[ZULU]

I think the average American Slave owner was probably more of a paternalistic kind of overlord and a good businessman.

Probably this is connected in some way with the curious concept of being a Christian and a slave holder.

Well cared for slaves not only live longer and produce more, they also reproduce.

[Optimus Prime]

And yet that's far from the truth. Slave owners could be monstrously cruel to the slaves they owned, even when it harmed their own economic interests. If that were the case then you wouldn't have cases like that of Mary Prince, who was living freely in England but wanted to return to where her slavemaster lived so that she could marry the man she loved, but couldn't because she would be returned to slavery if she did so. So an abolitionist society offered to buy her freedom from her owner so she could go back and marry, but he refused the money just to spite her. He wasn't thinking of his economic interests, but in maintaining his power over another human being.

The average slave owner was not a kind, paternalistic overlord who placed good business sense above the wellbeing of their slaves. As the saying goes, power corrupts, and for most slave owners holding slaves was like being handed dictatorial power. As many would do when handed absolute power, they turned into monstrously abusive despots.

[PapaBear3625]

I think the average American Slave owner was probably more of a paternalistic kind of overlord and a good businessman. Probably this is connected in some way with the curious concept of being a Christian and a slave holder. Well cared for slaves not only live longer and produce more, they also reproduce.

Also, when you're surrounded by hundreds of slaves, it's just not healthy to have them too angry with you. Despite the tales, I have a feeling that the life of an average slave was not much harder than the life of a free sharecropper.

[21twelve]

“Well cared for slaves not only live longer and produce more, they also reproduce.”

Which was VERY important for the slave owner, seeing as how the importation of new slaves was made illegal in 1808.