I think that most people are, in factd, beaten down and confused. They're
just living their lives, making it from one day to the next. I used to
really like reading all of the articles that come to me in my inbox. I liked
to know what was happening and to read various opinions and interpretations.
I find that my attitude has changed. I find it all very distressing. I feel
like we are being manipulated by forces beyond our control. People do a lot
of theorizing and interpreting and demonstrating. They glory in the fact
that a lot of people come to a demonstration, or that they're able to delay
a catastrophe. But look at Standing Rock. Pipelines are being built all over
America. It's an absolute nightmare. And when Trump takes office, that
pipeline in North Dakota will most probably be revived. Right wing
governments are taking root in many european countries. Today I read an
article in The Atlantic about how China is becoming more repressive and
hostile. James Fallows knows China well, lived there, and has a lot of
friends there, so I'm sure what he writes is accurate, although I suspect
that one of the reasons for the change in China is that the US has placed
all these ships in the waters surrounding China. But anyway, my point is
that it is all very overwhelming and depressing. I may surround myself with
articles by writers whom I respect, but the people whom I encounter are a
sample of the white, Long Island population and some of the views that they
express, are distressing, to say the least.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Sunday, December 18, 2016 10:10 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: What Should Reparations For Slavery Entail?
Well, most of us know how we got into our current mess, and we know what to
do to bring dignity and respect to all People. So what's stopping us?
How long are we going to allow ourselves to be ruled by Lust and Greed? Has
the Ruling Class really conditioned us to think only as far as the end of
our own noses? Do we really enjoy being victimized?
Have we been so beaten down that we wander aimlessly about like Zombies?
Spineless and frightened?
If we do not take charge of our own lives and determine our collective
future, we will all end this Human Experiment with a sad little whimper.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/18/16, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
What Should Reparations For Slavery Entail?infrastructure, not prisons.
CREATE! CAPITALISM, REPARATIONS, SLAVERY By Ama Biney,
www.pambazuka.org December 17th, 2016
Powered by Translate
Above Photo: Aehnetwork
In the light of the former British Prime Ministers dismissal of
reparations, activists must push the debate further by detailing what
reparations should entail. Fundamental to a reparations programme must
be the fact that we transform the system of capitalism which slavery
gave birth to.
Former British Prime Minister David Camerons insulting dismissal of
trans-Atlantic slavery and his opinion that Africans and people of
African descent should move on from this painful legacy, and continue
to build for the future, would never be audaciously uttered to Jewish
people by this arrogant warmonger who bombed Libya and sought to bomb
Syria, but the British House of Commons voted against such action. As
the African American actor Danny Glover said, the Jamaican government
should tell Britain to keep your prison, give us schools, give us
[1] In addition, the Jamaican government should ask Cameron to returnslavery and colonialism.
all the professional Jamaicans who are teachers, lecturers, health
workers, IT consultants, etc. to Jamaica instead of the criminals.
Moreover, Cameron should then pay the salaries of these Jamaican
professionals whilst they develop the economy of Jamaica for the
almost 400 years that slavery lasted.
In short, we must confront the reality that one of the reasons why
there is a brain drain in the Caribbean and Africa is the lack of
decent and attractive salaries to retain African professionals.
Britain can foot the bill to address this inequality that sprung from
It is necessary to advance the debate on whether Britain and the Westbodies and history do not matter.
in general (i.e. all those slave trading nations such as France, The
Netherlands, Spain, the USA, Portugal, etc.) should pay reparations:
what should reparations entail?
Acknowledging the atrocity and enormity of this experience is
necessary in an official apology. Commentators have observed how the
Maoris received an apology from the British Queen in 1995.[2] In 2008
the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd apologised in parliament to
all Aborigines for laws and policies that inflicted profound grief,
suffering and loss.[3] It appears when it comes to Africans our lives,
Racism will find various rationalisations (or excuses) to deny that5120588487https://twitter.com/popresistancehttps://twitter.com/popresistance
enslavement of Africans merits an apology and reparations. Yet, we
cannot erase the collective historical memory and experiences of
enslavement that was wrought on people of African descent and
continues with the covert and overt forms of racial discrimination
that they still experience in the 21stcentury. Notions of racial
supremacy and the inferiority of Black people are rooted in the brutal
killings of Black males by white police officers in both the US and
UK. Such notions stem from the legacy of slavery that gave rise to
racist stereotypes harboured by racist societies that have
institutionalised racism. Perhaps it should also be the case that in a
programme of reparatory justice, there should be legal redress for the
lives of the hundreds of Black men killed by racist police officers,
as well as the people of African descent unjustly incarcerated in
Americas prisons.
Whilst it is the case that no amount of financial compensation can
address the psychological and emotional scars of enslavement of people
of African descent, nor the horrors of the Middle Passage, nor those
who remain buried in the Atlantic Ocean as a consequence of suicide,
nor the 132 Africans deliberately thrown overboard in 1786 on the
slave ship Zong -in order that the ship owners could claim the
insurance a comprehensive economic package needs to address the
fact that the current economic and technological underdevelopment of
Africa and the Caribbean is symptomatic of the impact of 400 years of
enslavement. This enslavement was followed by the brief but no less
damaging interlude of colonialism and must be recognised as central to
any form of reparations.
There are those who refuse to accept the fact that the economic wealth
of Europe was built on the sweat, blood and toil of African people to
the detriment of Africa. Yet, let us be clear that the trans-Atlantic
slave trade was not a trade. The meaning of trade supposes equal
benefit to both parties. It was not trade but the looting of Africa
in which Europe benefitted at the expense of Africa as Walter Rodney
graphically illustrates in his acclaimed book, How Europe
Underdeveloped Africa. The consequence for Africa was and remains
that the African economy taken as a whole was diverted away from its
previous line of development and became distorted.[4] Reparations is
therefore a quest to repair the economic damage of underdevelopment
wrought by the process of enslavement and colonialism.
This
economic redress will be symbolic for it may run into trillions of
dollars, for one can never place an economic value on the millions of
Africans whose lives were lost in the slave raids, or as they died in
the long march to the forts on the coast. How many died on such
journeys? Can we account for those enslaved women who secretly aborted
or killed their child to prevent them from experiencing slavery? And
should we not include the medical experimentations carried out on the
bodies of enslaved African women graphically documented in the books
From Midwives to Medicine and Medical Apartheid? [5] As for the
psychological impact of enslavement, that too is another site of
struggle that people of African descent must address through spiritual
and psychological healing as well as education in which they reconnect
to understanding and learning about their history prior to
enslavement. For it is essential for Africans and the world to know
that Africans had a rich and complex history prior to the holocaust of
the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
Also, it is important for us to remember that on the ending of slavery
in the British colonies, the British government were able to
compensate the slave owners £20 million (£20 billion in todays
money). There was no compensation for the former enslaved African men
and women. In the USA there were pledges to the freed men and women of
forty acres and a mule that never materialised across the board.[6]
Hence, we need to address the question: What should reparations for
slavery entail? It should address the following:
First, an apology to all continental Africans and people of African
descent for the immorality of slavery, for merely stating regret
as the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair did in 2007 is mere
cant.[7] The former Jamaican Prime Minister P. J. Patterson stated
recently in an open letter to David Cameron: Contrary to your view,
the Caribbean people will never emerge completely from the long, dark
shadow of slavery until there is a full confession of guilt by those
who committed this evil atrocity.[8] Second, we must demand that all
Western governments instruct Western museums and citizens to hand over
to African countries illicitly acquired African artefacts languishing
both publicly and privately in their hidden vaults. They must also
provide the training and facilities for African countries to host,
display and conserve these returned items. This includes thousands of
artefacts, among them being the more famous and well known 400
Ethiopian treasures looted by British soldiers during the 1868 Magdala
expedition. [9] There are also the Benin bronzes looted in the British
invasion of the Nigerian kingdom of Benin in 1896.[10] Kwame Opoku has
diligently written on the need for these and many other African
artefacts to be returned to African nations.
Third, as mentioned above, the brain drain of African and African
Caribbean professionals should be halted by offering these
professionals the same salaries to voluntarily return to Africa and
the Caribbean in order to assist in the building of new schools,
universities, hospitals and clinics that would be set up and financed
by a comprehensive reparations economic programme.
Fourth, cancellation of all debt incurred by the Caribbean and African
nations on the grounds that they are odious and were not incurred by
the ordinary citizens of Africa and the Caribbean but rather their
ruling classes. Cancellation would free up these critical funds to
address the real needs of African citizens. Moreover, it is the case
that Africa loses approximately $50 billion a year through illicit
financial flows out of which are draining foreign exchange reserves,
reducing tax collection and deepening poverty. This colossal amount
may well be short of the reality as accurate figures do not exist for
all African countries. However, it is approximately double the
official development assistance (ODA) that Africa receives.[11] In
short, aid is simply a paltry and ineffective band aid that keeps
African economies in a continued process of economic subordination to
neoliberal capitalism under the illusion that there will be trickle
down growth. Blocking the haemorrhaging of illicit financial flows
and tax dodging would ensure there are funds and resources to build
railways to connect African people and economies; invest in adult
education that is almost non-existent in Africa compared to primary,
secondary and university education; massively expand electrification,
greener energy forms for ordinary citizens and provide employment for
African people, particularly the youth.
Overall, a dialogue within progressive activist circles and among
progressive Europeans, genuinely committed to addressing the profound
inequities of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and colonialism needs to
begin.
Farmers, womens groups, young people, people with disabilities, LBGTI
individuals, academics, professional people in the Caribbean and
Africa must be involved in this trans-Atlantic dialogue on what
reparations should entail, as well as, creating progressive
governments and leadership (compared to the current compliant
neo-colonial incumbents), to push for a reparations programme.
Ultimately, in addressing the issue of reparations, we must also
address transforming the system of capitalism which slavery gave birth
to. A rupture with this unequal and exploitative system is fundamental
in eliminating oppression that remains with us in the twenty first
century in reconfigured forms.
* Dr. Ama Biney is a historian and political scientist living in UK.
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What Should Reparations For Slavery Entail?
Create! Capitalism, Reparations, Slavery By Ama Biney,
www.pambazuka.org December 17th, 2016
Powered by https://translate.google.com/Translate
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valid.Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.Error! Hyperlink reference
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not valid.Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.Error! Hyperlink reference
Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.Error! Hyperlink reference not valid.infrastructure, not prisons.
Above Photo: Aehnetwork
In the light of the former British Prime Ministers dismissal of
reparations, activists must push the debate further by detailing what
reparations should entail. Fundamental to a reparations programme must
be the fact that we transform the system of capitalism which slavery
gave birth to.
Former British Prime Minister David Camerons insulting dismissal of
trans-Atlantic slavery and his opinion that Africans and people of
African descent should move on from this painful legacy, and continue
to build for the future, would never be audaciously uttered to Jewish
people by this arrogant warmonger who bombed Libya and sought to bomb
Syria, but the British House of Commons voted against such action. As
the African American actor Danny Glover said, the Jamaican government
should tell Britain to keep your prison, give us schools, give us
[1] In addition, the Jamaican government should ask Cameron to returnslavery and colonialism.
all the professional Jamaicans who are teachers, lecturers, health
workers, IT consultants, etc. to Jamaica instead of the criminals.
Moreover, Cameron should then pay the salaries of these Jamaican
professionals whilst they develop the economy of Jamaica for the
almost 400 years that slavery lasted.
In short, we must confront the reality that one of the reasons why
there is a brain drain in the Caribbean and Africa is the lack of
decent and attractive salaries to retain African professionals.
Britain can foot the bill to address this inequality that sprung from
It is necessary to advance the debate on whether Britain and the Westbodies and history do not matter.
in general (i.e. all those slave trading nations such as France, The
Netherlands, Spain, the USA, Portugal, etc.) should pay reparations:
what should reparations entail?
Acknowledging the atrocity and enormity of this experience is
necessary in an official apology. Commentators have observed how the
Maoris received an apology from the British Queen in 1995.[2] In 2008
the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd apologised in parliament to
all Aborigines for laws and policies that inflicted profound grief,
suffering and loss.[3] It appears when it comes to Africans our lives,
Racism will find various rationalisations (or excuses) to deny that1868 Magdala expedition.
enslavement of Africans merits an apology and reparations. Yet, we
cannot erase the collective historical memory and experiences of
enslavement that was wrought on people of African descent and
continues with the covert and overt forms of racial discrimination
that they still experience in the 21stcentury. Notions of racial
supremacy and the inferiority of Black people are rooted in the brutal
killings of Black males by white police officers in both the US and
UK. Such notions stem from the legacy of slavery that gave rise to
racist stereotypes harboured by racist societies that have
institutionalised racism. Perhaps it should also be the case that in a
programme of reparatory justice, there should be legal redress for the
lives of the hundreds of Black men killed by racist police officers,
as well as the people of African descent unjustly incarcerated in
Americas prisons.
Whilst it is the case that no amount of financial compensation can
address the psychological and emotional scars of enslavement of people
of African descent, nor the horrors of the Middle Passage, nor those
who remain buried in the Atlantic Ocean as a consequence of suicide,
nor the 132 Africans deliberately thrown overboard in 1786 on the
slave ship Zong -in order that the ship owners could claim the
insurance a comprehensive economic package needs to address the fact
that the current economic and technological underdevelopment of Africa
and the Caribbean is symptomatic of the impact of 400 years of
enslavement. This enslavement was followed by the brief but no less
damaging interlude of colonialism and must be recognised as central to
any form of reparations.
There are those who refuse to accept the fact that the economic wealth
of Europe was built on the sweat, blood and toil of African people to
the detriment of Africa. Yet, let us be clear that the trans-Atlantic
slave trade was not a trade. The meaning of trade supposes equal
benefit to both parties. It was not trade but the looting of Africa
in which Europe benefitted at the expense of Africa as Walter Rodney
graphically illustrates in his acclaimed book, How Europe
Underdeveloped Africa. The consequence for Africa was and remains
that the African economy taken as a whole was diverted away from its
previous line of development and became distorted.[4] Reparations is
therefore a quest to repair the economic damage of underdevelopment
wrought by the process of enslavement and colonialism.
This
economic redress will be symbolic for it may run into trillions of
dollars, for one can never place an economic value on the millions of
Africans whose lives were lost in the slave raids, or as they died in
the long march to the forts on the coast. How many died on such
journeys? Can we account for those enslaved women who secretly aborted
or killed their child to prevent them from experiencing slavery? And
should we not include the medical experimentations carried out on the
bodies of enslaved African women graphically documented in the books
From Midwives to Medicine and Medical Apartheid? [5] As for the
psychological impact of enslavement, that too is another site of
struggle that people of African descent must address through spiritual
and psychological healing as well as education in which they reconnect
to understanding and learning about their history prior to
enslavement. For it is essential for Africans and the world to know
that Africans had a rich and complex history prior to the holocaust of
the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
Also, it is important for us to remember that on the ending of slavery
in the British colonies, the British government were able to
compensate the slave owners £20 million (£20 billion in todays
money). There was no compensation for the former enslaved African men
and women. In the USA there were pledges to the freed men and women of
forty acres and a mule that never materialised across the board.[6]
Hence, we need to address the question: What should reparations for
slavery entail? It should address the following:
First, an apology to all continental Africans and people of African
descent for the immorality of slavery, for merely stating regret
as the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair did in 2007 is mere
cant.[7] The former Jamaican Prime Minister P. J. Patterson stated
recently in an open letter to David Cameron: Contrary to your view,
the Caribbean people will never emerge completely from the long, dark
shadow of slavery until there is a full confession of guilt by those
who committed this evil atrocity.[8] Second, we must demand that all
Western governments instruct Western museums and citizens to hand over
to African countries illicitly acquired African artefacts languishing
both publicly and privately in their hidden vaults.
They must also provide the training and facilities for African
countries to host, display and conserve these returned items. This
includes thousands of artefacts, among them being the more famous and
well known 400 Ethiopian treasures looted by British soldiers during the
[9]
There are also the Benin bronzes looted in the British invasion of the
Nigerian kingdom of Benin in 1896.[10] Kwame Opoku has diligently
written on the need for these and many other African artefacts to be
returned to African nations.
Third, as mentioned above, the brain drain of African and African
Caribbean professionals should be halted by offering these
professionals the same salaries to voluntarily return to Africa and
the Caribbean in order to assist in the building of new schools,
universities, hospitals and clinics that would be set up and financed
by a comprehensive reparations economic programme.
Fourth, cancellation of all debt incurred by the Caribbean and African
nations on the grounds that they are odious and were not incurred by
the ordinary citizens of Africa and the Caribbean but rather their
ruling classes. Cancellation would free up these critical funds to
address the real needs of African citizens. Moreover, it is the case
that Africa loses approximately $50 billion a year through illicit
financial flows out of which are draining foreign exchange reserves,
reducing tax collection and deepening poverty. This colossal amount
may well be short of the reality as accurate figures do not exist for
all African countries. However, it is approximately double the
official development assistance (ODA) that Africa receives.[11] In
short, aid is simply a paltry and ineffective band aid that keeps
African economies in a continued process of economic subordination to
neoliberal capitalism under the illusion that there will be trickle
down growth. Blocking the haemorrhaging of illicit financial flows
and tax dodging would ensure there are funds and resources to build
railways to connect African people and economies; invest in adult
education that is almost non-existent in Africa compared to primary,
secondary and university education; massively expand electrification,
greener energy forms for ordinary citizens and provide employment for
African people, particularly the youth.
Overall, a dialogue within progressive activist circles and among
progressive Europeans, genuinely committed to addressing the profound
inequities of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and colonialism needs to
begin.
Farmers, womens groups, young people, people with disabilities, LBGTI
individuals, academics, professional people in the Caribbean and
Africa must be involved in this trans-Atlantic dialogue on what
reparations should entail, as well as, creating progressive
governments and leadership (compared to the current compliant
neo-colonial incumbents), to push for a reparations programme.
Ultimately, in addressing the issue of reparations, we must also
address transforming the system of capitalism which slavery gave birth
to. A rupture with this unequal and exploitative system is fundamental
in eliminating oppression that remains with us in the twenty first
century in reconfigured forms.
* Dr. Ama Biney is a historian and political scientist living in UK.
