There has been a black u.s President, there’s currently a black Vice President, there are many black judges, CEO’s, drs, teachers, police officers, watch most sports and you’ll see black athletes dominating etc etc, so as a mixed race person I have to wonder why these examples were able to achieve whilst others require restitution? It doesn’t take long to realise it is not a colour or race issue but a rich versus poor issue, black people ‘mostly’ have much more opportunity in life than dirt poor trailer park white people

What about apartheid? Would you say the natives should get reparations? Just curious on how people view that part of very recent history.

Are you trying to excuse the British from all the treasure they stole from the world? It is estimated that the UK stole $3 trillion worth of resources from India (shouldn't they give some back); they controlled the heroin trade in China; they wandered across Africa stealing all the art and precious metals they could get their hands on; they stole art from Greece - I could go on but I think I will just play some Moody Blues to calm down

From a comment above that I thing pretty accurately says how I feel: "All this equivocation in the comments... This post and the comments assume all of Africa was one people, so "sold their own." There were tribes and cities and nations and straight up kidnapping like anywhere else. The difference is slavery in the western trade being permanent, having zero human rights, and selling apart families. That was not custom in the majority of African cultures until white colonization. Read about Belgium and King Leopold for starters. What they took can never be replaced and that kind of devastation leads to people selling enemies and strangers."

Some reparations is compensation for provable misdeeds such as a Black family's land seized without justification or monetary compensation by ( usually) a city government. Not always the case. But sometimes reparation to a specific family is justified.

They didn‘t sell „their own people“ as Africa has never existed as one ethnic group. There were tribes just like in Europe and they fought and had alliances just like in Europe - and they enslaved their enemies just like in Europe.

Um, reparations are made to the decendants of slaves. It doesn't matter how they became slaves in the first place. The western economy is built on the back of slavery and continues to oppress certain groups including those decended from slaves.

@Sue - No, there are no more slaves. The idea behind reparations is to counter the significant negative and measurable effects that still currently exist for black people in the US on finances, health, education, social justice and civic engagement. You're entitled to be of the opinion that, because ancestors in Africa sold their people, and because no slaves are now alive, the US has no responsibility for how it has treated its black citizens, but those debating the issue are well aware of those things and have certainly done their research.

Northern Africa is populated by Arabs. (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia). They were slave traders and the link between Africa and Europe.

Where did you get that information from? I want to learn more about it.

This comment is hidden. Click here to view.

Racist much ?

I think when most people discuss reparation, the idea is not to financially reimburse people for what their ancestors suffered, but to stop the racism that (provably!) exists today. Redlining. Underfunding of predominantly black schools. Discrimination in employment. Etc. (And if the knee-jerk racists could manage to get their heads out of their butts, they might realize that the real war is not between races, but between classes.)

They also did not consider the people they were selling to be "their own people" just by virtue of being black skinned. This is a largely modern concept. The people they were selling came from tribes their own tribe had conquered. Not their own people at all, by their definition. If they hadn't sold them, they would have still been slaves under a slightly different model of slavery (differing from the colonies chattel slavery). The real problem with slavery is accepting it in any form at all. And the US still has one legal form of slavery - forcing the incarcerated to labor for a token "wage". It's also part of what motivates the system to incarcerate people of color more than any other group. There are still black slaves in the United States.

They had young men, old men and boys in cages on the beach waiting for the ship to come in from Europe. They knew.

absolution? we are taking of things, that happened more that 200 years ago and made sense in that time. To talk about absolution and reparation - that is to take it out of context.

Yeah a lot of people seem to think of 'Africa' as a country instead of a whole continent of countries and cultures.

You're correct, Bunzilla. To quote my own other comment here: "They also did not consider the people they were selling to be "their own people" just by virtue of being black skinned. This is a largely modern concept. The people they were selling came from tribes their own tribe had conquered. Not their own people at all, by their definition. If they hadn't sold them, they would have still been slaves under a slightly different model of slavery (differing from the colonies chattel slavery)."

In our "anti-woke" history classes?

This comment has been deleted.

Many people try to use this aspect of history to absolve slavery. “See, black people did it too!”, while wilfully ignoring the fact that the echoes of slavey have carried on down the centuries and are still affecting people today

Of course they are ....look at the comments ....all a bunch of racist pricks

Maria please give me one book where you get this from.

Not even close! The Portuguese needed workers for their new colonies at San Tomé and Principe, off the coast of West Africa. They realised they could trade guns for people, and immediately started organising a slave trade to feed their need for sugar plantations. When they expanded across the Atlantic, they grew the idea. Brits, French, and Spanish all did the same. If someone didn't want to sell slaves, they'd sell guns to their enemies and those enemies would enslave them. There wasn't the choice to not sell slaves.

They were not sold to chattel slavery. They were sold to work for several years. This is not this simple and reeks of racism.

From a comment above that I thing pretty accurately says how I feel: "All this equivocation in the comments... This post and the comments assume all of Africa was one people, so "sold their own." There were tribes and cities and nations and straight up kidnapping like anywhere else. The difference is slavery in the western trade being permanent, having zero human rights, and selling apart families. That was not custom in the majority of African cultures until white colonization. Read about Belgium and King Leopold for starters. What they took can never be replaced and that kind of devastation leads to people selling enemies and strangers."

Lol. *sure* they were trying to *help*

Which African kings in particular?