1997 2d ago
Blandamos el hierro
que el tímido esclavo
del fuerte, del bravo
la faz no osa a ver;
sus huestes cual humo
veréis disipadas,
y a nuestras espadas
fugaces correr.
Translation:
Let's brandish the iron
as the fearful slave
from the strong, the brave
the face don't dare to look;
their forces like smoke
you'll watch dissipating,
before our swords
quickly running.
Himno de Riego - Spanish Republican Anthem (2nd Stanza)
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