Conscription: State sponsored slavery?

[Svartalf]

Well given that the temporary state of conscription was liable to arbitrary deferment, and that conscripts were liable to be made to do things that would put them into boxes, the dissimilitude so servitude is thereby lessened... unless you insist on accounting for the fact that a slave owner was apt to be more careful than the state about putting valuable property to death or at risk thereof.

and that's what I call a hobson's choice... take it as it is, or leave it, you don't have a say anyway. While one might accept the fact that military service sits among citizenly duties, like taxes or jury duty, the way the state is apt to abuse its power in so getting cheap and expendable troops, and to move the goalposts and alter the extent of said duty without consultation of the interested parties makes people look less like free citizens and a lot more like serfs.

[Audley Strange]

Well given that the temporary state of conscription was liable to arbitrary deferment, and that conscripts were liable to be made to do things that would put them into boxes, the dissimilitude so servitude is thereby lessened... unless you insist on accounting for the fact that a slave owner was apt to be more careful than the state about putting valuable property to death or at risk thereof.

and that's what I call a hobson's choice... take it as it is, or leave it, you don't have a say anyway. While one might accept the fact that military service sits among citizenly duties, like taxes or jury duty, the way the state is apt to abuse its power in so getting cheap and expendable troops, and to move the goalposts and alter the extent of said duty without consultation of the interested parties makes people look less like free citizens and a lot more like serfs.

But that does not make the concept of conscription the same as the concept of slavery. What you're getting at is not that the process itself is problematic, but that governments are not to be trusted, well yeah.

[Svartalf]

My problem is not with the concept, it's with the practice.

[Warren Dew]

That's a good point. Slaves are considered human objects not human beings. Conscripts are still considered citizens of the state with the same rights for which they are obligated to serve or be punished dependent on I suppose the social contract.

That's questionable even in the U.S. Conscripts are subject to the UCMJ, which abridges some rights relative to the civilian justice system.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I think democracy is an important point, so long as the conscription is enacted by elected representatives of the citizenry, and not simply decreed by a bureaucrat.

I don't see that as a salient point. Slavery, even if voted in by a majority, is still slavery. So, the analysis of whether it is slavery depends on other factors.

That depends on whether those subjected to the conscription law have the right to vote on it.

[Thumpalumpacus]

That's a good point. Slaves are considered human objects not human beings. Conscripts are still considered citizens of the state with the same rights for which they are obligated to serve or be punished dependent on I suppose the social contract.

That's questionable even in the U.S. Conscripts are subject to the UCMJ, which abridges some rights relative to the civilian justice system.

They are still of an entirely different legal status: not property.