John Brown

[Entrails Konfetti]

What are your opinions of him?

Personally, I believe that for his time he was very progressive.
Sure he did what he did for religious reasons. It was the new protestant belief that everyone is the same under god.

Yes he came from the pette-bourgoeis, he owned a tanning shop.
He believed in morallity, and his morals were of the ruling industrailist bourgoeisie.

Though theres one thing that remains true today, and he proves that point: a revolution is an action of armed defence by the opressed-- the oppressed in this sense were the industrial bourgoeisie. During the Kansas-Nebraska act when free soliers and slave owners raced to those two states-- and the majority of the two groups would later decide through sufferage if their state would be free-soil or slave-holding, he lead guerilla campaigns in defence of the abolitionists (the abolitionists were getting killed by slave owners in those states). He also did the same in Illinois (though that' rarely mentioned). His raid on Harpers Fairey, which was funded by abolitionists brought the publics attention-- it triggered the Civil War and proved that armed struggle was the only way this issue was to be solved. Lincoln and the Union Army followed in his foot-step, and they abolished slavery. Even the Union Army sang a marching hymm called " Brown's Body" to commemorate him.

You may say that Brown acted to abolish slavery in the names of the slaves, though Frederick Douglas supported him ideologically, and theoretically-- and Douglas was a man who split with Garrisons abolitonists because they believed Douglas and Sojouner should "tone it down". Also, in my book Lies My History Teacher Told Me it says that Harriet Tubman would have joined in Browns raid, but she fell violently ill. The book also mentions while growing up Brown was very good friends with a black male.

Brown was hung for treason, only some years later was it considered what he did was considered patriotic. Thus, it proves our point-- ruling-classes change, so does their ideology, and therefore what's considered "treason" isn't static.

Today we're traitors, tommorow we're noble citizens.

[which doctor]

I agree. He was condemned in those days, nowadays he is celebrated in history textbooks, to an extent.

He was a great insurrectionist, truly a man of direct action.

[Red October]

solid revolutionary for his time. im glad at least some white people took up the armed struggle alongside the slaves.

[OneBrickOneVoice]

A "True American Hero"

[YSR]

What's even more important is his model for white activists. The insurrectionary approach to anti-racist organization amongst white people is one which I think we've lost.

The Weather Underground (for all their monumental failings in organization) tried to use Brown's solidarity model with some success.

The Race Traitor people use his model as a plan of action for white anti-racists. In particular, the talk titled "The Point Is Not To Interpret Whiteness But To Abolish It" makes an excellent analysis of Brown's actions and how they were responsible for the Civil War and the end of slavery. (www.racetraitor.org Check it out, seriously. They seem to have stopped printing new stuff, but the old stuff is fantastic.)

I like to call John Brown my favorite white person in American history.

[Zero]

For the most part he was the only notable Bourgeois figure in Slavery politics that didn't argue for a reformist approach.

Big +propz` to him.

[Tekun]

I put John Brown in the same category as a Nat Turner, a Harriet Tubman, a W.E.B. DuBois

A man who fought against slavery as an institution, when all the odds were against him and the slaves he felt attached to
A great and honorable man

[harris0]

This guy is one of my favorite historical guys. I'm going to grow a beard like his.

[La Comédie Noire]

I'd like to think he showed the abolishinists how to do more than be hypocrytes. Interesting side note i actually live in the town where the John Brown Bell is located.

[harris0]

Originally posted by Comrade [email protected] 08, 2006 06:34 am
I'd like to think he showed the abolishinists how to do more than be hypocrytes. Interesting side note i actually live in the town where the John Brown Bell is located.
I live in the town where he lived at one point in his life.

[timbaly]

Brown was one of the most interesting figures ever to come out of the United States. Even though he was a deep rooted religious fanatic, I feel like I can tolerate that since religion was more powerful back then. In that way he is just a product of his time.

[PRC-UTE]

A heroic and self-sacrificing man. I believe I read that his actions helped cause a deeper rift in the political climate of the day, leading to the showdown over the question of slavery.

[Hanguk_Leftist]

It's sad that school children in the US are forced to learn about racists like George Washington instead of learning about John Brown or Nat Turner.

[Janus]

It's sad that school children in the US are forced to learn about racists like George Washington instead of learning about John Brown or Nat Turner.
Brown and Turner are covered in US history curriculum though they obviously have nowhere near as much popular acclaim as Washington.


I live in the town where he lived at one point in his life.
I once lived in Chambersburg where Brown planned the Harper's Ferry raid and met with Frederick Douglass. The house where he stayed at still exists and is open to the public.

[stevec]

He was an idiot. Anybody that picks up a stone to throw it at someone is an idiot.

Also, the civil war did not free the slaves, it made everybody a slave of the central government. Slavery was ended in the North without the need for a civil war, but the North went from being enlightened to being self-righteous. Wars are always started by the self-righteous.

Wars always make things worse, regardless of who wins. And the glorification of war guarantees that a future generation will repeat the same mistakes because it teaches conceit.

Washington and Brown were both idiots. To think one was good and the other was bad is doublethink. They were both war-mongers in different times.

[sp468732]

I remember asking the question my my US History teacher about racism precivil war. When I learned that the free soilers (which Lincoln was) were just as racist as pro slavery people, I asked my teacher if there was anyone who wasn't racist. He replied with an entire class period talking about John Brown.

That was one of the best classes of US history I had that year.

John Brown is a true American hero.

[RedKnight]

I'd rather die on my feet than live on my knees. There are somethings worth fighting for. As for me, give me liberty or give me death. I'm glad for revolutionary fighters like John Brown and Che Guevera. They are proff that change is possible if one takes action.

[YSR]

Could this be split and the original part put back in History? Despite the ravings of the restricted distracting us, John Brown is a pretty damn important figure and it'd be nice to bring this back to topic.

[shadowed by the secret police]

Until recently I always thought he was black when it fact he was white.
Remids me of Marx a bit---I mean his face and beard (when he had a beard).

[Umoja]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jon Brown went to white plantations, and brutally murdered all the people there, freed the slaves, and then went on to another planation to do the same thing.

Calling him a 'hero' is ridiculous. No matter how terrible slavery was, I don't see how any ethical human being could advocate killing unarmed people.

[shadowed by the secret police]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10, 2007 07:10 pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jon Brown went to white plantations, and brutally murdered all the people there, freed the slaves, and then went on to another planation to do the same thing.

Calling him a 'hero' is ridiculous. No matter how terrible slavery was, I don't see how any ethical human being could advocate killing unarmed people.
Unarmed!

I like to enlightened you on this head: but you can kill people with a pen just as effectivley as with guns and knives.

[Cryotank Screams]

I feel that in many respects he was a revolutionary, and his tactics and basic ideas and modes of action are good for analysis, and such; all in all, pretty good guy.

[Janus]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jon Brown went to white plantations, and brutally murdered all the people there, freed the slaves, and then went on to another planation to do the same thing.
Yes, John Brown did participate in some massacres in Kansas (not the South) but this was because there was violence coming from both the pro and anti-slavery sides hence the name Bleeding Kansas.

[YSR]

As Janus indicates, it's not as though he just showed up and killed people. There was a massive movement among pro-slavery advocates to move to Kansas so it could be made a slave state. Combine that with the immigration of abolitionists to the area and there was considerable violence in the situation before Brown.

Unless I'm mistaken, most of the violence was from pro-slavery settlers, no?

[Umoja]

Yeah, but John Brown wasn't killing 'pro-slavery' settlers with guns (at least not all the time) was he? I was under the impression he killed entire families, not justified.

[Luís Henrique]

Originally posted by [email protected] 10, 2007 07:10 pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jon Brown went to white plantations, and brutally murdered all the people there, freed the slaves, and then went on to another planation to do the same thing.
So he "killed all the people" but freed the slaves? Where do I get this strange impression that you don't consider slaves people?


Calling him a 'hero' is ridiculous. No matter how terrible slavery was, I don't see how any ethical human being could advocate killing unarmed people.

Do you earnestly think that someone could run a slave-staffed plantation "unarmed"?!

Luís Henrique

[Umoja]

Originally posted by Luís Henrique+January 11, 2007 12:54 pm--> (Luís Henrique @ January 11, 2007 12:54 pm)
[email protected] 10, 2007 07:10 pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Jon Brown went to white plantations, and brutally murdered all the people there, freed the slaves, and then went on to another planation to do the same thing.
So he "killed all the people" but freed the slaves? Where do I get this strange impression that you don't consider slaves people?


Calling him a 'hero' is ridiculous. No matter how terrible slavery was, I don't see how any ethical human being could advocate killing unarmed people.

Do you earnestly think that someone could run a slave-staffed plantation "unarmed"?!

Luís Henrique [/b]
I do think that women and children generally didn't carry around guns on slave plantations, no.