pull down to refresh
So they were subject to slavery then.
Not at the "command of a noble". This is intentional misunderstanding. Rare conditional enslavement is not the same as at the discretion of the class of nobles. Under your standard of taking an extremely rare scenario and using it to form a generalization, nobles are also subject to enslavement. It also misunderstands the power balance of ancient societies to say that everyone was ruled by a benevolent class of nobles that had absolute power. This wasn't the case. Nobles could and would be checked by freemen if they didn't follow the established customs of rule or were too harmful to their people. Similar to the way nobles would rebel against and overthrow kings. Pre-christian and pre-democratic societies weren't more free compared to modern societies because they had benevolent rulers with unlimited power, they were more free because there were checks against each institution of power which was far more distributed than the systems we have today.
I'm not intentionally misunderstanding. I think you and I are looking at this from entirely different angles. I agree, generally, with everything you wrote here.
My assertion is not that there was ever a class of benevolent rulers. Nor that there should or could be a hereditary class of men who are granted freedom at everyone else's expense.
Instead, I'd say that there is no right to freedom in any domain for any man unless he can defend it. There are no rights but those you take. If rights are granted, they aren't rights, they are just permission. Historically, there have been men who, through bonding together with other disciplined and capable men, have had sufficient strength to take their own freedom and defend it from aggressors. These I labeled "nobles". Everyone else can be enslaved, not because morality says so, but because they can't stop it from happening if/when aggressors come to enslave.
I would add that, generally, these nobles would establish some hierarchical order that benefits themselves by also enabling lower classes some freedom from the "war of all against all" and thereby winning their allegiance and support. This order is the foundation of western civ. But I don't think civilization for all was ever their goal. It was just the natural outcome of strong men banding together to secure their freedom.
Instead, I'd say that there is no right to freedom in any domain for any man unless he can defend it. There are no rights but those you take. If rights are granted, they aren't rights, they are just permission. Historically, there have been men who, through bonding together with other disciplined and capable men, have had sufficient strength to take their own freedom and defend it from aggressors. These I labeled "nobles". Everyone else can be enslaved, not because morality says so, but because they can't stop it from happening if/when aggressors come to enslave.
Yeah, I agree. My criticism is the sentiment or connotations that your message in the sign conveys. "Everybody is eligible for slavery except nobles, determined by nobles" does not remotely sound like what you and I have discussed previously. An observer without context would likely be off put even if he would agree with your messaging if given a chance for further discussion. If we want to recruit action takers to our side we have to have quality messaging that doesn't stop them before they start investigating.
I would add that, generally, these nobles would establish some hierarchical order that benefits themselves by also enabling lower classes some freedom from the "war of all against all" and thereby winning their allegiance and support. This order is the foundation of western civ.
Agreed. Any system of hierarchy has to establish a two way benefit for it to be a sustainable system in the long run.
An observer without context would likely be off put even if he would agree with your messaging if given a chance for further discussion. If we want to recruit action takers to our side we have to have quality messaging that doesn't stop them before they start investigating.
Very true. I should work on that.
I think this is just a sentence broken up instead of a list of principals. Also, not sure "all others can be slaves" is true. Freemen were always a class and they weren't subjected to slavery outside of capture in war if I remember correctly.