Thanks for typing all of that out. I understand your perspective a little better.OK, I was not familiar with the term dying on hill, this is what I wanted to know.
I grew up in a place, quite some time ago, where tattoo parlors were illegal. Some men, however, had them when they were in the Navy, or another branch of the service. Then, there were other people, that you'd run into on a regular basis, who had another type, which were not voluntary, in fact it was against their faith to have them. The horrors that that they had experienced, including the murder of entire families and communities, were not spoken about. I knew an older lady, an immigrant from Scandinavia, whose sister was hung, by the Reich, because she had been a Socialist. I have met many people from around the world with similar experiences. I know another woman, born in Cambodia who, as a child during the Southeast Asia conflict, witnessed the Khmer Rouge burn down her whole village from a distance, and kill everybody in it, including her family, with the exception of her brother who also escaped, and she managed to somehow navigate through the jungle, until some relief workers eventually found her, sent her to France, and then to New York, where she still lives and works, in her late 60's. She was not able to retire at 65 from her domestic services job at a major hotel, because she did not bring birth documents with her, when she escaped, and the aid workers that assisted her put down her age as about four years younger than she was, when they found her. She does not complain about this, she accepts it. Her brother was sent to the Soviet Union, and she discovered where he was decades later, and they had a reunion.
I can read endless books about how wonderful, clever and human Mr. Lincoln allegedly was, but there are real people, who know what war and suffering brings. I have met enough of them, since I was very young, to get some idea of the extent of human suffering, from afar. Perhaps you have been through some the things that people I have known, and continue to know, have experienced first hand, and can speak about it, or would rather not for which I wouldn't blame anybody. If not, and you have little real world experience with victims of war's extreme violence, over ideologies and power, I suggest that you put down your books, turn off the History Channel, and meet some actual people who have lived through unspeakable horrors - you might just begin to reconsider your positions about war, a bit. Only those who have been through these nightmares really know war, and I am extremely fortunate to not be in that category. The institution of slavery was bad, a stain on our history, but overall it was not equivalent to the worst behavior and events that humanity has engaged in, not even close. Mr. Lincoln had no soul, he was a shell of a man, playing a game, for amusement. Perhaps his work was for the best, perhaps not, but he was not capable of normal human feeling, and emotion. He is not the only such historical person like this, unfortunately there were, and still are, many, but make no mistake about it, this is the way the man whose image is on our currency, truly was.
I would ask you to consider that if you dismiss atrocities on the basis of there being potentially worse atrocities, than North Korean camps should be the only human rights violation of concern right now and conservatives shouldn't worry about looting in Portland because destruction and disruption was worse in Hong Kong. You can see where I am going with this...
Anyway, empathy is not mutually exclusive (and you somewhat aluded to that too). You can care about the victims of slavery and the dead soldiers on the battlefield.
You may blame Lincoln for the death of so many young men but I blame the greedy plantation owners and the politicians in their pocket who decided they would rather leave the union than do away with the exploitive and inhumane practice of slavery.