Apologising for the slave trade

[Pennies]

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.

Glad that DC was taught so much about slavery at school and therefore is not reliant on the Guardian!

I don't think I've ever been taught about it. Was taught about the Suffragettes at primary school in Ireland but never about the slave trade or the abolitionists. Don't ever remember being taught anything about it at school in England either, despite living a mere 20 miles from Hull.

This thread is so depressing. No doubt most of the white people posting on here have not even thought about the implications of slavery on the black descendents.

The most important one is that people like me have a limited identity in that most of us of West Indian descent can never trace our African ancestors beyond those that were enslaved. Most of us don't know what part of Africa we hailed from - we just have a broad idea.

That may mean nothing to most of you non-apologist out there but I'm sure if you lost your identity, you would not be happy about it.

As for African involvement in the slave trade. Europeans had guns, Africans had spears. Has it ever occurred to any of you that the Europeans gave the Africans in power no choice in the matter? How do you think they stopped themselves or their families from being enslaved? Of course slavery went on in African societies, just like in many societies (Roman, Greek, Chinese etc) but Europeans, especially the British, industrialised it and reduced the black Africans to nothing more than fodder. The fact that so many people try to down play the significance of British involvement in this evil trade by implicating Africans also speaks volume in itself. It is your way of saying, well, it does not matter what we did because the African leaders helped us out. Nothing like taking responsibility for ones actions, is there?

The impact of slavery is still with us but most of you are so insular and uninterested that it is like water of a duck's back. How many white people out there still regard black people as lazy n888ers (Ron Atkinson springs to mind)? Pessimistically, we are viewed as muggers, rapists and or single parents with troublesome sons, optimistically, we are seen as great atheletes, footballers, cleaners, nurses, bus drivers and not much else.

When a white person does something wrong, that person is chastised. When a black person does something wrong, the whole race is tarred with the same brush. That is the legacy of slavery but unless you know what is to be black in Briton, you have no understanding.

That is what is depressing about this anniversary. It is clear that many of the indigenous population don't care that it happened and have no interest in understanding the ramifications that evil trade has had on the survivors and their decendents.

thanks speedy. Am a bit surprised (or not) such a provocative thread has a count of 103 messages all day.

Speedy.

What you have written speaks loud and clear.

I have been wary of this anniversary because it has focussed so much on celebrating Wilberforce (who, although he campaigned aganst the trade, wasn't actually responsible, in the end, for it's demise) rather than on what enabled it to happen in the first place...and on the other engineers of protest, and on the generations-long after-effects. It has felt like a big collective 'phew! we can at last celebrate the end of slavery and put that embarrassing episode behind us'.

For me the biggest 'reparation' now would be to ensure that all citizens of this country have fair and equal access to it's wealth and opportunities. 200 hundred years after the trade officially stopped, that equality is nowhere near existing.

speedy....sigh .

I'd say I'm with you, but fact is, that despite being of mixed racial heritage, i look pretty much white so I'm not.

I am deeply deeply depressed by this thread for the same reasons that you elucidate so well.

I absolutely do not accept that getting Africans to acknowledge their part in the trade in any way diminishes the role of the Europeans. Absolutely not. I merely suggested that every one who had a role in it should acknowledge that. It was never meant to imply that it was a quid pro quo.

I just don't know what an apology now (by whom and to whom?) would achieve other than opening the gates to financial compensation and how do you calculate that?

Freckle - are you reading this thread highly selectively??

speedy, I think you are being too extreme. Just because people don't agree with you doesn't mean people think the things you are suggesting. "Most of you are too insular and uninterested..." No. That's just not fair. Many of us have taken a real interest in this and listened to other views (eg my conversation with my BIL which you don't comment on and he is not white or British but still doesn't agree with your standpoint).

I didn't learn about slavery at school (30 years ago) and I wish I had. But I'm learning now.

My mother has a jewish maiden name. We have no idea where it came from or why - chances are an ancestor was fleeing persecution of the most horrible kind. I would be interested to know more but it doesn't define me.

Some of my ancestors were (probably)peasants living in poverty in England. Some were probably Jewish and from god knows where. I have a daughter who will never know part of her heritage because she was born by donor. So there are plenty of us who have for one reason or another lost touch with our heritage.

Losing connection with your heritage is painful but it is not only black people who went through it. As for slavery itself, that is undeniable and a terrible wrong. But see my post on women too. Women have lived in slavery for millennia. It moves me and is instructive. But I am free and have opportunities even if these are still not as good as they should be because of history.

I refuse to define myself by history. My ancestors were an accident of fate. I am here now and making the most of this life is what matters.

no.is my answer. what a very liberal hippy thing to do.

ihave nothing to apologise for.

and many people of all and mixed races cannot trace their ancestory fro many reasons. It certainly doesn't define me.

great post speedy

Apologies are good, however, I would much rather we dealt with the HERE AND NOW, than things that happened 200 years ago. To me it is very much like the Holocaust. We can forever be reminded of it and get compensation for the victims, etc, but it does nothing to resolve the political and social problems facing religious and ethnic minorities NOW.

There is plently of slavery (mostly children and women) going on all over the world, including here in the UK (unpaid or poorly paid foreign workers from all over the world smuggled in to do shit work around the house for the wealthy in London, etc). The people who do this now, the smugglers and those who employ them need to be punished, stuck in jail and fined. It is going on right under our noses HERE IN THE UK and yet most of us do nothing about it.

I would like to teach my son about slavery both past and present. I don't want him to be just given a copy of Uncle Tom's Cabin at school (we read it at school, it changed my view of the world as a 12 year old, I read it several times over and it broke my heart, it was the beginning of my political awarenss as a child) and then be told that us whites need to apologise and that's that.

I want my son to be aware of colonial rule both past and present. The best way to apologise, is to get off one's arse and DO something, i.e. join a global charity, create awareness, get funds, help the slaves of today escape their masters. Join Amnesty, join UNICEF, join the UNHCR, join anti-racism and anti-slavery groups, there are plenty.

I am a member of several of the above, and yes I do consider myself a pink champaign drinking, pinko, liberal socialist. I also read the Guardian and make no apology for it

I haven't had time to read every post - so call that selective reading if you like. What do you think I might have missed?

i agree with you champagne liberal unapologetic yellowrose.

how many will with the back of hand to forehead proclaim they are victims of history - not just slaves many minorities

then how many will stnad up for justice now? and the ongoing slavery of today.

people re-act to things in all sorts of ways. it's all well and good telling people how you think they should react when you are not in their shoes.....

It isn't over and done with. Black people do not have fair and equal access to the wealth of this country, part of which was literally built on their great great grandparents blood, and generations before that. A significant proportion of people in this country still seem to regard black people as less deserving of respect and blithely use de-humanising language.

There are many atrocities which have left a long trail of tragedy and sadness - just because things have happened to other communities doesn't mean that any other is less important or more dismissable.

It is a deep deep feeling of human beings, this thing of where we come from and one that people have used - the destruction of the WElsh language was a deliberate and calculated step in the destruction of welsh identity and political strength "The first step in destroying a people is to destro ther language" said the architect of the anti-welsh speakers in schools.

"How can we ever cross this landscape of organised forgetting" Milan Kundera on the hiatus created when peole are separated from things which traditionally made them strong.

Yellowrose- hail to the opinko's! We're OK really

Speedy- eloquent post. If you would be happy (its up to you) I would appreciate it if you could write something similar and e-mail it moe, as I am doing my dissertation on slavery? Especially if you have any comments about the role of religion in salvery- the way people used it to justify slavery (The curse of Ham) etc), the role of the CofE Church as slave owners who were paid compensdation when the slaves weren't ), and the role of the Quakers etc as abolitionist campaigners? I would appreciate it (and its good to have such real life opinions, as I hope to teach after my PGCE and real voices are so much more imporant)

Thank you. My e-mail is peaches and cream 04 at bt internet dot com.

Please feel free to ignore if you wish though.

But I hope you now realise there's some white people who DO care

theres an anti slavery declaration / petition here, if anyone would like to sign it?

theres a complete difference - i dont think anyone would advocate - not teaching about the slave trade as part of history. or other ways of rememberance whicha re very important.

your right blu, saying - but this was bad too - is not an argument in itself. the testament is remembering and learning. no apologising for something of which i had no part of and would never condone.

I am not an advocate of cathartic hand wringing apology by people who then have a glass of chardonnay to calm down and then do nothing at all about current injjustice, including racism. But there is a serious acknowledgemnt that can be understood and taken as motivation for those things. i think it is the sense of 'we didn't do it, we can't do anyhting about it, so get over it' (not talking specifically oof Mn here) with no hint of further action that is not good enough.

I don't think anyone on this thread has written anything which can be interpreted as the poster not caring. I'm sure we all care about this issue. I know that I certainly do.

The main point of this thread though was to discuss the merits of an apology, to whom do you make it, who should make it and what does it achieve. That is what many have been discussing; I don't think that that impies any of us don't care.

yeah what freckle said

I don't think speedymama has any basis for even guessing what we think about "losing our identity".
I ask her to consider what she would think if I as a white person use the same racist tone as her. If I talked of "black people not thinking", wouldn't that be racist ?

The vice of racism is not attacked usefully by ill-researched claims of black uniqueness.
We have Jewish and Irish people who have had to move in big numbers with terrible loss of life. We have vast numbers of entirely genuine people asylum here and their descendants.

My identity was actually taken from my family of very white people. We had our name changed on the orders of other white people. Our language was exterminated by the English.

As for the guns vs spears junk. you need to read more history. In the time of slavery, ship guns did not reach any useful distance inshore.
Muskets were pathetically inaccurate and took 10-30 seconds to reload. In one to one combat that's great, if you have 10 white blokes attacking a village of a few hundred Africans they will lose big time.
Also white people, like any stranger would have severe problems navigating and catching black people, who presumably might well run away.
The Guardianisa view of the cast of Pirate of the Caribbean wandering around Africa capturing hundreds of black people is just silly.
White traders tapped into markets that already existed. That of course does not make them good people, and of course they made that market grow but the vast bulk of African slaves were captured by other Africans.

I'm not downplaying white involvement, but trying to understand the process. Understanding is the basis of any useful action.
The impact of slavery is still with us but most of you are so insular and uninterested that it is like water of a duck's back. How many white people out there still regard black people as lazy n888ers (Ron Atkinson springs to mind)? Pessimistically, we are viewed as muggers, rapists and or single parents with troublesome sons, optimistically, we are seen as great atheletes, footballers, cleaners, nurses, bus drivers and not much else.

"When a white person does something wrong, that person is chastised. "
That sums up what wrong on a structural level with your whole process of thought. Are mine the only writings you ever see that disagree with you ? Maybe you've had some bad experience that leaves you unable to think objectively at all ?
I find it entertaining but not surprising that you finish your post with the language of the BNP. They too talk of the "indigenous people", and hoew "we" are different and special.
I appreciate you have clearly had no formal training in analysing logic or reasoning, but ask yourself if you reversed your post to talk of white people and the wrongs they have suffered (German bombing, EU bureaucracy etc), would it not read as a racist rant ?

i've has no formal training on analysing logic or reasoning.

but still allowed an opinion.

Actually from all I have read it seems that there were white poele trapping people for slavery, and there were black people. There was a pre-existent system where if a tribe won over another village those people were taken to slavery (something evident in many religions, btw, not just African tribal communities- Muhammad did this, for example). The difference is, of course, its awful being taken into slavery by the next tribe and kept there,even if it is a system you also subscribe too (presumably if they won they'd have done it to the others?), but its vastly worse to be stolen, put in irons, packed onto a slave ship, exported without word to your family, sold at a market, and if you survive living out your life as property of usually cruel owners who are more than aware your upkeep outstrips your earnings after 60, sell your children, and your wife, and murder you if you even think about getting away.

Do agree so many other nations have been through similar- but a hundred wrongs doesn't make it any less shocking

AAAAAAAAARRRRGHHHHH.

Did I do something wrong Ruty?