Slaves and Slavery

Woke up this morning with one word ringing in my ears - slave. Maybe I dreamed it, but I don't care, let's start with "slave".

Regarding slaves, Mr. Lu Xun said in his article "Writings under the Light" on April 29, 1925, that the history of China is "an era when I wanted to be a slave but couldn't; and an era when I was temporarily a stable slave". The two eras Lu Xun referred to were the era of chaos and the era of peace. When we think of the group of intellectuals of the New Culture Movement, we know that they often went too far (e.g., Prof. Qian Xuan-tong advocated the abolition of the square Chinese characters and the total alphabetization of the Chinese alphabet. In addition to Prof. Qian's whim, Hu Shi, Chen Duxiu, Li Dazhao, and Lu Xun all opposed this idea. However, the New Youth published the same article, but still wrote an article advocating this, perhaps for them, as long as the banner of democracy and science is still there, the fundamentals can be safeguarded, and the rest lies first of all in the attack on the reactionary rule and its ideological foundations. Yuan Shikai called for the restoration of Confucianism and opposed Confucianism. It is only by breaking down that we can build up. So perhaps we need to read more about the claims of this group of people in the new culture, or we will be reduced to "slaves", slaves of the new culture movement.

In fact, slaves are not necessarily bad. Marx's materialist view of history does not also have an inevitable "slave society" stage. China's three ancient dynasties, the ancient Egyptian civilization, the ancient Greek and Roman civilization, the two rivers, the most famous Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian, India's Peacock Dynasty, which is not the peak of the slave civilization. After China entered the feudal society, the slave factor is still not cut off, the two Han farmers more or less grabbed to be private slaves, the Qing dynasty banner officials, always will be "lackey" on the mouth, the Republic of China minor official also wrote a special book "lackey small history", will be the Qing dynasty's important lackeys said again. India's caste system continued from the slave era, to this day still profoundly affects the functioning of the entire Indian society, its disadvantages are certainly serious, there is no benefit, who dares to abolish the caste system today in India, a total abolition of the caste system? If really abolished, India will fall into what kind of social situation, who can stabilize the social situation? It cannot be assumed that the reform can only be carried out slowly. Otherwise it is the bloodshed and unrest under the revolution.

Today, slavery is a rare species in the world, and the existence of slave societies is much wider, many countries that have declared the abolition of slavery still have a large number of slaves contributing to the functioning of the society, including some large countries. Of greater concern, though, is slavery.

Slavery is the character of the slave. What exactly is the character of a slave? I didn't find an authoritative explanation, but it's probably the character of a submissive, unassertive person who waits for others to dominate him. Compared to "slaves", slavery is a serious yet relaxed state. It is serious because slaves are forced to suffer oppression, and they can rise up if they are conscious of it, such as the Spartacist revolt in Ancient Rome in the 1st century BC. However, slavery is an unconscious slave orientation, even if a person has a free body, if he is controlled by slavery, then he is a slave in practice, he is his own slave master, he is his own slave, the object of service is the master of the heart. When I was in college, my friends said that I always sounded coy to people on the phone and made them feel inferior. My own feelings at the time were that I didn't want to speak loudly, and that gentle expression was a sign of respect for the other person. I don't know if my own self at that time had a kind of slavery in the middle of my character, and it showed so directly. Say its easy because the slave belongs to the obligation of unpaid work for the slave master, even free to scold, trade and kill, slavery is good in the person is free, there is no longer a slave master class can be so unscrupulous. In a time when there were no slaves, and slavery, at least many people were able to escape the oppression of slavery, and some, if not most, were able to be autonomous. But it's hard to say, I think the opposite of slavery is the ability to be autonomous, to have a sense of autonomy, to be critical. How many people nowadays are actually "what you think you think, is actually not what you think", modern media, propaganda has long been all kinds of consciousness implanted into our minds, fiction is not a product of modern times, in the beginning of mankind has been the existence of the classic advertisement "diamonds are forever, one will last forever. A diamond lasts forever." Given that we still live in a class society, we cannot choose whether or not to live in a society of slavery, but we can choose whether or not to live a life of slavery. If our hearts are free, permeable, and autonomous, like Andy's in The Shawshank Redemption, slavery is gone, and this is a life and state of true freedom from slavery.

I don't know if we still have people and societies without slavery and servitude. If there are, such people must be willing to read books, and from various perspectives, positive and negative comparisons, and finally gradually see the nature of society, and know how to think critically; if there are, such a society must be a society that emphasizes education, and strives to provide all kinds of thinking opportunities to its citizens, and finally makes its citizens' sense of autonomy very strong.