Every single sentence in this article is offensive, and the overall article is also offensive. It also makes impossible generalizations such as this one:
"Most Romans, like Augustus, thought cruelty to slaves was shocking."
For a different perspective, I'd recommend some of Elaine Pagel's work on the early Christian movement, in particular:
In "Adam, Eve, and the Serpent: Sex and Politics in Early Christianity" Pagel's makes clear that slaveowners could rape their female slaves. Some of the early Christian leaders denounced this practice, and argued that slave owners had no right to rape their female slaves. In this, the early Christians represented a dramatic break with the culture of Rome. And this is also why Nietzsche once referred to the early Christian movement as a slave revolt.
Unless you don't think that rape is cruel, it is accurate to say that slaveowners believed in cruelty to slaves. From everything I've read, these kinds of horrors were closer to the norm than the exception:
"Vedius Pollio, a rich Roman, once invited his friend the emperor Augustus to dinner. The entertainment was interrupted when a slave broke a valuable crystal cup. Trying to impress with his toughness, Vedius ordered the slave boy be thrown to the huge moray eels in his fish pond."
And good god, let's not learn management techniques by studying dictators such as this:
"But Augustus was not impressed. In fact, he was outraged at this novel form of cruelty. He ordered Vedius to free the slave boy and told the other slaves to bring all the crystal cups they could find and smash them in their master’s presence. He then told Vedius to fill in the fish pond and get rid of the moray eels."
This whole bit somehow succeeds at being innocent, stupid, shocking, deplorable, wrong and offensive all at once:
"Most Romans, like Augustus, thought cruelty to slaves was shocking. They understood that slaves could not simply be terrified into being good at their job."
Here's a cold hard fact: if you are a slave owner, then you are cruel. It is a simple matter of definition: to be a slave owner means that if someone does what they wish with their life, you are prepared to beat them, torture them, imprison them, or even kill them, to be sure they do not have the freedom to do what they want to do with their life.
Any article that suggests that it is possible to be a non-cruel slave owner is an article that does not understand what slavery is.
"Most Romans, like Augustus, thought cruelty to slaves was shocking."
For a different perspective, I'd recommend some of Elaine Pagel's work on the early Christian movement, in particular:
http://www.amazon.com/Adam-Eve-Serpent-Politics-Christianity...
In "Adam, Eve, and the Serpent: Sex and Politics in Early Christianity" Pagel's makes clear that slaveowners could rape their female slaves. Some of the early Christian leaders denounced this practice, and argued that slave owners had no right to rape their female slaves. In this, the early Christians represented a dramatic break with the culture of Rome. And this is also why Nietzsche once referred to the early Christian movement as a slave revolt.
Unless you don't think that rape is cruel, it is accurate to say that slaveowners believed in cruelty to slaves. From everything I've read, these kinds of horrors were closer to the norm than the exception:
"Vedius Pollio, a rich Roman, once invited his friend the emperor Augustus to dinner. The entertainment was interrupted when a slave broke a valuable crystal cup. Trying to impress with his toughness, Vedius ordered the slave boy be thrown to the huge moray eels in his fish pond."
And good god, let's not learn management techniques by studying dictators such as this:
"But Augustus was not impressed. In fact, he was outraged at this novel form of cruelty. He ordered Vedius to free the slave boy and told the other slaves to bring all the crystal cups they could find and smash them in their master’s presence. He then told Vedius to fill in the fish pond and get rid of the moray eels."
This whole bit somehow succeeds at being innocent, stupid, shocking, deplorable, wrong and offensive all at once:
"Most Romans, like Augustus, thought cruelty to slaves was shocking. They understood that slaves could not simply be terrified into being good at their job."
Here's a cold hard fact: if you are a slave owner, then you are cruel. It is a simple matter of definition: to be a slave owner means that if someone does what they wish with their life, you are prepared to beat them, torture them, imprison them, or even kill them, to be sure they do not have the freedom to do what they want to do with their life.
Any article that suggests that it is possible to be a non-cruel slave owner is an article that does not understand what slavery is.