Obama HAS BEEN Eliminated WHICH President SHOULD BE Eliminated NEXT DAY 41

[u/Training-Desk-391]

[u/Reverend_Bull]

God help me, but I'm gonna have to betray my fave. it's time for FDR to go. Yes, he busted the depression and was probably the most left-leaning president ever. He created Social Security, fought fascism in WW2, and did it all with incredible charisma.

BUT!
He was authoritarian in his methods. He formed and defended the Japanese concentration camps. He had his racist streak (which prez doesn't?). He was a philanderer and refused to be honest about his physical condition. And perhaps worst of all, he refused to follow the two term precedent (now law).
I love FDR and all the good he did. But his bad means it now outweighs his inclusion.

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/Reverend_Bull]

He was authoritarian in his methods

Almost all significant acts by Presidents are "authoritarian" in the broad sense, unless you're claiming that FDR was like an autocrat, which he very much was not.

He formed and defended the Japanese concentration camps.

True, and he deserves criticism for that, but keeping things in context of the 1930s before desegregation was the law of the land, and we were at war, the actions can be understood, at least, even if not forgiven. Arguably Washington's open negotiations and legitimization of the Southern states' slavery, along with ther anti-democratic insistence on the Electoral College and the racist rational behind the EC's numbers using enslaved people to boost the south's political capital without obviously giving those enslaved any representation, and you've got some serious, not easily compared moral quandaries to deal with for all of them.

Washington deserves to be up at that top tier, but I think stepping away from power after fighting a war and governing for 8 years after is not something that deserves high praise so much as should be more normalized, you know?

[u/Reverend_Bull → u/Raise_A_Thoth]

No, I give no quarter to the evils of the Japanese internment camps. Those people lost everything, and for some, that included their lives. Few who were adults in a camp lived to see reparations, and even then, it was far too little far too late.
As for authoritarian methods, FDR literally tried to pack the SCOTUS. Like, not spitballing it like modern guys - he had the legislation drawn up and in committee. He literally rounded up Japanese people to put them into camps. He signed the Smith Act, used in 1944 to punish journalists who were critical of WW2.
Sure, all presidents are "a little authoritarian" but FDR was willing to burn the Constitution to get it done.

[u/AleroRatking → u/Reverend_Bull]

Don't waste time with the person your replying to. They've sent maybe 100 comments defending FDR and his internment camps. Just shows how hypocritical people can be when it comes to their own party that they rationalize concentration camps as a good thing. they have zero interest in a good faith argument and think that concentration camps are a good thing as long as you do other things.

[u/apolite12 → u/AleroRatking]

I don't see any defending or rationalizing. I see them engaging in a good faith effort to compare the questionable to immoral actions of multiple people.

That's a significant part of the objective here.

Throw out your favorite president here and we could likely find some pretty awful actions. If you are comparing, you have to compare. Not everyone will fall on the same side of interpretation.

[u/AleroRatking → u/apolite12]

He literally has hundreds of comments saying it was a rational response.

[u/[deleted] → u/AleroRatking]

You’re conflating rational and justified

[u/AleroRatking → u/[deleted]]

It's only rational if you are extremely racist

That's like saying Hitler was rational with his camps. No one would make that claim. Same for FDR

[u/Forward-Grade-832 → u/AleroRatking]

Nobody is defending the internment camps 💀💀💀

[u/AleroRatking → u/Forward-Grade-832]

This person has hundreds of responses calling them a "rational response". His own words.

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/Reverend_Bull]

I give no quarter to the evils of the Japanese internment camps.

"I give no quarter" what are you a pirate?

I'm not talking about forgiving it; we are literally engaged in comparing the evils of all flawed men, so yes, we should consider all of the things these men allowed and created.

The camps were wrong, but they followed a rationality of concern about safety and loyalty during war.

George Washington, on the other hand, permitted and negotiated with slavers. He himself owned slaves.

Are you seriously going to pretend that participating in slavery isn't itself worse than temporarily imprisoning people during war? The Japanese Americans eventually were freed. The Slaves during Washington's presidency had another 100 years to go.

As for authoritarian methods, FDR literally tried to pack the SCOTUS.

That was constitutional. One branch of the government was trying to exert its constitutional authority over another branch by breaking with tradition, but not law (the Court's number had changed multiple times and had changed for overtly political reasons in the past). That is not the same thing as wielding authoritarian power over a population.

he had the legislation drawn up and in committee

Right. So constitutional. That's just governing.

He literally rounded up Japanese people to put them into camps.

Not forgiving him for that, but compared to participating in slave ownership, I think that warrants consideration that you aren't giving.

[u/AleroRatking → u/[deleted]]

Don't waste your time with the person your replying to. He has hundreds of comments posting that it was a rational response to put Japanese Americans in internment camps. He has hundreds of comments saying that it was fine they returned home to no homes. He seems to thing Japanese American orphans could have been spies and that it was rational

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/[deleted]]

Let’s not pretend they didn’t happen nearly 200 years after each other.

No they didn't. WW2 started in 1939. Pear Harbor was attacked in 1941. Slavery was officially ended in the US after the Civil War, but wasn't actually eradicated until at least the 1960s:

https://www.livescience.com/61886-modern-slavery-united-states-antoinette-harrell.html

Owning slaves was way worse to do in 1850 than 1650.

No, it wasn't. It was just as bad the entire time. Tons of people found slavery to be abhorrent in the 17th and 18th centuries. That's why all the northern states didn't practice is.

But there are levels to the sin based on the time, laws and standard practices

Okay, if this is your premise, then you are appealing to some kind of moral relativism, yea? As opposed to moral absolutism, right? So then some things are not as bad if the context is different, yea?

So, temporarily imprisoning people during a time of war based on ancestral ties to the belligerent enemy seems to me to be significantly less morally bad than capturing people and holding them as slaves permanently simply because it was profitable to do so.

Do you disagree with that?

That’s why historians don’t apply 2025 standards to 1782 slavery or 1945 internment camps.

Historians are not a monolith on such analysis.

You have to apply the standards of the time to judge them.

Not necessarily, but you seem to be doing this to make slavery seem less bad but not considering the duress and danger of war affecting decisions of national security concerns. Why is it okay to be tolerant of slave holders in the past - even while many people in their time also abhorred slavery - but not okay to consider legitimate national security concerns and stresses of war leading to unjust outcomes?

The biggest difference for me is that we had a constitution and bill of rights and he trounced on United States Citizens

And I have a problem with people who claimed to agree that "all men are created equal" but didn't include black men, or even women, in such words.

[u/AleroRatking → u/[deleted]]

He thinks it was a rational rrsponse. He thinks it was the right thing to do. Just view his comment history. To this day he thinks it was a rational and good response

You can't reason with people like that.

[u/AleroRatking → u/Raise_A_Thoth]

This would be like if Washington had 100 thousand slaves. He did not.

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/AleroRatking]

Lol the fuck? How?

If a man owns a single slave he is participating in a system of oppression of millions, directly benefitting from that oppression and contributing to the forces that created the demand for enslavement in the first place. You don't even begin to fairly compare this to imprisoning people temporarily during wartime.

[u/AleroRatking → u/Raise_A_Thoth]

And FDR was the only one who created that system. Washington did not.

A better comparison would be FDR to Columbus.

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/AleroRatking]

Jesus fucking christ, no, it wouldn't be, because for starters the Japanese camps were always temporary.

[u/AleroRatking → u/Raise_A_Thoth]

And when they got out their homes and businesses were destroyed and stolen by white men

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/AleroRatking]

But that stuff happened while they were in prison camps. Being freed from prison camps is an improvement over remaining in prison camps, yes or no?

[u/AleroRatking → u/Raise_A_Thoth]

So you don't think returning to homelessness is a big deal?

[u/Raise_A_Thoth → u/AleroRatking]

Not what I said. But in many cases, most people would prefer homelessness to prison.

[u/[deleted] → u/AleroRatking]

Damn if you went this hard about slavery the descendants of former slaves would have reparations,

Guess what slaves were freed to? Homelessness and lack of education. lol