Book One of Aristotle’s Politics struck a chord in me, mostly in how odd it was in its concepts. Aristotle holds pretty steadfast in his position that humans can basically be sub-divided into nearly different species, the most pronounced of which is that between “masters” and “enslaved people,” and it’s interesting to see how just this one book coincides with other topics we’ve discussed.
Kant’s Categorical Imperative isn’t perfect, but for trying to objectify the subjective I think he did an alright job, and right away we can see that Aristotle (by relatively contemporary ideals) is wholly unethical in his description of masters and enslaved people. The idea that a sub-genre of humans exist solely to be the means to an end of a master’s power is, I’ll say, pretty disgusting, but with context added it also brings up an interesting argument.
I used SparkNotes to assist in my understanding of the reading, I will admit, and they mentioned Aristotle’s belief that everything in nature has a purpose - otherwise it wouldn’t exist. Aristotle, it looks like, extrapolated his ideas about nature into the arguably more nuanced arena of humans and human relationships, and I can understand why that would make sense to do. But in the end I don’t think it does make sense.
Just looking at his description of the master-slave relationship, he is assuming (as previously mentioned) that there are some people who are just too “simple,” I suppose, to hold any power, and therefore their place is that of the servant. I think that this same argument, consciously or not, is applied today to those with special needs or disabilities - they’re “broken” (I don’t truly think that but that’s the societal gist), and if it’s bad enough they’ll be supported (rather meagerly) by the state, and if it’s not bad enough then they’ll be forced into performing labor they’re capable of and basically being exploited.
Aristotle operates under the assumption that hierarchy is something natural, that there has to be a pecking order of people in order to survive as a species - it’s our purpose, collectively, and our individual roles can be that of the slave or the master (or the wife or child but those don’t really apply in the same way).This is just something that I do not and can not agree with, and even Aristotle himself, in the same book, expressed disdain for hoarding of wealth/power, which tells me that he’s not even completely sure as to the “nature” of slaves and masters. If a man’s place is that of the master, shouldn’t he use his slaves in order to be as wide-reaching and powerful of a master as he can be? Where is the stopping point?
And I get it, I understand that some (if not most, if not all) of Aristotle’s views and ideas are archaic, I understand that his views and ideas have been built upon for the last several centuries and we have contemporary understandings of the same questions Aristotle posed. But it’s still just weird to see a person thinking this way, and to know that a lot of people have based their ideologies and outlooks on the work of Aristotle and his colleagues. I want to know where the idea that some people are better than others began, because it feels like such a natural part of life, but it isn’t and does not have to exist as a prevailing idea.
