My respectful disagreement on some of this (particularly , 5, and 6) is that:

It's a historical term and you can't alter history. Words have meaning and you need a word to refer to that class of peple at that time.

You do make a good point that you can properly refer to a person in historical context as an ex-slave or a person before a slave. I think one's status as a freed slave can also be a point of pride