The English started the slave trade

[Annamaria14]

I just saw a black American woman post online,

"The English started the slave trade. They caused all our problems, they hurt generations of people. I will never set foot in that country".

What do you think? I felt a bit guilty, because the English did cause a lot of problems around the world. Have we learned from our past. How can we do better in the future

'The poverty that existed here was densely hidden in the slums of the East End, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow'

Yes, indeed, but not exclusively so. Many small towns, in all areas, had slums, typhoid, cholera and grinding poverty.

Do I feel guilty about things my ancestors may or may not have done? No, definitely not. I did not do them.

I do worry though that, in their haste to get rid of street names, statues and anything else which protesters think represents something of which we should be ashamed, the events of history will be diminished or lost entirely and without the lesson of the past to learn from we will continue to make the same mistakes forever.

@StoneofDestiny. So the pyramids should be blown up? They were built using slave labour.

They don't do tea 😊

I was grateful that there was a whistling kettle tbh otherwise tepid coffee tasting tea from the coffee maker

That article talks about the 1850s onwards, after Engels and long after the Carribbean slaves were freed.

Sugar which was often only available in the company store in exchange for company tokens paid instead of cash, and which was often diluted with chalk or even quicklime to increase the profit.

Try reading Peter Frankopan's "Silk Road". Practically every culture (including plenty of African cultures) has been involved in slavery at some point. It's glib and easy to apologise for things which are not actually one's own fault: hand-wringing about slavery requires nothing of us but leaves a nice smug glow. Most of us could do better morally in some aspect of our lives; but actually changing that requires effort and sacrifice, which is not so easy

What point precisely have you made? You suggested earlier that there was some frisson of similarity between this and the collapse of the Berlin Wall. A comparison so absurd, it's beyond parody.

As I thought I said (in fact I know I did, but don't worry ...) that was my personal reaction. I didn't realise it could be "wrong", but everyday is a learning day.

The Manichean certainties which drive the statue smashers? You may think that is something to celebrate. History teaches otherwise.

I now know that my personal experiences and reaction to events is of no significance and can be safely dismissed. I'll go off and learn what I should be thinking.

No Wauden, but putting a man of a plynth is meant to signify greatness and civic pride in him.

(Electric) kettles make tea, coffee, hot chocolate, anything. They're not prejudiced.

So the pyramids should be blown up? They were built using slave labour

I was under the impression that was a bit of a porky ? If nothing else the Egyptians were as good at keeping records as the Germans and scholars have deciphered a lot of details about the Great pyramids building (in 10 years) with no slaves - it was a volunteer workforce. (It had to be - they were skilled).

That said, if anything the pyramid itself is a mere sideshow to the real Wonder of the World, which was the civil service which organised it all.

The coffeemakers that take the little pods make awful tea (and lots of plastic waste).

@DGRossetti

Hmm. Whether you have deliberately misinterpreted the point I am making, I know not. But your post is unintentionally ironic. Particularly the part about being told what to think.

Sugar which was often only available in the company store in exchange for company tokens paid instead of cash, and which was often diluted with chalk or even quicklime to increase the profit.

The adulteration of foodstuffs is an ongoing issue everywhere. Just look at horse meat sold as other meat in recent years (and other meat sold as horse meat), or the melamin in baby milk scandal in China not that long ago.

Or even the widespread use of palm oil in everything to increase profits...

The British working class only tasted pure unadulterated white sugar, black treacle, white flour and other wholesome produce when groups of them combined to start the first co-ops, following the lead taken by the Rochdale Pioneers.

@forgetthehousework

I do worry though that, in their haste to get rid of street names, statues and anything else which protesters think represents something of which we should be ashamed, the events of history will be diminished or lost entirely and without the lesson of the past to learn from we will continue to make the same mistakes forever.

This is so key. I often wonder if when we don't teach certain books or take out expressions that we know are racist are we doing a disservice to the memory of those who called it out at the time. its almost as though there's nothing to see here, move along.

I taught (briefly) Huckleberry Finn in Ireland. It uses certain language and expressions and we avoided saying them but I think it is important that the pupils read the original text fully to understand how language can be used to create distance and problems amongst people and how black people were treated then. The pupils all had a critical response to the text that revolved around why and how this could happen and why didn't more people do something to change the law/practices.

However protected it is in law, clearly can't protect it from cultural revisionists. We should learn from history not delete it. There could have been a notice by the statue to have given some historic balance, now, that would have been constructive.

I'm pissing myself at the fact it landed in the harbour. Weirdly echoing the direct citizen action of 1773 in Boston. With a deeper significance of the origin of the tea that was dumped and where it all ended.

The unpleasant truth for Americans is they are the children of a violent revolution. Which they mythologise and fetishise. So they are really on the back foot when it starts to happen again.

At least the British were sensible enough to cancel their revolution and go back to being subjects.

I taught (briefly) Huckleberry Finn in Ireland. It uses certain language and expressions and we avoided saying them

Muhammed Ali's powerful and devastating statement on his refusal to enlist in the Vietnam war loses all it's impact if you sanitise it.

We had our revolution in 1688 and our civil war in 1642. Got them the right way round.

@DGRossetti. Interesting that the ancient Egyptians alleged that the pyramids were built by 'volunteers'.

I do worry though that, in their haste to get rid of street names, statues and anything else which protesters think represents something of which we should be ashamed, the events of history will be diminished or lost entirely

There is a Year Zero impulse here. It is the desire to deconstruct and it means consigning things which don't meet the Manichean certainties of the 21st century to the dumpster. Complex historical figures, which includes all of them, are increasingly precarious. This also includes literary texts, street names etc. It runs in parallel to the redefinition of words. This is not about a critical assessment of history. It's about obliterating objects which cause offense. How does that elucidate anything?

@DGRossetti

Yes - dignity in words.

This link (James Baldwin at Cambridge University in 1965 is a breathtaking piece of oratory.

And we learn from our shameful past. The Irish Famine, which was a product of incompetence and indifference, not a conspiracy to kill the Irish. The British ruling class had no desire to kill the Irish. They did not give a fuck about them one way or the other.

Anyways, the lessons learnt from that catastrophe were put to some use in India, and the refinements of those lessons were put into practice at Belsen where the recovery rate among the survivors was significantly higher than the Americans managed at Buchenwald where they let the starving wretches stuff their faces and kill themselves when their stomachs ruptured.

They didn't like it, all that watery soup. They wanted meat. But they got watery soup and lots of it and survived, thanks to British knowledge about famine learned at the expense of those that went before.

Is the American Dream at the expense of the American Negro?

was the title of the debate

@MockersxxxxxxxSocialDistancing

The British learned from their experience in the Irish famine not to overfeed staving Jewish camp survivors.

Blimey @Mockers talk about oversimplifying two of the biggest (relatively recent) genocides in European history.

I'm not sure starving the Irish by increasing the export of corn to the colonies can be reduced to a learning experience. Particularly considering their role in camps in South Africa - they kind of had some experience prior to WW2 in food distribution.

Apologies haven't read the whole thread but don't forget Britain was the first (or one of the first) to abolish slavery. Britain never had segregation unlike the US.
Following on from a previous poster, I heard that the White House was built by slaves. One of the most recognisable monuments in the US and the symbol of power that is intricately linked to slavery - perhaps they should consider pulling it down and rebuild it with one not stained with the sins of their past.
I think before the American woman singles out England she should be concentrating a bit closer to home.

The British did not 'starve the Irish.' They sat back and let the Irish starve. Not much of a distinction if it's you starving, admittedly.

And now you seem to be suggesting the British were responsible for deaths in Belsen rather than what they did which was to save more lives there than anyone else acheived in any other camp.

And the British did indeed invent concentration camps in South Africa, and they were, by comparison, holiday camps compared to what the locals had to suffer at the hands of the Afrikaaners.