Friday, November 21, 2008
In what ways were Locke’s ideas about private property and human liberty contradictory?
While Locke promoted the idea of human liberty, he also supported the slavery. How was that possible? Human liberty, in Locke's view, only applied to the human beings who were rational, or were able to become rational through education. African Americans, who were believed to be inferior than the others, therefore could be denied fundamental human rights. African American slaves were only properties different from other "able" human beings, and since the right of private property was ought to be fulfilled, the enslavement was justified.
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4 comments:
I know that the African American slaves were treated as property and thought of as nothing more than an animal. I even know that the slaves in Europe were treated as property also but what I don't know is whether or not the European slaves were thought of as non-human like the American slaves.
Yeah, I think the key here is that Locke's ideas had a "loophole" built in, that you can dehumanize whoever you want, you just have to come up with the reasoning
I think its just because African-Americans weren't seen as humans that they didn't deserve the same rights to human liberty. Comeing from their perspective they looked differently, they spoke differently, and they certainly acted differently. They seemed to have the fortunity to have the same physical qualities a human shared but in Locke's and many others' eyes, they were just another creature.
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