The Economist is carrying a free story (free except for the annoying subscribe pop-up) about a French slave trading ship that crashed into a reef and sunk just off of the tiny island named "Île de Sable" on July 31st 1761.
The Island is a tiny mountain top of sand 500 miles east of Madagascar. The island was subsequently re-named Tromelin Island (google map link) for reasons explained in the article. Zoom in and out again to see just how desolate a place this still is.
The shipwrecked French crew, built a boat out of the wreckage of their ship, with the help of some of the slaves. The boat they built, for lack of materials, could accommodate only about half of the people stranded. So all 123 Frenchmen climbed into the boat, left the 88 remaining slaves (out of an original 160 or more), and sailed off toward Madagascar, with a promise to return.
The article is the story of how that promise was not kept, not entirely the fault of the French First Officer, who pleaded for a ship to rescue the slaves, but was rebuffed at every turn. Too busy worrying about the British fleet was the excuse.
Finally in November 1776, 15 years after the shipwreck, with the British Fleet otherwise distracted, a French ship arrived and rescued the last seven remaining survivors (all women except a 8 month old baby boy) from the island.
The story is an interesting read, and documents how easy it was to be callously abandoned in that day and age. (Not nearly as callous as being sold into slavery by your own disaffected relatives, mind you!).
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @06:58PM
It is historical fact that they were making slaves of each other long before the Europeans arrived. It was rather standard practice in tribal warfare to either enslave the losers or wipe them out entirely.
(Score: 4, Touché) by tangomargarine on Thursday December 17 2015, @07:00PM
inter-tribal warfare != "by your own disaffected relatives"
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @07:32PM
but aren't we all relatives to some extent ...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @07:40PM
Do your research. The African tribal chiefs traded his own people for use as slaves in return for goods. The roots of slavery go back to at least 1800 B.C. Don't blame it all on the whites, it was in use way before.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Thursday December 17 2015, @08:03PM
Participating in slavery and/or genocide is abhorrent and disgraceful regardless of how many steps are involved and the nuances of 'who started it'.
Slavery exists today as it did before America and days of European Empires. It's all the same, it's disgusting and people of all races and nationalities have been complicit in it at some level. We may be ignorant, naive, apathetic or just powerless, but slavery continues to modernize and adapt to advances technology and social events.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @08:09PM
Exactly, it's no less abhorrent but stop acting like all the colored people were living in harmony for millenia before white men showed up and invented it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @08:28PM
Nice strawman you've got there.
(Score: 3, Touché) by tibman on Thursday December 17 2015, @08:37PM
What color is it?
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @11:07PM
It's not really a straw man when so many people forget to take into account nuances like this.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @11:47PM
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Anyone who believes that unrelated tribes selling prisoners of war as slaves to europeans means that the slaves are somehow responsible for their own slavement then they must also believe that completely unrelated people of european decent are responsible for buying those slaves and keeping them enslaved. You don't get to assign collective responsibility to all black people simply because they are black and then turn around and the deny that white people directly and collectively benefited from their side of the transaction too.
Yeah the tribes selling prisoners as slaves were scum, but that doesn't exculpate the people buying those slaves, keeping them and breeding them so that their children and their children's children were born into slavery by one iota. Not one iota. Two wrongs do not make a right.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @12:37AM
means that the slaves are somehow responsible for their own slavement
This is the real straw man.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @01:46AM
> This is the real straw man.
Its the logical conclusion of getting worked up about "disaffected relatives."
In the US there were only two groups - slave owners and slaves. If the fault wasn't with the slave owners then it must lie on the slaves themselves.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Friday December 18 2015, @03:33AM
In the US there were only two groups - slave owners and slaves. If the fault wasn't with the slave owners then it must lie on the slaves themselves.
Slaves from Africa didn't travel to the US and then get enslaved. You ignore the third group in Africa doing the enslaving. Then there's other groups in the US who had nothing to do with slavery.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @03:49AM
> Slaves from Africa didn't travel to the US and then get enslaved.
So what? Once they are here that's all that matters.
> Then there's other groups in the US who had nothing to do with slavery.
Thank you captain obvious. Now say something that is relevant.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday December 18 2015, @10:16PM
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday December 18 2015, @03:47AM
In order to sort out what the real straw man is, I must recommend the book Things Fall Apart [barnesandnoble.com] by Chinua Achebe. Granted, it takes place in a later era, but it does give some insight into authentic African culture. It contains some folklore as well. (Well, how is folklore not part of culture?)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @03:53AM
Yeah. No one is going to go read some random book just because you said they should. If you can't be bothered to summarize what about the book applies to the topic at hand, fuck I can't even be bothered to click that link. All you did was post to make yourself feel good.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday December 18 2015, @03:54AM
Holy crap. Hate to reply to myself. There's a movie version! [youtube.com] I'm not sure what to think of this, given that African culture is mostly oral tradition. At any rate, interesting.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday December 18 2015, @03:55AM
Terrible audio, btw. Overmodding, ho!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @02:47PM
The bottom line is at the time in the 18th century, this was accepted practice. Doesn't make it "right", but at that time it was considered "right". While I, and most everybody, finds it abhorrent, those involved found it business as usual.
What current practices that we consider as normal or "right" today will our descendants find abhorrent in 100+ years? Livestock Factories? Animal Testing on Primates?
Most people today don't even think about these practices, or prefer to ignore any complicity they have in them (eating cheap chicken, etc.).
It was the same in 1761 for right or wrong. Arguing who sold who into slavery is just silly since it won't solve anything. I would argue there is no single race that can be considered perfect.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @02:25PM
Nice fallacy fallacy you've got there.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @08:22PM
> Do your research.
Go google it!
On the internet that's how you say "I'm wrong but my ego is too fragile to admit it!"
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @10:02PM
It can also mean "I'm not going to do your homework for you!" Honestly, if you are so pig-headed that you refuse to educate yourself, then why should we even bother to engage you? You do realize that 90% of the responsibility to learn is on the student, right?
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @10:14PM
> It can also mean "I'm not going to do your homework for you!"
Then why are you posting trying to convince us of anything in the first place?
> You do realize that 90% of the responsibility to learn is on the student, right?
Ok, this student just took that responsibility and learned that there is zero evidence for your claims.
So now its settled. You were full of bullshit all along.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @04:45PM
Protip: there are at least a few people that post as AC. Neither are we some collective hive mind. Honestly, I shouldn't really even need to explain this.
(Score: 2) by el_oscuro on Thursday December 17 2015, @11:26PM
You mean something like this?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Historical+revisionism [lmgtfy.com]
SoylentNews is Bacon! [nueskes.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 17 2015, @11:34PM
Do my research for me.
FTFY
Why is it everyone else's job to prove you right?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 18 2015, @04:15AM
Not to mention the fact arab raiders frequently enslaved europeans they ran across.