Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe.

I spent a few years in a developing country in South Asia for work. One thing that shocked me to the core was how utterly medieval the system of maids/servants/domestic help was: they were essentially slaves. There is a HUGE swathe of the culture who are so impoverished that they have no choice but to scrabble for the very, VERY low "wages" they can get so that they can continue to live on in their rubbish-strewn slums, with no peace or hope or even basic sanitation. And the minority of people who depend on these staff of slaves/servants happily keep this system going: they know that the wages they pay are only enough to keep their help at barely sustenance levels. The abuse and exploitation is hideous and I do not understand why this isn't widely known and discussed out of that country (it isn't just one country in that region, either).

Sure, I can see that happening in the US. Standards of living are going down, it is harder and harder for the middle class to maintain what their previous generations had, and young people are weighted with crushing debt and rising housing prices, combined with uncertain employment prospects, like never before.

It won't happen in a generation or two, but eventually? Sure.

I was shocked by what I experienced of this system in S Asia as well; when I brought it up in the context of a particular person who was waiting on us hand and foot, I was told "He loves it, he's grateful for the work. He's very happy to do this." The people benefitting from the system seem to have zero qualms about it.

What country or countries is this in?

PP here. My experience was in India.

I think it’s interesting that you don’t see that many people are already or still living in indebted servitude in plain view of you.

Slavery has always existed and indeed today there are globally more in slavery than ever before. It is literally a default mode of civilization-what is rare is the fact that there are currently large numbers of cultures today where it is banned.

If you think it doesn't exist now, have you missed the entire nail salon industry?

In the short term what I think is more realistic is a permanent class of immigrant labor like they have in Dubai. Trump really admires that sort of economy and would like to duplicate it here. Deporting all the immigrants is not going to work for business and he’s going to replace it with a guest worker program where people have no rights and have to leave after a few years. It’s why he wants to get rid of birthright citizenship …. But he could also probably just do it by revoking work authorization if you get pregnant.

Anonymous wrote:With the rise of AI and no clear path for most people to make a living in the face of inflation do you with slavery or indentured servitude will eventually come back? That people will actually need to be slaves so they can be housed and feed themselves?

Yea.

Pretty sure that if we were talking about passing the 13th amendment now, Trump & MAGA, et al. would consider it DEI.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:None of you remembers the story about the lady who was held here by her "employers?" They stole her passport, used her as a maid and nanny and didn't pay her. I'm sure that happens way more than you think.

I'm sure it does.

I'm sure there are many, many undocumented people in the US who are being exploited and abused in similar ways.

+1

It happens all the time. They are exploited by the traffickers and employers.

Anonymous wrote:I'm from Pakistan and though my parents and people in our urban family & friend circle treated house help really well, we continuously read about cases where house help was treated like slaves, specially in villages.

It isn't just "in villages." It was standard in Karachi, where I lived.

But everyone thought their family was different.

Anonymous wrote:I'm from Pakistan and though my parents and people in our urban family & friend circle treated house help really well, we continuously read about cases where house help was treated like slaves, specially in villages.

1. They treated them "really well", but...they paid them almost nothing. Maybe they didn't slap them or yell at them, and maybe your mom gave her old clothes and the kids' clothes to them, but that doesn't make up for the fact that these people are paid so little they have no chance of having a clean, safe home or any alternative. Have you ever seen the slums where these people live? I have.

2. In Pakistan, if a person rapes, beats, or even murders a servant/maid, even a child servant, "forgiveness laws" mean that punishment can be avoided or reduced drastically IF the family of the victim agrees to "forgive" the perpetrator. And if your family lives in a slum, has just lost a working body making wages as a maid/servant, and the perpetrator offers them a little bit of money, they HAVE TO "forgive" them. But of course, most of these crimes are not even reported, as the family of the victim risks financial ruin or becoming targets themselves. How civilized.

3. About 40% of Pakistanis are illiterate. There are scores of child servants/maids and people who have worked as servants for below-poverty level wages for generations, with no education or chance at anything else.

But of course, every one you know "treats their servants really well!"

I'm from Pakistan and though my parents and people in our urban family & friend circle treated house help really well, we continuously read about cases where house help was treated like slaves, specially in villages.

Anonymous wrote:With the rise of AI and no clear path for most people to make a living in the face of inflation do you with slavery or indentured servitude will eventually come back? That people will actually need to be slaves so they can be housed and feed themselves?

No. I don't think so. May be a small number of freak cases but not mainstream.

^ live in a single tiny room

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe.

I spent a few years in a developing country in South Asia for work. One thing that shocked me to the core was how utterly medieval the system of maids/servants/domestic help was: they were essentially slaves. There is a HUGE swathe of the culture who are so impoverished that they have no choice but to scrabble for the very, VERY low "wages" they can get so that they can continue to live on in their rubbish-strewn slums, with no peace or hope or even basic sanitation. And the minority of people who depend on these staff of slaves/servants happily keep this system going: they know that the wages they pay are only enough to keep their help at barely sustenance levels. The abuse and exploitation is hideous and I do not understand why this isn't widely known and discussed out of that country (it isn't just one country in that region, either).

Sure, I can see that happening in the US. Standards of living are going down, it is harder and harder for the middle class to maintain what their previous generations had, and young people are weighted with crushing debt and rising housing prices, combined with uncertain employment prospects, like never before.

It won't happen in a generation or two, but eventually? Sure.

Almost every week while I lived there, the local news would have stories about

I was shocked by what I experienced of this system in S Asia as well; when I brought it up in the context of a particular person who was waiting on us hand and foot, I was told "He loves it, he's grateful for the work. He's very happy to do this." The people benefitting from the system seem to have zero qualms about it.

What country or countries is this in?

I’m not PP but India is like this. Even my American Indian friends who have moved back to India or otherwise spent time there ignore how horrific this is, and accept the cheap labor as normal

I'm the person who posted about it, and it is Pakistan and India. They have slavery there (it is called "maids" and "servants").

I have NO IDEA why this doesn't receive international coverage. When I lived there, there were regular local news reports about a servant/maid who had been abused horrifically. It wasn't considered a big deal; only the really bad abuse was reported, and people still didn't really care.

It was super common for normal middle class people I saw to speak with contempt to the cleaners/maids in their homes. More than once, I would see kids speaking with disrespect to the maid or nanny or cleaner, and the parents said nothing. I saw a woman slap her maid once, and more than one other person casually told me about slapping their maids, sometimes laughing while they described it. They see the poor who work in their homes as beneath them.

The worst part is that there are many CHILD servants/maids in those houses who are not in formal education and are just locked in to the cycle for life.

I’m pp. yes, and they pay them very VERY little. In addition to the slums where an entire family might need to sleep in a single tiny room and sleep in shifts, it is not uncommon to see families living outside, even in dumpsters. These people often work for middle class families, and the families think nothing of having multiple servants who work in their homes waiting on them, and then return home to absolute squalor. And if they live with the family, they sleep on the floor.

This article is old, but I don’t think much has changed.
https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/mumbai/other/the-servant-in-the-indian-family/articleshow/15932324.html

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Maybe.

I spent a few years in a developing country in South Asia for work. One thing that shocked me to the core was how utterly medieval the system of maids/servants/domestic help was: they were essentially slaves. There is a HUGE swathe of the culture who are so impoverished that they have no choice but to scrabble for the very, VERY low "wages" they can get so that they can continue to live on in their rubbish-strewn slums, with no peace or hope or even basic sanitation. And the minority of people who depend on these staff of slaves/servants happily keep this system going: they know that the wages they pay are only enough to keep their help at barely sustenance levels. The abuse and exploitation is hideous and I do not understand why this isn't widely known and discussed out of that country (it isn't just one country in that region, either).

Sure, I can see that happening in the US. Standards of living are going down, it is harder and harder for the middle class to maintain what their previous generations had, and young people are weighted with crushing debt and rising housing prices, combined with uncertain employment prospects, like never before.

It won't happen in a generation or two, but eventually? Sure.

Almost every week while I lived there, the local news would have stories about

I was shocked by what I experienced of this system in S Asia as well; when I brought it up in the context of a particular person who was waiting on us hand and foot, I was told "He loves it, he's grateful for the work. He's very happy to do this." The people benefitting from the system seem to have zero qualms about it.

What country or countries is this in?

I’m not PP but India is like this. Even my American Indian friends who have moved back to India or otherwise spent time there ignore how horrific this is, and accept the cheap labor as normal

I'm the person who posted about it, and it is Pakistan and India. They have slavery there (it is called "maids" and "servants").

I have NO IDEA why this doesn't receive international coverage. When I lived there, there were regular local news reports about a servant/maid who had been abused horrifically. It wasn't considered a big deal; only the really bad abuse was reported, and people still didn't really care.

It was super common for normal middle class people I saw to speak with contempt to the cleaners/maids in their homes. More than once, I would see kids speaking with disrespect to the maid or nanny or cleaner, and the parents said nothing. I saw a woman slap her maid once, and more than one other person casually told me about slapping their maids, sometimes laughing while they described it. They see the poor who work in their homes as beneath them.

The worst part is that there are many CHILD servants/maids in those houses who are not in formal education and are just locked in to the cycle for life.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp3j0e79q52o