“Okay, dude, you’re a working man. So, aside from getting captured and sold, and tortured, what was the worst thing to do, the worst job, once you were taken against your will back in the day, before the Civil War, or even before the Revolutionary War? What was the worst slave job from the time Columbus landed until they stopped selling people on the auction block? Could you do it like the top tens on the Military Channel.”

-Steevo

Sure thing, Steevo, here it goes, giving myself twenty minutes, and factoring in the punishment for not getting your slave job done.

10. Tobacco cutter, if you sucked they whipped you

9. Cotton picker, if you sucked they whipped you

8. Indian fighter, if you sucked, the Indians took care of the punishment

7. Land clearance and food farming was heavy, dangerous work, and if you sucked, they sold you to a sugar plantation

6. Sugar cane harvester, if you sucked they killed you by breaking you on a canon wheel or by strapping you to the muzzle and being “blown away,” which was the origin of the term that is now used to discuss fashion and modeling

5. Loading the hold of a paddle wheel steamer with cotton bales, tossed down from above by angry negroes, you freakin’ worthless Mick! If you sucked you starved

4. Sugar cane rendering in a hellish factory, if you sucked you were broken or blown away

3. Rail splitting and laying, if you sucked they whipped you, and if you still sucked, would beat you to death

2. Child coal donkey, harnessed to coal carts in a mine, you were all starved and worked to death, whether you sucked or not

1. Gold or silver miner, beaten by overseers while you worked, and if you ran, you were fed to mastiffs or torn apart between four horses and then fed to the mastiffs.

0. British Navy sailor, who was kidnapped or taken out of prison, if you sucked you were whipped, and if you sucked really bad you would die at sea, falling overboard and watching the ship sail away as the sharks circled. If you were good at your heavy-lifting gymnastics job, your bowels would eventually burst, because you were chronically constipated from the no fiber diet and dehydration, then you were put out of the Navy to starve. But, there was a silver lining tot his dark cloud—8% of the time you were heroically ripped to shreds by enemy canon fire!

-1. A soldier, who was kidnapped or sentenced to the ranks by a court for being poor or drunk or homeless, supervised by a vicious murderer armed with a spiked axe, or sword, dressed up in a tight, bright uniform, squeezed into one-size-fits-all, hard, leather shoes, that were not made for left or right feet, but for pointed elf feet, starved, frozen in winter, and then lined up and marched around until you were standing in neat rows across from a thousand .75 caliber muskets and a few cannons that fired giant, iron bowling balls, aimed at the ground so that they would bounce right through you, and the guy behind you, and the glob of flesh-to-be behind him... The penalty for disobedience was picked from the list above, depending on the military code you were operating under. Weather you sucked or not, you lost arms and legs and hopefully your head, because after the doctor cut your leg off with his dirty bone saw, he left you on the side of the road, unarmed and defenseless, so that bandits, wolves, feral dogs, and escaped plantation slaves could take what they wanted from what was left of you, you worn-out meat-shield.

Have a nice day!