Slavery: Sorry seems to be hardest word(From The Scotsman, Monday Nov 27)
I was struck by reading this article from The Scotsman two weeks ago, and even more so by some of the comments appended to the article.
"TONY Blair's attempts to condemn Britain's role in the slave trade without making a full apology have been attacked as "spin".
In a newspaper article today, the Prime Minister issued an
"expression of regret" for Britain's involvement in the forcible
transportation of millions of Africans through British ports, including
Glasgow and Liverpool. However,
he stopped short of taking responsibility for the horrors inflicted on
past generations; such a move could have opened up the government to
claims for reparations and been contentious with "middle-England"
voters.
Now anti-slavery campaigners are urging black and white working
class Britons to "reclaim" government-organised commemorations on the
bicentenary of the abolition of slavery on 25 March next year. They
claim ministers are emphasising the "white middle class" contributions
to the abolition of slavery while largely ignoring the role that
Africans' own uprising played." This CNN piece provides more background and facts about the horrifying trade in humans. There is no doubt that slavery and the trade in slaves was evil and inexcusable, but it is in my opinion preposterous to expect any modern government to pay reparations, and it is totally oppportunistic of so-called "human-rights" groups to attempt to wring money out of governments and companies 200 years after the fact, particularly a government whose predecessor abolished the slave trade. Was this not sufficient apology at the time?
"I mean not to accuse any one, but to take the shame upon
myself, in common, indeed, with the whole parliament of Great Britain,
for having suffered this horrid trade to be carried on under their
authority. We are all guilty—we ought all to plead guilty, and not to
exculpate ourselves by throwing the blame on others; and I therefore
deprecate every kind of reflection against the various descriptions of
people who are more immediately involved in this wretched business."
William Wilberforce, 1789 Abolition Speech in the House of Commons. (Copied from one of the comments to the article).
Some commenters pointed out that Arab and African traders were involoved in the slave trade long before European nations entered the business, yet they have not been asked to apologise, and that many forms of slavery exist to this day, some flourishing in Africa. The interesting thing to me was how the comment stream quickly spiralled into a discussion on modern-day racism and related topics. There were some notably frank, straightforward and non-politically-correct comments from a Cape Town correspondent calling herself "Media 1". I hasten to point out that while I found these comments interesting, they do not represent my own thinking in any way. My observation is that in South Africa today, not many people are prepared to express such thoughts openly - the risk of being branded racist is ever present.
Sample:
Media 1, Cape Town / 11:18am 27 Nov 2006 Slavery
was terrible, slavery IS terrible! Many nations in Africa still
practice it just as they did many hundreds of years prior to the white
mans arrival. But for the white man to apologise for it would be absurd. I
truly believe that only apology should come from Africa herself. I
think an apology for failing to keep up with the rest of the world
would go a long way to curing her current problems. Let African
leaders apologise for their disruptive, disrespectful and barbaric
behaviour over the last 60 years. Let them take responsibilty so that
the rest of the world can move on and worry about our own problems as
opposed to the CONSTANT plight of Africa and her people. Let them stop their slavery and their mass genocidal missions of ethnic cleansing..African's must allow Africa to flourish! The white man must apologise for nothing! Another comment on the issue from The Daily Telegraph
5:20:49 PM 
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