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Apologising for the slave trade

366 replies

Pennies · 25/03/2007 09:26

Today marks the 200th anniversary of the slave trade and there have been calls recently for there to be a formal apology from Tony Blair and / or the Queen.

Will it make any difference?

My personal opinion is that you can't apologise for someone else's actions - it would be a bit like me apologising for Tony Blair's sanctioning of the war in Iraq (and I have never voted for him so I haven't even approvied those actions vicariously IYSWIM). It would be an empty apology, wouldn't it?

I can't see that it would ever change anything, or am I missing something.

OP posts:
yentil · 27/03/2007 17:05

an oplogy means nothing to me. acknowledgement of its legacy is somenting different entirely. we are far from having slavery included in the national curriculum. if ever. my sense of belonging is no longer important. I think its too late for me, But i will help my children to educate their children and so on and so forth and one day it may change.

right now, in the black community the legacy of slavery is rearing its ugly head and we have a battle to fight. buts thats a whole different thread. take care all.

KathyMCMLXXII · 27/03/2007 17:07

DC's shop assistant comment was a comment about education, disguised as a comment about race for the purposes of winding you up.
What he meant (I think) was that your children would end up serving his (mixed race) children in a shop because you said you teach your daughters they are queens and he teaches his children they need to get good academic qualifications. I think he misunderstood what you meant about teaching your daughters they can be queens.

It wasn't as racist as it sounded but it was deliberately meant to offend so I'm not surprised if you are annoyed by it!

ruty · 27/03/2007 17:08

i honestly don't think so yentil [about the shop comment] It was deliberately phrased to upset you, yes. But i don't think DC meant it in the way you think. [I am going to go and have a shower now ] I only say that because i know what he is like on here. And he has far too much time on his hands when he should be writing a lecture, allegedly.

ruty · 27/03/2007 17:09

Kathy said it much better than me anyway.

Molesworth · 27/03/2007 17:11

In summary, he's an arsehole who thinks he's far more intelligent than the rest of us

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:12

Hwn i started my disseration, I contacted the MP / AM / etc regarding- salvery in the curriculum. Gelny Kinnock (is she our EU rep? Not sure- was quite surprised LOL- one of thsoe petition sites) contacted me,a s did AM and MP, to say they ahd petitioned for salvery in the N/ Curriculum, and they felt confident it would be included soo, that was only recently however.

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:13

Och my typich today!

Sorry.

Cold hands and bad wrists (I've even got my glasses for once as well LOL)

KathyMCMLXXII · 27/03/2007 17:16

It is utter madness if it still isn't included though.
No matter what you think about apologies/racism/collective guilt, if history is about understanding how we got where we are today then something that caused such a large scale movement of populations leaving obvious social and cultural legacies is surely a bit of a blindingly obvious thing to include, if we're going to have a national curriculum at all .

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:17

I agree.

So use the link I pasted below, sign the peition than when it says contact your MP paste in your worries. It will find all yor relevant poeple and send for you.

Easy.

ruty · 27/03/2007 17:24

my sister is a music teacher at a big inner city school in London. The English teacher wrote a play about slavery and the beginnings of the Abolition, and my sister was asked to do the music. She was really worried it was going to be a ham fisted am dram affair, but apparently it was brilliant. My sister's school is mostly black and all girls. They drafted in some posh white boys from a local private school. they considered reversing the roles but in the end decided to go with the white kids in the roles of the white slave traders etc and the black kids in the role of slaves, protestors, etc. My sister worked with her girls to create music with African influence, music that the girls had at home with their families. They performed it in Westminster. I wish I had seen it.

LucyJu · 27/03/2007 17:24

Can anyone tell me how the world would be today if the slave trade had never taken place? (And I assume here we are talking only about the British-US part of the slave trade, not about any of the other parties involved - e.g. Arabs, Portuguese, North Africans).

Would I, as a white anglo-saxon-type person, be living in poverty (notwithstanding the generations of miners and mill-workers in my ancestry who did precissely that)? What about black people - if their ancestors had not been sold into slavery, then what would have happened? Would Yentil have become a doctor or not?

Looking at the past from our 21st-century viewpoint we are disgusted, shocked and horrified. But is it right or sensible to judge the actions of people two centuries ago by today's standards? What things, considered "normal" today might cause future generations to look back in horror and revulsion?

An apology is meaningless, in my opinion. I do not accept any responsibility for the slave trade. On the other hand, I do hold some degree of responsibility to those modern day slaves, working in Chinese sweatshops, who provide about 90% of the UK toy market.

I actually think that all this harping on about an apology goes against the interests of black people. We cannot change the past, although we can try to learn from it. Better to look to what is happening now so that we can try to change that and, with luck, make a better future for all of us.

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:28

Sounds amazing Ruty

Lucy, nobody knows. Inustrial revolution was absed on slave money but humanity is what it si and I suspect that it would have happened anyway, at some point, us being the species of innovation and all that, how can anyone possibly tell? Doesn't justify anything though. In Africa, countries were stripped of their men, children and childbearing age females- I suspect (though have looked and can find little) so draw the conclusions you can from that .

Blandmum · 27/03/2007 17:30

yentel, DC is an equal opportunities arse.

He offends most people on MN from time to time. Not that this makes your upset any better IYSWIM.

He doesn't mucn like peopl with arts degrees, and recently Biologusts have come in for a kicking because none of us are good enough at mathematics. King of the crazy generalisation is our DC.

If nothing else you are in darned good company.

One thing though, I don't think that anyone has tried to 'justify' slavery, have they? No one has said it was right or permissable in any way....or have I missed that post?

OrmIrian · 27/03/2007 17:35

"but in the end decided to go with the white kids in the roles of the white slave traders etc and the black kids in the role of slaves"

Is it just me or does that sound a bit harsh? You, you're posh and white so you can be the scum-bag slave trader.

ruty · 27/03/2007 17:38

they talked it thru with the kids and came to a mutual decision, apparently. Sorry if it sounded harsh. The kids seemed to all get a lot out of it, and it was all pretty sensitively handled, i think.

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:38

OOh DC didnt mind me- I chose to do a stats module in my arts degree LOL

Yeah but, he is always like that. Its just him.

Depends on how the roles were chosen I suppose. Someone had to do it? And as they were invitreed visitors maybe there were less of them than the black kids?

WHY amd I defending Ruty's sister? Like Ruty can't do it herself LOL!

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 17:39

PMSL Ruty- sorry

KathyMCMLXXII · 27/03/2007 17:39

Must have been a very interesting dynamic between the kids from two schools, Ruty - would make a great subject for a teenage novel or tv drama, something like that!

OrmIrian · 27/03/2007 17:43

It wasn't that you sounded harsh Ruty - it was just that I would have felt distinctly uncomfortable if my (white but not posh) DS was cast in that role. But as you say someone had to do it. And if the kids were happy. I'd love something like that to happen here. I genuinely don't think that the enormity and horror of it strikes people.

ruty · 27/03/2007 17:46

Thanks Peachy.
it would have made a great documentary too I think kathy.

Blandmum · 27/03/2007 17:52

PC he should like me too then, since I've done more statistics than you can shake a stick at!

I can do a two way ANOVA by hand!

And I understand the difference between parametric and non parametric statistics and when you should use them. Doesn't cut much ice with him though. I'm tarred with the same brush as all the innumerate biologists you see.

DominiConnor · 27/03/2007 18:01

KathyMCMLXXII it was not a comment about race at all. It was a comment about crap parenting.

PeachyClair · 27/03/2007 18:01

LOL MB

(nbest not tell him I did bio as my a level then.... )

KathyMCMLXXII · 27/03/2007 18:06

I said I thought it was about education, DC.
But you must have known it would be taken as a comment about race given the context (even being hampered by your lack of an arts degree ).

drosophila · 27/03/2007 18:59

I'd love to know what a Psychology Degree individual would make of our DC.

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