Slavery: 200yrs on.

[SID THE CYNIC]

Anybody else totally pissed off with all this coverage of the abolition of slavery?
And as for all this 'lets apologise' shite....come on!
We'll be paying out compensation to the relatives of slaves soon.
An attrocious practice, but who are we to 'say sorry' for what was obviously an accepted thing 200+years ago. We can be sorry such things did occur, but blacket apologies are pathetic.

Sid.

[Sam Slater]

No one should say sorry for something they didn't do. You could say sorry on behalf of your ancestors, but most of us come from working class backgrounds, so our ancestors didn't benefit directly from the slave trade.

So we have to be sorry, on behalf of our ancestors counterparts, who happen to belong to the same race, who happened to get rich off slavery. Even if we accept this we still can't say sorry to the enslaved individuals. No we're saying sorry to the great great grandchildren of those slaves. It's bollocks.

Yes, we're saying sorry for something someone else did, and we're saying sorry to someone that was never a victim. Quite logical really.

My uncle -about 5 years ago- got mugged by 2 black youths while he was on the way home from the pub. He got a black eye, a missing tooth and his wallet nicked. His pride was hurt more than anything else and he was ok.

Does this mean a totally unrelated black man living in Watford has to apologise to me because my uncle got mugged in Sheffield by another black man who he's never seen or met? Of course not!

No Swede has ever apologised to me about Viking raids, and I was really upset when I found out as a boy that King Harold had to endure such pain when that arrow went into his poor eye. The French never did apologise to me, and I never really got over it personally. Hell I may be a millionaire if only I hadn't grown up with that hurt hanging around me. I want compensation please.

I'm not even going to go into the Germans (twice) or Italians, Japanese and Turks at one time or another.

I did once give a begger in Barcelona 5 Euro's just to say sorry for fucking up their nice Armada though. It was unjustified and I feel guilty for that.

[Flat_Eric]

I agree Sid, complete and total bollox of the highest order.

And the the irony of it all is that it was largely Africans themselves who did the rounding up of other Africans to sell on as slaves to the Europeans. It was also common practice for white European captives to be sold as slaves in North Africa.

Not forgetting either that the BLACK ON BLACK slave trade was (and still continues to be) rife in many parts of Africa.

It's also worth mentioning that while the European empires were carting salves off to the New World plantations and colonies 200, 300, 400 years ago, the NORTH AFRICANS and ARABS were at the same time equally busy BUYING BLACK SLAVES off BLACK SLAVE TRADERS via the trans-Saharan caravan routes.

So if maybe if "apologies" are needed over slavery, the Africans should start off by apologising to each other.

[Dorrin]

As the Romans came over 2000 years ago and took slaves back with them from here, I think the Italian Prime Minister should apologise to me and give me a few bob in case one of my relatives was one of them.

Makes as much sense to me as all this tree hugging going on at the moment.

[thecocker]

I agree with Sam wholeheartedly. By the way Sam, it was a helluva lot more than 2 'greats' ago.

It does make me wonder how many of these people who could be claiming actually knew their family tree or, were even interested in tracing it, before all this kicked off. I've no doubt they all be taking trips to their local libraries etc. now.

[c.j.jaxxon]

To tell you the truth some to most blacks don't expect and are not looking for an apology ANYTIME soon so we ain't racking our brains about it. (I'm speaking about the U.S. here) We got better things to fight about like police brutality, covert disrimination, job and school disparities etc.

[Phil mCc]

I am sorry, now can we leave it at that.

Phil McC

[Dace]

I think its the whole years off oppression and all of that sort of thing we should be feeling maybe a little guilty about rather than the slavery thing 200 years ago, lets get the priorities right before attempting to do the "right" thing

[eroticartist]

The working class are slaves now but they don't realise it!
Mike Freeman.

[one eyed jack]

I totally agree with Sam and C J Jaxxon.

In fact some of the blacks I know (and thats quite a few) are saying what the fuck!? Its so cringeworthy its annoying. We've come so far since then and besides as Sam put it slavery has not just been to blacks in the slave trade.

Throughout history most nations have been slaves of. I know there are some people who want to show some kind of apology by protesting in the chains and stuff of 200 years ago. Thanks for the history lesson but what relevance does it have today when you have girls from eastern europe selling their bodies and souls and being treated worse...at least if you paid for a slave 200 years ago you had to feed them to make sure they worked properly.

I remeber the lead singer of Arrested Development saying in an interview about al the angry rappers using slavery as an excuse to whip up a storm against the establishment. His answer was, slavery wasnt entirely that
bad, at least there was a community family feeling amongst the slaves that you seldom see these days.

Not that that makes it right of course but it was the first time I heard it said like that\and it had me thinking. It wasnt all beatings and "bale that hay nigger!" every day I'm sure. If you beat your slaves they are rendered useless to work. Yes sure slavery is bad but there is still slavery going on today if you choose to see it like the orientals selling pirate dvds on the streets.

Open your eyes and take a look around, slavery isnt abolished at all. Besides, if there was an apology it shouldnt come from the people that had nowt to do with it but the big corpoations like Lloyds who founded their shipping companies from it.

Hey I wouldnt mind the pay out though. That would be nice. I guess I'll only get half rate though right?