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Comment by tankenmate | Hacker News Reader

But as always the true power in a relationship is from the subordinate party, they can always say "no"; i.e. take their ball and go home. Authority comes from submission. Maybe this is why Cuba is still hounded even worse than the USSR ever was, they refused to play along.

In the end sovereign relations is little different from playground antics; pleading your case from the stance of rationality and/or fairness doesn't get you very far, only once someone is seriously hurt do things change (sometimes not ever then; Stubenville anyone?).

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"as always the true power in a relationship is from the subordinate party, they can always say no"

That's the first I've heard of this line of thought. Is there research on this statement? It's pretty counter-intuitive to think that the true power in a relationship lies with the subordinate party. I don't see how slaves, military personnel, or even office workers could be considered truly powerful over their superiors. In some cases saying "no" would lead to serious inconvenience and possible misery. In other cases it could lead to death.

In the case of slavery, even subordination could lead to misery and death. What would have happened if every slave had simply stopped responding and refused to do work for even one minute? They'd be beaten and tortured but if they kept it up, their people wouldn't be enslaved anymore as doing so would just be a waste of money and time.

Obviously you couldn't get that many people to allow themselves to be tortured to death to prevent future enslavement, but the thought exercise makes it appear that the GP's assertion has merit even if it's not entirely practical.

There is the case of the Haitian Revolution, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitian_Revolution, where that is exactly what happened.

> their people wouldn't be enslaved anymore as doing so would just be a waste of money and time.

Doesn't look like a big win to me. Native Americans were not very popular as slaves, so they were simply killed instead...

Well, it somewhat worked with religious martyrs of various denominations. I'm thinking of Christian martyrs and Islamic ones for example, where the act of resisting was in itself a way to transcend death.

I think in the end it's all a matter of how you sell it. There wasn't a unifying story for all those enslaved africans to rally behind. In the end there needs to be a narrative that pushes people into openly rebelling against the status quo.

Does a poem count as research?

There are no masters, only slaves. None command, when none obey.

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