[ONE BIG SNIP]

: >  On the brighter side, if you would suggest we further extend your taboo
: Would all of this mean that all "workers" are systematically degraded
: for profit.  We are, after all, exploited for someone elses gain.  May
: degradation is a relative term, i.e. people who only get minimum wage
: are degraded but those who earn $50,000 a year are not.

: No one has yet raised the issue of late 18th early 19th Century
: [extreme] exploitation of immigrants, then women and children by rampant
: laissez faire capitalism.  Was that practice better, worse, or as evil
: as slavery?

Egad...
I hope we don't get into one of those fruitless discussions of whose
suffering was worse, or who was more evil. Speaking of evil, capitalism is
only evil in the eye of the beholder, and that's another fruitless
conversation, divided along our own political lines.

Yet, what we can talk about is how much of this do we bring to the
cultural institutions, especially if there is the opportunity to do so.
Plantations which still have slave quarters provide an excellent
oportunity to discuss this side of American history.  Elis Island may want
to talk about the problems of new immigrants, incountering culture shock,
rasicm, explotation, language barriers, and even divisions within the
immigrant community.

Also you've got the living history issue to contend with but that's
another discussion.
 --
M Marie Maxwell
http://www.wam.umd.edu/~maxwell/
Semi-professional grad student
Will study for food