[baddox]

Age of Sail pirates were fascinating in many ways. Some of them had workers' comp, equal pay and voting rights for blacks and other minorities, constitutions designed to limit autocratic power on the ship (unlike legitimate merchant ships), and fairly flat payouts of booty (one documented ship gave the Captain two shares while the lowest crew members got one share).

[maceo]

Right, and many of the pirates become pirates because they were fleeing the autocracy of legitimate merchant ships.

And the newfound freedom of pirates was a direct threat to the state. It's no wonder that in a span of 50 years, as mercantilism developed, pirates went from being knighted (Francis Drake), to being the worst kind of criminals (Blackbeard).