My Family's Slave

[Derived Absurdity]

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/ar ... ry/524490/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[maz89]

Yeah, I cried reading this.

But I stopped after reading a couple of comments about how Asians should be banned from America since their values are "antithetical to Americanism". Despite the author being Asian. Despite America's own history.

I don't understand people.

[Anakin McFly]

^Same. The story is heartbreaking. The comments are, too, in a completely different way.

[Anakin McFly]

Found this: https://twitter.com/JShahryar/status/864539064183119872

One problem I have with that criticism is that many commenters seem unaware of just how deep the value of filial piety runs in East/South East -Asian society. The idea of betraying your parents by reporting them is morally abhorrent and practically unthinkable, even if it is to save someone else from victimisation. This doesn't in the least lessen the severity of their crimes nor the need to stop them as quickly as possible. But the solution instead would be to find a way to do so without that betrayal, be it in helping their victims escape, or even getting a non-relative friend to be the one to report them instead.

Perhaps the Asian emphasis on filial piety / loyalty is itself worth criticising, but that goes into a discussion on different value systems and on what basis we consider the Western one superior to another. But I'm struck by the different ways that my local friends and especially Filipino readers vs Western readers are responding to the article and how we think the author should have reacted (he could have done more, or at least acted earlier), even though we're both equally outraged by what that family put Lola through.

EDIT: more racism from reddit:

"Its not a surprise the author and his family are asian. They can be the most harsh in these kinds of situations."

whereupon someone nicely replied: "Yeah, white people would never have slaves. /s"

elsewhere: "Sometimes other cultures do things that make some of us Americans kind of queasy. I'm one of those kind of Americans."

facepalm

[Islandmur]

^Same. The story is heartbreaking. The comments are, too, in a completely different way.

See I read this story yesterday and the only thing that struck me was the lack of emotions in the story... I felt nothing besides disgust for the author, because I had the feeling that this is just another way to make money off "the slave".

[maz89]

He's dead now... I'm not sure if he really made anything off the article as he wrote it a couple of months prior.

I thought the article oozed with the author's guilt and regret - on doing too little, too late. That was my take, anyway.

I will probably comment later in a bit more detail, but I think I'm with Anakin in realizing the situation is complex. I don't necessarily disagree with people saying 'he should have acted sooner' or 'he could have done more' but it's much easier to criticize from a position of privilege - when you're born to people - and in a country - who already recognize the immorality of slavery. The people who criticize really don't (and can't) know how they would have handled the situation in the author's shoes.

[Anakin McFly]

because I had the feeling that this is just another way to make money off "the slave".

I thought of that too, but the author was a professional journalist and would have been aware of the impact this story would have in raising mass awareness of modern day slavery - which is exactly what he did - as well as the scrutiny and criticism it would have subject him to. The easier alternative would have been to keep silent, do nothing, and save his and his family's reputation, which I would have considered worse. He had the choice to go to the grave with the secret, and get money with articles on other subjects (he was a Pulitzer winner and had a book out), but he took the harder route of publicly owning up to what his family did, and clearly naming the slavery for what it was after the decades he spent in denial.

[Anakin McFly]

I also want to talk about the difference in family structures: in the West, it's the norm for kids to grow up with their parents and then leave at 18 to live on their own and eventually start their own families.

Whereas in Asia (and as was the case for the author's family), the tradition is for kids to stay with or at least very near to their parents or parents-in-law until they die. It's the cultural expectation that they will love and provide for their parents as they age, just as their parents loved and provided for them when they were young. When we start working, the norm is to give part our salary to our parents (who are, in turn, giving part of their salary to their parents), especially if they have retired and have no other source of income. It's just what everyone does, and people would be aghast if you said you didn't. If we have children, parents and parents-in-law often play an integral part in their upbringing.

So to deliberately abandon your parents - even if it's turning them in to be jailed - is not only considered extremely selfish and self-centered (you get to keep all your money, you don't have to spend time and energy caring for old people, etc) but would also compromise your ability to function in a community built around multi-generational family units. (which is another reason LGBT people here have an especially tough time, but that's another discussion.) The latter part changes when moving to a Western country, but that expectation is still there, where the idea of an adult neglecting their aged parents is morally on par with the idea of parents neglecting their child.

(My parents are fairly Westernised as it is, but my mother was still shocked when she first learnt that kids leave home at such young ages in the West - "Who would look after their parents?")

There are definitely times when exceptions should be made, such as in this case and also matters of abuse. But it's far from as easy or obvious as it would be in a Western context, and that's something a lot of commenters are missing.

[Islandmur]

Seems like Asia is not too different than Haiti and in Haiti we also have servants.

However I am talking about the tone of the article rather than its contents, it's dry, impersonal, distant, detached, I am usually a very emotional person, I cry reading articles about 99% of sad things even sad things with happy endings, I cry re watching a movie for the 10 or 20th time even again with a happy outcome, but this ? Nothing.

It's full of phrases that are meant to be shocking... I had a family, a career, a house in the suburbs—the American dream. And then I had a slave.

Just because he died a few months later doesn't mean it wasn't mean to be "sensational". I don't really see real remorse or guilt, I see a lot of excuses and avoidance.

Sorry I may be wrong of course but that is how I read this "story".

[Derived Absurdity]

Mur's reaction is exactly the reaction I had to the article and it explains why my feelings while reading it were so profoundly negative. It's very dry and emotionless IMO. I didn't get the impression that the author felt any remorse or true sadness in the slightest. In fact I'm left with the very strong impression that he's an unbelievably repulsive piece of shit, to be frank. Anakin makes some points I was unaware of which goes at least some way towards mitigating his actions, but... I don't know, almost every sentence in there rubbed me the wrong way. I mean, he realized she was a slave, but it's like he didn't have any understanding of the gravitas of that at all.

That twitter thread is pretty much on-point IMO, and it says a lot of what I was thinking. The more I think about the article the angrier and angrier I get. Even with the traditions Anakin explains the author should have been a fuck of a lot more remorseful for his actions and taken a hell of a lot more responsibility. At least. Everything about the way it was written reeks of pathological narcissism and debilitating self-centeredness.

Also it's just mediocre writing. Like Mur said very bland, very detached, very dry. No memorable turns of phrase or emotive wording. Nothing at all.

[phe_de]

However I am talking about the tone of the article rather than its contents, it's dry, impersonal, distant, detached, I am usually a very emotional person, I cry reading articles about 99% of sad things even sad things with happy endings, I cry re watching a movie for the 10 or 20th time even again with a happy outcome, but this ? Nothing.

It's full of phrases that are meant to be shocking... I had a family, a career, a house in the suburbs—the American dream. And then I had a slave.

Just because he died a few months later doesn't mean it wasn't mean to be "sensational". I don't really see real remorse or guilt, I see a lot of excuses and avoidance.

Why should he? As far as I'm concerned, he didn't do anything wrong.
He didn't enslave Lola; that was his grandfather, and then his mother. As a kid he was hardly in a position to rebel against it.

I like how the article does not try to pull emotional heartstrings. The author lets the readers form their own opinion instead of trying to manipulate them.
All in all, a well-written article about a problem that is not exclusive to America or Asia; but also to Europe, especially France.

[Derived Absurdity]

I like how the article does not try to pull emotional heartstrings. The author lets the readers form their own opinion instead of trying to manipulate them.

Considering that you can't feel emotions, it's not surprising that you would consider emotional writing a form of manipulation. Thankfully not everyone is as emotionally and morally empty as you.

[phe_de]

Considering that you can't feel emotions, it's not surprising that you would consider emotional writing a form of manipulation. Thankfully not everyone is as emotionally and morally empty as you.

Coming from you, I take this as a compliment.

[maz89]

I don't really understand criticisms of the tone being "detached" and "unemotional". All accounts of Lola were told matter-of-factly, without embellishment, which for me is a plus. Like phe_de said, I'm thankful the author doesn't try to overtly manipulate something that is already heinous.

As for the author feeling no remorse or guilt... what is this article if not an admission of an unforgiveable sin destined to forever be a taint on the reputation of his family and their relatives? Complaining about a lack of remorse is like that saying that if Tizon wrote a few paragraphs about how he harbored suicidal thoughts over Lola's slavery, it would make what happened more bearable. It wouldn't. His remorse doesn't mean shit and he knows it. There are no excuses given because there can be none. This shit happened. It shouldn't have, but it did. The author did what he could to ease Lola's life towards the end, where he aimed to do the 'right' thing (even if it was, again, too late), but it's hardly implied to be enough or sufficient to cover the earlier monstrosities.

I read that naive twitter rant, and I'm going to repeat what I said earlier: people have absolutely zero idea of how they would have behaved if they had the author's experiences. Screaming from a moral high ground when you've led a privileged life yourself is a lot easier than coming clean about the horrors of your family history.

[Derived Absurdity]

I like how we've regressed to the point where criticizing someone for owning slaves is now considered "screaming from a moral high ground".

[Anakin McFly]

I was close to crying for most of it, but not from the writing itself (which I did think was good, to the point of being manipulative, but YMMV) so much as from the cruelty Lola suffered and how grossly unfair it was.

As for the author feeling no remorse or guilt... what is this article if not an admission of an unforgivable sin destined to forever be a taint on the reputation of his family and their relatives?

This. Again, he didn't have to write this - certainly not for the money, and I don't think he was under any illusions that the article would make him look good. The title is 'My Family's Slave', which is significant given how long he spent in denial about that being what Lola was. He grew up in the US, and he would be fully aware of the impact the word 'slave' would have.

when you've led a privileged life yourself

It might be useful here to unpack the different forms of privilege going on, because the author was certainly very privileged in some ways but not others. And I think it's his own privilege that hindered his ability to feel as much remorse as he would have. He was brought up to see Lola as sub-human. His initial conscience and guilt over her was aggressively stamped out by his parents whenever it surfaced. He used denial as a coping mechanism when he was a kid who couldn't have done anything, and by the time he was an adult the denial had hardened to the point he was reflexively making little justifications just to be able to get by.

I think that's clearest in how oblivious he was to the impact of slavery on Lola - he seemed genuinely puzzled by how she couldn't just 'relax' after a lifetime of doing nothing but caring for his family and knowing no other way to live. He'd been blocking out her trauma in order to stay sane, and that's not something that can just undo itself after decades and make him suddenly regain the very empathy he'd been rigorously trained out of. In that way, he'd been as much conditioned into being a slave owner literally from birth just as Lola had been conditioned into being a slave, and we can't know that we would have acted any better had we been in his position. History suggests otherwise, and I'm reminded of when Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote about how, if he'd been a rich white man living in the US a couple hundred years ago, he would probably have owned slaves as well.

I grew up with a series of maids until I was 15, as was the case for most middle-class families here (who often continue having maids long after they are 15; my family had to stop due to financial problems). Each was with us for about three years until their contract ended and they went home. They were paid enough to send money back to relatives and have some for themselves, given their own bedroom and bathroom and a day off each week, stayed in touch with their family and friends through phone and mail (I remember one chatting excitedly to me about her boyfriend Paul, who often sent her letters), and my parents were kind. My parents also made a point of telling me and my brother to do our own chores and not ask the maid to do them - if she tried, my parents would stop her and say that it's not her job to wait on us.

But this wasn't the case for everyone, and I remember visiting classmates and friends whose family maids waited on them hand and foot, even in such stupidly trivial things like tying their shoelaces for them. But my friends didn't think there was anything wrong with it because that was all they knew, and the author's experiences sound very similar. I don't think it made me a better person than them because my parents taught me differently. Sure, as you get older you should start to understand more about the world and realise how messed up some things were, but that also underestimates the lasting power of one's upbringing and how difficult it can be to change those attitudes.

[Derived Absurdity]

I get all that, but as Mur said it was the tone of the piece that upset me rather than the actual content. It's less what he was saying, more the way he was saying it. While reading it I kept saying to myself "wow, this guy is a fucking asshole" over and over again. But yeah, there were a lot of things in the article that signified some... issues.

https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/864645712075685889" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Anakin McFly]

I agree with that, and had likewise wondered about her own perspective.

Minor sidetrack for the comments: "He argued about taking her to a dentist all night...instead of just taking her? at 18 or 20 yo?"
Yes. If his mother was against it, to do so would be a severe act of disobedience. It's why he asked her in the first place, and the fact he did so repeatedly already showed guts. I'm 28, and if I want to do something my parents are likely to object to, I ask their permission. I have friends in their 40s and 50s who do likewise. Age has nothing to do with it. It's a collectivist culture vs the individualist one in the West. You act as a family (and in the case of wrongdoing, are held accountable as a family - which the author did in naming her as his family's slave).

from wikipedia, bolds mine:

"Filial piety means to be good to one's parents; to take care of one's parents; to engage in good conduct not just towards parents but also outside the home so as to bring a good name to one's parents and ancestors; to perform the duties of one's job well so as to obtain the material means to support parents as well as carry out sacrifices to the ancestors; not be rebellious; show love, respect and support; display courtesy; ensure male heirs, uphold fraternity among brothers; wisely advise one's parents, including dissuading them from moral unrighteousness; display sorrow for their sickness and death; and carry out sacrifices after their death.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filial_piety

Trying to dissuade his mother from her cruelty is exactly what he did, repeatedly. Beyond that, his hands were tied.

(While that may seem wrong, changing individual aspects of a culture's moral system is also tough, because everything is so intertwined that once you change one thing the whole moral framework and culture is at risk of collapsing; whereupon there had better be a superior alternative available to deal with the mess, and that runs into the problem of how we're defining superior cultures.)

That aside, I've been thinking about moral relativity and the idea of identifying 'bad' people, presumably to punish them. But the fact is that the author is far from the only person in modern times whose family has had a slave, and if anything he's probably one of the better ones. He mentions this being common accepted practice in the Phillippines, and it is, as it is in many other parts of the non-Western world. Which only logically leads to people using this story to support their racist assertions about how non-whites are immoral savages with no respect for human rights, hence the comments about banning immigrants from Asia and the Middle East. The same claim is implicit in blanket condemnations of the non-Western countries and cultures that condone slavery.

But all that ignores the historical context that shaped these circumstances and individuals in the first place, including colonialisation and the exploitation of developing countries that sent them into poverty and contributed to creating/maintaining practices like slavery. If an entire race of people are much more likely to be slave-owning assholes, you have two options: 1) believing that there is something inherently wrong or inferior about that race; 2) realising that it's a lot more complicated than that, and if you'd grown up in that same socio-cultural context, you'd have been the same. I think that's the 'privilege' maz was talking about.

It's true that the end point of this approach might be a situation where you can't blame anyone because everyone is a victim of circumstance. But maybe that's where we need to go. I've been starting to think that this focus on identifying and punishing bad people is a distraction that doesn't address the root of the problem: how did they become bad people in the first place? How can we stop this?

I'm reminded of the way white supremacists like to cite black crime statistics as 'proof' that black people are inferior and more prone to crime. And sure, many of the people in question may be genuinely horrible people who did terribly cruel things. But to focus on their crimes and how bad they are ignores the circumstances that created them, and the fact that in their place, we'd likely have turned out the same.

[maz89]

Thank you Anakin. I was about to launch into my own defense after reading Absurdity's comment, but I don't have to since you've said everything I wanted to say, only with a lot more nuance and insight.

I've been starting to think that this focus on identifying and punishing bad people is a distraction that doesn't address the root of the problem: how did they become bad people in the first place? How can we stop this?

This, and I've always alternated between "it will take time" on my good days, and... "we can't" on my bad. As a fellow Asian who's seen extremely poor, illiterate families from villages earn their means by sending their 8-year old children to city-dwelling families for housework (in exchange for a place to stay, food to eat and some money), I can tell you that the situation is ugly. Instead of the knee-jerk reaction of denouncing the families who take in these children, it is more important to fix the root cause: poverty, lack of education, corrupt governments. With popular politicians playing musical chairs in the positions of power, I'm not too hopeful.

[Islandmur]

I get all that, but as Mur said it was the tone of the piece that upset me rather than the actual content. It's less what he was saying, more the way he was saying it. While reading it I kept saying to myself "wow, this guy is a fucking asshole" over and over again. But yeah, there were a lot of things in the article that signified some... issues.

https://twitter.com/Karnythia/status/864645712075685889" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I just type a whole reply that disappeared.

Point is it speaks to the character of a person who falls back on cultural upbringing (despite being raised in the states from early childhood) to justify never growing any backbone to right something very wrong that went on under his nose for years. Not only that once the mother dies, he takes his slave home and "saves" her.

Puts her in a room and says "you're now free" here's 200$ bucks a week. But he doesn't get her to see someone, doesn't offer any kind of guidance to this freedom, does not enroll her in any school for learning to read (but proudly brags she taught herself to read), does not seek to enroll her in any kind of program where she might meet peers or at least people her own age, but lets her keep on taking care of his family... because that's what she knows to do? This guy is a freaking journalist a winner of one of the most prestigious awards for journalism... but yeah cultural background.

Yes I can understand Lola's stockholm syndrome would have been shocked by anything else. I see that constantly here were people treat their servants as slaves. Or the child "restaveks" that never run away. It's like battered wives they don't think they will make it on their own.

There are those that say he didn't have to write about it, he had money already. So ? first off, when did having money start being a motive for not wanting more money? secondly if not money he could have wanted more fame, he already had won a title for writing no?

[Cassius Clay]

I think he was probably seeking absolution for himself/family by attempting to be brutally honest. But there is a distinction between trying to right wrongs/taking responsibility versus seeking absolution...even though they overlap. Often, people are selfishly more motivated by the latter and end up making the process all about themselves and about assuaging their guilt. And when that happens they end up rationalizing/justifying/whitewashing the narrative and inappropriately centering themselves in the process. That's how centering your guilt can end up being narcissistic. When someone whitewashes like that, they are basically attempting to get absolution without doing all the work it takes to get there....and that's where people take issue. When we talk about the issue with "white guilt" dominating and obfuscating anti-racism work, it's basically about all this...about white people trying to take shortcuts to absolution with really fixing anything.

Everyone has human complexity...even the most evil people aren't one-dimensional. I used to think that some crimes are so heinous that the perpetrator has forfeited their humanity forever; then I saw a rape survivor give a talk with her rapist. It fucked with my head because I'd never seen anyone take such brutal responsibility for their terrible action without centering themselves, while still highlighting the cultural norms that encouraged his actions (while never framing it as an excuse). I realized that it's not that your humanity is forever forfeit if you do something heinous, but it's that for other's to re-accept your humanity, you must take full responsibility for what you did...while not making it all about yourself. And that's an incredibly rare thing. People often try to assert and express their human complexity without first fully taking the appropriate amount of responsibility, and I think that's what is rubbing some people the wrong way about this story. Because when you whitewash, your are still marginalizing the humanity of the person you dehumanized.

Edit: I forgot to add that the twisted irony is that people thinking their actions have definitively forfeited their humanity forever is partly what makes them not want to be fully honest and be fully accountable. Then they end up asserting their humanity on a dishonest foundation, while continuing to marginalize their victim.

[Anakin McFly]

Point is it speaks to the character of a person who falls back on cultural upbringing (despite being raised in the states from early childhood) to justify never growing any backbone to right something very wrong that went on under his nose for years. Not only that once the mother dies, he takes his slave home and "saves" her.

The thing here is that I didn't see him as 'falling back' on cultural upbringing as an excuse to justify anything; rather, the idea of not rebelling against one's parent's wishes is something so deeply ingrained that it's not even something he thought to question. Because I didn't, when reading that section on how he asked his mother to send Eudocia to a dentist, and his mother kept refusing. At no point did the idea of him taking her to the dentist by himself even cross my mind. In his position I would have been extremely agonised. I might have begged further until she relented. I might have tried to personally go to a dentist and ask for advice, or save up to buy dentures. (All of which he could have done but didn't.) But disobedience wouldn't have been something I considered as an option, any more than euthanising her to stop her physical and psychological suffering (which some people might very well have thought a possibility if they'd been brought up with a strong cultural belief that death was preferable to suffering, and that to them would be the most moral choice).

I don't think 'culture' should ever be used as an excuse for anything, and if a culture supports slavery and other human rights violations it is necessary to be outraged and try to fix it. I hate it when people dismiss misogyny because it's part of a 'culture'. But my point is that this isn't about justifying his actions or his continued obliviousness, nor what Cassius mentions as his self-centered desire for absolution rather than responsibility, but rather that one's cultural upbringing is something that affects your whole worldview and what options you even think are available to you.

Puts her in a room and says "you're now free" here's 200$ bucks a week. But he doesn't get her to see someone, doesn't offer any kind of guidance to this freedom, does not enroll her in any school for learning to read (but proudly brags she taught herself to read), does not seek to enroll her in any kind of program where she might meet peers or at least people her own age, but lets her keep on taking care of his family... because that's what she knows to do? This guy is a freaking journalist a winner of one of the most prestigious awards for journalism... but yeah cultural background.

I'd blame this on his privilege rather than culture. This part had nothing to do with culture and everything to do with how he'd been taught to see her as subhuman.

then I saw a rape survivor give a talk with her rapist. It fucked with my head because I'd never seen anyone take such brutal responsibility for their terrible action without centering themselves

I find that interesting, because others who saw that talk accused him of reinforcing a system where someone can rape someone, be very sorry, take responsibility for it and then get famous for being such a decent guy. But that's always going to be a problem with these things: if someone takes complete responsibility without whitewashing their crimes or speaking over their victims, that too is seen as admirable, and they end up getting more praise than if they'd done with the author of the article did.

[Anakin McFly]

As a sidetrack regarding culture, I'm primarily defensive because of the comments I've seen accusing his refusal to turn in his parents or disobey them as a fucked up cultural norm. But it's part of a larger system that causes good as well as harm. The Asian emphasis on family and community means that most elderly are taken care of and surrounded by family and friends rather than neglected in nursing homes to die alone. I have many friends whose parents were outraged and screamed a lot when they came out as LGBT, but the idea of kicking them out into the streets never crossed their minds. (Still happens, but very rarely.) They continue providing their children with food and shelter because that is their duty as parents, unlike many kids in the West who get disowned and homeless the moment they come out. There are lower rates of child abuse - still far too high, but for instance Japan sees around 100,000 cases a year with a population of 127 million; compared to the US, which sees over 6 million cases a year with just double that population. Some of this is likely due to greater underreporting, but among my local friends who are close enough to talk about this stuff, only one of them has been raped (by an ex), while so many of my US friends have been abused by family and partners. In discussions on sexual abuse here it's clear that more people are speaking from a position of not having experienced it, vs in the West. We have lower crime rates in general, although this comes at the expense of harsher and more authoritarian laws. But women can go for a stroll at 2am (as a friend often does) and have a reasonable expectation of safety. My local trans women friends get dirty looks and called names. My trans women friends in the US get hospitalised on a regular basis.

There's always a give and take: between freedom and security, individual fulfillment and community strength, where every moral system has its flaws, and all the criticisms of Asian culture that have been swamping comment threads about this article come across as hypocritical when they seem oblivious to how the US/Western model has caused different forms of harm (as well as legalised slavery for many centuries, which is much less justifiable in a country that was explicitly founded on the basis of liberty).

This doesn't have to do with the article itself, and is just a general commentary on those comments and their assumption of Western moral superiority. Every culture is messed up in its own way.

[Derived Absurdity]

There are 13 guests viewing this thread right now. Wtf? Comment you bitches!

Edit: maybe it just said 3. idk lol

[Gendo]

There are 13 guests viewing this thread right now. Wtf? Comment you bitches!

Edit: maybe it just said 3. idk lol

Yeah that was because on another forum I'm on, someone linked the exact same article and they were talking about. I linked to this thread and told them that it was being discussed here as well.

[Derived Absurdity]

ahhhhhh

[Cassius Clay]

others who saw that talk accused him of reinforcing a system where someone can rape someone, be very sorry, take responsibility for it and then get famous for being such a decent guy.

While I'm not sure that I endorse everything in that talk, anyone walking away from it thinking about what a "decent guy" he is must have their head up their ass...because it deeply misses the point of it all. The guy's decentness and/or admirability is completely irrelevant.

[Islandmur]

[quote="Anakin McFly"][quote]
The thing here is that I didn't see him as 'falling back' on cultural upbringing as an excuse to justify anything; rather, the idea of not rebelling against one's parent's wishes is something so deeply ingrained that it's not even something he thought to question.
[quote]

See Anakin, you keep generalizing this thing without thinking about the man who wrote the article. No, this isn't about Asians, this is about one particular man who had a different upbringing then Asians in general. This is an ambitious man, a well learned man, an educated man, a man who won a Pulitzer Prize this doesn't sound like a man who would let 'filial piety" stand in his way should push come to shove. However the man who was cruel and hard, not because he was Asian but because his family taught him cruelty, because even when you keep servants most are not treated like slaves (even if a part of asians do so) the cruel ones do so. If these people had been good people they would not have treated Lola that way, no matter their culture.

The shame he felt was that people would judge them and see the truth, it wasn't about Lola that's why when he inherited her all he did to clear his image was to pay her, that way he could say he wasn't using her. He never did anything to heal her, to repair the damage done to her soul, no... He never as you said it stopped seeing her as a subhuman, therefor he never really came to any sort of realization about her situation.

You keep putting yourself in his shoes... know what ? With your sensitivity Lola would have been freed before you were 18.

[maz89]

See Anakin, you keep generalizing this thing without thinking about the man who wrote the article. No, this isn't about Asians, this is about one particular man who had a different upbringing then Asians in general. This is an ambitious man, a well learned man, an educated man, a man who won a Pulitzer Prize this doesn't sound like a man who would let 'filial piety" stand in his way should push come to shove. However the man who was cruel and hard, not because he was Asian but because his family taught him cruelty, because even when you keep servants most are not treated like slaves (even if a part of asians do so) the cruel ones do so. If these people had been good people they would not have treated Lola that way, no matter their culture.

Just because he eventually became well-learned and won a Pulitzer does not necessarily translate into 'he should have gotten over his deeply ingrained cultural roots'. Contradictions are a part of human nature. Also, the author did try to help Lola once she became freed from the clutches of his mother, even if his actions weren't (and couldn't ever be) enough. Lola had long ago accepted this way of life (to preserve her own sanity), so by the time the author could do (or did) anything about it, it was too late. He even took her back to her home town but she did not want to stay. Her whole life had been spent with Tizon's family, where she had developed an attachment with the boys she had helped raise, even an up-and-down relationship with the family matriarch. These were the only people Lola had known her whole life. Chances of Lola being open to therapy or meeting new people were pretty slim, given by the way Tizon describes her.

I also disagree that the author "never stopped seeing her as a subhuman". He dedicated an entire paragraph to his disgusting discovery of his mother's journals in which Lola was barely mentioned. Heck, he wrote this damn article, essentially pissing over whatever legacy he might have otherwise left behind as Pulitzer winner. If he was so well learned, he would have also been aware of the potential backlash such a revelation would spur, right?

I don't think anyone is disputing the fact these people were not 'good people' for treating Lola the way they did. All I'm saying is, though, is that I don't believe anyone is innately born evil. Evil is born out of circumstance. You can certainly feel good about yourself when you judge the cruelty of this family - and many others like them - but it is important to think about how you might have turned out if you had been born in a part of the world where slavery was acceptable.

[Islandmur]

You do realize I live in Haiti and I'm Haitian? Look up the term restavek. And since I am not poor (nor rich) but I do have servants. And there are people here that do treat their servants as slaves to this day.

Don't lecture me about how I might have turned out, because you know absolutely nothing about me. What the f is there to feel good about? Am I judging them hell yes and so are you.

This was put on here for discussion, so I discussed I offered my opinion you may not agree with it that's your privilege however don't you dare make it about me or think you can insinuate things about my life.

The very reason I did not answer you on this thread is because I saw how personally you were taking this and your little jab about me feeling good about myself proves me right.

[Anakin McFly]

This is an ambitious man, a well learned man, an educated man, a man who won a Pulitzer Prize

Pulitzer aside, so am I, and I still can't bring myself to disobey my parents. When they've done things I've morally disagreed with, I do confront them, sometimes repeatedly. I do other things to try and fix the situation. I do all I can to change their minds. I don't disobey them.

If these people had been good people they would not have treated Lola that way, no matter their culture.

I completely agree with this, and my point wasn't that their treatment of Lola was due to culture; instead I was referring specifically to the author's reluctance to turn his parents in or go against their wishes. Culture may justify that, but it does not excuse his family's cruelty nor his lack of further action to rectify the situation, nor his privileged obliviousness to her trauma. All that is on him, not his culture.

You keep putting yourself in his shoes... know what ? With your sensitivity Lola would have been freed before you were 18.

Thanks. I'm humbled that you would think that, but I'm not so sure. I was a lot less sensitive at 18.

[maz89]

Wow. Islandmur, I do not know you, I have nothing against you, and I was actually using 'you' in a generic, impersonal sense there to offer my own 'opinion'. My point remains though. "People" cannot know how they would have fared in Tizon's position if they had his experiences (or if they were not taught to treat servants in a subhuman/cruel way).

I am tempted to respond to the other things you've said but I'll refrain.

Carry on.

[Anakin McFly]

adding to my previous reply: exceptions would occur in extreme situations. If my parents were serial killers who told me to murder or torture an innocent person, I wouldn't. I don't know if the same would apply to the author. What happened to Lola was arguably a different form of murder, but it took the form of countless smaller decisions one after the other where preventing none of them alone would have saved her, while risking making him outcast and no longer able to have a say.

[Islandmur]

Wow. Islandmur, I do not know you, I have nothing against you, and I was actually using 'you' in a generic, impersonal sense there to offer my own 'opinion'. My point remains though. "People" cannot know how they would have fared in Tizon's position if they had his experiences (or if they were not taught to treat servants in a subhuman/cruel way).

I am tempted to respond to the other things you've said but I'll refrain.

Carry on.

I don't think anyone is disputing the fact these people were not 'good people' for treating Lola the way they did. All I'm saying is, though, is that I don't believe anyone is innately born evil. Evil is born out of circumstance. You can certainly feel good about yourself when you judge the cruelty of this family - and many others like them - but it is important to think about how you might have turned out if you had been born in a part of the world where slavery was acceptable.

It is very hard to believe you were not addressing me since it was my words and my post you replied to. I'm the one who talked about their cruelty, and I'm the one that mentioned they weren't good people (which you put in quotes). I do not get mad often and people tend to take it for granted that I will just be nice... but I've got my buttons just like everyone else.

[maz89]

It is very hard to believe you were not addressing me since it was my words and my post you replied to. I'm the one who talked about their cruelty, and I'm the one that mentioned they weren't good people (which you put in quotes). I do not get mad often and people tend to take it for granted that I will just be nice... but I've got my buttons just like everyone else.

How do I put this clearly? I was addressing what you said, but the 'you' in my last sentence was meant to be generic, not to refer to you specifically but to anyone who held your criticisms and judgments, which have been regurgitated everywhere and not just by yourself. But, nope, you managed to make it all about yourself and reassured me that you (yes, specifically you) are indeed the perfect moral judge for the world because you are not cruel to your child servants. Thank you for clarifying, although you missed my point. In any case, I'm not interested in continuing this discussion any further.

[Islandmur]

It is very hard to believe you were not addressing me since it was my words and my post you replied to. I'm the one who talked about their cruelty, and I'm the one that mentioned they weren't good people (which you put in quotes). I do not get mad often and people tend to take it for granted that I will just be nice... but I've got my buttons just like everyone else.

How do I put this clearly? I was addressing what you said, but the 'you' in my last sentence was meant to be generic, not to refer to you specifically but to anyone who held your criticisms and judgments, which have been regurgitated everywhere and not just by yourself. But, nope, you managed to make it all about yourself and reassured me that you (yes, specifically you) are indeed the perfect moral judge for the world because you are not cruel to your child servants. Thank you for clarifying, although you missed my point. In any case, I'm not interested in continuing this discussion any further.

First off I have servants not child servants which are restaveks and a term I told you to look up in order to know that yes where I live child slavery still exists, so yes I do have a an understanding of how Tizon? grew up because the same sort of thing happens here.
As for the rest of your attack it just serves to prove that you were indeed adressng me personally to begin with and not some generic "you".

I'm being the moral judge? Because I don't agree this man deserves absolution for writing an article AFTER his slave had died? and stating throughout said article that she had no voice? Not in her mother's journal, not even herself when supposedly asked? that only HE gave her a voice such as it is after death?

You really think that Lola the slave handed down from grandpa to dad to son died a virgin?

Yes the discussion such as it was is over.

[Cassius Clay]

It is very hard to believe you were not addressing me since it was my words and my post you replied to. I'm the one who talked about their cruelty, and I'm the one that mentioned they weren't good people (which you put in quotes). I do not get mad often and people tend to take it for granted that I will just be nice... but I've got my buttons just like everyone else.

How do I put this clearly? I was addressing what you said, but the 'you' in my last sentence was meant to be generic, not to refer to you specifically but to anyone who held your criticisms and judgments, which have been regurgitated everywhere and not just by yourself. But, nope, you managed to make it all about yourself and reassured me that you (yes, specifically you) are indeed the perfect moral judge for the world because you are not cruel to your child servants. Thank you for clarifying, although you missed my point. In any case, I'm not interested in continuing this discussion any further.

Jesus, maz...it's okay to judge terrible things and the people who take part in them...especially when the point is that they still haven't taken full responsibility for their part(therefore trivializing the suffering and humanity of the victim). You're doing this bizarre thing where you're acting like you're so above judging people, because you think people are being judgmental for judging slave owners??? It's not a meaningful defense to insist that we shouldn't judge because we are "privileged" to not have been in his shoes, because we might as well defend any evil act in such a morally vacuous way. What right do you have to judge us judgemental people?? You haven't walked in our shoes!!!

Okay, but seriously, with that said...I think part of the issue is that you keep making this about Tizon's image...and his image really isn't that important. Which is really the whole point of the criticism...that Tizon seems more concerned with his image(than with responsibility, truth and the real humanity of Lola) and you seem to be enabling that. And the fact that you keep framing judgment of this issue as people thinking they're so "good" is more evidence that you are too superficially focused on "image".

[maz89]

Jesus, maz...it's okay to judge terrible things and the people who take part in them...especially when the point is that they still haven't taken full responsibility for their part(therefore trivializing the suffering and humanity of the victim).

Putting aside the haziness of 'taking full responsibility', I agree. We can surely judge terrible things to be terrible. We can all freely admit that what happened to Lola was abhorrent. We can blame the grandfather and the mother for enslaving a woman, for torturing her until she forever lost her soul (to repeat what I've already said in this thread). At the same time, we should also be cognizant that we could have been these people. That we are fortunate to not have been born to families that taught inflicting cruelty against slaves as a 'moral' action, ingraining such behavior in our malleable psych from a tender, young age. It seems that most people are afraid to confront this notion because they believe so surely in the inherent goodness of their soul.

This is the part where most of you will say, "hey, you don't know us! You haven't walked in our shoes! We have experiences EXACTLY like Tizon's! We did x and y to combat slavery and cruelty to servants in our homes from the premature young age of ten, completely overriding the forces and beliefs and values that shaped us, freeing slaves as soon as we hit the age of 18." In which case, obviously, I have to recant my statement, right? :)

It's not a meaningful defense to insist that we shouldn't judge because we are "privileged" to not have been in his shoes, because we might as well defend any evil act in such a morally vacuous way.

I can't believe I have to say this but I am not defending any evil act or any person who commits an evil act. I am only laying emphasis on the tragedy of it all, on how evil is born and cultivated and passed on from generation to generation.

Okay, but seriously, with that said...I think part of the issue is that you keep making this about Tizon's image...and his image really isn't that important. Which is really the whole point of the criticism...that Tizon seems more concerned with his image(than with responsibility, truth and the real humanity of Lola) and you seem to be enabling that.

Not sure I follow. Do you mean that by appearing too sympathetic to Tizon's situation, I am enabling an easy system where slave-owners can now come out, write about how they provided token comforts/liberated their slaves, and therefore be 'forgiven' for what they did, simply because it caused a dent to their 'image'?

[phe_de]

Okay, but seriously, with that said...I think part of the issue is that you keep making this about Tizon's image...and his image really isn't that important. Which is really the whole point of the criticism...that Tizon seems more concerned with his image(than with responsibility, truth and the real humanity of Lola) and you seem to be enabling that.

Not sure I follow. Do you mean that by appearing too sympathetic to Tizon's situation, I am enabling an easy system where slave-owners can now come out, write about how they provided token comforts/liberated their slaves, and therefore be 'forgiven' for what they did, simply because it caused a dent to their 'image'?

Personally I don't think that Tizon's main motivation was to appear good. He didn't make cheap excuses for his behaviour; he just reported the story matter-of-factly.
The fact that he is earning so many vitriolic comments on Twitter or even on this thread proves that he was successful in not manipulating his audience in feeling sympathetic towards him.

And he never asked for forgiveness.
I agree that we can find something abhorrent from our point of view (like slavery); but that we should be careful before we make moral judgements.

[phe_de]

I like how we've regressed to the point where criticizing someone for owning slaves is now considered "screaming from a moral high ground".

Said the poster who created this thread.
http://forum.pittersplace.com/forum/vie ... f=2&t=1811

[Islandmur]

Kinda wonder what everyone would think if this had been discovered instead of having been written in a story.

[Derived Absurdity]

I like how we've regressed to the point where criticizing someone for owning slaves is now considered "screaming from a moral high ground".

Said the poster who created this thread.
http://forum.pittersplace.com/forum/vie ... f=2&t=1811

Lol, you're a fucking moron. What kind of dumbass point do you think you're making here?

[maz89]

Personally I don't think that Tizon's main motivation was to appear good. He didn't make cheap excuses for his behaviour; he just reported the story matter-of-factly.
The fact that he is earning so many vitriolic comments on Twitter or even on this thread proves that he was successful in not manipulating his audience in feeling sympathetic towards him.

And he never asked for forgiveness.
I agree that we can find something abhorrent from our point of view (like slavery); but that we should be careful before we make moral judgements.

Yeah, thanks phe_de. It was starting to feel a little cold in here.

[Anakin McFly]

I agree that we can find something abhorrent from our point of view (like slavery); but that we should be careful before we make moral judgements.

Arguably, the act of considering something abhorrent is itself a judgement, and in the cases of clear evil there's not much need to be careful. Slavery isn't a grey area.

I think we need to distinguish between judgements of behaviour and judgements of people. What happened to Lola is clearly morally abhorrent under pretty much all mainstream human moral systems that revolve around a basis of hurting people = bad. But the fact of that evil doesn't change the fact that in his exact same circumstances, we would have done the same (given that the only person in those circumstances was Tizon, and that's how he acted).

[maz89]

I agree that we can find something abhorrent from our point of view (like slavery); but that we should be careful before we make moral judgements.

Arguably, the act of considering something abhorrent is itself a judgement, and in the cases of clear evil there's not much need to be careful. Slavery isn't a grey area.

I think we need to distinguish between judgements of behaviour and judgements of people. What happened to Lola is clearly morally abhorrent under pretty much all mainstream human moral systems that revolve around a basis of hurting people = bad. But the fact of that evil doesn't change the fact that in his exact same circumstances, we would have done the same (given that the only person in those circumstances was Tizon, and that's how he acted).

Yeah, I assume this is what phe_de means when he talks about being careful.

[phe_de]

I agree that we can find something abhorrent from our point of view (like slavery); but that we should be careful before we make moral judgements.

Arguably, the act of considering something abhorrent is itself a judgement, and in the cases of clear evil there's not much need to be careful. Slavery isn't a grey area.

I think we need to distinguish between judgements of behaviour and judgements of people. What happened to Lola is clearly morally abhorrent under pretty much all mainstream human moral systems that revolve around a basis of hurting people = bad.

Exactly.
The system of slavery can and should be criticized if we have a moral framework that puts emphasis on humanism, and the value of the individual.

But the fact of that evil doesn't change the fact that in his exact same circumstances, we would have done the same (given that the only person in those circumstances was Tizon, and that's how he acted).

Also this.
Plus, he did more than most people in his situation did: He broke the silence.

So: Should we criticize societies that practise slavery? Definitely.
Should we criticize those members of said society who actively practise it (like Tizon's grandfather)? This too.
But: Should we criticize those who do not actively fight against it after growing up believing slavery is "normal" and having respect of your parents deeply engrained in you? Now it becomes more difficult.
And finally: Should we criticize someone for breaking the silence? I don't think so.

[Islandmur]

But the fact of that evil doesn't change the fact that in his exact same circumstances, we would have done the same (given that the only person in those circumstances was Tizon, and that's how he acted).

No this is not true, because if it were change would not exist. Slavery would still be alive and well. It is because people made different choices despite their circumstances that things change.

People go against their upbringings all the time, even in similar societies (although that's harder and rarer while still living in said society). But people do break the cycle.

An abuser who himself/herself was abused as a child is not innocent, is not forgiven his crime because of his upbringing. Especially one that had all the opportunities to learn better and did. He was a writer someone who explored the world of books and writings. Someone who delved into human emotions. This is not someone who was confined only to his community, who was cloistered inside an environment and not exposed to the world.

He did not break any silence, because he gave Lola no voice, the article was all about him. Also (@Phede) he didn't not believe it was normal one of the point of his article was that very young he realized how wrong it was, he knew it was not normal even in the realms of having servants it was not normal.

back to general reply:
I can bypass and understand anything he did or didn't do as a child and young adult.. but as a grown man... I'm afraid I can't. When you live in a free society and you reach a certain age, you can not continue to blame your upbringing or parents for your actions and choices. That is what growing up is all about to forge your own identity.

I'm sorry but I can't help but wonder why only after the death of all parties involved did this article come about. I can't help but question why in a shoebox? Why not do more once he had the care of Lola? Like I said before... psychologist... tutoring or special classes.

I'm sorry the story just rubbed me the wrong way and I can't help that.

[Anakin McFly]

There's no need for you to apologise, Mur.

No this is not true, because if it were change would not exist.

I was referring to his individual circumstances, not that of his society/culture as a whole - because if that were the case, nothing would have changed, as you said. But the people who initiated those changes in history did so because of some factor that made them different and allowed them to break out of that mindset. Maybe it was a particular experience they had, or an unusual series of events, or even just a greater level of sensitivity to injustice than others around them. If all of us here had been born into rich families at a time and place when slavery was the norm, we'd probably all have had slaves, and while maybe some of us might have been unsettled enough to fight for change, such people were the exception rather than the rule. Or in Nazi Germany - the majority of people who went along with what the Nazis wanted were ordinary people who were not particularly evil themselves but still ended up doing evil things.

If I'd been born a straight cis dude I'm pretty sure I'd be an MRA ranting on the internet right about now (gamer? check. socially awkward and bullied? check. lonely virgin? check.), and probably also a super fundie Christian. Such that while I often get angry at those people and what they do, I don't consider them to be significantly different from me, and that much of the time it was only our circumstances - rather than any personal virtue - that determined the people we became and continue to be.

I believe we still do have free will and aren't just helpless pawns of powers beyond our control, but our options are often limited.

[Derived Absurdity]

I still don't really know why I'm not an Internet-ranting MRA. Straight white male? Check. Financially privileged? Check. Bullied? Check. Socially isolated and awkward? Check. Lonely virgin? Double-check. Autistic? Check. Angry on the Internet all day? Check. Atheist? Check. I mean, jeez. How perfect could I get? The only thing I don't have is being a gamer, and even that's just because MRAs and their ilk have turned me off gaming forever. What's so different about me? Don't answer that.

I don't find the argument that "you can't criticize someone for partaking in an evil system because you haven't walked a mile in their shoes" particularly compelling, even when it comes to unfamiliar cultures and unfamiliar moral customs. Because I criticize people for partaking in an evil system all the damn time. I mean, I'm a communist in a society which worships capitalism, a vegan in a society which considers animal rights a joke, a militant anti-theist in a society which says atheists are evil, an antinatalist in a society which says having children is your most important purpose, and a child rights activist in a society which says children are property. I've rejected pretty much everything about my society simply because I thought I should. It wasn't even that hard. I have very little patience for people who just mindlessly soak up all the cultural and moral norms of the society they were brought up in, even when they clash with their moral intuitions. I don't see why that should change just for people who were brought up in societies I consider unfamiliar or bizarre. There have been people who opposed slavery for thousands of years. In every single slave-owning society they've been there. They were right. What was everyone else's excuse? You think I have too high an opinion of myself for thinking that I would probably have been one of those people? It really should never have been hard to convince yourself that slavery is terrible. Really. It doesn't matter what your culture says.

I realize there are hard limits to this way of thinking. Like, if I lived in America in the 1800s I probably wouldn't have been a racial egalitarian. I also probably wouldn't have been some enlightened atheist. If I had lived in 1930s Germany, I probably wouldn't have supported the Nazi Party, but I don't know if I would have done anything beyond that. So I get that we need to realize the limits of our perspective a bit and that saying culture and upbringing are 100% irrelevant is stupid and privileged and narrow-minded and absolutist and is way too extreme... but this thread is going to the extreme in the other direction, saying that culture and upbringing are so all-consuming that they can even cover up an otherwise perfectly normal person's acceptance of owning slaves. Nope.

[CashRules]

Veganism should be a death penalty offense.