Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Chris12 » Fri Mar 14, 2014 9:46 am

Well this shouldn't be uncontroversial :big:

In the Caribbean a number of countries have started to demand reparation money from a number of European countries, primarily Britain which is sued by 14 countries for the slave trade all of these countries have taken part of in the past.

I imagine there are quite a lot of different thought about this topic.

My personal thought is that all of those countries are shameless beggars. Whether they genuinely believe in this or are exploiting their ancestors suffering for some quick cash I remain entirely unsympathetic to their demands.

I agree slavery was horrible and anyone who argues against that deserves a punch in the gut but we are living in the 21th century. Everyone who was a slave is dead has long since died, everyone who owned slaves have long since died. Everyone who has ever been, owned or seen a slave has been dead for over a century. The people making those claims have never been slaves and neither have their parents or their grandparents.

The people on the Caribbean have no right to any compensations in regards to Slavery. Those people are not their ancestors and furthermore neither are we! Just as they have no right to ask for this money I have no reason to pay money for crimes committed by others.

And if we where to answer to these ridicules demands what then? Where would it end? Will these people be suing African countries next for selling their ancestors in the first place? Can China demand millions from Mongolia for the thousands that perished against Ghengis Khan? Will half of Europe, the middle east and north Africa ask for donation from Italy next? Coming to think of it I'm pretty sure my ancestors have likely suffered at the hands of either Romans, Vikings, the Spanish or the French. Where can I make my claim? :roll:

Re: Your thougts on Slavery and reperation.

Postby FelixSH » Fri Mar 14, 2014 10:12 am

Chris, this is the internet. EVERYTHING is controversial. :big:

I generally agree with you, suing countries for former horrible crimes is absurd. That would just lead into bad places. An official statement about how these crimes are acknowledged by Britain, France, etc. would be the only thing that seems fair to me here (but that would be something I would like to see. Just the acceptance: Yes, our country did this and it was horrible, we aren“t proud of it).

I agree definitely insofar that the people who live today are not responsible for what there ancestors did, so having to pay money for that reason seems absurd. It is the right thing to help other countries, but not because of a crime from history, but because it is the right thing to do.

Re: Your thougts on Slavery and reperation.

Postby xtc » Fri Mar 14, 2014 10:31 am

Generally, I agree with Chris12. The point that Africans sold other Africans is often overlooked
However, I only wish I could agree with his implication that slavery is no longer with us. It most certainly is!
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Re: Your thougts on Slavery and reperation.

Postby EmperorDave » Sat Mar 15, 2014 8:40 am

This kind of topic has sometimes been brought up in my college last month but only by a very very few people and I have to agree, reparations will do absolutely nothing to solve or quell the pains of slavery that have affected so many. It may seem nice to get money for one's ancestors pain but what will it do in the end, will money truly heal the wounds and absolve the pains that their ancestors went through, nothing good will come out of it. I think the best way that this could work is instead of money we use knowledge, we go into greater detail about slavery and teach about it a little more than now because there are some states, countries, and other places that only briefly touch on the subject, I think if we talk about it more in the schools and teach the youth about the truth of slavery that could be a better reparation than any money could be because it shows that the countries involved in the slave trade are accepting what they did and are trying to show why it is wrong and give an in-depth history on the subject. Also I agree with xtc, people tend to refuse to even believe that Africans sold other Africans and some people only believe it was European Christians who were involved, the fact is it was more than that and it should be taught that those European Christians were not alone in the slave trade. Knowledge is a powerful instrument and I think that is the best way we can deal with slavery of the past, to learn from it and never do it again to our fellow man. Also Chris sadly slavery is still practiced now, in some countries it is legal and in places where it is not legal it goes under the name of human trafficking, something that needs to be talked about more and more.

Re: Your thougts on Slavery and reperation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Sat Mar 15, 2014 10:17 pm

I'm more liberal than conservative, but I also see this as one of the nuttiest ideas in history.
Take the concept of such reparation to the ultimate logical extreme, and every non-white would have to sue every white person in North America, South America, Australia, and Africa for everything they had, and then on top of that deport them all back to the home countries of their ancestors. I'll be europe would just love the huge influx of destitute refugees that would result. Those with mixed ancestry would probably simply be exiled out to sea because they'd be seen by non-mixed people as members of the other race.
No one would win in such a scenario. it'd only make race relations and inter-racial tensions far worse than they already are. It's only utter parasites (including unscrupulous lawyers and Al Sharpton) that favor such a horrible idea.
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Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Sun Mar 16, 2014 6:19 am

Chris12 wrote:Well this shouldn't be uncontroversial :big:

By the way are you sure you meant uncontroversial?
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Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Chris12 » Sun Mar 16, 2014 6:38 am

Yes I'm pretty sure I did.

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Sun Mar 16, 2014 7:47 am

Well, because this is the same as saying that it should be controversial... and i get the feeling you meant the opposite of that. That something like this should be obvious... NOT a matter of controversy or debate.
Or were you being facetious (trying to be funny)?
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Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Chris12 » Sun Mar 16, 2014 10:02 am

Or were you being facetious (trying to be funny)?


What tipped you off? The happy smiley next to it? :lol:

It was a sarcastic acknowledgment that its a controversial topic. To be fair I'm quite surprised most people commenting are saying they agree with me.

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Sun Mar 16, 2014 10:51 am

Chris12 wrote:
Or were you being facetious (trying to be funny)?


What tipped you off? The happy smiley next to it? :lol:

No, just a wild guess. I have Asperger's, so i don't always pick up on things like written sarcasm when the context doesn't make it absolutely obvious. The :big: smilie didn't really tell me anything. A :lol: , :P , :roll: , or a :quirk: probably would have tipped me off however.

Chris12 wrote:To be fair I'm quite surprised most people commenting are saying they agree with me.

What's so surprising about that? The only people would would benefit from such a thing are lawyers, rabble-rousers like Al Sharpton, and virtually no one else. The question has been around for decades. I remember Al Sharpton advocating the very same notion on the Phil Donahue talk show way back in the 1970s, when i was little if any older than you are now. No one with any sense could avoid seeing that it would be a litigation nightmare that would drag on for more decades, tank the economy all over again, and benefit only the shyster lawyers who took on such a case. Most of the black folks who joined such a lawsuit would be unable to prove they were the descendents of slaves, since many blacks moved in long after slavery was abolished (my state sees a huge annual influx of refugees from Somalia today in fact). The situation would be ripe for abuse and there would be way too many plaintiffs.
Then the Indians (aka Native Americans) would chime in... and they have a helluva better case in my opinion. We took their lands away from them, whereas most blacks (at least in the US itself) are WAY better off than they'd be in whichever part of Africa their ancestors came from. native americans however most definitely are worse off for the rest of us being here. Same with the aborigines of Australia, the actual Indians (of india; duh!) and every other place that has been colonized by a European power (you Dutch aren't blameless in this regard either, you know).
No, if pursued this whole business would (to coin a phrase) open the biggest and nastiest can of worms imaginable!
I admit we white folks don't have a nice track record of inter-racial relationships... but neither does anyone else. You pointed out some examples yourself; the mongol invasion of europe in the 13th century would have wiped European culture out completely if the reigning khan Ogedai hadn't conveniently died in 1241 or so and their traditions hadn't called for a mass return to the homeland to select a new khan. The Japanese proved white people had no monopoly on imperialism and cruelty in WWII. And blacks were busy enslaving one another and Native americans busy killing one another long before white folks were known to either.
No, anyone with any sense hopefully sees this whole business for the utter and disastrous nonsense it actually is.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby mikeybound » Mon Mar 17, 2014 9:50 pm

Generally, I agree that the issue of slavery is about as dead as everyone involved. The fallout, on the other hand...the slave trade was good for Europeans, but it had a damaging effect on the victims governments, cultures, economies, and national stability. From the way things look, those issues seem a bit more persistent than the trauma of a few slaves. So while I agree slavery isn't an issue here, we did kinda cause some fallout.

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Mon Mar 17, 2014 10:30 pm

Besides all that, we fought a devastating war to end slavery in this country. he war between the States was the most tragic episode in US history. A lot of good folks (on both sides) died because of it; most southerners fighting to protect states' rights rather than slavery itself. If any government should be held responsible, it's the Confederacy. oops. They're gone, and the money they left behind is worthless (except to collectors). The Union corrected a situation that admittedly went on generations too long (mainly because of the resistance of the South; slavery was abolished in most of the North by 1800) at a high cost to itself and an even higher cost to the South. Those who profited by slavery lost everything in their fight to defend it, and they had to bebuild almost from scratch like they were a third-world country (which, for a while, they essentially were).
If that isn't enough for the crybabies, I say: Too GD bad!
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby mikeybound » Mon Mar 17, 2014 11:35 pm

But my point is that ending a problem and treating the after effects are two different things. I'm not saying we're personally responsible, or that throwing money at them will fix anything, but shouldn't people do more than say "Hey! We ended an affront to human rights, and it only took us a few hundred years!"?

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Tue Mar 18, 2014 6:51 am

What we should be (and lately have been finally, if stumblingly) doing is making it so that everyone in this country is treated the same, and has the same access to basic human needs like food, clothing, and shelter, regardless of their race, creed, color, national origin, ancestry, sexual orientation, and so on. Beyond that, the past is past. No one alive now was a slave in a plantation back then, and though life in America is harder when you're black a lot of them need to do more to help themselves - socially and economically. After all, there are reasons why blacks are considered by many to be either lazy or violent thugs; it's because all too many of them deliberately cultivate such an image. A relative minority still, yes; but a few rotten apples... Anyway, it may be harder but it's not impossible for black people to succeed in this country; if they only try rather than complain how other people treat them.
If anyone deserves economic reparations, it's not black people (most of whom - even those in slums - are better off today than they'd be if their ancestors had never left Africa, which by and large has been ravaged by wars, epidemics and famine). It's the Native Americans (aka Indians), who most definitely would be better off if white folks had never existed. They're the ones who should receive reparations if anyone at all does; they still live (those who still survive at all that is) with the aftermath of their lands being taken away from them, their population decimated, and their culture all but destroyed every day of their lives.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby mikeybound » Tue Mar 18, 2014 1:30 pm

That, I agree on. Ideally, reparation resources would be put towards improving education, housing, etcetera in their societies. The problem isn't weather these groups deserve reparations, but weather they'd actually do anything worthwhile with them.
Last edited by mikeybound on Tue Mar 18, 2014 6:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Re: Your thoughts on Slavery and Reparation.

Postby Jason Toddman » Tue Mar 18, 2014 1:38 pm

Indeed. There I wholeheartedly concur, and not just for blacks either but everyone from a disadvantaged background.
Of course, the conservatives would never stand for it.
Dare to be different... and make a difference.
To boldly go where no one in their right mind has gone before...