Slavery Abolished - Not In The Iom

[Lonan3]

An apology would be nothing more than a PR stunt. It would be meaningless.

Slavery was a fact of life in virtually all civilisations for many thousands of years - as were slave traders.

As recently as a little over fifty years ago the Japanese took prisoners and used them as slave labour, using the same justification that white settlers used with black people - that they were inferior.

The scale of slavery and slave trading in the British/Dutch/French/Spanish etc colonies was exceptional because of the sheer weight of numbers involved. At the time, it was seen as perfectly acceptable and even as an economic necessity or, to put it another way - market forces ruled.

Simply because we have reached a stage in our development where we no longer see people as 'saleable commodities' does not, IMO, mean that we have to apologise for ancestors who knew no better.

If we were required to apologise for every deed in history that was done because of a set of values that we now reject, there wouldn't be enough paper in the world to print them on.

 

From Wikipedia: The history of slavery in the ancient world was closely tied to warfare. Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Hebrew, Greek, Roman, Persian, Chinese, Mayan, Aztec and Indian sources are replete with references to slavery in connection with warfare. Captured prisoners of war were frequently impressed into slavery by their captors, often as manual labourers in military, civil engineering, or agricultural projects, or as household servants. Many ancient households were maintained with one or more slaves and slaves provided nearly all the agricultural and construction labour in some societies.

Slavery nearly everywhere permitted cruelty and abuse although slaves were usually treated semi-humanely as valuable "property". Slavery nearly always predates written history on every continent. After writing was introduced, domestic slavery and sometimes concubine slavery was noted among the nomadic Arabs, and among Native American hunter gatherers, African, New Guinean, and New Zealand tribes, and among the Germanic and Viking raiders and many other pre-literate people.

 

If the suggestion is that, as one of the nations that allowed slave trading at an earlier time in its history, we should apologise for what are now clearly seen as unacceptable deeds - I'm sorry, but I don't see any value in that except, as I've said, as a PR exercise.

[Chinahand]

My only trouble with the argument that slavery has always existed and so what was so different about Western slavery is the scale and use the slavery was put to.

 

I'm a capitalist, I think the free market is central to solving the world's problems, but at the same time I don't think it is right to shy away from capitalism's dark side. Industrial slavery and its implementation in the Caribbean, Brazil and USA were very different from historic slavery - historically slavery was a consequence not a means. Wars produced conquered people who were hence enslaved - in the 17th and 18th centuries making money created the insentive to enlave - it became a means to capital and as with all things capitalism gets involved with became systematized on a huge scale.

 

Iron making has existed for thousands of years, but to say therefore that there is little difference between the Blacksmith and the Satanic Mills of the industrial revolution is to miss the point: I think the same problem is happening here with comparisons of the western slave trade to Mesopotamia.

 

Previously the restrictions on expanding slavery reduced its impact - but capitalism broke those restrictions - plus to use Jared Diamond's phrase - it gave the slaver the Guns, Germs and Steel to have a huge advantage over the enslaved.

 

It isn't the slavery per say I regret - a historic phenomenen - but its use in capitalism - deliberately enslaving for the accumulation of ever more capital and every more slaves - that was the logic of the triangular trade.

 

I don't think an apology will be coming from Blair et al - rather an expression of regret. That to me is acceptable and qualitatively different from an apology - I can't apologize for my ancestors, but I can regret their behaviour. i think Blair's already regretted the British response to the Irish Potato Famine - regretting slavery is similar. He hasn't regretted the colonization of India and that to me is the point - the balance of good to bad over that is much finer, it would be pure PR to regret such a hugely complicated act which has positive as well as negative consequences - but western industrial slavery: I've already issued to challenge, and thought for a while Cambon had picked it up, who will defend it and say it isn't a regretable period of our history?

 

I don't think there is anything wrong with acknowledging that and working to ensure it never happens again - not in brothels, or slums, or anywhere.

[Cambon]

For one who apparently studied black african slavery.... I can only wonder what books you read! You appear to have a wholly distorted understanding of the extreme inhumanities these people suffered. You cannot compare a homeless man to a black slave!! Their suffering is on a completely different scale. You're probably right, a major crime to them is a theft of a sleeping bag... a major crime to a black slave may be having a spike slammed through their hand. Incomparable!

 

I cannot believe you end that paragraph with "How much better off are they than the slaves were?" !!!!! Absolutely stunned that you could think that.. let alone question it.

 

DJDan, try reading the writings of Frederick Olmsted - a very vocal, anti-slavery campaigner at the time. His writings always depict the worst happenings and are very accurate.

 

Alternatively, try reading a book called The Deeper Wrong - Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. This was actually written by a black girl, born into slavery and tracks her life. It has some horrific tales. The treatment of slaves was horrible, especially by todays standards. However, it does not talk of daily beatings. The impression you will get from the book is that of mental anguish rather than physical violence. Also, compare like with like. Public floggings, torture and hanging of white people was the norm back then. It was not just a slave/ black issue. Remember the US still uses the death penalty on a regular basis today.

[Lonan3]

My only trouble with the argument that slavery has always existed and so what was so different about Western slavery is the scale and use the slavery was put to.

 

I'm a capitalist, I think the free market is central to solving the world's problems, but at the same time I don't think it is right to shy away from capitalism's dark side. Industrial slavery and its implementation in the Caribbean, Brazil and USA were very different from historic slavery - historically slavery was a consequence not a means. Wars produced conquered people who were hence enslaved - in the 17th and 18th centuries making money created the insentive to enlave - it became a means to capital and as with all things capitalism gets involved with became systematized on a huge scale.

Just to point out that it wasn't only conquered people - that a form of the evil known as 'Capitalism' existed and was abused long before:

 

Debt slavery existed in very early times, and some African people had the custom of putting up wives and children as hostages for an obligation; if the obligation was not paid, the hostages became slaves.

The Egyptians used slaves captured in war or bought from foreigners.

In the Bible, Joseph is sold into slavery in Egypt. (Hardly 'historical' evidence, I know!)

In ancient China, people were sold into slavery to pay debts.

It is estimated that the Arab Barbary Pirates of North Africa took over 1 million white slaves from Europe between 1530 and 1780.

There is evidence that the culture of slave-taking had existed in west Africa from at least the 9th century AD, with the Ashanti selling prisoners captured in local tribal conflicts as slaves to Arabs.

 

And why are we making such a fuss about the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act in 1807, when the The Slavery Abolition Act, outlawing slavery in British colonies, wasn't passed until August 23, 1833?

[Cambon]

I've already issued to challenge, and thought for a while Cambon had picked it up, who will defend it and say it isn't a regretable period of our history?

 

I don't think there is anything wrong with acknowledging that and working to ensure it never happens again - not in brothels, or slums, or anywhere.

 

Nobody can defend it. All I was originally doing was saying that there are comparisons to be drawn between life today and life in America 140+ years ago.

 

Your second point is the more important in my opinion. We can regret the past, but the child and sex slave trade is now, and we should be ashamed of that in a modern society.

[Amadeus]

Perhaps everyone who owns an iPod or any other object manufactured in China should apologise to the Chinese people? It's well documented that many migrant workers in china work under slave-like conditions (no breaks, no work laws or rights, very little pay, no health care, etc..) - not that it would make any difference...

[Chinahand]

Just to point out that it wasn't only conquered people - that a form of the evil known as 'Capitalism' existed and was abused long before:

 

Debt slavery existed in very early times, and some African people had the custom of putting up wives and children as hostages for an obligation; if the obligation was not paid, the hostages became slaves.

The Egyptians used slaves captured in war or bought from foreigners.

In the Bible, Joseph is sold into slavery in Egypt. (Hardly 'historical' evidence, I know!)

In ancient China, people were sold into slavery to pay debts.

It is estimated that the Arab Barbary Pirates of North Africa took over 1 million white slaves from Europe between 1530 and 1780.

There is evidence that the culture of slave-taking had existed in west Africa from at least the 9th century AD, with the Ashanti selling prisoners captured in local tribal conflicts as slaves to Arabs.

 

And why are we making such a fuss about the Abolition of the Slave Trade Act in 1807, when the The Slavery Abolition Act, outlawing slavery in British colonies, wasn't passed until August 23, 1833?

 

But capitalism was so undeveloped debt and buying and selling were only a tiny part of "life" - it was agriculture, war, tythe and ceremony, not buying, selling and borrowing!

 

Why was 1807 so important - because slavery wasn't sustainable - they were killing the slaves at such a rate that, without the trade bringing in new slaves, the numbers enslaved would reduce due to, what's the euphemism, natural wastage. With the abolution of the trade the abolition of slavery was almost guaranteed - it destroyed the system.

[Chinahand]

Perhaps everyone who owns an iPod or any other object manufactured in China should apologise to the Chinese people? It's well documented that many migrant workers in china work under slave-like conditions (no breaks, no work laws or rights, very little pay, no health care, etc..) - not that it would make any difference...

 

Go to where these migrant workers come from in the countryside. There you'll find a life that really has no breaks, no rights, no pay, no health care - just back breaking work in the fields for almost zero return. I personally talked with literally hundreds of workers in Chinese development areas about what its like back home - most said the factory and the dormatory block was a tough living, but far far preferable to home - and they could earn 10 times more.

 

From Dickensian London to todays Shanghai the countryside is idealized by the haves and disliked over the worse urban slum by the have-nots.

 

I find it very odd that those who claim to have a social conscience would rather return these people to rural drudgery than allow them to voluntarily gain the trickle down of the vast wealth creation they are a part of. Without their contribution that wealth creation would stop - people buying i-pods are helping to change China from being like North Korea to being like South Korea - their are social problems in both, but I know which I support - Amadeus you aren't making sense.

[thebees]

A recent National Geographic article was dedicated to 'Rising China' they told of a couple who left their children with their grandparents for a year at a time to goto find work, working in dreadful conditions for poor pay because the industrial revolution has taken so much work away from the small villages and the pollution of the rivers (by the industrialists) means they cannot fish for food (a similar thing is also happening in oil rich poor countries). Another part of the article told of people who were so desperate for heat that they climbed coal slag heaps to 'womble' any left overs, they had been ordered to leave their homes and had had the electricity supply cut off because developers wanted the land their homes were on. It is a crime. This is modern day slavery and I am glad that others realise this too.

Britain should not apologise for the slavery in the olden days, it should make a stand and change the slavery of today. The only way forward is to make open and fair trade. I avoid buying things that were made in China (or any other country where I know there to be absolute poverty in areas of manufacturing), I often get quite mad that everything is made in developing nations, not because I do not like them but, because I do not want to be a part of the capitalist chain that makes the rich richer and the poor desperate. We know things are wrong yet are powerless to change things because of the huge amounts of money this trade nets, much like the people 400 years ago. Perhaps in centuarys to come the decendants of the poor of the developing nations will receive an equally empty publicilty stunt of an apology too.

What about the £1.99 chickens...who is the slave there? certainly not Mr Tesco. Its the farmers but then they get a subsidy from the government so thats all ok then? no it isnt! Why is the tax payer subsidising farmers because the supermarket giants are demanding more for less all the time? anyway I could go on about this for hours and hours but I have work to do

[Chinahand]

Thebees - certainly be angry and outraged at pollution, poverty and the flauting of laws by the powerful over the weak.

 

But also do not mix up symptons with causes - these are caused by poverty and not the market. Trade and Development will reduce pollution and poverty in China and will make the rule of law more powerful.

 

The west used to buy its toys and ephemera from Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea - made in sweat shops every bit as bad as those in China which make the stuff now.

 

These countries started at the bottom and worked their way up - Hong Kong is now richer on average than the UK - but in the 1950s it looked just as corrupt and poverty stricken as industrial China today.

 

Through suffering, hard work and investment the people of these countries have completed what China is doing today.

 

If you avoid buying Chinese goods and stop trade you will condemn Chinese people to poverty - something you seem to want to end. You are totally wrong when you say the industrial chain "makes the rich richer and the poor desperate". I have worked and seen this at very close quarters. I am sure the National Geograhic showed you people living in desperate poverty - but by opening up its economy China has given these people an opportunity to escape it.

 

Overall multilateral trade and multinational companies HELP break the cycle of poverty - I will say that without qualification for China.

 

See the comment at the bottom of this story: Chinese plant rolls out first MG

 

Factory manager Paul Stowe, who relocated from Longbridge to China, told BBC Radio Five Live that Nanjing was "very hot and very dusty at times" in summer, and that "caused us some problems with the production facility".

 

"But with regard to working conditions and working practices it's very similar to anywhere else in the world," he added.

 

I've been in Chinese factories owned by multinationals and I've been in ones owned by locals - the locals do not have money to invest and have worse standards - the multinationals bring in higher standards, higher wages and become training grounds for local talent. Take these away and the local companies would become poorer and have even worse standards.

 

You say you are in favour of open and fair trade - well then - put your money where your mouth is and accept trading with China is about creating development wealth and has little to do with slavery.