bensmoif

Brother, no he did not liberate a single one of his own slaves. Some escaped and he did not pursue, but his final slave died under Benjamin Franklin's enslavement 9 years before Franklin himself died.

Them facts you were looking for: https://share.google/J4zlTt102nc81Fhay

I think it's a sound analysis, he was a thoughtful and philosophical man who considered the nature of slavery heavily, and he benefitted from it greatly, and dearly understood its terrible nature, and continued it's cruelty, and freed no one.

I'll accept your conceit but answer this: why didn't he liberate his slaves? If it's a wash, why keep humans in slavery at all?

I think it's because, in his own calculus, he believed he needed to desecrate human beings, destroy their families, and humiliate their dignity to maintain his greatness.

My brother: trolls troll out of cynical cruelty, there are many children's books that can illustrate this clearly.

Franklin's ability to speak plainly about the evils of slavery, in between his own acts of unspeakable cruelty, and robbing families of their dignity and humanity, requires a level of disconnect and pride that is worth significant mention whenever we do justice to his great legacy.

This talk of human utility sounds like a lot of chump shit.

In this century we have a word for that kind of talk by slaveholders who professed some longing for abolition (Franklin. Jefferson, Washington, John Jay) but did not really wanna be inconvenienced: trolling.

I don't think it's irrelevant that a brilliant man like Benjamin Franklin may not have been able to achieve as much as he unmistakably did WITHOUT the heavy assistance of forced slave labor in his life, from cradle to grave.

Pretending like these things can be separated is ignorance. Ignoring its brutality does a disservice to our history and that man's legacy

Really interesting, and a link to your GitHub with a "code coming soon". Please get us the tool already!

Oh yes to this! I spent yesterday morning working this out when it smacked me in the face

The tax is his shares, those shares become public assets, the government and (ostensibly) the citizens finally get a say in what the hell is happening with that guy.

The solution is obvious and simple: Tax wealth not work.

Following... My audiologist had the big talk with me last week and I guess I'm due to take care of my hearing...

Please tell a story about the music ya'll chose for this, it's incredible.

Am I going to be the first to bring up "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra"?

Bought one of these miniature kits years ago and kept it on my desk at work and goddamn is it cool and fun and works great! Really encourage any model machine nerds to get one.

Many people believe what you're describing is the problem.

Everyone who cares about the use of technology to conduct warfare, especially the corporate power leveraged to enhance the killing power of the state.

This is an absolutely unhinged project idea. Great work