I see life is all about servitude. Given all you can to family and community and to humanity as a whole.
I see many already do this as part of life.
Regards Tony
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Voluntary Servitude
- Thread starter Laika
- Start date
I see life is all about servitude. Given all you can to family and community and to humanity as a whole.
I see many already do this as part of life.
Regards Tony
julianalexander745
Active Member
Augustus
…
Some slaves became very wealthy and powerful and even owned slaves.
Some served as senior government officials, slave soldiers could become very powerful and even took over empires on occasions: Mamluk Sultanate (Cairo) - Wikipedia
Are you imprisoned in a library? Is it for being unreasonable?
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I would say no and certainly according to the medieval canon lawyers who pioneered the idea of individual bodily self-ownership, this would have been an impossibility.
Why?
Because of the principle of persona libera non potest obligari (a free person cannot be obligated) which means that a free person cannot be subject to an obligation that treats him or her as a "thing" rather than a "person".
See:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=CAA4GBnA0hoC&pg=PA94&lpg=PA94&dq=voluntary+slavery+canon+law&source=bl&ots=yyg5Iqd6a0&sig=GJPOl4Dn0sGxbMF-zAdUKyxJa3w&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=voluntary slavery canon law&f=true
"...The real intention of the clause persona libera non potest obligari...is to argue that a free person cannot be subject to any obligation that will treat him or her as a thing instead of a person. [This] would transform a personam liberam (free person) into a res (thing). In canon law (as in civil law) this would be untenable..."
To submit yourself voluntarily to slavery is, in a sense, to deny your very personhood which bestows your right to choose in the first place, because only persons have freedom of choice and autonomy. That is a philosophical absurdity, according to the medieval canonists and I agree with them.
You can't freely submit yourself into a state of slavery and thereby transform yourself legally into an object or thing rather than a person because this would be denying the very freedom of choice and personhood that you exercised in the first place to do this, to freely decide.
So morally and philosophically speaking, while people did do this in past civilizations, it is a logical impossibility to reduce oneself into a condition of voluntary slavery...I mean, that's essentially saying "I, as a free person, do solemnly de-personize myself and have chosen to become a thing, that is an object rather than a person".
Eww.
If you claim to have the freedom and autonomy to voluntarily do things, then you are implicitly recognising that you are a person and persons are not 'things' - so as a person you can't turn yourself into a thing by exercising the very freedom and autonomy that makes you a person, surely?
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber
On one hand, I feel if thats whats someone wants, why not? But, on the other hand, I worry about exploitation and worse circumstances for the working class as free servants become ideal over paid labor, and those who are hard times and short on money. Not to mention the ill amd desperate. I feel the risks of those may outweigh letting people do it.
I'd grant them the right.
It still might be if the pay is extremely low, or where other work is unavailable such that the worker has little choice. Slavery surely is as much about choices than anything else. Early industrial societies, as in the UK, was much like slavery - given the working conditions, wages, and options open to those who found themselves in such positions. The same could be said for many workers now in foreign countries producing goods for us in the West if they are actually being exploited - that is, few other options being available.
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber
How would you address the possibilities of exploitation?
Well, spluh!
A modicum of regulation to ensure competence, & that the contract is honored.
Tambourine
Well-Known Member
I think it is a mistake to look at voluntarism only in the form of singular choices, rather than looking at their effects in their totality.
When I become a slave, then I find myself in a state of coerced labor - meaning that I can be made to work whatever my "master" wants me to, in any way he chooses, regardless of my wishes and even against my will.
Freedom of choice, on the other hand, implies that I can choose, and revoke my choice at will. So voluntary labor would entail labor that I could refuse or leave at any time and for any reason I choose.
Given how slavery is a form of coerced labor, I would say that this is a contradiction: I cannot be a voluntary slave, because being a slave implies that I cannot just up and leave or stop working at any point, cannot choose what I work or how I work - yet voluntary labor implies just that.
When I become a slave, then I find myself in a state of coerced labor - meaning that I can be made to work whatever my "master" wants me to, in any way he chooses, regardless of my wishes and even against my will.
Freedom of choice, on the other hand, implies that I can choose, and revoke my choice at will. So voluntary labor would entail labor that I could refuse or leave at any time and for any reason I choose.
Given how slavery is a form of coerced labor, I would say that this is a contradiction: I cannot be a voluntary slave, because being a slave implies that I cannot just up and leave or stop working at any point, cannot choose what I work or how I work - yet voluntary labor implies just that.
IndigoChild5559
Loving God and my neighbor as myself.
It depends on how well it pays. If it pays minimum wage, a person can't even afford rent, clothing, and food. At least, not where I live. At least if they were a slave, they would have housing, clothing, and not go hungry. Indeed, under Torah laws, a master would have to treat him extraordinarily well. It became economically unfeasible to own a slave in Israel, and eventually died out on its own.
At any rate, the modern conscience needs to be sensitized to the plight of the underemployed, those not being paid a living wage. This is the "slavery" of our time.