Will The Slave Rebellion in Essos End Like That of Spartacus?

[Mordred]

The sons of the harpy will not all be killed but they will be greatly reduced in population, their wealth reduced, and will be suppressed.  The slaves will be free and they will become the majority.  The Free People of Meereen will get to decide on how to govern themselves.  They will stumble along the way like every people had to.  But the important thing is they are free. 

It is no small accomplishment to free a half-million slaves.  Anybody who does that has done a great service to humanity and should rightly be considered a heroine in Dany's case.  Dany the Moses could choose to march the ones who want to leave out of Meereen and build a new city.  Like the biblical exodus.  The ones who stay behind can enforce the law against slavery.

Making slaves free gives them an opportunity.  It does not mean the liberator has to hand feed them and solve all of their problems.  The people will have to make their own choices.  Some of those choices will be terrible.  That is part of growing pains.  They will pay for the consequences of those bad decisions and will hopefully learn over the years. 

[Aldarion]

15 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

People die in war. Nobody doubted that. Both the revolution of 1789 and the one of 1917 mark the beginning of (civil) wars, or took place amid a world war.

I won't shed any tears for poor innocent slaver children caught in the crossfire.

I am not talking just about people "dying in a war". We are talking about revolution, witch hunt for political opponents, potential political opponents, anyone who could theoretically be political opponent and in the end anyone current ruling group doesn't like, and potentially about total societal collapse.

15 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The founders of Braavos were all slaves ... who were able to leave slavery behind. Meaning people actually can do that.

Slavery will end in all the Free Cities and with the Dothraki, too. Slaver's Bay is just the beginning in this regard.

Not if Daenerys hopes to arrive to Westeros before she is wrinkled and toothless. Or a skeleton, for that matter.

15 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Economy has nothing to do with slavery unless you allow it to shape society. If you don't, then things can continue as before. Which is why there was a civil war necessary to abolish slavery in the US - because the elites in the south were not willing to abolish slavery.

And to be sure - slavery still is economically viable in our day and age and gets more and more viable. Why not have house slaves and bed slaves when you are wealthy? Our elites definitely could profit from that institution while still having paid workers work at their factories. The reason we don't sufer that kind of thing openly in the west has to with moral issues, not with economic reasons.

Economy has everything to do with slavery because economy is one of most powerful forces shaping society. Fact is, slavery has existed in all societies once. It ended for economic reasons. Only once slavery became economically superfluous could anybody even think to abolish it in few areas where it could still theoretically be profitable. And by the way, if you truly believe that there is no slavery in today's day and age, you are out of touch. It is simply a so small number that we can go on ignoring it. And elites definitely do have slaves, even if it is not called that. We just choose not to see it because we like to imagine how much better we are than people used to be in Antiquity and/or Middle Ages.

Christianity was not able to stop slavery in Europe. If a religion cannot do that, what hope one conqueror can have?

12 hours ago, frenin said:

Except that the cotton was still profitable and thanks to that,  in part, slavery was so rooted that it was impossible to abolish it without the use of force... (Just as Slavers's Bay).

These cities would not return to slavery if Dany cuts them off, they will be forced to change.

Cotton may have been main product for southern states of the US, but within US themselves it was just a minor note. When slavery ended, a lot of people moved to work in the North, and South itself started industrializing. What you are proposing is basically that Westeros will conquer all of Slaver States, introduce serfdom, and then keep them conquered and economically subservient long enough for serfdom to take root and displace slavery permanently.

12 hours ago, frenin said:

It is irrelevant, the South was economically and socially separated from the North, that was one of the reasons of the tensions, their echonomy was different, their culture was different and bar the racism, their values were different. And again.

You keep ignoring the part of slavery being part of the culture, like it or not, people just don't change their culture if they can avoid it,  they fight with teeth to keep it.

Slavery was also part of culture in Roman Empire, but nobody tried to return to slave-dominated economy once it became unviable and was supplanted by colonate (a beginning of feudalism). Besides, it is not as if ruling class cares about culture that much - at least not the economic portion of said class. They care about profit and will follow what brings them money.

12 hours ago, frenin said:

It was the culture of the entire southern population, there is a lovely speech named Cornestone Address  in which the Vice President of the brand new Confederancy explains how little slaver matters to the South societyand in several seceded states, "having a right to keep slaves" was outright cited as causus belli. https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states just as several top officials of the confenderancy army said it so.

It may have been culture, but again, it would not have survived for long if there was no economic justification for it. McDonalds is a poisonous peace of garbage that is definitely not part of any of European cultures, yet... look at these maps. There used to be time when women were solely housewives, and it was economic reasons which put an end to it.

Of course, in both US South and Rome, slavery was much less widespread than it was in Slaver's Bay. But that is argument for Daenerys not being able to end slavery.

[Rosetta Stone]

12 hours ago, Mordred said:

The sons of the harpy will not all be killed but they will be greatly reduced in population, their wealth reduced, and will be suppressed.  The slaves will be free and they will become the majority.  The Free People of Meereen will get to decide on how to govern themselves.  They will stumble along the way like every people had to.  But the important thing is they are free. 

It is no small accomplishment to free a half-million slaves.  Anybody who does that has done a great service to humanity and should rightly be considered a heroine in Dany's case.  Dany the Moses could choose to march the ones who want to leave out of Meereen and build a new city.  Like the biblical exodus.  The ones who stay behind can enforce the law against slavery.

Making slaves free gives them an opportunity.  It does not mean the liberator has to hand feed them and solve all of their problems.  The people will have to make their own choices.  Some of those choices will be terrible.  That is part of growing pains.  They will pay for the consequences of those bad decisions and will hopefully learn over the years. 

The slaves are the majority and will remain so after they get their freedom.  This is the difference between the experience of the South in the U.S. and Slaver's Bay.  The slaves became free in the South but remained the minority.  Things will have been easier and quicker for them if they had been the majority.  But yeah there will be mistakes along the way as they establish their own rule.  Even so, the future will be much brighter. 

[Lord Varys]

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

I am not talking just about people "dying in a war". We are talking about revolution, witch hunt for political opponents, potential political opponents, anyone who could theoretically be political opponent and in the end anyone current ruling group doesn't like, and potentially about total societal collapse.

Which is all fine in a setting of war and revolution.

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Not if Daenerys hopes to arrive to Westeros before she is wrinkled and toothless. Or a skeleton, for that matter.

Well, killing people is going to speed things up.

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Economy has everything to do with slavery because economy is one of most powerful forces shaping society.

If can be - if the ideology in charge allows economy to influence things. Which is a pretty modern phenomenon. Prior to that, you had developments in agricultural techniques and weapons shape societies on the whole. Just look at China - all those inventions when Europe was filthy backwater, yet they were lacking the ideological framework to conquer the world.

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Fact is, slavery has existed in all societies once. It ended for economic reasons. Only once slavery became economically superfluous could anybody even think to abolish it in few areas where it could still theoretically be profitable. And by the way, if you truly believe that there is no slavery in today's day and age, you are out of touch. It is simply a so small number that we can go on ignoring it. And elites definitely do have slaves, even if it is not called that. We just choose not to see it because we like to imagine how much better we are than people used to be in Antiquity and/or Middle Ages.

Slavery ended in the West because people decided they no longer wanted to do it. Of course the British, who were first, decided that it is a measurement of civilization whether you permit slavery or not. That way you put pressure on peoples who want to be like you.

But slavery can be profitable even in our society, especially if were to reintroduce it in the societies where people effectively are slaves, anyway.

And I never said slavery is gone - I'm aware that there are slaves in the world. You just can't keep open slaves in the West at this point.

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Christianity was not able to stop slavery in Europe. If a religion cannot do that, what hope one conqueror can have?

Christianity never tried to stop slavery anywhere. People used it to justify slavery just as people tried to use it to end it (with worse arguments considering the Bible actually regulates slavery while never anywhere outlawing it).

[Aldarion]

2 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Which is all fine in a setting of war and revolution.

 

 

2 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Well, killing people is going to speed things up.

 

Which makes her no different from any other lord in the series.

2 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

If can be - if the ideology in charge allows economy to influence things. Which is a pretty modern phenomenon. Prior to that, you had developments in agricultural techniques and weapons shape societies on the whole. Just look at China - all those inventions when Europe was filthy backwater, yet they were lacking the ideological framework to conquer the world.

 

China didn't need to conquer the world, because it was largely self-sustained society. Likewise, ideology provided justification for European colonization, but colonialism would have happened with or without ideology - it was rooted in geopolitics, industrialization, overpopulation and a score other things (which factors caused it differed by era).

Modern-day ideologies of tolerance and inclusion are based on the need to sell same products to different groups of people - which is most easily done if differences between groups are reduced. It has nothing to do with humanism. Likewise, Basil II's acts against dynatoi were based on need to maintain Empire's military and tax base (as always, rich avoided taxes the best they could). If anything, it is ideology that is a modern phenomenon.

2 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Slavery ended in the West because people decided they no longer wanted to do it. Of course the British, who were first, decided that it is a measurement of civilization whether you permit slavery or not. That way you put pressure on peoples who want to be like you.

Actually, France abolished slavery before the British did, in 1794. British were the first to ban slave trade, in 1807. But notice the timeline: Britain had shifted away from agricultural society by late 18th century and industrialized by early 19th. And again, neither of these countries was actually dependant on slaves economically at any point of their history. In both cases, slaves were always a minority of the workforce.

[R2D]

Bump

[Lord Varys]

6 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Which makes her no different from any other lord in the series.

 

China didn't need to conquer the world, because it was largely self-sustained society. Likewise, ideology provided justification for European colonization, but colonialism would have happened with or without ideology - it was rooted in geopolitics, industrialization, overpopulation and a score other things (which factors caused it differed by era).

Modern-day ideologies of tolerance and inclusion are based on the need to sell same products to different groups of people - which is most easily done if differences between groups are reduced. It has nothing to do with humanism. Likewise, Basil II's acts against dynatoi were based on need to maintain Empire's military and tax base (as always, rich avoided taxes the best they could). If anything, it is ideology that is a modern phenomenon.

Actually, France abolished slavery before the British did, in 1794. British were the first to ban slave trade, in 1807. But notice the timeline: Britain had shifted away from agricultural society by late 18th century and industrialized by early 19th. And again, neither of these countries was actually dependant on slaves economically at any point of their history. In both cases, slaves were always a minority of the workforce.

I don't think I ever suggested Dany was different from any other lord in the series. She is, in the sense, that she is royalty and a monarch and the Mother of Dragons and all that, but not in the sense that she is better or worse than the 'normal good guys'.

Ending slavery is a cause for which I gladly watch her bathe in the blood of slavers. It would be the right thing even if it doesn't work. But it is ludicrous to speculate about what happens years or decades after the series is over when we have no reason whatsoever to expect the author to shed like on that era. It is like saying that Viserys III's secret bastard son by some Pentoshi whore will take over Westeros in 315 AC. Could very well happen - but we have no way of ever finding out.

The Ming Dynasty burned the largest fleet in existence in the 15th century because they decided there would be no more exploration. This was an ideological choice. Just as it was to close their borders, to have a ruler who is the son of heaven, etc.

Colonialism as such doesn't happen without an ideology, either. You do have to justify why you are setting up colonies at the far end of the world. This whole thing started in the 16th century, and ideology and justification varied. In the end slavery was justified by means of 'scientific racism' because people needed a way to justify why they were doing what they did, especially after they had established liberal democracies.

Overpopulation had nothing to do with colonialism, especially not back in the 16th century.

The past was just as full of political ideology as the present. The idea that there is a Roman Empire is ideology. Monarchy and aristocracy are ideologies, religions are ideologies or help establish and enshrine political ideologies, the medieval estatist state is ideology, the Pope's silly presumption that he rules the earth is nothing but ideology, and so on and so forth.

Just to be clear - the slave trade is basically the important issue here. Slavery was a thing in Europe throughout the middle ages (slaves are called slaves because they once were all slavs, from the point of view of the English at least), but after the Ottomans cut off Europe from the established slave trade, people had to turn elsewhere, eventually settling on the triangular trade thing. Which, to be sure, was done by the Arabs in a similar manner overland in the early middle ages. And prisoners of war/defeated people on the vicinity were always enslaved. It is a myth that slaves were basically transformed into serfs. Just as it is myth that the ancients didn't know that it was better to enslave foreigners than your neighbors.

US slavery in the 19th century resembles George's slavery to no small degree considering the slave trade as such was basically over considering the Europeans had taken over Africa and were enforcing an end of slavery there. Instead, the Americans had to breed their slaves in light of the fact that trade opportunities were drying up - like the Lyseni breed their bed slaves.

What's missing in George's world is the racism that's the ideology behind slavery, justifying why it is okay to keep a certain group of people in bondage. In Martinworld everybody can and is enslaved, although people do seem to have preferences. We have the old prisoner of wars thing as well as debt slavery and stuff.

[Aldarion]

8 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Just to be clear - the slave trade is basically the important issue here. Slavery was a thing in Europe throughout the middle ages (slaves are called slaves because they once were all slavs, from the point of view of the English at least), but after the Ottomans cut off Europe from the established slave trade, people had to turn elsewhere, eventually settling on the triangular trade thing. Which, to be sure, was done by the Arabs in a similar manner overland in the early middle ages. And prisoners of war/defeated people on the vicinity were always enslaved. It is a myth that slaves were basically transformed into serfs. Just as it is myth that the ancients didn't know that it was better to enslave foreigners than your neighbors.

 

Ottomans didn't cut off Europe from slave trade, you don't need to get that far to get slaves. What they did was cut Europe off the Silk Road and luxury trade with China in general. That was the reason for Age of Exploration. Triangular trade only appeared as a consequence of discovery of Americas and, in particular, epidemics which killed off most of native population.

Slaves were not "transformed" into serfs, but fact is that during Middle Ages slaves were not the basis of the economy. Which is why we could, eventually, get the abolition of slavery in Europe (Poland etc.).

8 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Ending slavery is a cause for which I gladly watch her bathe in the blood of slavers. It would be the right thing even if it doesn't work. But it is ludicrous to speculate about what happens years or decades after the series is over when we have no reason whatsoever to expect the author to shed like on that era. It is like saying that Viserys III's secret bastard son by some Pentoshi whore will take over Westeros in 315 AC. Could very well happen - but we have no way of ever finding out.

It is not just that slavery might eventually return - main problem is that Daenerys has, from what I have seen, done nothing to prevent said return. She abolished slavery, but former slaves were not given means of self-sustinence (be it as free peasants, serfs or coloni), and all economic power is still in hands of former slavers. Slavery will not return "years or decades" after the series is over - it already is returning, in form of debt bondage and people selling themselves back to slavery to secure their existence.

9 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Colonialism as such doesn't happen without an ideology, either. You do have to justify why you are setting up colonies at the far end of the world. This whole thing started in the 16th century, and ideology and justification varied. In the end slavery was justified by means of 'scientific racism' because people needed a way to justify why they were doing what they did, especially after they had established liberal democracies.

 

Ideology and justification are easy to manufacture - especially today, but they were easy in the past as well. Belief that white people are the dominant race was not the cause of slavery, it was manufactured to justify it.

9 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

The past was just as full of political ideology as the present. The idea that there is a Roman Empire is ideology. Monarchy and aristocracy are ideologies, religions are ideologies or help establish and enshrine political ideologies, the medieval estatist state is ideology, the Pope's silly presumption that he rules the earth is nothing but ideology, and so on and so forth.

 

Depends on how you define ideology. Any set of ideas can be called an ideology.

9 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

What's missing in George's world is the racism that's the ideology behind slavery, justifying why it is okay to keep a certain group of people in bondage. In Martinworld everybody can and is enslaved, although people do seem to have preferences. We have the old prisoner of wars thing as well as debt slavery and stuff.

That is no different from actual Middle Ages. In Middle Ages, most slaves were criminals, prisoners of war, etc. Most of slavery was going on in Muslim states and, to lesser extent, Roman (Byzantine) Empire - but even there slaves were of similar categories I outlined. What slaves came from outside the societies in question were often from Eastern Europe, and from each other, with Jews serving as intermediaries in slave trade. It was very different from the Age of Colonies slave trade you are thinking of.

[Myrish Lace]

On 8/1/2020 at 12:16 AM, frenin said:

Then the Slavers don't have any leverage,

Slavers are currently besieging the last bastion of their opposition. They have money, armies, fleets, their alliance controls the region. They have leverage aplenty.

It's the slaves who are poised to see their last hope fly away.

On 8/1/2020 at 12:03 AM, Damsel in Distress said:

Daenerys and her campaign will be the inspiration for slaves in other places to revolt against their masters.  The slaves of Volantis will be free.  It is they and the other freed men who will march against the slavers in other places and spread freedom.  

We already know how that story ends - we see it play out in Astapor. Dany leaves. Slaves, freedmen and others kill each other to determine who get to lead. Then slavers' punitive expedition beats the crap out of survivors and restores old order.

On 7/31/2020 at 9:27 PM, SeanF said:

Where would the Slavers find  soldiers who are prepared to fight in a lost cause?  Especially as the Wise Masters of Yunkai and the Great Masters of Meereen are likely to be dead, by this stage.  The soldier citizens of New Ghis and the Camel Corps of Qarth aren't going to be sufficient to reimpose slavery upon millions.  Once you've lost the monopoly of violence, it's immensely difficult to get it back.  

Slavers of the Bay are surprisingly adept at finding people to murder for their cause. Good Masters were basically destroyed, their city wrecked, yet they still managed to muster ships for the siege of Mereen. Great Masters organize urban insurrection despite their city being occupied by hostile army. And since soldier citizens of New Ghis have already reimposed slavery in Astapor, so they are self-evidently sufficient for the task at hand.

 

Ironically Dany's crusade in the Bay did not uplift the slaves - it uplifted the slavers. Before Dany they were lazy, complacent and divided; assured of their own dominance and uncaring about their neighbors' problems. But this entire crisis taught them some harsh lessons and the slavers were quick students.

Slavers of the region are now united in a powerful coalition. That's the first time since the Doom. Previously they were quite willing to sell each other out. But now even wrecked Astapor is treated like an equal partner by other slaver cities. New Ghis' legions do not conquer fallen city for their own benefit - they restore their ally without any attempts to turn it into a puppet/colony/vassal state. That's some shrewd diplomacy and it pays off.

Dany will depart soon. If slaves in Volantis revolt, the city will implode a la Astapor - and with it the only power in the vicinity that might challenge slaver coalition of the Bay.

[SeanF]

54 minutes ago, Myrish Lace said:

.

Slavers of the region are now united in a powerful coalition. That's the first time since the Doom. Previously they were quite willing to sell each other out. But now even wrecked Astapor is treated like an equal partner by other slaver cities. New Ghis' legions do not conquer fallen city for their own benefit - they restore their ally without any attempts to turn it into a puppet/colony/vassal state. That's some shrewd diplomacy and it pays off.

Dany will depart soon. If slaves in Volantis revolt, the city will implode a la Astapor - and with it the only power in the vicinity that might challenge slaver coalition of the Bay.

There won't be any Slavers of Slavers Bay, after the conclusion of the fight outside Meereen.  They will be ex-slavers, deceased slavers.  They've suffered heavy losses to plague, their sellswords are turning on them, and they're being hit by the Ironborn, as well as the defenders of the city.

They could raise an insurrection in Meereen because Daenerys pulled her punches in her dealings with them.  Another ruler would have just turned the freedmen loose on them.

[frenin]

23 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Cotton may have been main product for southern states of the US, but within US themselves it was just a minor note. When slavery ended, a lot of people moved to work in the North, and South itself started industrializing. What you are proposing is basically that Westeros will conquer all of Slaver States, introduce serfdom, and then keep them conquered and economically subservient long enough for serfdom to take root and displace slavery permanently.

It was a very big note, more than the 10% of the trade, and sure,  when the South was beaten they were forced to change,  they could not revert to the old ways so they had to change whether they like it or not.

Not Westeros, Dany, she's going to take over the Dotharki, which means that the main suppliers of slaves are gone, and she's going after the Slaver's states, which means that there is going to be a change on theur ways whether they like it or not.

 

 

23 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Slavery was also part of culture in Roman Empire, but nobody tried to return to slave-dominated economy once it became unviable and was supplanted by colonate (a beginning of feudalism). Besides, it is not as if ruling class cares about culture that much - at least not the economic portion of said class. They care about profit and will follow what brings them money.

Except the South indeed did... because it was part of their culture and they wanted the situation to remain like that forever, even when they already knew that the North becoming industrialized, was a threat.

 

 

23 hours ago, Aldarion said:

McDonalds is a poisonous peace of garbage that is definitely not part of any of European cultures, yet... look at these maps. There used to be time when women were solely housewives, and it was economic reasons which put an end to it.

You're confusing correlation with causation here...

 

 

23 hours ago, Aldarion said:

It may have been culture, but again, it would not have survived for long if there was no economic justification for it.

It shouldn't have survived for long since the system only benefited a very small group of men, yet it did

 

23 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Of course, in both US South and Rome, slavery was much less widespread than it was in Slaver's Bay. But that is argument for Daenerys not being able to end slavery.

Because...  Once the slavers are beaten, Dany would have less hard work to convince the newly freedmen to keep it that way.

 

36 minutes ago, Myrish Lace said:

Slavers are currently besieging the last bastion of their opposition. They have money, armies, fleets, their alliance controls the region. They have leverage aplenty.

It's the slaves who are poised to see their last hope fly away.

And they are being badly beaten.

Once Dany comes back, none of their leverage is going to save them from her armies. So, i'm really struggling to see how their position is that good.

 

[Aldarion]

1 hour ago, frenin said:

It was a very big note, more than the 10% of the trade, and sure,  when the South was beaten they were forced to change,  they could not revert to the old ways so they had to change whether they like it or not.

Not Westeros, Dany, she's going to take over the Dotharki, which means that the main suppliers of slaves are gone, and she's going after the Slaver's states, which means that there is going to be a change on theur ways whether they like it or not.

And she is not going to stick around to make sure that things change for good, plus taking all Dothraki with her is physically impossible, which means that however much damage she does to slave trade, it will not be permanent.

1 hour ago, frenin said:

Except the South indeed did... because it was part of their culture and they wanted the situation to remain like that forever, even when they already knew that the North becoming industrialized, was a threat.

 

And again, they were able to do so only because their primary export product (cotton) still had to be picked manually (a.k.a. by human workforce), thus making slavery profitable.

Besides, if it truly were culture, fact still remains that South was absorbed by the North.

1 hour ago, frenin said:

It shouldn't have survived for long since the system only benefited a very small group of men, yet it did

 

It would have survived so long as the rest of the society was not damaged by it. And many things in history which survive for long only benefit a very small group of men, so your argument makes no sense.

1 hour ago, frenin said:

Because...  Once the slavers are beaten, Dany would have less hard work to convince the newly freedmen to keep it that way.

 

More likely is that newly freed men will just take slaves of their own because slavery to them as well is normal. Changing a group at the top does not lead to end of the system - it perpetuates it. Just look at historical revolutions.

[Hodor the Articulate]

2 hours ago, Myrish Lace said:

Ironically Dany's crusade in the Bay did not uplift the slaves - it uplifted the slavers. Before Dany they were lazy, complacent and divided; assured of their own dominance and uncaring about their neighbors' problems. But this entire crisis taught them some harsh lessons and the slavers were quick students.

Slavers of the region are now united in a powerful coalition. That's the first time since the Doom. Previously they were quite willing to sell each other out. But now even wrecked Astapor is treated like an equal partner by other slaver cities. New Ghis' legions do not conquer fallen city for their own benefit - they restore their ally without any attempts to turn it into a puppet/colony/vassal state. That's some shrewd diplomacy and it pays off.

I don't know how true this is. New Ghis, Volantis, the Dothraki, etc are not in SB (or heading there) to support their bros. They're there to sack Meereen and remove Dany. Astapor is now controlled by Yunkai.

[Lord Varys]

4 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Ottomans didn't cut off Europe from slave trade, you don't need to get that far to get slaves. What they did was cut Europe off the Silk Road and luxury trade with China in general. That was the reason for Age of Exploration. Triangular trade only appeared as a consequence of discovery of Americas and, in particular, epidemics which killed off most of native population.

It made it more difficult to get in slaves via the Byzantines.

4 hours ago, Aldarion said:

It is not just that slavery might eventually return - main problem is that Daenerys has, from what I have seen, done nothing to prevent said return. She abolished slavery, but former slaves were not given means of self-sustinence (be it as free peasants, serfs or coloni), and all economic power is still in hands of former slavers. Slavery will not return "years or decades" after the series is over - it already is returning, in form of debt bondage and people selling themselves back to slavery to secure their existence.

That is the problem of Dany's entire approach in ADwD. But you would be foolish to assume that our guys are just going to shrug off the poisoned locusts, the desire to slay the dragons, and the entire Sons of the Harpy thing after the war Dany tried to prevent was fought and won. Then the victors will slaughter the defeated, and it will be the freedmen and their allies who do this, most likely without Daenerys even giving any input - who is still going to be stuck in Vaes Dothrak after Yunkai'i have been crushed and the Volantenes arrive.

The slavers will be killed and their wealth will be taken by the former slaves and their allies. And they will also take everything they can from the Yunkai'i and their allies. Those people will be destroyed for the war they forced on Meereen.

4 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Ideology and justification are easy to manufacture - especially today, but they were easy in the past as well. Belief that white people are the dominant race was not the cause of slavery, it was manufactured to justify it.

Of course, that was my point. And the modern thing was just the whole scientific aspect to it - if you go back to descriptions of slaves back in Baghdad then you do also have racisim against black people - the difference simply is that things weren't as fixed back then than they were in later days when 'racial hierarchies' and stuff were developed.

4 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Depends on how you define ideology. Any set of ideas can be called an ideology.

Ideas shaping political and societal realities would be ideologies.

4 hours ago, Aldarion said:

That is no different from actual Middle Ages. In Middle Ages, most slaves were criminals, prisoners of war, etc. Most of slavery was going on in Muslim states and, to lesser extent, Roman (Byzantine) Empire - but even there slaves were of similar categories I outlined. What slaves came from outside the societies in question were often from Eastern Europe, and from each other, with Jews serving as intermediaries in slave trade. It was very different from the Age of Colonies slave trade you are thinking of.

Of course, modern slavery was more extreme and more part of the world trade. But that's why the actual issue is the slave trade, not so much slavery as a concept because the former is what enabled people to enslave people at place A and ship them many miles to places B and C.

[frenin]

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

And she is not going to stick around to make sure that things change for good, plus taking all Dothraki with her is physically impossible, which means that however much damage she does to slave trade, it will not be permanent.

If she's not going to stick sround then it's a moot point. If she does, then it's over for the slavers.

She's not going to take all of the Dothraki with her, she's going to take enough and she's going to make the suppliers destroy the buyers. So, It does seem like permanent.

 

 

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

And again, they were able to do so only because their primary export product (cotton) still had to be picked manually (a.k.a. by human workforce), thus making slavery profitable.

But they knew it would not always be profitable... Yet they didn't care.

 

 

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

Besides, if it truly were culture, fact still remains that South was absorbed by the North.

economically?? Sure, the South had no other option.

culturally?? Not even in close.

The Redemption of the South (which is exactly what the slavers are trying to do in Slavers bay with their coalition), the Klan, the Jim Crow era and last but not least the Lost Cause.

https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/lost_cause_the

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_Cause_of_the_Confederacy#:~:text=The Lost Cause of the,a just and heroic one.

 

You only need to take a look of how popular movies like the Birth of a Nation were to reevaluate your thinking.

 

This can't happen with Dany however, because the slaves actually outnumber the slavers.

 

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

It would have survived so long as the rest of the society was not damaged by it. And many things in history which survive for long only benefit a very small group of men, so your argument makes no sense.

Fair enough.

 

 

2 hours ago, Aldarion said:

More likely is that newly freed men will just take slaves of their own because slavery to them as well is normal. Changing a group at the top does not lead to end of the system - it perpetuates it. Just look at historical revolutions.

... Then Braavos is indeed a miracle.

[The Commentator]

On 7/30/2020 at 7:08 AM, Aldarion said:

Bolded doesn't make much sense, or maybe I'm misunderstanding something.

Anyway, slavery always happened when it was economically expedient, and always retracted when it ceased to be economically expedient. Everything else was secondary.

 

Slavery is not going to happen, even if it offers economic advantage, if it is not legal.  Westeros would benefit economically from slavery but it is outlawed.  Economy is not the only thing which drives a society.  Religion is very important.  The values of the people are not always derived from business.  In any case, stopping slavery in Meereen is very feasible.  It will mean making war against those who would want to continue slavery, but they have a choice to stop.  If they choose to continue with this brutal and immoral practice then they deserve the consequences.  Dracarys!

[Lord Varys]

Depending how many Dothraki are there, Dany certainly could take all of them. It would depend on the number of ships they can make ready - which could effectively be all ships the slavers from Slaver's Bay and Qarth to Pentos have.

But the Dothraki are irrelevant insofar as slavery in Slaver's Bay and the Free Cities are concerned. What they do in the Dothraki Sea has no bearing whether there is continue to be a slave trade or not. That's dependent on the merchant cities.

If they no longer bought/took fresh slaves from the Dothraki, the Dothraki would only capture slaves for their own needs, no longer the surplus they continuously delivered to the slavers at Slaver's Bay.

[Rose of Red Lake]

While slavery is likely to return in some form, most of the population could die from famine or dysentery because war (especially dragons) will have destroyed anything edible or drinkable. Repeating this cycle:

"Without slaves, Meereen had little to offer traders. Copper was plentiful in the Ghiscari hills, but the metal was not as valuable as it had been when bronze ruled the world. The cedars that had once grown tall along the coast grew no more, felled by the axes of the Old Empire or consumed by dragonfire when Ghis made war against Valyria. Once the trees had gone, the soil baked beneath the hot sun and blew away in thick red clouds. "It was these calamities that transformed my people into slavers"

Also dont think any assets will be seized in the chaos, so there won't be money to rebuild. This is very different from Braavos. The city wasn't founded on fire and blood. It was founded on refuge.

[Darth Sidious]

On 7/27/2020 at 9:37 PM, BlackLightning said:

Me too. I'm optimistic too and I think that everything Dany has and will continue to accomplish after Drogo's death will bring honor to House Targaryen. When it's all said and done, she'll equal and surpass the greatest of her House.

Essos is too big to conquer in one lifetime? I don't know.

Not all conquests mean arduous war and strife. Some conquests are peaceful. The Vale and the North submitted to the Targaryens not in the aftermath of a bloody series of battles but with parleys. Dorne submitted to the Iron Throne by way of marriage.

Yi Ti and Asshai could simply do the more sensible thing and free all their slaves independently. Or they could squeeze some good terms out of Queen Daenerys and make-over their systems of chattel slavery into serfdom. Slaver's Bay chose to fight Daenerys every step of the way but the Further East and some of the other Free Cities could capitulate willfully without so much as a sword being drawn.

Stranger things have happened. Particularly in this story...

I hope so.  And stranger things have happened.  

[Aldarion]

On 8/2/2020 at 4:29 PM, Widowmaker 811 said:

Slavery is not going to happen, even if it offers economic advantage, if it is not legal.  Westeros would benefit economically from slavery but it is outlawed.  Economy is not the only thing which drives a society.  Religion is very important.  The values of the people are not always derived from business.  In any case, stopping slavery in Meereen is very feasible.  It will mean making war against those who would want to continue slavery, but they have a choice to stop.  If they choose to continue with this brutal and immoral practice then they deserve the consequences.  Dracarys!

Just wrong.

Slavery happens all the time when it is not legal. It may not be as widespread, but laws are generally nowhere as effective as you think. Rich people in particular can easily ignore laws. Likewise with religion: it may restrict slavery to an extent, but it cannot prevent it if slavery is economically expedient. Again, look at history: Byzantine Empire was one of most Christian states in history, yet it had extensive slavery. Anglo-Saxon England had slavery and slave trade (operating out of Bristol) as late as 11th century. As for Norman England, as much as 10% of England's population were slaves in 1086. according to Domesday Book. And this is in context of a Christian society, where Christianity was far more hostile to concept of slavery than any other religion before (or after) it. Yet downward trend in slavery began with pagan Roman Empire during 3rd century, due to spread of institution of colonate, which eventually evolved into feudalism.

Oh, Daenerys definitely can stop slavery in Meereen. She just can't prevent it from returning as soon as she turns her back on the city, unless she spends decades setting up alternative economic system (such as aforementioned colonate) and indoctrinating people in it.

And why do you think Westeros would benefit from slavery? Very fact that it is a feudal society indicates that serfdom / colonate is actually more effective / efficient for them. In fact, slavery in Roman Empire was largely (though, again, not completely) abandoned in favour of colonate by 4th century, because colonate was much more effective way of running economy.

On 8/2/2020 at 4:08 PM, Lord Varys said:

It made it more difficult to get in slaves via the Byzantines.

Byzantines by that point were not a source of slaves at all. It was Venice which was main Mediterranean slave trade state - they were incorrigible slavers - and they were in cahoots with Ottomans as much as they were at war with them. And Ottomans themselves were very big on slavery, though I don't think they had much slave trade with Europe; they were mostly importers, and most of that was done through war.

 

On 8/2/2020 at 4:08 PM, Lord Varys said:

That is the problem of Dany's entire approach in ADwD. But you would be foolish to assume that our guys are just going to shrug off the poisoned locusts, the desire to slay the dragons, and the entire Sons of the Harpy thing after the war Dany tried to prevent was fought and won. Then the victors will slaughter the defeated, and it will be the freedmen and their allies who do this, most likely without Daenerys even giving any input - who is still going to be stuck in Vaes Dothrak after Yunkai'i have been crushed and the Volantenes arrive.

The slavers will be killed and their wealth will be taken by the former slaves and their allies. And they will also take everything they can from the Yunkai'i and their allies. Those people will be destroyed for the war they forced on Meereen.

Again, it does not matter who or how many people Daenerys kills, or whether slavers or slaves win in the end. Unless Daenerys provides alternative economic model (colonate or serfdom would probably be most viable), slavery will return, simply because it is all people know - be it Masters or former slaves. It takes time for inertia to be broken. And slavery may return even if inertia is broken, if no alternative model is efficient enough to replace it.

On 8/2/2020 at 4:08 PM, Lord Varys said:

That is the problem of Dany's entire approach in ADwD. But you would be foolish to assume that our guys are just going to shrug off the poisoned locusts, the desire to slay the dragons, and the entire Sons of the Harpy thing after the war Dany tried to prevent was fought and won. Then the victors will slaughter the defeated, and it will be the freedmen and their allies who do this, most likely without Daenerys even giving any input - who is still going to be stuck in Vaes Dothrak after Yunkai'i have been crushed and the Volantenes arrive.

The slavers will be killed and their wealth will be taken by the former slaves and their allies. And they will also take everything they can from the Yunkai'i and their allies. Those people will be destroyed for the war they forced on Meereen.

In that case, most powerful ideologies of the past were actually religions; though even they had their limits, as I already explained wrt slavery.

On 8/2/2020 at 4:17 PM, frenin said:

If she's not going to stick sround then it's a moot point. If she does, then it's over for the slavers.

She's not going to take all of the Dothraki with her, she's going to take enough and she's going to make the suppliers destroy the buyers. So, It does seem like permanent.

If she does not stick in Essos, she will not end slavery - especially since we have no evidence that she has actually even started working on introducing a socioeconomic model which could replace slavery. If she does, she will never go to Westeros in time to confront the Others and we will never get "a song of ice and fire".

On 8/2/2020 at 4:17 PM, frenin said:

But they knew it would not always be profitable... Yet they didn't care.

 

People rarely to never care about the future. Entire modern-day economy still runs on fossil fuels, despite us knowning for decades that they are a limited resource (and talking specifically about naphtha / oil, it is useful enough in other applications that using it as a fuel means that we are literally burning gold. Except gold is actually comparatively useless). And all other stuff today's people do is often no better. In fact, our political system is essentially designed to favour short-sightedness and societal suicide.

On 8/2/2020 at 4:17 PM, frenin said:

economically?? Sure, the South had no other option.

culturally?? Not even in close.

The Redemption of the South (which is exactly what the slavers are trying to do in Slavers bay with their coalition), the Klan, the Jim Crow era and last but not least the Lost Cause.

https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/lost_cause_the

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_Cause_of_the_Confederacy#:~:text=The Lost Cause of the,a just and heroic one.

 

You only need to take a look of how popular movies like the Birth of a Nation were to reevaluate your thinking.

That actually proves my point: it took time to change people's attitudes.

On 8/2/2020 at 4:17 PM, frenin said:

... Then Braavos is indeed a miracle.

Indeed it is.