Why do I not feel divided by the most dividing leader in American History?

[ronburgundy]

The fact that it was legal to have slaves of one race in the US but not another is an indication it was motivated in part by racism in the US.

Both your arguments suffer from the same failure to understand enabling factors from primary motivating causes, so I give them the same response (again).
Something being "a factor" in allowing something to happen doesn't make it the primary motive people have for making it happen, which is what I actually said. I never implied that racism didn't exist or play a role. I said the desire to maintain slavery in 1860 was not primarily based in racist sentiments.
If you want to marry a woman and her father's approval (which she cares deeply about) allows that to happen, does that make her father's approval the primary basis for your desire to marry her? This is the "logic" you are applying. Did the slave owners pay slavers to go to Africa and get slaves primarily because they hated black people and just wanted to bring them to the US to make their lives miserable? That is the absurdity that you presume by claiming that slavery was primarily about racism.
They paid to get slaves in order to profit off of them. Cultural racism merely determined who were the easier victims on whom they could profit via this method.

First, I never said slavery in the US was primarily motivate by racism.

Good. Then nothing you have said has any relevance whatsoever to anything I have said.

IMO, it is absurd to think one can derive and partition out the various motives for the maintenance of slavery.

There is nothing magical about slavery. It is just another human activity, and it is quite possible to partition motives and enabling conditions for human behavior. You and all people do it every day constantly. It is how anyone has ever anticipated other people's (or even their own) behavior.
Your argument is like religious assertions that we cannot understand nature.

Second,slavery in general is driven by economic profit. Slavery of a particular race is not driven by profit but by racism. And maintaining a racist institution requires a racist mentality.

Way to contradict yourself. You just said above that US slavery was not primarily motivated by racism, now you say that it was driven by racism. Competent English speakers understand that to say that a human activity is "driven by" X is the same as claiming that X is the primary motive for X.
In addition, it is absurd and baseless to claim that slavery in the US was not driven by the same primary factor that drives slavery in general, profit. It was merely a particular instantiation of the phenomena. As is true of most your arguments on most social issues, you have no concept of the difference between the psychological factors that drive behavior versus the societal level factors that enable those actions and thus impact how extensive and extreme those actions are allowed to be.
The people who went and got slaves, and the people that bought and "owned" them were driven and motivated to do so (same thing) by economic gain. Racist views enabled more people to get away with these actions and get away with more inhumane treatment, but without profit motive, there would be no motive to have slaves of any race to begin with.

 

[Bronzeage]

Anyone who claims President Obama is divisive is simply not being fair to Abraham Lincoln. His election caused seven states to walk out the door. President Obama couldn't do that on his best day.

If the Union of states was as new as it was in 1860, I think Obama would have caused more than 7 seven states to leave it and the Union would have lost.
The historical events since 1860 have changed the context in which leaving the Union has far more going against it, no matter how racially divided people feel. IOW, willingness to leave the union is less strongly tied to racial divisions than it was in 1860.
Not to mention, the desire to maintain slavery was not primarily about preserving racist sentiments, but preserving the economic benefits of having slaves (no matter their race).

Lincoln's actions did make it more difficult for a state to seriously consider succession, but the election of a black President in 1860 is something that wasn't going to happen.

Beyond that, there were many reasons for the succession of the Southern States, but the most overlooked reason was not the economics of slave labor, but the economics of the slave trade. If the slaves had been freed through some magical spell, there would have been a short period of turmoil, but what real effect would it have? The former slaves would soon be looking for work, and what were they going to do? Most of them would be field workers, for wages. The people who would be out of work would be the slave traders, and more importantly, the eastern plantation owners who sold surplus slave to the expanding plantations in the western states. The eastern plantations had discovered a strange truth. The economic benefits to having slaves was short lived. It did not take long for agricultural lands to be depleted and production to drop to unprofitable levels, even with slave labor. The difference was covered by breeding slaves for export to other states.

In the days before chemical fertilizers, a true economic analysis of the plantation slave labor system would reveal that when the loss of land value due to soil depletion was great enough, that after a few decades, a plantation would post a net loss, if it's only income was sale of cotton or tobacco.

 

[ronburgundy]

If the Union of states was as new as it was in 1860, I think Obama would have caused more than 7 seven states to leave it and the Union would have lost.
The historical events since 1860 have changed the context in which leaving the Union has far more going against it, no matter how racially divided people feel. IOW, willingness to leave the union is less strongly tied to racial divisions than it was in 1860.
Not to mention, the desire to maintain slavery was not primarily about preserving racist sentiments, but preserving the economic benefits of having slaves (no matter their race).

Lincoln's actions did make it more difficult for a state to seriously consider succession, but the election of a black President in 1860 is something that wasn't going to happen.

Beyond that, there were many reasons for the succession of the Southern States, but the most overlooked reason was not the economics of slave labor, but the economics of the slave trade. If the slaves had been freed through some magical spell, there would have been a short period of turmoil, but what real effect would it have? The former slaves would soon be looking for work, and what were they going to do? Most of them would be field workers, for wages. The people who would be out of work would be the slave traders, and more importantly, the eastern plantation owners who sold surplus slave to the expanding plantations in the western states. The eastern plantations had discovered a strange truth. The economic benefits to having slaves was short lived. It did not take long for agricultural lands to be depleted and production to drop to unprofitable levels, even with slave labor. The difference was covered by breeding slaves for export to other states.

In the days before chemical fertilizers, a true economic analysis of the plantation slave labor system would reveal that when the loss of land value due to soil depletion was great enough, that after a few decades, a plantation would post a net loss, if it's only income was sale of cotton or tobacco.

That is all fine, and very consistent with my point that economics and profit were the driving motivations behind creating and protecting the practice of slavery. Exactly who in the slave market stood to lose the most by the end of slavery is tangential to anything I am arguing, which is simply that racial attitudes were not the driving motivators, only the enablers. In fact, it is likely that many slave traders and owners and the leaders who fought hardest to protect it were not especially racist compared to other people. What differentiated them was their economic gain they got from it.

 

[fromderinside]

In fact, it is likely that many slave traders and owners and the leaders who fought hardest to protect it were not especially racist compared to other people. What differentiated them was their economic gain they got from it.

Ahah. So you propose something akin to what ISIS is doing.

Why ISIS Trumps Freedom http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/14/o...is-trumps-freedom.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

[URL="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/14/opinion/roger-cohen-why-isis-trumps-freedom.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss"]Young European Muslims join Islamic State to escape alienation and the unbearable weight of individual choice.

ISIS enshrines a Theology of Rape (and slave trade) http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/14/world/middleeast/isis-enshrines-a-theology-of-rape.html?ref=world&_r=0[/URL]

Claiming the Quran’s support, the Islamic State codifies sex slavery in conquered regions of Iraq and Syria and uses the practice as a recruiting tool.

Exactly what is needed for a 7th century pre-agricultural Theocracy in 'Merica.

 

[Bronzeage]

[

That is all fine, and very consistent with my point that economics and profit were the driving motivations behind creating and protecting the practice of slavery. Exactly who in the slave market stood to lose the most by the end of slavery is tangential to anything I am arguing, which is simply that racial attitudes were not the driving motivators, only the enablers. In fact, it is likely that many slave traders and owners and the leaders who fought hardest to protect it were not especially racist compared to other people. What differentiated them was their economic gain they got from it.

War is always fought for economic reasons. Our moral, philosophies and religion will justify our needs and motives, but it's always the money.

 

[fromderinside]

War is always fought for economic reasons. Our moral, philosophies and religion will justify our needs and motives, but it's always the money.

I'm thinking its more power than money although the two get confused in Iwannabeamillionaire societies. Fear of the other is always how its run.

 

[Bronzeage]

War is always fought for economic reasons. Our moral, philosophies and religion will justify our needs and motives, but it's always the money.

I'm thinking its more power than money although the two get confused in Iwannabeamillionaire societies. Fear of the other is always how its run.

Power is money. The critical thing to remember, war is very expensive to wage. There has to be an expected gain.

 

[laughing dog]

Good. Then nothing you have said has any relevance whatsoever to anything I have said.

Wrong. Not only are you attacking a straw man, but as many have pointed out, doing it illogically.

There is nothing magical about slavery. It is just another human activity, and it is quite possible to partition motives and enabling conditions for human behavior. You and all people do it every day constantly. It is how anyone has ever anticipated other people's (or even their own) behavior.

Of course people can partition about "motives" but that doesn't make it accurate, because there is no way to measure or validate the claims.

Your argument is like religious assertions that we cannot understand nature.

Perhaps if you explained that, it might make sense. But I seriously doubt it.

Way to contradict yourself. You just said above that US slavery was not primarily motivated by racism, now you say that it was driven by racism. Competent English speakers understand that to say that a human activity is "driven by" X is the same as claiming that X is the primary motive for X.

Competent English speakers with minimum reasoning ability know that you are simply wrong. I had never said US slavery was primarily motivated by racism. Nor does "driven" mean "primary".

In addition, it is absurd and baseless to claim that slavery in the US was not driven by the same primary factor that drives slavery in general, profit......

As usual, reasoning failure. Slavery in general is an economic activity. Slavery of a particular race is not primarily just an economic activity. I guess that reasoning is too nuanced for you to comprehend.