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Great Grandpa was a slave. Apologize

Posted April 9th, 2007 in Reflections by M

Apparently black people wish for some sort of apology, as well as some sort of financial consideration because at some point in time these sons of toil moved tons of soil under a variety of persuasive agents such as whips, shotguns and axes. They sowed, weeded and harvested for massa to eat. They cleaned, washed, mowed and painted for the modest salary of room and board, shared and hard respectively.

I am not one of these seeking these nebulous things.

As a matter of fact, I find these attempts, and the resulting rippling gymnastics hilarious.

Tony Blair, trademark Cheshire cat grin in abeyance, bemoans the shameful enterprise that was the slave trade, conveniently overlooking the fact that a good bit of Rule Britannia was built on the backs of slaves on all 7 continents. If Atlantis had been around you bet your boots some of His Majesty’s vessels would have set out there and delivered gifts of whips, guns, bibles and small pox. Tony came just short of wringing his hands in sorrow. 

The Archbishop of York, emotion plainly visible across his countenance, also called for a formal apology from the UK, temporarily forgetting that the UK is not the shouting gentlemen who sit in parliament — he too is part and parcel of it.

The British are not a people to do things by halves. London Mayor Ken Livingston is unable to resist the overwhelming urge to apologize for London’s complicity in the Slave Trade. He also finds among his conflicting great emotions, overwhelming sorrow.

Some doofuses even had the temerity to chain themselves and had a brisk walk with said chains in empathy for the slaves. Uh huh. Try doing that for 60 years.

The Church too has not hesitated to toss its hat into the ring. The Archbishop of Canterbury too wishes for the Church to make amends post haste for the trade.

Whoever came up with the pearl “honey catches more flies than dung” ought to have shared this with the bearded gentlemen who landed on our hallowed shores to convert our black hearts. I find it hilarious that they found the natives rather reluctant to be converted. I wasn’t there, you understand, but perhaps the natives found it difficult to reconcile fellows talking out “turning the other cheek”, “blessed are the meek” and “peace on earth” with hard swearing, vicious fellows who substituted lambs with village maidens and proceeded to lay down with them by night, whipped, clubbed and shot errant natives before noon and in the afternoon burnt incense and read from the Good Book.

The good Archbishop conveniently forgets to mention that the Good Book itself is replete with slaves and slavery. Just mention Hagar to Abraham and watch him turn pink.

But I digress.

With little fanfare, the 25th of March was the anniversary of the ban of the slave trade. There was little mention of this in the Kenyan media. This could be due to the fact that we are:

  1. Bored beyond belief with the proliferation of meaningless anniversaries and holidays. The other day we had ‘ World Water Day’.
  2. There was nothing actually to commemorate.
  3. All the above

The fact that people believe the slave trade is over just because there are no people living in plantations saying “Yessuh massa William suh!” speaks volumes of the collective naivete of a civilization that prides itself on “information everywhere”, “globalization” and “communication”. Visiting the yahoo home page and giving a cursory look to the headlines therein is enough to convince most that they are indeed in touch with the realities on the ground.

Consider for example the domestic maid. This poor lass is generally source from some remote village and planted in a household. Her impressive array of duties include cooking, cleaning, sewing, darning, washing, taking care of the general household and taking care of the massa home owner’s children. Her pay is usually token, and meals are deducted from the same. She generally eats on her own in the kitchen. Any breakages or damage is invariably deducted from her token pay.

And then on the 25th of March the massa home owner sits down at his PC and, emotion creasing the face, poured out the heart about the angst, consternation, anger, sadness  the vile trade(delete as applicable)

  • His/her people inflicted on the slaves
  • His/her people had inflicted upon them

Consider too the thriving traffic of young girls and women to Europe, where under lock, key and whip, they attend to the assorted needs of their masters and mistresses.

Today. 2007. 200 years since slavery was banned.

So, with regards to this reparation, I wonder if anyone would answer for me the following questions:

  1. Who, exactly is going to apologize is it the governments? I for one would laugh myself to tears seeing Condoleezza Rice or Baroness Amos apologizing for the slave trade. Is it the civic society? Is it the common man? The church?   
  2. If we generously generalize that black people were oppressed by the white people, what becomes of those shades of grey like Colin Powell and Barack Obama? Do they apologize from one side of the mouth and accept the apology with the other?
  3. Since the blacks happily took part in the slave trade themselves, vigorously buying and selling their brothers, how do these factor into the apologies?
  4. Our Arab brethren also took part in this trade and made some good living out of it. Why then the double standards?
  5. What use is this apology?
  6. Why am I being apologized to, and it is my great great great grandfather who was bought, sold and worked himself into the grave for no pay?
  7. Why do people want an apology from Tony Blair for things done 150 years before he was even an idea in his folks’ minds?
  8. if Mr Blair does make this apology, it will be completely hollow and meaningless. Why would he take responsibility for the deeds of his forefathers? If my ancestors through guns, whips and ships propelled my country to be the second superpower in the world and I stepped into the shoes of leadership,  I dare say I could find the tears and sorrow to be as sorry as you would like me to be. I would even apologize if you’d like. At the end of the day I’d still be sure that it wouldn’t change a damn thing
  9. Am I the only one who finds ludicrous the notion that I have to apologize to a boy I wouldn’t know from Adam because my father soundly clobbered his father in nursery school?
  10. Those outraged black folk fuming about the white oppressing them ought to put down those writs and dig a little deeper into history where they will find the Berbers took white slaves from Europe. Are they ready for that reparation?
  11. There was a roaring slave trade in West Africa, and as a matter of fact they even constructed a market! Demanding an apology from Tony Blair is as absurd of demanding an apology from a bullet and neglecting to mention the gun.
  12. Why stop at the transatlantic slave trade? Myopia appears to be a fairly coming affliction
    1. The prime minister of Greece should apologue for all the things the Greeks did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    2. The prime minister of Italy should apologize for all the things the Romans did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    3. Saddam Hussein, before being unceremoniously hanged, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should have been made to apologize for all the things the Persians did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    4. The relatively mild people of Norway, Denmark and Sweden should be startled out of their placid lives with demands that they apologize for the things the Vikings did
    5. We can ask the same of the Mongols, the Spaniards, the Portuguese, the Egyptians …
  13. If financial reparation is to be made:
    1. Who will actually foot the bills for this? The taxpayers of the US and the UK? Which include descendants of the said slaves?
    2. How will the figures be arrived at?
    3. Who will receive this monies? If your great grand mother was the bed wench of a plantation owner are you eligible for half?
  14. If we can figure out who will offer the reparation, and how it will be done, how will this invalidate the inhumanity that took place?
  15. If it is an apology people want, what if I personally offered an apology for the inhumanity of the slave trade. Will that do? If not, why not?
  16. We have spent all these centuries without these reparations. Why the sudden urgent need now? I like to think that most of us are doing just fine without it.

I think it is high time we started taking responsibility for ourselves, and stop looking for feeble crutches like the need for reparation to get on with our lives. Don’t get me wrong — the life of a slave back then was infinitely worse than death. The people that participated in this were undoubtedly the scum of the earth. I believe that they and Hitler will get their own heated section of Hell to themselves.

But come on people! Enough with the feeble crutches! Are we poor because of the slave trade? Perhaps. Perhaps not. The question is what are we going to do to correct the situation? Sit on our backsides waiting for nebulous apologies and money from the guilty descendants of the slave traders that will magically transform us? Someone has even discovered post traumatic slave syndrome! Get over yourselves already!!!

When will people ever learn — no one is going to help you. You wait for George Bush and Tony Blair to apologize. You wait for money to be wired to your bank account in reparation. That’s right, my sons and daughters. Wait right there for millennia of oppression and brutality to be corrected by a hallmark e-card and a wire transfer. Bush and Blair won’t apologize for something blatant for invading Iraq but somehow they will apologize for centauries of slave trade. They have so much money in their coffers and have fulfilled all their health care, defence, education and social security needs that they are looking for something to do with the extra funds.

You wait there. You may never walk alone my lovely but I can assure you that you will jolly well wait alone.

PIC OF THE DAY

If there ever was a clever logo …

Henry Mancini – Baby Elephant Walk

  • http://kadhat.blogspot.com egm

    It is indeed a crutch, as you say. One that is, unfortunately, used by most to explain their circumstances. While poverty is indeed very real, there comes a time when you just have to make do with what life has handed you and build something out of it, without focusing too much on the past. Otherwise you will be stuck in the past as everyone else catapults way ahead of you.

    Well put!
  • http://gukira.wordpress.com Keguro

    Perhaps the question of reparation and the need for apology might be explained by the complex fact, not simple argument, that the contemporary form of capitalism, the here and now, which structures the social and the international was built in large part through the slave trade, and its multiple cognates.

    It is disingenuous to claim, as you do, that there is no substantive difference between the Atlantic slave trade and earlier forms. Not to mention, that we understand contemporary forms of slavery and critique them should not mean that we advocate a willful amnesia, that trick of neoliberalism that converts history into individual responsibility.

    Now now, you cannot dismiss my claims as disingenuous. How so?
  • Gracelet

    *looks around in amazement* so this is what the view is like from the top!!

    This topic reminds me of that guy – Shaka Zuklu Assegai I think he was called- who wanted land and money because he was the son of a slave. Wonder how much he got ??

    I remember the chap! I too wonder how much he got too!
  • http://annesasylum.blogspot.com/ anne

    Very well written and thoughtful post…

  • I

    M.. Very well written…

    I have often asked myself the same questions you are asking.. do we really believe slavery is gone?!!? I think NOT!

    As for those waiting on an apology and some $$, what words if uttered will take away the pain of your grandpa who was starved, used and probably abused for decades, “sorry”?

    and how much money is enuff to pay for that pain and abuse? what? $10, $20 $1000?

    I also wonder how they arrive at these figures!

    We need to look forward and stop looking behind. There nothing in our past that can help us if it hasn’t already.

    Forward ever — backward never
  • http://www.goraila.com All employees are slaves

    Just M
    I agree with you, say 75%, BUT i have some notes:
    (i) Slavery being a trade, there was the buyer and seller, so all parties were guilty. But I also know some of the stuff for sale was violently acquired.

    (ii) An apology is Ok. It has some healing power, mostly (75%) on the culprit, as it makes him have “a clean conscience” if at all that is possible. But thats all it does, similar to a case where a murderer apologizes to you for taking the life of your dear one. The apology does not bring them back, but to your, 25% of relief is good.

    So who should give/accept apologies? No problem if the sons of the concerned do it. After all we are ALL products of our forefathers (u know genes and all)

    What if the son of the accused is the product of a slaveowner and a slave? Then what?

    (iii)Mbecha in the Bank is good. Does not take the pain/crime away, but in modern society we have created these instruments as ways of “paying” for sins done. Same way you may be paid by the estate of a drunk driver for the death of a loved one. Who pays whom? We can learn from the example of the Jews and the Nazis/Swiss Banks. The American institutions (e.g. Wachovia Bank, Burlingtons, etc) that benefited should pay money/whatever to develop institutions/system that help provide relief to the sons of the grieved.

    Again, some of the beneficiaries of the slaves are the products of slaves and slave owners. How do you charge them then? Half what everyone else is paying?

    (iv)African slavery: who to blame most? Those African chiefs who knowingly sold their people/enemies. The Wazungus/Arabs, were “scum”, as you say, and as such what do you expect from scum?

    (iv) History is repeating itself with modern African slavery. Who is to blame most? Again the African chiefs. The chiefs in Senegal, Chad, the Sudan, etc. And the Likes of Moi, Mugambe ( and maybe even Kibaki?), who rule their chiefdoms such that their people/their enemies are forced to seek better life in the west. Why else would our nurses seek to go the the US to wipe the bottoms of old pathetic and mean white women/men, (whom their own offspring have abandoned in the homes because of their meanness)? Why else would our strong young men(educated/capable) be abandoning their homes to go do menial jobs in the USA? Why else would our young girls be deceived into marrying Germans only to end up being slaves in Brothels in German/Greece? Or why else would parents at the coast give their tween daughters to be defiled by old Italian men in Malindi?

    I am sure 200 years ago the chiefs had valid reason for selling off the Africans, the same way we know justify the flight of Africans to the West, to be wasted and demeaned. And do not tell me these Africans leave on their own accord.

    So another 200 years and we will look back and have more apologies for this new slavery, right?

    (v) Do something about it. Speaking for the Africans, i am yet to understand what it is that makes it very hard for Africans as a whole to say enough is enough. Probably we do not believe that freedom and dignity(-whatever that means) is worth fighting for.

    (vi) House girls/shamba boys slaves of Nairobi
    YES. This shows you that the “desire” to do evil is in the heart of man, as The Good Book you quoted says so. How then does one eradicate that evil?

  • http://mywordsonly.blogspot.com acolyte

    Well at least the Brits are making some efforts to apologize, all we get from various leaders in the States are expressions of deep regret that have to be voted and agreed on before they are even issued.

    I for one am not convinced of the genuineness or validity of Tony Blair or Rowan Williams’ contrition. Why should their apologies hold any more weight than a random Briton I run into in town?

    The Japanese Americans got reparations for the internment they suffered during the World War but the case for black people is more intricate as they were not only interned but enslaved. What formula is going to be used to arrive at this? Exactly who is going to pay, the government using taxpayers money (some of which was paid by black people)? The institutions and companies that beneifted from the slave trade?

    Plus we all do know that slave trade is far from over, it just took different forms. One merely has to look at the plight of most minorities world over to realise how little has changed for them since emancipation. What of the case of large corporations like Walmart whose buying power can coherce companies in China to produce goods at the lowest price possible and the main way to do this is to overwork their factory workers and pay them as little as possible. Or what about these so called bi-lateral trade agreements which aren’t equal in any way because third world countries have to provide goods that are as cheap as possible for export while the goods in the first world country are protected by subsidies and crushing tarrifs on imports so as usual the third world country has to cut costs ie child labour et al.

    Of course I don’t even have to touch on the situation in Kenya where thanks to poor Administration the economy is stumbling forward resulting in most Kenyans living on less than a dollar per day while 3% correct me if I’m wrong own 90% of the nations wealth, forcing our smart young ones to flee the nation.
    Yes we still need to hear apologies, but we also need action to match those apologies. Talk is cheap….

  • http://gukira.wordpress.com Keguro

    Slight correction: I’m still not in Kenya. Onward then! (Such a pity that hiphop ruined the fine phrase, Onward ho!)

    For one, we might consider that Africans, most postcolonial (or neocolonial) Africans, choose your term, were not directly impacted by slavery. Ah, you say, that supports your argument. But wait. It is a particular form of arrogance on our part, and I include myself here, to say that African Americans and Afro-Carribeans, and let’s not forget the substantial Afro-Latin populations, do not deserve apologies and reparation. You will have noticed in the past 10 or so years that slavery and imperialism have been refigured as “good” for Africa by revisionist historians beloved by the Grimacing Texan and his British Toady. (Were I to be self-promoting, I would direct you to my post on Fanon and African privilege.)

    That sounds to me like a pair of straw man arguments.
    - At no time have i said, or even insunuated that Africans were not directly impacted by slavery. That is a strange intepretation seeing as Africans were obviously and very deeply impacted by slavery
    - At no time have i said that African Americans or Afro Carribeans do not deserve apologies and reparation. If anything I gave numerous examples to indicate that at one point or another very many different peoples were in the same bondage.

    With regards to the reparation, you have not, as far as I can tell, addressed a single one of the questions that I have asked

    To claim, as you do, that there might not be continuing psychic impacts, replayed in the space of the quotidian through racist acts, seems a willful denial of history. More than that, I’m more than a little troubled by your sense that people should “just get over it.” It is, strangely, a sentiment that mimes empathy only to dismiss its validity. Your subject position does not allow you such a privilege. Though, as I’ve already suggested, it is precisely your subject position that allows such privilege. Paradox is interesting.

    The end of your post is especially troubling, for it presumes that individuals have been “doing nothing” while waiting for reparations and apologies. That it has taken this long for western leaders to even begin considering apologizing for slavery is beyond tragic. That they still need prodding to do so suggests the persistence of attitudes created during slavery and transmitted into the present.

    And how do you propose to force them to apologize then? Try and put yourself in Joe Public’s shoes. Why should he apologize?
  • http://mountkirima.blogspot.com Kirima

    Very insightful post on a very difficult topic. You have raised some valid points on the difficulty of actually determining the guilty pary for slavery. For one I do not believe in collective guilt, you cannot whole handedly blame an entire race or nation for the sins of some individuals even if they were guilty of complicity or silence.

    Hmm … got a point there. I hadn’t quite thought of it that way

    The issue or reparations is emotional for slavery, colonialism, and even at home for land clashes, mau mau etc. and so I agree with you that in all these cases it becomes difficult to determine who should pay for these crimes because unless we can identify the actual perpetrators it would be very unfair to penalize their descendants or their communities.

  • njege

    who says slavery ended? apart from the mboches, what about the watchies/casual laborers/etc who make 3-5k a month and have to pay rent buy food etc?

    capitalism is a much more effective form of slavery because there is no bothered consciences and no pesky need for for your descendants to apologize 200 years from now?

  • njege

    sorry that last sentence should have been a ‘.’ not a ‘?’.

    on a slightly related topic…i think there is a kind of reverse racism where the victims of racism turn around and demand special rights because they have previously been victims. its like, since my father was a slave to your father, now its your turn. nuh-huh. wrong! slavery and discrimination is wrong regardless of who is doing it.

    Oh my! I hadn’t thought of it that way — the feeeling of some sort of ‘entitlement’!
  • http://mrembo.wordpress.com Mrembo

    As I read I was thinking “If only he would post this on some of the African American discussion boards I read”. woi woi woi!!

    In fact I’ll look for one and post it. Any ideas?

    I agree with your sentiments kabisa especially the issue on maids. It is with real shame that I admit, prior to coming to Europe, I never ever saw the plight of maids as an issue. I never paid attention to the abuse countless of them suffer.

    At the same time I cannot help but think, there will always be an underclass in any society. History has proven so and as long as that class exists there will always be exploitation.

  • Jogoo wa Shamba

    I have always been of the belief that you cannot know where you are going unless you understand where you are coming from. This does not by any means imply that you have to live in the past. The past is gone and though it may have influenced where we are,it should just be left at that – past.
    I think an apology (wherever it will come from), will not make a damn difference? Lets try to forget the whole thing and move on…my 2cents worth

  • http://kadhat.blogspot.com egm

    Njege’s point on reverse racism reminds me of a predominantly black town in the south that would not vote in a white man simply because of his race. They even shunned light skin blacks, so Obama (albeit bi-racial) would have a difficult time getting votes there. Reverse racism is just as bad.

    We don’t even have to go that far! Here in Kenya some people won’t vote for you because you come from a certain area!
  • http://gathara.blogspot.com Patrick Gathara

    I do not think M is advocating a “wilful amnesia”. While one does well to recognize historical injustices, one should avoid being trapped by them Thus while we can condemn the slave trade, if 200 years later we still allow it to define us, if we continue to exalt and parade our victimhood, then we continue to perpetuate the vice against ourselves.

    The fact is Idi Amin, Bokassa, Moi, Mobutu, Mugabe and the plethora of rapists, incompetents and kleptocrats who have governed Africa recently have little to do with a trade that was abolished 2 centuries ago. Our current poverty is very much home-grown. And no apology is going to magically erase our culpability.

    PS
    M, sorry to be pedantic but I believe the Persians are actually Iranian not Iraqi.

    Whoops! The I and the Q
  • http://udi-m.blogspot.com Udi

    Personally, an apology wont mean much as long as Kramer of Seinfield and Don Imus still consider as niggers and black women as ho’s and jiggaboos. Latest news- a black woman bought leather couches and on the label tag, the color was referred to as Nigger- Brown. So why bother apologising for something you are not even sorry about.

  • vituvingisana

    How is/was Kenya (ok, I am being narrow-minded here but I am Kenyan) affected by the Trans-Atlantic slave trade?

    Kenya/ns should be looking to the (very silent) Middle East where most of the EA slave traders (according to my history books in primary & secondary) came from akina tipu tip.

    Me thinks the arab countries still look at Africa as a source of slaves… I read in some newspapers back in the day that apparently arab slave traders flourished in countries like Mali even into the 1970s…

    Shouldn’t Kenya receive compensation (free oil???)…

    That said it is the current & past crop of idiots who pose as “leaders” who really led us down the poverty path. African examples would include moi, kenyatta (yes, him of the land grabbing era), mugabe, idi amin, mobutu among many others!

    We need to start WORKING towards the future… sure look in the rear-view mirror but don’t drive in reverse!

  • http://gukira.wordpress.com Keguro

    Perhaps what so disturbs me about this post, and some of the comments, is that I feel about it the same way I do when my privileged white students tell me that racism no longer exists. Just as I would insist they do not have the right to make that call, I would similarly claim that Kenyans do not have the right to judge the validity of psychic and social claims regarding slavery.

    If I may not insist, then I want to at least register how sad this conversation makes me. In part, because it registers how impoverished relations are between Africans (Kenyans in this case) and African Americans. That state will continue as long as we refuse to acknowledge how much we exercise African privilege as a way to negate other diasporic black histories.

    If this is to be a conversation about exploitation in Kenya, then let it be so. We need not use the slave trade as a convenient metaphor.

  • http://udi-m.blogspot.com Udi

    Keguro- u have a very valid point

  • msaniixl

    I co-sign Udi on this one…and to think the pull someone like imus has, majority of that audience must cosign his sentiments…

    @Njege I disagree there is nothing like reverse racism its just racism period, and your analogy is flawed too..its like magically after slavery ended in the US the victims somehow vaulted to the same status as the perpatrators ..those social/institutional structures are still there..

  • munyanta

    no amount of money can compensate for the atrocity that was the slave trade. i concur with M that reparations have no significance at this point in time. its up to us africans to stop letting others see us from a point of weakness and focuss on what is important.

  • http://www.sidaki.blogspot.com sidaki

    Yup.

    Well put my friend. Those idlers should just get over the whole idea of slavery as a crutch and get on with their lives. It happened. Period.

  • http://prousette.blogspot.com prousette

    Slavery has not ended,yet.
    It has just taken more acceptable forms and another 200 years down the line there shall be the same chorus of descendants of child labourers, underpaid workers etc seeking reparation.

    Though it is rather touching that someone apologized for the unfathomable ills done by slavery.

  • http://alexcia.blogspot.com/ alexcia

    All talk of apologies and reparations must be viewed with a certain degree of cynicism and skepticism.

    The message to all people of color (it was after all about color) and kinky hair, to all native populations wherever they may be (in SA, Zimbabwe, Europe, Middle East or South America) from apologies and reparations to this generation is that:
    1. You are a bunch of pathetic, weak and helpless losers – 200 hundred years later and you still haven’t dusted and picked yourselves up?
    2. We whooped you asses because you are bunch of pathetic, weak and helpless losers.
    3. If you were not a bunch of pathetic, weak and helpless losers we would not have enslaved you.
    4. And sorry, like a junkie, you cannot do anything without us
    5. Just so you know, we might some day have to whoop you again because you are just bunch of sorry ass pathetic, weak and helpless losers.

    In all this, Europeans know that history did not begin 200 years ago.
    They look at China and India and they know that the story will not end here

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  • http://www.simplyclarah.blogspot.com Klara

    Was watchin that Apocalyptos a other day n it reminded me of our dark History

  • Mitzy

    In the American case, a very tiny minority owed slaves and during the slavery era, many blacks were free men & women or were slave owners themselves (I’m sure descendants of these want reparations cheques too!).

    Why should the descendants of the larger white majority that weren’t slave owners be the ones to owe and pay the debt? Many white non-slave owners also fought hard and gave their lives to abolish slavery. Are the descendants of black slaves going to repay the white folks for such loss of life?

  • http://gishungwa.blogspot.com Gishungwa

    Hypothetically they apologize and then what? Really does i think we should just forget it. Wearing a sorry shirt and binding yourself in chains and yolks then strutting around town doesnt come close to the real thing. I doubt they had tees, jeans and sneaks for the occasion…

  • http://tallb.wordpress.com/ aegeus

    Apology or not, hey the past be the past learn from it and move on! For all the energy and effort expended in the reparation exercise and related matters can be best utilised in improving your lot.

  • http://justsue.wordpress.com Sue

    I still believe slave trade goes on. Especially in Northern Ug and Sudan..

  • sizzla

    1. Who, exactly is going to apologize is it the governments? I for one would laugh myself to tears seeing Condoleezza Rice or Baroness Amos apologizing for the slave trade. Is it the civic society? Is it the common man? The church?

    The apology is not a black V white thing per se – do not fall into this trap!

    Then what sort of thing is it? Who will apologize and who will receive the apology?

    2. If we generously generalize that black people were oppressed by the white people, what becomes of those shades of grey like Colin Powell and Barack Obama? Do they apologize from one side of the mouth and accept the apology with the other?

    See answer to question 1

    3. Since the blacks happily took part in the slave trade themselves, vigorously buying and selling their brothers, how do these factor into the apologies?

    Trading (buying and selling) slaves is not the crime the west would be asked to apologize for. The dehumanising of Africans is a good place to start.

    Again I ask — who is apologizing?

    4. Our Arab brethren also took part in this trade and made some good living out of it. Why then the double standards?

    At this time we can only fight our legacy. Again the question suggests this is a black v white thing. You might as well ask why we don’t also take up the plight of the jews.

    Good point. Why don’t we?

    5. What use is this apology?

    Process the word through a thesaurus its use is defined by its meaning.

    Enough with the not quite clever shadow boxing. Answer the question. What use is the apology?

    6. Why am I being apologized to, and it is my great great great grandfather who was bought, sold and worked himself into the grave for no pay?

    Personally, the first thing which comes to mind is I am being apologised to because your stripping away of my identity and my culture means I can no longer trace back my ancestry with any certainty that far.

    How am i stripping away your identity and it is my father who did things to your father? I refuse to pay for the sins of my father

    7. Why do people want an apology from Tony Blair for things done 150 years before he was even an idea in his folks’ minds?

    There are many things done in the name of forefathers..just seems a bit suspect when a line is drawn over an apology and reparations.

    8. If Mr. Blair does make this apology, it will be completely hollow and meaningless. Why would he take responsibility for the deeds of his forefathers? If my ancestors through guns, whips and ships propelled my country to be the second superpower in the world and I stepped into the shoes of leadership, I dare say I could find the tears and sorrow to be as sorry as you would like me to be. I would even apologize if you’d like. At the end of the day I’d still be sure that it wouldn’t change a damn thing

    Mr Blair has is not being asked to make a personal apology…which makes you wonder why he appears to be taking it so personally?

    Then doesn’t that make the apology even more empty?

    9. Am I the only one who finds ludicrous the notion that I have to apologize to a boy I wouldn’t know from Adam because my father soundly clobbered his father in nursery school?

    The bible is still used today as a scapegoat to justify wars, treachery, government foreign policy and to excuse world atrocities! – the use of the bible in this way is concrete recognition of the relevance and the significance of ancestry.

    I did not in fact mean the bible when I said “from Adam”

    10. Those outraged black folk fuming about the white oppressing them ought to put down those writs and dig a little deeper into history where they will find the Berbers took white slaves from Europe. Are they ready for that reparation?

    Maybe, maybe not but if nothing else this is a good example of how the word ‘slave’ is used loosely – don’t lose track of the real crime..the word slavery is regularly used as a veil to cover it.

    And there you go again glossing over. Kindly address this part: “Berbers took white slaves from Europe”

    11. There was a roaring slave trade in West Africa, and as a matter of fact they even constructed a market! Demanding an apology from Tony Blair is as absurd of demanding an apology from a bullet and neglecting to mention the gun.

    A demanded apology is not an apology. Just ask those who have already apologised most if not all will tell you they have recognized the crimes of their establishments which makes them look like hypocrites when they sit on their inherited throne preaching crime does not pay!

    Then why are we looking for apologies

    12. Why stop at the transatlantic slave trade? Myopia appears to be a fairly coming affliction
    The prime minister of Greece should apologizee for all the things the Greeks did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    The prime minister of Italy should apologize for all the things the Romans did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    Saddam Hussein, before being unceremoniously hanged, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should have been made to apologize for all the things the Persians did when they dominated the world, including trading in slaves
    The relatively mild people of Norway, Denmark and Sweden should be startled out of their placid lives with demands that they apologize for the things the Vikings did
    We can ask the same of the Mongols, the Spaniards, the Portuguese, the Egyptians …

    What because they haven’t they shouldn’t? – why not just eradicate the whole world of the very concept of apologizing – we’ll start in our primary schools.

    It is hyporcisy to ask for an apology if you are not ready to apologize yourself

    13. If financial reparation is to be made:
    Who will actually foot the bills for this? The taxpayers of the US and the UK? Which include descendants of the said slaves?
    How will the figures be arrived at?
    Who will receive this monies? If your great grand mother was the bed wench of a plantation owner are you eligible for half?

    Well convicted drug dealers usually have their assets taken…guess we could start with taking Buckingham Palace….and some of those crown Jewels. But regardless, just like the war on terrorism, in the name of justice, if you have to, then make up new laws as you go along.

    Who is this “we”? And how many crown jewels? As for making up laws as we go along — that is why Bush is in the doghouse

    As for who will receive this monies…any African carrying the slave masters surname would be a good place to start.

    That is a bit naive. What of Africans who were the product of slave masters and slaves? Do they get paid half?

    14. If we can figure out who will offer the reparation, and how it will be done, how will this invalidate the inhumanity that took place?

    It never will in the same way a prison sentence will never invalidate a crime – but the crime was still done.

    15. If it is an apology people want, what if I personally offered an apology for the inhumanity of the slave trade. Will that do? If not, why not?

    Apology would be accepted – so why is it so hard at the government level?

    Which government

    16. We have spent all these centuries without these reparations. Why the sudden urgent need now? I like to think that most of us are doing just fine without it.

    Sudden?, urgent?, doing fine? – I wonder how long it was into slavery before house ni$$ers said the same thing.

    Did they?
  • KT#1

    The apology is necessary – refer to several books written on the subject.

    You’ll have to do much better than “refer to serveral books” to put across your argument

    Acknowledgment of this atrocity/ holocaust is certainly a step in the right direction.

    Why? And how so?

    We ‘modern age Kenyans’, as it were, may not be able to identify with this but the living generations of these ancestors are still affected by their enslavement. You shouldn’t knock something you know so little about…

    And on what basis are you concluding I know little on this, pray tell? Because my name is not Jones?
  • sizzla

    Why do you draw a line between paying for the sins of your father and inheriting the wealth of your father?

    It’s not a black v white thing per se…it’s establishments apologizing for their role in slavery – beneficiaries apologize to victims.
    …like the Church has recently acknowledged…like Ghana has already acknowledged…and Virginia…ask them who they apologized or want to apologize to.

    The UK having declared themselves as the leaders of morality should be the first to start…just don’t go taking the pi$$ by decorating a celebration as a commemoration.

    You’ll find some of your answers here..read it and where blacks have been victims of white mobs I expect you to go looking for the blacks who sold out to assist.

    http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/48613/

    In all the world wars tales of sellouts, espionage and treason are rife. Africans who sold Africans can be dealt with in the same way but don’t let that detract from the true crime.

  • sizzla

    Then what sort of thing is it? Who will apologize and who will receive the apology?

    It is a moral thing where establishments apologize for their roles in slavery. There’s a word for describing people who see this as a black v white thing…racist.

    And for a member of one race to defend the other race around that same black v white nucleus is even worse than an African selling another into slavery for trinkets.

    Again I ask — who is apologizing?

    It is a moral thing where establishments apologize for their roles in slavery.

    Good point. Why don’t we?

    Who is this we?

    Enough with the not quite clever shadow boxing. Answer the question. What use is the apology?

    It lays the foundation of morlity for future sincere relations.

    How am i stripping away your identity and it is my father who did things to your father? I refuse to pay for the sins of my father

    Easily said while sitting there on your fathers throne.

    Then doesn’t that make the apology even more empty?

    When a child is naughty you don’t ask them to apologize you tell them to. The idea is this becomes part of their ethical makeup by the time they become adults.

    It will not be empty because the apology will come with an explanation of how it was derived..and it won’t be because someone told them to.

    I did not in fact mean the bible when I said “from Adam”

    Shadow boxing right?

    And there you go again glossing over. Kindly address this part: “Berbers took white slaves from Europe”

    In America, many immigrant groups have benefitted from equalities gained by African-American civil rights movements. But before we go into that, Berberbers “”took”" white slaves or “”bought”" white slaves?

    Then why are we looking for apologies

    Why not?

    It is hyporcisy to ask for an apology if you are not ready to apologize yourself

    What you mean like this?
    http://cauderno.wordpress.com/2006/09/27/ghana-apologizes/

    Who is this “we”? And how many crown jewels? As for making up laws as we go along — that is why Bush is in the doghouse

    The same we where you said “Good point. Why don’t we?”

    Bush is a law unto himself….but still, the doghouse isn’t too bad a place when you have puppets willing to follow you in there.

    That is a bit naive. What of Africans who were the product of slave masters and slaves? Do they get paid half?

    The most famous half breed Bob Marley didn’t stop singing about it until the day he died.

    Which government

    Start with Britain.

    Did they?

    Get a tamed horse to plough your field then give it water and some hay then it’s easy to see why it believes it is free.

  • yamgambo

    Reparations,apologies,etc great subject. I have always thought that this would be a mind boggling question such as the current questions of illegal immigrants and abortion are in the united states. Any answer may be right or wrong but inaction is always the route of choice obviously enough.

    My little familiarity with psychology tells me that we are all a product of our environments and that being the case no one is quite qualified to speak on the long standing effects that slavery has had on the descendants of former slaves unless you have walked in their shoes for as long as they have. Aside from slow and painful progress in the areas of civil rights, I do not think that there has been proper closure to the inhumanity that most of these former-slaves descendants have endured for generations.Apology in one form or another would go a long way in re-writing the history for the benefit of the future generations of former slaves especially those of darker hue whose skin color is a constant reminder of disparities that have continually visited their kind. As a matter of fact, I think that just like the native Americans, the African Americans deserve to have their own sovereign nations as a form of apology and recognition of their right to self-determination as a group.

    As for the Obamas and Powells of this world, when it comes down to it, they, like any other black person have had to overcome the obstacles that come with their skin color and just because they are of mixed heritage and successful does not override the fact that they will, for the entirety of their lives, be judged as black.

    As for the question of domestic servants, we live in a free market world and as long as it is not forced labor, I do not see anything wrong with it.

    By the way, great article.

  • Hivemind

    Excellent article.

    I think there is a simple conclusion most British (or others) would come to when thinking about slave trade and apologies: Why on earth should I apologise about something I, my parents, or even my grand, grand parents had nothing to do with?

    It might also be asked: Who is there to apologise to, if those seeking an apology were not even involved in the slave trade at all?

    I am sure many more would comment on how the British at the time did something that could be considered much more important than any apology, how Britain outlawed the slave trade and pressed others to do the same, setting up a substantial naval unit dedicated to preventing it also, freeing slaves on captured ships. Indeed, the british units even took action against African rulers who would not abolish trade of slaves in their kingdom, and pushing others to sign anti-slave treaties.

    Perhaps this action does not make amends for the slave trade, but I would say it was a bloomin good try.

    Of course, just as the acts of slavery were not committed by the modern british, and so blame lies not with them, nor was this act of good, so the praise lies not with them either.

    Is playing a pivotal role in (indeed, beginning) abolition of the trade not repentance enough for Britian today?

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