Royal commentator says that African descendants of past kings should pay reparations for slavery

[cocococococococo]

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www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/donald-trump-jr-fordwich-slave-trade-reparations-b2171510.html

If you look at my posts I haven't said that, I specifically said if reparations are paid I thought they were to go to help developments in the Caribbean to help the descendants of slaves still living in poverty. My husband isn't in the Caribbean, his family left 3 generations ago, and he isn't in poverty.

If you have a look I added a post to explain that and to explain the point of the post about tracing his ancestry was in answer to one saying it would be impossible. Well it isn't impossible for him.

You sound very angry but hopefully you can read my posts, not just the one.

Most, but not all, descendants of slaves who are in need are in the Caribbean or the US. I assumed reparations would be to help them, why would they be paid in Africa, surely the people left in Africa didn't suffer from slavery in the same way as slaves did?

I am quite angry @ancientgran

I despair that some people want to pay out for complex historical wrongs while whole swathes of the world need our help now.

The self-loathing that has taken over certain sections is worrying and leads to people saying the daftest things like a white beggar is better than a Eton educated black, simply because they are white.

To argue against it is to be called 'racist' the magic word which shuts debate down. Whoever expanded the term 'racist' to include any critical thought of a black person or nation is an absolute PR genius.

Anyway, back to the point of the thread. No payment for Historical Wrongs from governments but a facility to pay to black charities on a personal level and I think that already exists.

Well I'm a bit angry that you don't acknowledge that you got it wrong. I never asked for compensation for my husband so your "how is your husband being "paid up" going to help him?" was neither relevant or appropriate.

Agree ... ^ Oh but we must NEVER say that white people are disadvantaged in any way. According to some, we all all born with a silver spoon in our mouth dontcha know? By the very virtue of being born white, we will automatically have an easy, carefree life, full of riches and wealth and things being given to us for free, without any disadvantages. We don't need to work harder at school or college or work, because things will fall in our lap because we're white.

As we covered above, the compensation to slave owners was paid nearly 200 years ago. Whether or not we have just paid off borrowing from that time is neither here nor there. The money was paid long ago to people who are long dead. There is equally no one subject to the slavery of that particular slave trade alive. It’s not possible to pay reparations even if it were desirable.

I think that’s the point though- slavery isn’t what caused modern day poverty in the Caribbean. Some islands are very wealthy despite slavery whereas others are impoverished but also have a history of slavery.

They’re dead. Whh waste your time raging against people who died nearly 200 years ago?

Whether or not we have just paid off borrowing from that time is neither here nor there.

Of course. About as neither here nor there than as an oil tanker spillage in the ocean

I can't for the life of me see anything wrong with asking the present generations of these families to cough up for, say, a fund to mitigate educational disadvantages for Black kids now in the UK

This doesn’t even make sense. Not all black kids in the UK are are descendants of slavery. Which period of slavery do you think they are ALL descended from.

And how does the fact that White Working Class boys suffer from more education disadvantages in our schools fit in there.

If the transatlantic slave trade is to blame for disadvantages for their descendants here it would be all black people in the UK. And how do you explain they aren’t the most education disadvantaged if you look at demographics? If it’s just a left over problem from slavery?

Don’t be daft - the money was paid in early 1800. The government did borrow at the time but it’s a bit misleading to say it was just paid off in 2016. Basically that’s when we tidied up gilts (government bonds) and got rid of undated ones. So yes, there were bonds from that time redeemed in 2016 but we have issued a great many gilts since 1800s.

Those are two unrelated things.

also as I noted above we haven’t really just paid it off - it’s just that we only finally got rid of undated gilts in 2016.

I think it’s very complicated and would be almost impossible to administer.
Two recent episodes of “who do you think you are” one with the actress naomi Harris and the other one with footballer and tv presenter Alex Scott showed that when they traced their ancestors both were descendants of slave owners and not as they had presumed slaves.
it was interesting as neither had imagined that outcome.
Alex commented that she has steeled herself to see her ancestors as slaves but in fact her great great etc grandfather owned 17 slaves.
that could the case for lots of people. How would you distinguish the two as you can’t trace everyone’s history.

Most posters here probably couldn't even find their ancestors in the UK from 1600s without crawling through parish records for ages and ages. If they could find them at all....

Imagine trying to find descendants of the millions of slaves from the 1600-1800s.... how could you? Majority of them weren't recorded, because they weren't considered people, so there'd be huge gaps of information.
it would be impossible.

So I guess you'd have to just pay the relevant governments in various countries a sum of money and hope they spend it on the "correct" people... somehow....

How much you pay... Who knows?

Somewhere in an echo chamber, this statement reverberates over and over again. While everyone outside gets on in the real world gets on with dealing with real problems.

How is he able to travel his ancestry back to the 1600s? Where are the records he's seen?

@00100001 Majority of them weren't recorded, because they weren't considered people, so there'd be huge gaps of information.

You completely made that up, the records are very detailed. Slaves were property, they could be bought, sold even inherited. It was possible to own a share in a slave. The value of a slave changed throughout their life and all this was documented. When the British Government paid off the slave owners every single slave was accounted for, the slave owners had to prove the slave existed and the claimant owned the slave. It's all in the National Archives. The information is incredibly detailed and well documented.

There's also the slight complication of what's to be done about the former slaves who were freed and then bought slaves of their own. How widespread it was I don't know, but it did happen.

My mothers family tree goes back to the year dot and there are very interesting characters, plantation owners, merchants and pirates too, but the money disappeared long ago. I remember granny as a landlady of a spit and sawdust pub in the North West, pretty grim.
The Slave trade was an atrocity, in the same way Ukraine, Kosovo, the Holocaust and indigenous populations in many countries, we should let it lie in the past and learn. We don’t of course because exploitation of people is probably higher scale now than it ever was in the past.

Up until 2015 we were paying back the slave owners via our taxes. Why wasn't any of that money paid to the enslaved?

No-one should be paid reparations. The victims are long dead and how do you quantify who the descendents even are?

When slaves were freed many stayed and worked the plantations for meager wages, the rest left and many starved because there was no work. In the US many were gathered in camps, the men conscripted into the Army during and after the Civil War. They were concentration camps by any other name, gradually the survivors were dispersed, free but tied to hard labour for survival wages, for very many not much has changed today

So much nonsense and re-writing of history to fit the coloniser's narrative.

People in Africa are still being taken advantage of today. The exploitation and bribery of African leaders to allow Europeans and Chinese to take over projects, diamond rich areas etc - it's happening today - but everyone is silent.

Healthcare staff being employed by the UK and paid peanuts - some have the most ridiculous contracts to basically keep them tied to the company. I have met people from Africa in healthcare working 7-14 days on site - not allowed to leave for £14 an hour! Meanwhile other British nurses and Doctors are earning 3-4 times that an hour.

We continue to exploit people from other nations even today. I want to see those who benefit from slavery - modern or ancient share with those they exploited.

Some people HAD to buy slaves - they were buying their OWN family members to free them from the white slave owners! Read a bit more around this please.

Read a bit more around this please

I was making a comment, not asking for a tutorial.