Bigger travesty: Slavery vs. Holocaust

Which is worse? I am inclined to believe that the holocaust was much grander and terrible, though slavery is not to be taken lightly. For now, and since the holocaust is in the past and seems unlikely to be repeated, it seems that slavery should probably hold more concern for us in modern times.

That being said, each is born of ignorance and each is horrible in its own way.

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It's crazy when you imagine that kind of death.

Eerie. This reminds me a bit of what I've heard about Stalinist Russia. Cannibalism of family members due to starvation, poor living conditions and tragic compensation for farmers and peasants, etc. It is estimated that 20 million Russians died during Stalin's rule.

Originally Posted by a lurker

I'm sure little Ester Evangalist was giving you a ton of lip before you gave us the enlightening factoid that religion has kiled a whole lot of people.

I believe that you are misappraising Arainach's statement. While it seems easy to place blame on the Church, thats because it is. Perhaps Arainach is alluding to the idea that organized religion has promoted behavior which discourages idealogical and religious competition. For instance, think of how many people 'died' (and I think you'd be troubled to call it anything other than murder) during the crusades as Christianity marched from one part of the world to the other, converting/killing everything in its path...not to mention encouraging outdated modes of thought which bypassed logic and caused people to act irrationally towards not only the world, but the people in it. Think of all of the heretics who were burned alive, skinned, quartered for trying to dispute the church's claim that the earth is the center of the universe...

...Not to mention the vatican's role (or lack of concern) in regards to the Holocaust. There was no visible opposition from the Catholic Church in saying 'This is wrong'. Meanwhile, millions of jews were being killed. The point is that the church had the power to do something positive, and decided not to. I think the reasoning into this is quite clear. This may not be 'direct' killing, but this is merely semantics. The church IS responsible for a great number of deaths.

I agree that the Church seems to have had rather bloody hands throughout its history, all for the name of expansion.

Though there is little way of supporting a claim that religion (more importantly, the followers of the religion) has killed more people than anything else, I am inclined to see a bit of truth in such statements regardless. If any religious zealots would like to get technical, what about the flood? (lol) God killed almost the entire human population on earth, not to mention entire cities (such as Sodom and Gomorroh), so I consider the ideal of death and religion going hand in hand, to be rather appropriate.

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If you want to go this direction, you can easily find benefits to the Holocaust, as well.

"benefits"? No. The research that you refer to cannot be deemed ethically permissable to use in modern medicine. There is nothing beneficial about it. It COULD'VE been beneficial but that would humanize the killing of 7 million people. The ends doesn't justify the means. Any counter argument implies that murder is acceptable.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Capo

I was quoting a guy who was saying slavery was beneficial to the economy. Did you even read my post? Or his, for that matter?

I only glanced over the blood and guts of your comments, without context. My mistake, let me read it again...

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Human experimentation by Nazi physicians and scientists produced some scientifically valid results, most notably work done in the study of hypothermia.

These tests were endured by Jews to allow german scientists to study how to better suit nazi soldiers to adapt to the bitter coldness of Russia. It was only beneficial to the process of nazi warfare and did little to better mankind as a whole. I think you are giving to much credit to the 'validity' of german research which came at a rather high price. I simply don't believe that the ends justified the means.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Capo

I never asserted that "the ends justified the means". Again, if you had read the thread (all of it, mind), you would have seen I was responding to someone who was extolling the virtues of slavery with an equally ludicrous statement.

I am glad to see that. Pardon me. I considered it unlikely that we'd ever agree on something.

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Rabbi David G. Dalin disagrees.

Thanks for that, though this perspective is not exactly common. I'd like not to be cynical towards the church but it usually doesn't end well. Its difficult to say which perspective is falsified and which isn't. Even so, this looks promising.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.