Fair point. The Russians do not have these problems because they are not ashamed. If Olusoga is looking for apologies or compensation for slavery, I am quite prepared to meet him, accept his apology, togehr with cash, cheque or even a postal order. I know there are posters on here who see stepping into their opponents perspective as a dangerous and pointless endeavour that gives undue worth to a viewpoint they despise, but purely as a mental exercise theres usually something to be said for examining your opponents strongest argument instead of their weakest. This is a moral argument. Wider imperialism reparations that include South Asia, China for the Opium Wars and so on, surely even more prohibitively costly, regardless of how effective the education system gets at making young Brits feel a vague sense of guilt about it all. Duke University professor, William Darity Jr, and writer, Kirsten Mullen, jointly published a report for The Roosevelt Institute, an American liberal think tank, laying out a case for slavery reparations. 1894 shipwreck confirms tale of treacherous lifeboat. We could just cut to the chase, and impose a reparations tax on anyone who is descended from from anyone who did something, er, wrong. No doubt life expectancy of a slave was shorter than that for a free man. Slaves were crowded in a new environment with new diseases. I generally reckon cant blame me, my distant relative was on your side arguments are pretty weak since relying on a doctrine of virtues of the fathers risks implicitly accepting sins of the fathers. * the legal institution and pretty much the practice Fuck right off As a winning debating strategy. Eventually, 11,000 separate British slave-trading expeditions resulted in the trafficking of three-and-a-half-million Africans to the New World plantations, the greatest forced migration in modern history until the 20th century. Britain was happy to force the Bevan Boys down coal mines. He is a Cultural Marxist trying to destroy the West. Anti-black riots broke out in Liverpool that year. This is nothing to do with slavery or as with black lives matter, blacks being shot, and everything to do with a shakedown of the white man. It could not have happened at all unless African traders and kings had offered slaves to the Europeans. I dont think the traders can be given a pass on this front either., Just means they werent alone in being in the wrong.. The good news is that Black Lives Matter may be that trigger. He also studied at the University of Liverpool and so benefits from slavery as much as anyone else. The historian and producer said he wanted to. Even discussing it gives your opponents arguments merit. Between that night at the opera and 1807, nearly 800,000 Africans were enslaved. Your email address will not be published. Its an interesting exercise to consider, given we live within such a system, how or whether that contradiction can be settled. It's against this backdrop that Black British History Month was created. He saw how enslaved people who had risen up were burnt to death, castrated or mutilated, punishments he regarded as merited. That is not true. For some peculiar reason possibly because theres a section of Western society has become very insecure about its own position its being some credence. "I don't know why this generation has a different relationship with the past, goes to the past, expecting and looking for different things to earlier generations, but that's really is my observation about them," he says adding the internet has played a huge part. How does importing new labour from West Africa solve the food shortage in the West Indies? Wrong ?!?! Probably few other societies had as much chance of buying freedom. He previously worked at JP Morgan for 18 years in a number of senior roles and was . His book is a product of that childhood terror, and partly an exploration of his condition as a black Briton. (Britain expended blood and treasure on ending the slave trade, and thereby paid its moral debt already is one way of trying to resolve it, but rather unsatisfactory at righting the wrongs done to those who had already fallen victim to the trade.) Will Britain change? The economics of the slave trade may have meant that it was cheaper to work someone to death rather than allowing him a comfortable old age. Its entirely possible to think something was awful without feeling the slightest twinge of guilt or personal responsibility. That someone did something 200 years ago means double ought nothing. I am not so sure about that although it is another argument. They are stupid false for America. "I have," he admits, "a habit of . In the late 1800's and early 1900's, 30,000 Jewish migrants from Russia and Eastern Europe settled in Manchester. They deliberately bought skewed mostly male gender balance. For almost 60 years, there was impasse. Slavery didnt last much longer for various reasons, fizzled out in a century or so, but we have the records to show it was still part of the system after twenty years of Norman rule: https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/domesday/world-of-domesday/order.htm. Its extraordinary success rested upon the foundation of sympathy laid down during the previous 70 years of abolitionist activity in Britain. David Olusoga He presented the recent series of A House Through Time on BBC 2, and Black and British: A Forgotten History. Good point, I wonder how he squares the obviously comfortable living he has writing, opining and broadcasting about slavery with his principles. many African tribes kept slaves. Heroes of 2020 What Marcus Rashford's campaign for hungry children tells us about . Support 100 years of independent journalism. "Equiano is the most important voice that we have from the British experience of slavery and the slave trade," he said. Anyway, I digress, we did have at some point, a gang of pedos turn up and put their case, reasonably, and were tolerated and conversed with. A covering letter would be a courtesy but probably not a necessity. How could Britain, a civilised and Christian nation, indulge in rape, torture, killing and the forced labour of Africans over two centuries? It doesnt end with the parties saying Well that was pleasantly intellectually stimulating, now lets have a nice game of cricket Youre opponents are not playing by the same rules as you are. It may not. I think it's an astonishing achievement.". In 1986 I came across the book Staying Power by the British journalist Peter Fryer. 2023 BBC. Make sure it doesnt happen in the least costly way. That hes able to write this article is because hes living in what is, by historical standards, a remarkably tolerant society. Peter Pan & Wendy is a live-action reimagining of the J.M . He is the undisputed King of the Internet Pedants and Lord of the Unnecessary Snark. And the transatlantic slave trade? He was immersed in it. After decades of complaints, the Royal African Company lost its monopoly in 1712 and, Olusoga writes, Independent traders were turned loose upon the shores of Africa. These traders had argued (stone-blind to irony) that the right to enslave Africans was a defining feature of English freedom and that the Royal African Company had breached their status as free-born Englishmen. Flyover Americans arent going to take it. Should black history be taught all year round? Indeed, third-century York may have been more ethnically and racially diverse than present-day York. Long after he had published Corydon, his defence of pederasty. Both of these need proof. The historian tells Michael Segalov about getting up early, reading George Orwell, taking his dog George for a walk, playing his guitar My first reaction, years and years ago, was thats awful. Jamaicans and Nigerians used to hate each other. Then the second. It was far too real to her. Over 1000 years in Britain. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Those who grew rich on slavery and the slave trade were not neutral and no achievement or act of philanthropy justifies airbrushing their involvement from history.. Yet American slave-produced raw cotton continued to feed the 4,500 mills of Lancashire. Particularly as nowadays anyone who dares even look at someone a few days below the age of consent is believed to be an incorrigible nonce who deserves hanging, castration, or castration by hanging. The New Statesmans global affairs newsletter, every Monday and Friday. She had no interest in esoteric discussions of the war. So there were times when food was expensive, we can call those shortages or famines. A weekly round-up of some of the best articles featured in the most recent issue of the New Statesman, sent each Saturday. The following decades were taken up with popular and political rhetoric about immigration and parliamentary acts to limit blacks coming to Britain. There is the Push argument and the Pull argument. @ Boganboy Thats why when the question is raised, I always point out that they owe me lots and lots of money. Separated from home and family and landed in the West Indies (countless numbers dying of suffocation during the journey, given that the people traffickers were packing the holds to maximise profits), the Africans had no recourse to the law, much less the conscience of their captors. So this race baiter can try his guilt trip on someone else. But it is Olusoga who keeps insisting that its the Brits who are uniquely responsible.. Olusoga was born in Lagos to a White mother and a Nigerian father who, I hate to say nautrally, did a runner. Olusoga, who presents the BBC documentary series A House Through Time, told presenter Lauren Laverne that racism was "just the background hum of life" when he was growing up. After all, adult males were all but worthless and demand for women might have been enough to drive the trade anyway. They are pretty much airbrushed from history, whereas the transatlantic slave trade seems to be wall-to-wall on our TV screens and in our school textbooks. But its still awful, even on a historical scale. What would happen to that money, who knows, but as its (or was) your money, thats between you and your grifter of choice. not at all to disparage your ancestors GC. Intellectually more convincing anyway for practical and political purposes, demolishing a straw-man often makes a better video or audio clip while simultaneously making your opponents position sound stupid. The Coldest Case in Laramie: yet another bleak true crime podcast, From Sophie Mackintosh to Stephen Moss: new books reviewed in short, Universal Credit falls short of covering the bare essentials. Oh man. His autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, details how he was sold into slavery aged 11, his experience of travelling the world as slave to a Royal Navy officer - who renamed him Gustavus Vassa - and how he bought his freedom from his final master, an English merchant in Montserrat. Well whats the point of pretending it doesnt also induce moral disgust in me, just in case someone mistakes it for guilt, or an admission of liability? Certainly they killed them casually often for religious reasons. He talks about slavery because YOU care. Blacks like Mr Olusoga despite endlessly banging on about it seem to overlook the fact that they are in a minority. What do you think their stongest argument is? I know. Inflaming the reader has no purpose relative to slavery. He was Chairman of Moneysupermarket Group from 2014 to 2019 and Senior Independent Director of Close Brothers Group plc from 2006 to 2014 and is a Past President of the Chartered Management Institute. Hes welcome to pursue his line of thought but he should bear in mind that tolerance is, by its nature, in the gift of the powerful. Hundreds of White women raped every day. Maybe heard of Saint Balthild, seventh-century English lass sold into slavery, exported to the Continent, served in a palace and ended up marrying the Frankish King?). But those were in those long-lost days when democrats and republicans could talk to each other and agree to disagree while both leaving the conversation a little the wiser.. Britain should be proud of helping to stop (African to America) slavery, like the Republican Party and unlike the Democrats. It began to alter (slightly) the history curriculum at university level: the first undergraduate one-year course on black British history and culture was taught at the University of Warwick in 1984. His current research focuses on stress, burnout, and wellbeing in sports, with a particular interest in high-performance environments and elite coaching. Shouldnt Olusoga be writing in Ubangi bantu-language? Then, in October, came a breakthrough. There is plenty of slavery about we just do not call it that. One of the reasons why the American and Caribbean experiences were very different. is that the extra demand distorted the market, led directly to more armed slave-raiding expeditions against rival tribes and so on.. There is no reason to think that slavery was nicer in Africa. if he wants to be an historian he should present a fair and realistic picture of what happened, Your email address will not be published. Olusoga patterns his narrative after Fryers, starting with the North African presence in Roman Britain. June 16, 2020 - 20:29 BST Aisha Nozari. Would probably have taken your suggestion as a challenge. It does not take people long to starve to death and slaves were paid for. Although the bottom line is that no Black person remembers slavery. "They're not looking to history only to make them feel good and give them comfort, but they're looking to history to tell them things about truths about their society that we have traditionally edited out of British history.". The Royal African Company, established by Charles II in 1672, eventually enslaved and transported more Africans than any other company in British history. It was the first of the slave narratives that I'd ever read and I found it astonishing.". And yes, grand scheme of things, forced choice between living in a central Asian city about to be captured by ticked-off Mongols and an African tribal group about to be captured by profit-hungry slavers then fine, I take the latter hands down. Everyone was. Grew up in Quedlinburg. Get back to us when youve developed your historicalguiltometer. But any planter who deliberately starved his slaves to death would quickly go bust. You can be redeemed, you worthless pasty people. They included Josiah Wedgwood (the pottery entrepreneur), Granville Sharp and Thomas Clarkson. Black history: Should it be part of the wider curriculum? If one disproves his assertions would slavery then be okay? Cheap ass presentism. Later his parents separated from each other when he was just two years old. There is an alternative argument that it is their ancestors who were wronged hence deserve compensation and as descendants theyre entitled to an inherited share (so their portion depends on how many slaves at what position in the family tree) plus interest, regardless of how well theyre doing now. The vast majority of Americans are not guilty. That someone did something 200 years ago means double ought nothing.. Back in the heyday of blogging, perhaps ten years ago or so, there was a blogger calling him/herself The Heresiarch who enjoyed running against received opinions. Instead the racket still goes on with endless boatloads of illegals swarming into Europe. Would, say, Huguenot-descended South Africans suing France over the 1572 St. Bartholomews Day massacre, or Cornish people suing HMG for the suppression of the 1497 Rebellion, deserve compensation? 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