Is slavery a big issue?

[Saigon]

As for the OP, anyone who has graduated from high school in the US will have read about, discussed, and studied slavery very extensively.

I am pleased to hear that.

It is only by learning about these things that we can stop them being repeated.

And it was nice to see quite a few African-Americans (including the Obamas) do go to the castles to see this history for themselves...

 

[Publius1787]

Slavery is only a big deal if used as a modern bargaining chip to bring historical sympathy to an modern political ends. And a weak one at that.

The same could be said of the Holocaust, and yet I can think of a dozen major movies (Sohpie's Choice, Schindler's List, The Reader) to have touched on specific elements of that during the past 20 years or so.

I agree that slavery, like the Holocaust, can be used as a bargaining chip, but on the other hand, it remains a crucial aspect of American (and African & European) history.

I'm surprised African-Americans don't focus more on it - not as a means to screw more welfare out of the state, but as a means of informing both black and white people as to the history and what that history means for the US.

Sure. there nothing wrong with teaching and learning history. But to use it as a weak barganing chip for political ends, which it is today, takes the discussion from its merits.

 

[Indofred]

Indofred -

Yeah, I wouldn't mess with those snakehead gangs. Or any of the other mafia who are involved with human trafficking. They are dangerous people.

Ghana probably isn't the best place for travel with a young child, but when the little 'un gets a bit older...lots of good beaches, and kids would love the chimps and jungle, I'm sure!

I used to have a lot to do with the Chinese in Manchester. My business was something they could use and were very willing to pay for when they found someone willing to work in the way they wanted the job done.
Most had no understanding of the culture, so fucked up in short order.
I, for various reasons, picked up enough Mandarin to do basic conversations.
That also meant I started to understand things most westerners never get to know about Chinese society in the UK.
Basically, there are the old Triads from HK who came over with the HK people many years ago and the snakeheads (from south China) that came over with the influx from Fujian.
There were tensions at first but they decided it was mutually useful to work together and share, rather than have coppers everywhere, looking after gang violence.
The Triads still run most of the gambling but the snakeheads run the people smuggling and most of the prostitution.
The latter is where the slavery comes in.
The cost of getting into the UK is very high. That and the daft interest means tens years or more of work before they pay off the debt.
Many, because of UK law and their lack of English, can't find any work so they're pretty much forced to become pros, often against their will.
No cash means retribution against their family in China.

The brothels remain unknown to the police as they are for Chinese only and no one talks.
The link I posted earlier shows why.
That's where the Thai one in Sheffield went wrong. They were very public and someone blabbed. (Rightly)

A while ago, there was a UK government report that stated there was no serious enforced prostitution problem in the UK.
Way wrong - they just couldn't find it.

 

[Umoja]

Slavery is only important to those who were enslaved. History forgotten is history repeated.

 

[Politico]

Is slavery a big issue?

Nope. Not even AN issue.

 

[Artevelde]

I was in Ghana last month and visited a few of the massive slave castles built by the British, Duth and Portuguese and used to ship slaves to the Americas.

The numbers are fairly staggering - the Portuguese alone shipped 4.65 million people. Even tiny Denmark shipped 50,000 slaves. Ghana alone saw 1.5 million people exported from their coastline.

What got me thinking is that slavery doesn't seem to have received a huge amount of media coverage over the years.

I can think of one movie (Spielberg's Amistad) and one TV series (Roots) and a couple of books which refer to it, but not a great deal when one considers how important the trade was to the history of the US.

Even Amistad was made by a Jewish director rather than an African-American one!

Is slavery too sensitive to discuss, or is it just so long ago that no one cares anymore?

The slavery is only one of the many forms that existed over human history and not the most recent one. Slavery lasted far longer in the Arab world.

There is also little being written or sais about Europeans being enslaved by North-African pirates.

 

[Artevelde]

Slavery is only a big deal if used as a modern bargaining chip to bring historical sympathy to an modern political ends. And a weak one at that.

The same could be said of the Holocaust, and yet I can think of a dozen major movies (Sohpie's Choice, Schindler's List, The Reader) to have touched on specific elements of that during the past 20 years or so.

I agree that slavery, like the Holocaust, can be used as a bargaining chip, but on the other hand, it remains a crucial aspect of American (and African & European) history.

I'm surprised African-Americans don't focus more on it - not as a means to screw more welfare out of the state, but as a means of informing both black and white people as to the history and what that history means for the US.

Somehow it is not surprising to see you write about slavery as if this only involved whites and Africans. you conveniently ignore the much longer and more widespread enslavement of Africans by Arabs, as well as - of course, the much more widespread enslavement of Africans by Africans.

 

[Artevelde]

What IS a big deal is the confused masses who seem to believe that America was the only nation built on the backs of African slaves or even that America was somehow the worst offender.
Anyone interested in the slavery issue would do well to remedy that bit of confusion first and foremost.

I totally agree.

I thought the local museums did a good job of mapping the slave trade, making it very clear the role France, Denmark and Sweden etc played, and also looking at countries like Brazil, Haiti, Jamaica.

Did they also talk about the enslavement of Africans by Africans locally?

 

[Artevelde]

It isn't much discussed in the media because the media is too busy pitting Americans at each other throats to pay too much attention to history.

Hell !~ all sorts of important history is largely ignored because why?

Because it isn't NEWS, that's why.

I couldn't agree more - America as a society seems to have become so obsessed with navel gazing and vitriolic attacks on other Americans that there is little time or space for anything else. The US media could do a lot better job of covering issues other than the endless Dem/GOP debates.

Slavery isn't news, but is important, and I think important to all Americans. Not to mention to Africans and Europeans.

If you were less of a provincial navel gazer yourself you would know that the history of slavery is very widely studied in the US.

 

[Unkotare]

Slavery is only important to those who were enslaved. History forgotten is history repeated.

Um, you don't see how you are contradicting yourself there?

 

[Unkotare]

Is slavery a big issue?

Nope. Not even AN issue.

???