Poll: If You Fought In The American Civil War, Who Would You Fight For?

[Bureacreative]

Union, baby! I got me some New Hampshire Pride I'm not keen to negate by fighting for the other side.

 

[sgtshock]

Like people have said, the North weren't exactly the good guys (forcing federal law on states for economic purposes), and the South only wanted to protect their way of life. However, their way of life wouldn't have been threatened if they hadn't based their entire economy on the enslaving of an entire race of people. It's hard to defend state's rights when those states don't believe in individual rights.

So yeah, Union.

 

[FaceFaceFace]

I'm tired of people insulting the schools in America for always teaching simplified "good vs bad" accoutns of everything. If you actualy bother take a challenging advanced placement course in high school, you'll learn all about how the American Revolution was barely justifiable and how the Civil War was basically a fight between big government and small government.

That said, only one side was planning on ending slavery, and since that also happened to be the big government side, I choose North all the way.

 

[Icehearted]

Racism has never exclusively been about the anger of lost labor, I assure you. I fully believe that southerners by and large regarded my people as little more than livestock they could occasionally rape or murder without penalty, unless of course the livestock they chose to rape or murder happened to belong to someone else.

I misplaced a "most" in my post, it's one of the big problems with posting while drunk and having to rewrite it two times. It wasn't just southerners who beleived that, it was pretty much anyone who got slaves from Africa, and more than likely a large portion of the Africans who traded them in the first place. I don't think it had as much to do with race as it did the fact that they were slaves.

If this makes no sense to you, it's because I'm hungover and awake 3 or 4 hours before I like to be on a saturday. And there is the makings of a shitload of snow outside, that I will have to shovel.

BRB hurling.

lol (sorry, you made me do it)

I get you, drunk posting is tough business, my friend. So are hangovers. For those I recommend Alka-seltzer, something with vitamin C (drinking depletes this, which causes the headaches) a small bite to eat and a nap. Good luck.

 

[Amberella]

I'll just sit here in Europe, sippin' tea.

I want to be in Europe. xD

But if I had to choose then the North.

 

[Soushi]

oooh, so hard to choose. On one side you have slavers, but they are mostly people who have a beef with the government and want to protect themselves. And on the other side, you have the guys who will kill you in your sleep on Christmas.

I would have to say.... for the Natives, yeah, just gather them together and go kick ass. We'd crush the savage forces of the North and the Belligerent forces of the south. And them we would force them off of the land, cause it is OUR LAND, Yeah! And then the very land itself would rise up and smash George Washington in his smug, ugly face! And them we would then force them onto a shuttle for the long trip back to Earth... ... ... There was something else i was talking about but i forgot what it was.

 

[almostgold]

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They are not 'offered' they are made to work otherwise they are punished within prison, such as solitary confinement etc.

So? They're convicted criminals, they're making money, it gives them an activity, it saves the US Gov't money, and it supplies our soldiers with quality gear. Why am I supposed to disprove of this? I love this.

OT: I live in KY, which was a border state. However, I am also Catholic. I can't remember which party Catholic identified with in that time period, we've flipped so many times. If you know, just tell me so i can cast my vote.

 

[MagicMouse]

the north, because they won.

 

[Hugh Mann]

at the risk of getting dive tackled, I just wanted to point out that the Irish were the real losers in the war. In the south irishmen were often hired to do the taskes that the gentry wouldn't want their slaves doing (a slave was a big investment in money and time). In the North, the conditions of many irishmen were worse than slaves in the south (not the face!) generally being used as expendable cheap labor to merely throw aside when worked to death, or as a change of pace you could be drafted into the army were Irish units were often the ones that the sent into the killzone (also happened with blacks when enough of them were on hand). I am not trying to say that slavery wasn't all that bad, but it did beat being Irish

OT: South, I've got a bone to pick with General Custer

 

[mklnjbh]

Haven't you heard of the Northern Irish brigades? There were a shite-load of Irish immigrants fighting for the North. Most were drafted and used as meat shields, but that was just tactics of the time.

 

[Duskwaith]

Wasnt slavery used as an excuse for state vs federal rights?

History is written by the victors, so south.

 

[Agayek]

That's where you're wrong, being in prison is the punishment, they are a danger to society and have been removed from it. Making them work for fear of punishment isn't the point of prison.

I won't get into an argument about that, because we're never going to agree.

That said, the point I was trying to make is that American slavery and penal labor is very different. Penal labor arises from the individuals actions, and their choice to violate one or more laws. Slaves became so simply because they were born.

The two are very, very different. Trying to compare them is inherently invalid.

So...you don't believe in a federal government at all? And forcing SLAVERY on an entire race is hunky dory? Also, I'm fairly certain that the majority of northern soldiers were neither german nor "anti-catholic," whatever the Hell that means. The only place in the world where I can think of anti-catholics dwelling is Ireland.

I'm 95% certain the OP does not condone nor support slavery. He simply does not agree in a strong central government, and I sympathize with that. Create the Confederacy, then worry about slavery IMO.

 

[Toaster Hunter]

I'm from New Jersey, so if I fought for the south, that would just be odd.

 

[Agayek]

thats not true. southern troops treated white and black union soliders differently. they'd take white prisoners and kill black ones. that is what lead to the end of the prisoner trade when US Grant demanded equal treatment and the confederacy refused.

the only acceptable action was to free the slaves as soon as possible. waiting for slavery to just disappear would be an insult to the slaves, insinuating that they are not as important. besides, slavery was evil for lack of a better word. the war to end it was necessary. and the only way to make up for it was to fight and die for the slave.

and no. the emancipation was not a political gesture. that is an insult and i do take it personally. youre lucky no one from the civil war is still around today. theyd love to kick your ass.

Read your US history before lecturing me on this. The Emancipation Proclamation freed the slaves in the South (where, at the time, the US Government had no authority), and allowed the slaveowners in the North and Border states to keep their slaves. Throughout the entirety of the Civil War, the Border states and some of the North had slaves. It didn't end until the 13th Amendment in 1865.

The Civil War was almost entirely an economic debate, rather than a fight to free the slaves.

Edit: Before you go off on me about it: Of course slavery is wrong. It was a vile institution, and I'd gladly kill anyone who willingly participated in it.

 

[Lavi]

North. I could see myself being a really assholish abolitionist who eventually gets killed for it.

 

[Lionsfan]

In truth, neither side occupied the moral high ground - but in schools they will teach the easy narrative of 'north = good guys, south = bad guys'.

Your whole post was right and people do need to know the whole story here, but mostly people learning about this are public school kids. Not bashing public schools, but since history is written by the victors you get basic, USA is morally perfect and right and just and blah blah blah. Just an example, in my middle school, we learned that the Spanish-American war was started when Spain blew up the USS Maine intentionally.

 

[funguy2121]

Unfortunatly I didn't read it but watched it on T.V, the show known as QI, it is a reliabale source though, you'll have to trust me on that one. My recall ability isn't perfect but I think the show said something like; "American prisoners make more than 90% military helmets for pennies an hour" or something like that. They didn't refer to it as actual slavery, but pretty damn close. If you want, PM me and i'll give you a link to the episode that showed it.

The difference between this scenario and slavery is that prisoners have been tried and found guilty by a jury of their peers. They're not always guilty, but it is safe to assume they have violated one or more rules of our shared social contract. They are supposed to be punished. I'm rather firmly of the opinion that prison inmates should be used as much as possible for menial labor, and be paid nothing for it. They're already getting free room and board, there's absolutely no reason to pay them any more.

Slaves on the other hand were born/captured and forced to labor for no reason beyond that someone could make them. They were forced to labor simply because they were born. That's a completely different scenario than prison labor.

That's where you're wrong, being in prison is the punishment, they are a danger to society and have been removed from it. Making them work for fear of punishment isn't the point of prison.

'Scuse me for butting in, gentlemen, but how is offering convicted criminals the chance to earn a bit of cigarette and ding dong money doing super-easy work at all tantamount to slavery? No one cuts off the sex offender's foot if he chooses not to make helmets one day.

They are not 'offered' they are made to work otherwise they are punished within prison, such as solitary confinement etc.

Source. Because I don't believe solitary confinement is punishment for refusing to work. Solitary is punishment for shanking someone in the shower. And even if I'm wrong, if you gave a presentation comparing the plight of criminals in prison to black slaves, you would be laughed away from the podium.

 

[funguy2121]

I'm 95% certain the OP does not condone nor support slavery. He simply does not agree in a strong central government, and I sympathize with that. Create the Confederacy, then worry about slavery IMO.

Right, I get what your saying, but he's still sympathizing with people who owned people, and yet complained about the goverment "forcing" their ideas and laws upon them? That's sympathizing with hypocrites.

 

[Jaythulhu]

Why are "The North" and "The South" the only available options? Given the ability to bring things from the current age back in time, I'd have fought for the British. If America had stayed as part of the Commonwealth, you can guarantee that most of the problems facing the world today that's been caused by Americans would not have happened (and yes, over 95% of the problems that ALL of us face, no matter where we are from, are either directly or indirectly the fault of America, whomever is in power at the time). Except Obama. His government has at least tried to repair the inter-country damage caused by previous administrations.