Slavery
Human slavery
has been in existence since our ancestors eschewed hunting/gathering for
built-up groupings called cities. Slaves
originated from physical conquest on a mass scale, or from economic domination
on a more personal level. In any case,
it resulted in one group of human beings owning another group of human beings
as property. Slavery is covered by
Hammurabi of Babylon as early as 1800 BCE, and repeatedly in the bible.
Slavery was
never “nice” or pleasant for the slave because he or she was at the mercy of
their owner or master, who was sometimes beneficent, and sometimes nasty and
cruel. Race was not a particular issue for
slavery in ancient times. Slaves were
whoever were conquered or captured, or who owed money or goods.
Weaker societies
or groups of people were obvious targets for stronger, more militaristic
raiders. One might speculate that
indigenous North Americans might have formed the bulk of this hemisphere’s
slaves if European diseases had not decimated them.
In the 15th
century, the Portuguese started “slaving” indigenous black Africans who were
captured and sold to the Portuguese by other stronger black African war lords.
Since this was lucrative business for all, it burgeoned, and other
militaristic/mercantile traders, like Britain, Spain, Holland and others. got
into the act. The American
colonies, with their fields of cotton, were prime targets for this slave trade.
Back then, it
was “follow the money”. American
“liberty for all” was fine, as long as you were male and Caucasian and
“freeborn”. Slavery was well
established, even in the Christian bible.
Some Northern colonist’s appeals for emancipation fell on deaf ears,
even amongst northern textile mills.
Americans fought
a civil war in which some 750,000 predominantly white Americans died to free
nearly 4 million black American slaves.
Another century of civil strife ensued before a modicum of true equality
of the races was attained in the United States.
There still continues to be racial unrest, primarily fueled by activists
such as Black Lives Matter, Antifa, and such inflammatory propaganda as “The
1619 Project” and “Critical Race Theory”, which the ultra-left “woke” movement
is attempting to install in our schools.
There is also a
movement afoot to offer “reparations” to descendants of original African slaves,
particularly in such left-leaning venues such as Gavin Newsome’s California. Payments of nearly $250,000 are in the works
by fiscally broke California to many of its black residents, most of whom are 4th
or 5th generation descendants of original slaves. IMHO, like much of current “woke” political
correctness. this proposal is too stupid for meaningful comment.
Some References
About Slavery
World slavery
summary
https://totallyhistory.com/slavery/
Britannica
review of historical slavery
https://www.britannica.com/topic/slavery-sociology/Historical-survey
African/American
slavery – NYT “Woke” version
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/19/magazine/history-slavery-smithsonian.html
The 1619 Project
and American Marxism
https://libertyscholar.org/the-1619-project/
The American
Black’s View of American Slavery
https://www.theroot.com/slavery-by-the-numbers-1790874492
Ray Gruszecki
February 8, 2023
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