BY RUNOKO RASHIDI
I want to tell you a story and give you a thesis. It is only a perspective and is clearly a work in progress. I raised the question of why so many African-Americans and other Africans in the Diaspora repeat, largely without investigation, that Africans sold other Africans into slavery. Many of them do it with relish. Such an assertion is very harmful . It bothers me and I think that it is largely rooted in self-hate and ignorance.
Well, here is my thesis and my story. A few years ago I took an African-American tour group to the West African country of Benin. While there, we went to the community called Ganvie. I believe that the people there are the Fon. Ganvie is a community built on stilts on the water. The people who built Ganvie were running away from enslavers and thought that living on the water would provide safety for them. The head of the community asked us why we chose to visit. It was a formal question and I am sure they ask all groups that. Well, I started to give my little speech about African-Americans returning to our ancestral birthplace and how we got to America via enslavement. The leader stopped me as I was speaking.
He said, “You are are in America for the same reason that we are in Ganvie! We came here to get away from the slavers!” In this case, the slavers were from the Kingdom of Dahomey. They captured other people that today we call Africans.
Since then, I have done a lot of research on the subject and traveled to many parts of Africa in search of answers. Yes, some of the people that we call Africans today were involved in the capture of other people that we call Africans today. You can say that such “Africans” were corrupted and empowered by Europeans to do their dirty work for them, and that certain groups and classes of Europeans, obviously, were the ones who derived the great benefits from it.
But is it really that simple?
The idea that we are all African is very new. And this is why continental and global African nationalism is so hard – because it is so new! And in effect, it was a reaction and the result of the European invasion of Africa and the forced removal and enslavement of African people.
Family, I am not able to show that continental African unity is rooted in antiquity. So the king of Dahomey would not have seen himself capturing other Africans for European enslavement. He would have only seen himself attacking a neighboring kingdom! He would not have seen himself attacking and capturing other Africans for European enslavement in the same way historically that the Germans, for example, in their countless wars with the French, would have seen themselves attacking their neighbors. They saw themselves as national groups, not as peoples violating racial solidarity.
This is what I think. Of course, there is a lot more to it. But this is the essence of it. Does this make sense?
As a historian I have learned that the worst thing that you can do, if you want to understand history, is to look at the past with the same mentality that you have today. To understand the past, you must put yourself within the historical context of the people who lived it.
So no, Africans did not capture and sell or trade other Africans for European exploitation. It is not that simple. It would be more accurate to say that certain kingdoms in what we now call Africa attacked other peoples in what we now call Africa, and that certain groups and classes of Europeans benefited enormously from it.
That is my thesis.
In love of Africa!
Runoko Rashidi is a historian and anthropologist based in Los Angeles and Paris. He is also the leader of African heritage tours around the world, including Nigeria and Cameroon in December 2014 and Ethiopia and Kenya in May 2015. For more information write to [email protected] or go to www.travelwithrunoko.com
so….what you're saying is….Africans captured, enslaved, and sold off other Africans…
yes, to the so-called civilized european. the ones from europe who came to civilize the savages in africa, right luigi?
"So no, Africans did not capture and sell or trade other Africans for European exploitation. It is not that simple. It would be more accurate to say that certain kingdoms in what we now call Africa attacked other peoples in what we now call Africa, and that certain groups and classes of Europeans benefited enormously from it." – RUNOKO RASHIDI
This is pure utter nonsense to cite where one kingdom (Kingdom of Dahomey) in Africa attacks and captures members of another kingdom or tribe in Africa and sells them to Europeans and then turn around and say Africans did not sell other Africans to Europeans to be enslaved because Africans did no look upon each other as other Africans back then but in nationalistic terms. This is nothing but word play and African countries today have acknowledged their roles in helping to enslave the ancestors of those who find themselves in America, the Caribbean and South America. These countries have apologized and offered reparations in the form of land and citizenship to the descendants of the enslaved, something European countries have never done but instead paid the enslaver class (Britains) reparations for loss of their enslaved.
This is why in my opinion we can not have an honest discussion on racism and slavery that will lead to any kind of solution or reconciliation. Non-white people, including those who classify themselves as African, can not seem to come to grips with the fact that they have aided and still aiding those who are most responsible (racist whites) for the oppression of other non-white people. In my opinion, the racist white people must responsible for todays neocolonialism and modern day slavery would not be as successful in oppressing and enslaving non-white people, particularly those who are melanated more so than others, if their so-called brethren were not lending assistance and collaborating with the enemy to keep the current system of oppression and racism in place.
When one acknowledges their mistakes, they are better able to correct those mistakes which would mean a change in behavior but one seeks only to blame other people for all their problems and not own up to their role in perpetrating those problems, one will not change their behavior and the problem will remain because their is no corrective behavior.
Farntella Graham iuno about all this "civilized" and "savage" talk. the point is, Africans sold other Africans and no amount of wordplay can change that fact
It seems the Europeans manipulated kingdoms against each other to get them to bring them slams.
Luigi Testa and the fact is that not all of them were sold by africans. most of them were captured in the woods with nets and rope, especially if you lived near the coast and the european went deep inland, too. no amount of trying to shift responsibility is going to relieve the white man of his role in crimes against humanity.
Farntella Graham and yes.. europeans come from europe lol
Marta Elá que me dices de esto?
Farntella Graham yeah and no wordplay will relieve Africans, Europeans, and any other culture or race from their ANCESTORS roles in crimes against humanity. the white man this. the white man that. as if there is some giant white man on the moon coordinating human misery. Everybody sucks. blacks, whites, asians, etc. every race's History is full of blood soaked nonsense.
There is still traditional slavery practiced in places in Africa, like Mauritania.
I always wonder why people bring up this topic. Is it for education or blame?Regardless of who was involved in the African slave trade, the effects of this enslavement are still present in America. We need to wake up humans.
For the misguided people below let's be clear. Yes Africans captured other Africans and sold them to the Europeans BUT They then regretted it because they had no idea what the Europeans were going to do with the Africans they sold. To this day African nations are still apologizing for their ancestors selling us to the Europeans and actually have programs for us while also inviting African Americans back. SIDENOTE: I know someone is eventually going to bring up the "Africans had African slaves too" argument so let me kill that while i am at it. Slaves themselves say that African servitude was VERY DIFFERENT from European slavery. European slavery was the worst kind of slavery in HISTORY. No other people were sold as chattel…
Actually, the writer made a point, in the past, we didn't see each other as one racial group, we saw each other as different people with different ethnicities-yes, that was crying shame because at that time other races had already started identifying by their various races. A person from one tribe, will only legally sell someone from a different tribe. People didn't go round, rounding up and sellling their relatives, rather they sold their prisoners of war; this is not to say there were not people that sold people of their tribe, it happened, but it was an abomination which was punishable by death.
read your thesis and it's on point. Just finished reading Randy .J. Sparks' "Where the Negroes are Masters" and the Asantehena empathizes your point. Before Europeans came, they fought the Fante and many other nations and captured many prisoners. They would either kill them or put them in prison, which meant they had to feed them. When the Europeans came, they found they could trade them for cloth, guns, gun powder, rum, etc.and never have to worry about them attacking again and they didn't have to kill or feed them.
It would not be accurate to say that only Europeans benefited from the trade in slaves. A search of the Sub Saharan Slaves trade to the east coast of Africa reveals that the Arab Musiim traders sold slaves to the Asian markets ( Arabia and India and beyond). Muslim records indicate the number of slaves bought at market ( West Africa) and the numbers sold at East African coastal markets. Depictions of the brutality of the Arab slave trade show how black women had their breasts cut foo with swords so as not to feed their children and black babies littered on the desert floor. By Muslin records one in ten black African slaves survived the forced march across the Sahara and eleven million slaves were sold by their records. Thus 100,000,000 black Africans perished due to the Arab slave trade.it must be mentioned that as the custom of warfare, the losers of conflict ( men ) would be beheaded and the women sold as slaves. The men would rebel so the Arabs had no use for them. If you look at the interiors of many of the African kings abodes rows and rows of skulls were proudly displayed. The heads of defeated warirors. The slave trade existed to sell off the excess that they had no need of. Yoruba history speaks of the wars that neighboring empires waged against them and the people they stole.Though it is uncomfortable to admit ,since the Europeans lost one in ten slaves in the trans Atlantic voyage and 13 million slaves made the passage, 1.3 million pales in comparison to the suffering brought on by the Saharan slave trade. Let us not forget that many African countries have just recently ( last century) abolished slavery. Nor should we forget the hundreds of thousands of black African slaves ( Zanji) who constructed the irrigation systems of the caliphate in Iraq (Basra). When they almost defeated their Arab slaveholders an empire wide army had to be formed to defeat them. their fate was be be slaughtered for wanting to be free.
I am a black South African who have been living in Lagos, Nigeria for over 7 years now. I have been studying many aspects of Nigerian society as well as their amazing history. I have to differ with my learned brother in that after studying and researching slavery in Nigeria, I have discovered that in fact members of the Egu and Awori tribes of Badagry were heavily and exclusively engaged in slave capturing from 1507 until the last slave ship left to Bahia in Brazil in 1888. Bear in mind that more than 18 million Nigerians were captured and exported to Europe (initially Lagos in Portugal) and then to Brazil, the West Indies and America. In fact, it has been estimated that 35% of all Africans sold into slavery came through Badagry. Having said that, from the 1640's the Yoruba Oyo Empire became the biggest slave capturers and benefited immensely from this inhuman trade and enslavement of fellow Africans and countrymen. Finally, the Egu, Awori and Oyo tribes refused to allow Europeans to come inland to capture Africans for enslavement because they made it perfectly clear that it would be their domain exclusively. The history is clear and unambiguous and in the words of Kwame Nkrumah, Africa for Africans in the past wasn't always rosy.
Oh but they did know exactly what the Africans they captured were going and why.
Brian E Ebden And you know that how? Had they been to a chattel slave plantation and surveyed their handiwork? As has been mentioned, African slavery differed from chattel slavery. I don't know how you can assume that these people 'knew' what they were assisting in creating? The only captured African that I know of that returned to tell of his enslavement was Cinque.
I don't think it's really far fetched..whites created the concept of 'race'. Africans during that time were I'm sure more tribalistic and didn't see themselves as 'nations'. And it seems this is why the 'divide & conquer' tactic has been so successful, b/c it seems we STILL are slaves to this kind of thinking, through out the diaspora.
African chiefs gave away Africans to European invaders largely on the Barrel of the Gun.Some resistant chiefs and village men that tried to resist got shot instantly.Africans had never seen a piece of wood and bit of iron which when pointed at someone killed them so fast! and many fell into submission to white man's demands for slaves and other goods in unfair trades because they felt the witeman was a powerful magician with his new weapon.Years later as some of these corrupted chiefs and elements realized that they would often recieve rare souvenirs like mirrors,wines,guns and garments, they took it upon themselves to engage in the dirty trade for a profit by selling away prisoners of war,and some criminals but also some innocents to white enslavers.White enslavers would often need mascular males and beautiful women but some of these were not availbale among the prisoners. The African fixers did not know the extent of evil that the white man had in stock for these sold blacks and if they knew maybe they wouldnt have given them away.Either way Europeans premeditated, planned and constructed custom ships for carrying slaves,showed up at the shores with guns and threatened and killed African peoples into submission and eventually wrote history books about it, victimising the victim even more.
Of course, there is an agenda at play. But we also need to address this issue b/c it's still at play today–the divide & conquer tactics are still being played to pit us against each other. Knowing that, it's easy to see how it's possible that there were Africans who helped them capture other Africans–if we can see it in effect in Africa today, then it's plausible that it happened centuries ago but it doesn't absolve white crimes against humanity and their continual profit off black labor–the prison industrial complex which is the new plantation and their brutal maintenance of this evil system. That's ALL ON THEM. They cannot blame anybody else for that.
And in some cases villages were invaded by these enslavers and innocents captured and taken to the ships without any involvedment of African people helping
Most of ethnicity in Africa,like Hausa or Yorubas has landmass many times the size of Western Europe and don't see or recognised themselves based on skin colours,but ethnicities. This is the disparity among so called Africans. Being African was concept coined by Europeans.
Brian E Ebden Do you have sources to back up that claim? I assume if you do not respond with accurate and credible sources that you are trolling….
Kenyon Martin You do know that assumption is the mother of all ——- now don't you. Go google it yourself.
Brian E Ebden Ight so that means you are trolling lol
It's not quite that simple. Many Africans were forced to sell rival kingdoms. Mind you, Islamic slavery made the west African slave trade much more possible. If someone points a gun to your head and says give me your belongings or I will kill you an your family you will do it. Nation against nation tribe against tribe this is how it played out in many African countries. What is not talked about is how many died trying to fight traders off.
Luigi Testa You are right but as she indicated, accessories to a crime don't absolve WHITES of masterminding the crime. You are sounding like a career criminal who uses a fence to get rid of your stolen goods and tries to go into court and blame the fence for your crime. That fence didn't MAKE you commit the crime & nor did those african chiefs complicity MAKE whites decide they wanted slaves. THEY CAME to AFrica with the intent & solicited help. The criminal intent was ALREADY there.
The phrase de jour is 'Africans sold their brothers and sisters' to the Europeans. The point the writer is making is that Africans never identified themselves by colour but by ethnicity. So just as we never say Europeans invaded and massacred their brothers and sisters during the first and second world wars and identified them by nationality i.e British, French and German so it was in Africa.
Any given Sunday Again, it is nothing but word games. We are not so stupid to think someone would sell their "brothers and sisters" into slavery. The point is Africans assisted in the worst holocaust ever known to humankind and to deny such in any form is to engage in the same lies the Europeans do to this day like saying slavery was abolished in the USA after the civil war when the 13th Amendment legalized it as punishment for crimes they would put on the books to target black people.
The so called offending African countries you speak about did not exist during the slave trade so on whose behalf are they making amends. Africa as we know it now is a European construct formed in 1884 after the Berlin conference where the Europeans balkanized Africa into the countries they are today. Slavery was abolished for some 50 when Nigeria, Benin and all other countries (except for Ethiopia, Egypt etc) were established. Another hole in the African sold their own theory is that they did it for power and wealth however how does one get wealthy on cloth, beads, mirrors and rum? Money did not exist back during the slave trade so what did the Europeans have that could 'enrich' Africans. Land and people was what made you wealthy in pre-Columbus Africa not beads, cloth and trinkets.
Luigi Testa U are just as racist as your ancestors and will do to Black people just as they did if you could (do it).
They didn't capture and sell africain to the European, but because of the tribalism some tribu were more suitable for slavery due to their rank. I'm come from Senegal and until now the word "matchoudo" which slave is still using for some ethny. It is very common that some ethny don't marry between them. And that is now so imagine a few centuries ago . . .
Farntella Graham Real talk.
@Brian E Ebden, NO, they didn't.
Any given sunday. Africans traded more than beads cloth and rum. They had salt iron gold diamonds fruits foods vegtables not only were africans trading with europeans they traded with asians too.
The type of slavery that europeans practice is entirely different from African slavery. No African slave was stripped of their identity, religion, basic human rights and classified as something other that human beings during their enslavement in Africa by Africans. So regardless of the fact that Africans sold other African into slavery is pointless to me because that was the culture of the times. For me, it's about the way in which African people at home and abroad have been treated by the so called "civilized" european that bother me, not the act of slave trading.
Too many blacks have this belief that the continent of Africa was one big united community with love all around. Bullshit there were wars, skirmishes, trade, religious differences. Hell much of the present internecine warfare that exists today had it roots from then. So it's time for a reality check and for blacks to stop believing that Ancient Africa was some Utopian experience. It was hell for most.
I am simply amazed at some of the comments to this thread. Might I remind many that more than 18 million Nigerian's of different tribes were captured by Nigerians of a few tribes and sold into slavery. Why are we trying to rationalise it any differently in terms of straight denial, reductionism and semantics. Its like arguing why do blacks in the US make up a disproportionate percentage of those in incarceration. Black folk have been informed and taught of the strategy since the days of Marcus Garvey & Malcolm X and still we fall prey to it over and over again. Its time that we as a collective take a firm look at ourselves and fix what we have to in order to move forward. The bottom line is that Africans DID engage in and profited richly from African slavery. There is no two ways about it. Now lets move on.
There was NO barrel of the gun story ever. Africans willingly and happily captured and sold millions of other Africans into slavery. PERIOD.
Any given Sunday maybe what they bargained with wasn't material?
We are all confused with his-story that we are told, I don't think africans sold their people to slavery, Queen Nzinga fought against the portuguese for slavery.
I'd like to touch on this word, "Slaves". They were prisoners of war and other human beings sold or traded into a European slave system. The African forts on the Gold Coast of Ghana were not filled with slaves, they were filled with prisoners of war, criminals, etc. I don't refer to any of my ancestors as slaves , but as human beings in the slavery system. Some descendants of prisoners of war. Next, I'd like to mention that The Fante on the coast of Ghana, knew full well what European slavery was like. On occasions they sent family, experienced seamen, to help take the cargo to the Caribbean. When they got there, they were sold with the others. Their families were told they had died in the passage, but later travelers would see them in bondage, report back to their families, who demanded their return. On their return, they talked about the brutality, etc in the slavery system. Leaders of the Fante sent their sons to England and France to be trained as gentlemen and returned home. The Fante and the Asante were in full control of the trade. The Europeans didn't hold them at gunpoint. when ever the English tried to use force, they were massacred along with their Fante allies. The Fante and Asante kept an open door policy in the trade. They favored neither France, England, Portugal , etc. ALL were welcomed.
The Fante built the slave forts and the women intermarried with European seamen and had large mulatto families that lived free around and in the forts. Blacks bought slaves, especially in Charleston, S.C. Recommended reading: Randy .J. Sparks' "Where the Negroes are Masters"
@Brian Ebden, Tell us your source, how you came to that conclusion.
Most of us are missing the point. Elder Runoko is simply telling us to embrace African Unity now more than before. That's why he emphasised that it is a new concept so we need to promote it. The forces of globalisation are too strong for Africans to face as isolated countries like today. An African leader goes to China to make an economic deal claiming he is representing a country of 10 million people. The Chinese Government knows its representing 1 BILLION people. So how is the African leader ever gonna get a fair deal? As Africans we are also a BILLION of us!! Let us unite. We have the power. We have the wealth. We have the numbers. What are we waiting for??
Carlos Abreu Google Slavery in Badagry its all there.
@Brian E Ebden, You sound to me an agent of white supremacy. Blacks like you make our struggle harder to defeat them.
Carlos Abreu That is absolutely rubbish Carlos. The truth is what it is. We cannot alter our history to sooth our ego's and forward our victim status. An agent for white supremacy is one who believes that fairies, gnomes and goblins live in your garden AND that it was all hunky dory in Africa before whites came here. It was not. Check our history and you will change your mind I'm sure
I think that many people miss the point here. But what stuns me the most is the eagerness that some of us have to embrace the idea of African enslavement of Africans. Some of us are adamant about it. It is almost like we demand that it be true! And that I find disgusting.
Brother Runoko: Africans did heavily enslave other Africans for hundreds of years. That is a truism whether we like it or believe it to be so or not. As a matter of fact, the Oyo, Dahomey and Aro tribes thrived on the enslavement business in West Africa and that is something which we cannot move away from. In fact in the 1850's, the ancient city of Kano in Northern Nigeria was the center of slavery for many years with tens of thousands of slaves (from surrounding tribes) under the rule of Usman dan Fodio; then so were the Ghanaian Ashanti and that's a well documented fact. The only West African collective who never engaged in the capture and sale of fellow Africans were the Benin Kingdom however they did keep many domestic slaves during their centuries old rule. What I sense is that we as Africans should follow the lead of Europeans and blatantly lie about our history. That I can never do and find it unpalatable.
And to build on what Dr. Rashidi just said, I think that when people bring up this ridiculous argument, they only do it from deflect from challenging Systematic White Supremacy. It only shows how afraid most black people are to actually attack the system that's keeping them marginalized.
Reginald Johnson I am understanding you correctly here: Are you actually saying that one method of challenging white supremacy is to lie and fabricate our history?
Runoko Rashidi, I am in agreement with you. Whatever peoples on the continent we now call Africa capture whatever other people and sold them to Europeans, they could not have imagined the inhumane treatment these people would face in the hands of the European slavers. Just as we cannot deduce history from our present perspective, I would trust that we can now see that man's inhumanity to man is a gross error and this activity needs to cease. However, it proliferates in all countries with the trading of humans and human organs and this is an outrage. Man is brutal. Man is insidious and we of the Light need to continue to CALL for a halt of any and ALL activity that is a detriment to another. We do not have to look at the past or even to Africa for the indecent treatment of people. This series of videos from Dick Gregory speaks volumes: http://youtu.be/LJMFwTA92bg?list=PLR9RT-e-pyrK-Cz6RBVL70t2pU5EXbOXD
Brian E Ebden But who is lying?
Bro. Rashidi, fine piece of writing and the thesis is simple, succinct, and right on! Hopefully, the radical righteous will reconsider their position; if not, let's moveforward.
White boy…your agenda is clear and if I were you I wouldn't bring up prison colonies, as we know that most of you are descended from those who were shipped to the new world as prisoners. This is another wedge issue the whites will use but it CAN never absolve your guilt for the enslavement, rape, brutalization, subsequent lynching, and wholesale morally bankrupt society that you have erected AFTER the purchase of human souls. Try as you might. lol..
Carlos Abreu I peeped awhile ago that he/it is unlikely to be black. Just a poser and a troll. You know where ever we go, they are spying and trolling.
What happens when a child is abandoned by its mother, they go back blaming, asking questions and so on. Have African Americans truly healed from their experience in America. What they are really saying is not just why did you sell me they are saying do you know what I went through being here. When children are sent through foster homes and things happen, they are angry until they heal.
The issue also is that Africa still has a thriving slave trade going on throughout the continent in its many forms. Mauritania is an overt example and there are more. Also, continental Africans have not made things easier. Though for the most part many of us get along. However, I have lived in various countries in Africa and are on many FB groups. They also have ignorant folks like we do who stay some stereotypical anti African American stuff. It goes both ways.
A little known fact is that one of the reasons the Slave trade ended was because African chiefs began to run out of captives to sacrifice. They now longer wanted to sell slaves to Europeans because their ritual killing of war trophies was being undermined. Those of us whose ancestors survived were fortunate that they did not meet their death at the end of a sword. To those who may think that slavery was an European institution may I recommend Sourcebook of Korean civilization by Peter H. Lee. Asian slavery was just as brutal and lasted until the 1400's.
1) chattel slavery didnt exist in Africa, indentured servitude did according to Olaudah Equiano.
2) this new narrative of blacks sold each other into slavery came out after blacks began becoming conscious a few years ago, from you know who
3) europeans went to Africa and bought the POWs and then turned around and put those Africans on the slave ships too
4) no one can ever seem to name 5 African nations that supposedly sold 150 million Africans into chattel slavery
5) its a huge difference between a buyer and a seller
Brian E Ebden This Song was Made Especially for People Like you
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoeZkOQxZMY
Dr. Rashidi, I agree. If we look at what France is doing today to 14 Afurakan countries, everyone would get a pretty good picture of what took place. I believe blacks like thinking we did that to each other rather than blaming whites, when we look at what whites have done to us, it should not be had to belive they did that, and wish to blame our own people for slavery. We need to ask the question, why did they come to Afuraka? The answer looking to hold black people as slaves, after they started colonizing all the island nations of the Americas, and other places..
Brian E Ebden Where did you get your information? Who wrote this book, or did someone tell you this, be very mindful of who and where you get your information. Rmmember, the conquerors always write history to favor themselves. In the words of their racist Winston Churchill, he said, "History will be kind to me, because I intend to write it". Even if it meant lying, and that they did.
Brian E Ebden I cannot believe you said that …. Do you realize this is what whites do, that is why we are so brain washed. They had us thinking we do not have a history, we just popped up out of nowhere, when we were the first humans to inhabit the earth, hundred of thousands of years before the Europeans, building, teaching creating, practically everything people do today. Please do yourself a favor, study our history, from an Afurakan source. Thank you. Not Skip Gates.
Brian E. Ebden I do not believe those Nigerian anymore than I do you. Where did they get this information. One of our great black historian Dr. John H.Clarke, (deceased) who I totally respect, said that did not happen, not in the manner you and they have presented. It probably was the same thing that is going on in many Afurakan countries today, France is forcing 14 Afurakan countries to pay colonial taxes, military bases over many of the countries, Legionaire groups (blacks) holding the people hostage in their oown country, if the leaders do not cooporate they are killed or taken out of office by coups, and citizens are killed and harrassed if they complain about what Fance is doing. There are some things that is not worth talking about, so why are so many blacks bent on pushing the issue our black leaders sold us into slavery. What point are you making, even if they did, they were not the ones holding our people in slavery for hundreds of years, that is what you need to dwell on, and how slavery has built this world, and blacks are still treated like slaves, and they do not want to pay us our debt that thye owe us. Are you blaming the Afurakan leaders for them not paying us. I will not be making any more statements to you about this matter, because you cannot use it for anything constructive, and I know I cannot use it. You said you did the research on our people selling us into slavery, what else have you researched? There are more issues that is more important you should be researching. It appear, you are trying to protect the whites for what they did to us. You spend all your energy protecting whites, face it, this is what you are doing. I cannot believe I wasted this much time responding to your nonsense.
Abannyarwanda Abarundi Dukomokamisiri You have so elequently nailed this thing, this Brian need to nip it in the bud, and stop making himself, look unread on African history, or European history. Some blacks like making themselves look like clowns, which is what whites want Brian to do.
Kenyon Martin Excuse me, but those Afurakans who recently apologized for Afurakan leaders role in slavery, they do not know anymore about that than me or you, most of what we have heard came from whites, very discreditable, the conquorers are going to lie everytime for history to be kind to them. How many history books on Afuraka, have we seen in schools? Zero, the little Afurakan history in scholls are written by the people who held us in slavery for hundreds of yours. You all need to stop it.
Farntella Graham Thank you, I knew you were coming in, and coming in strong.
Daphne In Afuraka, and the diaspora.
Cooper The Arabs and the Jews taught the whites.
Say that.
dublinmaxx You are so right, and she fought those pigs for forty (40) years. Our mother queen, she is to be praised every day.
Farntella Graham I'm half Italian (my great grandparents moved here in 1910 and had nothing to do with slavery) and half black. what are you even talking about? so i don't want to hate all white people for what some did i am a racist? lol ok whatever. have a good life
Nzingha Shabaka First of all you are preaching to the choir… Second stop what? Nothing i said was untrue. Need sources?
Kenyon Martin You said Afurakan leaders sold us into slavery, you keep asking for proof from others, but where is your proof our people sold us into slavery. Do not, I'll repeat, do not tell me you got it from a European source, or anyone else who got their information from an European source.
Dr. Rashidi Yes, yes, that is what I am feeling, they act like they want it to be true.
@Luigi Testa, It doesn't matter whether you're half black. Actually you took the side of the Whites, our historical enemy, then you're an enemy too. Till today no apology, no reparation, and the beast have the audacity to tell us to move on.
Do they dare to tell Jews to forget the past and to move on?
If you have nothing to say shut the hell up.
Carlos Abreu divide and conquer. you're hating other race's and not focusing on the Global Elite who want you to stay focused on that hate. you're going to get us all killed
Dr. Rashidi I visited your facebook page, I see where your tour group traveled to the Netherland. I would like to know, what would interest blacks, that would cause us to go to the Netherland? After all they are some of the most racist Europeans in the world. Are you familiar with black peter?
Carlos Abreu Oh yea, you talk strong black man.
Carlos Abreu The mulattos destroyed the Haitians revolution.
@Luigi Testa, If to remember what those devil Europeans did and Italians are still today one of worst racist beast on the earth and you have the audacity to blame the victims.
Any serious conversation must be taken into account the wrongs not addressed.
I want reparation for the many wrongs the European [and Arabs] did and they must acknowledge the past because "your past is always your past. Even if we forget it, it remembers you".
Tell Italians and other Europeans to put the money on the table for the enslavement and colonisation, the same way Jews received reparation!
Deep down inside you hate us. That's why you want to protect and deflect the many wrongs committed by them.
Bastard.
Carlos Abreu i don't deflect. I just don't live my life being told what to think and look at all of the facts in order to be as informed as possible. There is no race that has a clean history. Race specific slavery was an invention in or order to separate the poor white inddentured servants from the poor black indentured servants so they would not form coalitions against the rich plantation owners. So the poor whites never rose in social status because they at least werent slaves. its all just business and mind games in order to keep the rich people rich. The Elite propagate all this race shit so we all keep fighting with each other while they continue to rob ALL of us. So stop you're name calling and focus on the real enemy before we all end up in concentration camps.
@Nzingha Shabaka, Preach sister, that's the truth many people avoid at all cost.
“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
–George Orwell
@Nzingha Shabaka, Sister, that is not the real issue here. Those people don't come to Europe looking for racist Dutch Peter and similar stuff. We had great history back then in Europe. Would you refuse to visit Egypt and see first hand our great ancient history because of those racist Arabs?
I'm sure no. That history belong to us, is our history.
Thank you.
Brian E Ebden "Slaves" is a European word. Chattel slavery, generational slavery, rape, 3/5ths of a human laws, deculturization that affects Afrikan people today. What the Afrikan kingdoms did was they were already fighting and capturing prisoners of wars and then Europeans came bought the prisoners and did nefarious, unspeakable things. The kings and queens did not know what Europeans were doing overseas to turn their servants into "slaves." Slavery that we speak of is an entirely European word and concept, that you and your children were objects to be used in any demented way and you could never earn your way into society and were robbed of culture and the ability to build your own and were now forever dependent on a brutalizer.
"Slaves" is a European word. Chattel slavery, generational slavery, rape, 3/5ths of a human laws, deculturization that affects American-Afrikan people and how they spend money today.
What the Afrikan kingdoms did was they were already fighting each other and capturing "prisoners of wars" and then Europeans came bought the prisoners and purchased them and once far away did nefarious, unspeakable things.
The kings and queens did not know what Europeans were doing overseas to turn their servants into "slaves." And if they rebelled they were captured too.
Slavery that we speak of with the atrocities and even the word slavery is an entirely European word and concept, that a person and their children and their children's children were objects to be used in any demented way and you could never earn your way into society and were robbed of culture and the ability to build your own and were now forever dependent on a brutalizer. The one-drop rule and generational slavery and rape did you think Afrikans practiced that or knew about that and it was a massive Afrikan conspiracy and not a European one?
Brian E Ebden You sound like, one of your direct ancestors was a European slave trader and you inherited his guilt.You must be an un educated self hating mulatto or commenting with a fake name.There is overwhelming evidence of traders showing up with guns and violently using them.In fact most of the captives were taken into slavery at gunpoint without any barter exchange with chiefs.It was slavery then colonialism which was similarly abusive ..read Congo and king leopord of Belgium
Carlos Abreu How did you conclude I would not go to Kemet, (Egypt), because I asked the question, why would I want to travel to a racist county? I am not trying to say we shouldn't if there is something there to learn or something we can use, I ask the question for information, or to learn something that I may not know.
@Nzingha Shabaka , Sister, there is a misunderstanding on my part. I didn't write what i meant. I meant despite Egypt dominated by Arabs invaders are filled by anti-black racists, that fact will not deter you to visit and see first hand our great past, ancient Black Egypt. And the parallel applies to Netherland too.
Thanks.
If you call what Africans did "enslavement" what do you call what the police and prison system do?
Slavery is a European concept. As is whiteness. As is the one-drop rule. As is European supremacy and color coding and wordplay such as white supremacy.
What are you doing to restore Afrikan culture and industries to Afrikan people? Because we don't see a lot of biracial people in Pan-Afrikanist circles, but you are not representing Afrikan identity well at all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99441lXkqaU
We know who the Jesse Lee Petersons ("I'm Black and Afrikans are not a race, only Europeans and Asians and Hispanics are a race") are in this page and we know who the Afrikans are.
Chizoro Ehieze-Okeke Humans have always enslaved each other since the beginning. And for the record i dont represent anybody's culture well at all because I am my own person. I am more concerned with my education than claiming an entire continent that i have never been to and in all intents and purposes doesn't give a shit about me. These nationalist ideas are dangerous because of the police and prison system you mentioned. We are growing into a militarized police state and once Martial Law is called, we are all going to be killed or living in work camps/concentration camps. So i would rather focus on ideas that bring together all kinds of races and cultures to stop a very disturbing growing evil that is happening around the world
Nzingha Shabaka He's one of those "colored" but not Afrikan cultured people who were taught the European racist color code "black with one drop and white without" And support European customs/lifestyle/industries and tell Afrikan people they should give up their identity history customs and industry. If we listened to him and stopped rebuilding Afrikan civilization we'd all be impoverished self-hating Negros/Blacks fixating on skin color instead of proud Afrikans re-discovering our cultures and being culture-builders. Take the positive, subtract the negative sister. Ashe.
Chizoro Ehieze-Okeke Chizoro, isn't it sad how stupid blacks have become? As a collective we are worth billions of dollars but cant build a car, a lab in fact we cant build jack except swag like wanna-be gangsters/hoodlums and talk nonsensical rubbish such as you. You call yourself a master-plan-thinker? You're an idiot son. Go back to school to learn about my tribe. WE are the first and oldest human beings. WE are the fathers and mothers of all civilisation. WE gave birth to everyone and are the FIRST and oldest Africans. But then again you wouldn't know that now would you. Like someone said, if you don't want blacks to know something – put it in a book. Thats what you need to do "master-plan-thinker-sic" Research/Read Khoi-San if you can even read.
Brian E Ebden I study psycho-semantics. The mental meaning of words. I also study history and what European parents tell their partially Afrikan children.
You're not going to hack my brain with your European tricknology. First off. There is no WE "Brian." If you come from South Africa, a place where Europeans grafted African name onto themselves and stole the wealth, erased Apartheid from history books, the most heavily brainwashed Afrikans on the planet then you better come at me as an AZANIAN AFRIKAN or don't come at me at all.
You're not going to brainwash me like the so-called "Indians" of North America. Or "South African." Or BLACK/Negro/Colored.
I mess with Runoko Rashidi because he's a self-identifying American-AFRIKAN and practices the customs that create the industry. And we're out here building Afrikan industries. We don't care about your color. Go be a European. We'll take an albino Afrikan over a European wolf in sheeps clothing. Only thing worse than a European supremacist is a wannabe European supremacist. Shameful and disgusting behavior sir. ASHE! 🙂
Christopher James That religion…
Luigi Testa I stopped reading at you're your own person and tried to go on but then you inserted vulgarity to psychologically dominate the conversation and I quit. I'm an Afrikan person. I must celebrate Afrikan customs to survive economically and build independent industries and markets for my children.
You seem dependent on European industries since there are not many Afrikan owned industries…due to the richest Afrikans, the American-Afrikans being strippped of their culture, and thus their holidays customs and industries.
We're just getting it back. Go depend and enrich European industries Mr. "I'm My Own Man."
Brian E Ebden If you lived 100 years from today you are the kind who would assert that Ebola and aids are natural diseases with origin in Africa and that they are non foreign man-made diseases introduced into Africa after colonialism to devastate Africans in effort to reduce their populations.Secondly i do think that you are a conniving faker.Everything you claim has no factual basis
And you have a diabolical motive in your disinformation..,trying to sound smart without proved facts
Brian E Ebden I check one source I think you were using as if to prove what you adamantly says our own people played a major role in selling us into slavery. The very first one did not do it, it only showed the condition our people had to endure when they were captured, thats all. Another thing, instead of pushing all this stuff on us, just give us one or two that is creditable, one that we can believe beyond a shadow of a doubt, they did that. Okay ….
"THE IDEA THAT WE ARE ALL AFRICAN IS VERY NEW. And this is why continental and global African nationalism is so hard – because it is so new! And in effect, it was a reaction and the result of the European invasion of Africa and the forced removal and enslavement of African people.
Family, I am not able to show that continental African unity is rooted in antiquity. So the king of Dahomey would not have seen himself capturing other Africans for European enslavement. He would have only seen himself attacking a neighboring kingdom! He would not have seen himself attacking and capturing other Africans for European enslavement in the same way historically that the Germans, for example, in their countless wars with the French, would have seen themselves attacking their neighbors. They saw themselves as national groups, not as peoples violating racial solidarity." – Runoko Rashidi
I wear an Igbo name because I am a Nigerian-Afrikan on both sides of parentage. The point was divide and conquer was used and name switch to unified Africans only came later. Of all people an Afrikan in South Africa should be the last one to overlook that part.
Can Afrikan women relate to such a person who argues like a racist skipping the main points to argue something entirely different. The point is the European concept of race and race based economics is an entirely new concept to Africans and Pan-Africanism is now just figuring the game.
Brian What the hell is wrong with you man?
Brian E Ebden to quote you."the FACT that Africans captured and sold millions of other Africans into slavery? Its a given and a well known fact"…,.You get this from a western propaganda on the issue that is around 100 years taught in western schools and written in books by enslavers.The same captors were also the same writers of History books.And they always made sure they attributed their evil deeds to their victims.They are visionaries they knew time would come and the black man would investigate his past.Black man whether slave or in colonialism did not get chance of self education between 1400 ad to 1940 ad.Secondly im writing from Rwanda and i am Rwandan.The Hutu -Tutsi genocide was a Belgians construct from the start to finish and was aided by the French.You know Nothing about Rwandan genocide i lived it and i survived it.
Brian E Ebden Slavery Wasn't a Trade, It Was a Robbery and Genocide.Just like colonization. http://www.reunionblackfamily.com/apps/blog/show/11782086-we-did-not-sell-each-other-into-slavery
Chizoro Ehieze-Okeke Oh you racists and your delicate sensibilities. No wonder none of you have read my comments objectively
Luigi Testa You're the one calling people white and black. We're the ones identifying as Afrikans and getting back to culture so we can produce our own wealth. We study Afrikan history and culture and are marketing it. You're telling us to quit and continue to be dominated in a European market. As well as identifying us by skin color. So you're the racist Luigi. I'm a Nigerian-Afrikan culturally and historically that's what I bring to the market. I don't know who you think you are.
But if you don't think you're an African but merely "Black" what are you doing here? Do you consider the half-Afrikans, half-Europeans that were the best slave traders and liasons Black or Afrikan? Do you even study history or are you just using European supremacist terms and talking points taught to you by non-Afrikan curriculums?
To label us "racist" as in Afrikan supremacist because we wish to practice and produce Afrikan culture and markets instead of serving in the European markets is the quintessence of unlearned stupidity Luigi Testa.
You might as well go tell the Native Americans they were "racist' (Native American supremacists) for gaining reparations or the interned American Chinese for getting reparations and starting China Towns instead of begging to share jobs with Europeans and descending into poverty. You sound like a complete and utter imbecile and a token.
Brian E Ebden Your point is Afrikans sold Afrikans. Rashidi's point was this "Family, I am not able to show that continental African unity is rooted in antiquity."
1) We did not see ourselves as Africans. Rather we saw ourselves as Igbo, Yoruba, Fon, etc. etc. Then we saw ourselves as neighbors who wronged each other and could be defeated and sold for profit.
2) Pan-Afrikanism is a new precept.
That people should identify as Afrikans is new. That we should be held to a common standard and help each other build markets and culture out of necessity of global Racial European domination is new. But it is moving forward.
Brazilian-Portuguese and other Europeans were in Dahomey trading slaves and when they had children those children were liasons for slavery. If you know so much about slavery talk about how the European had half-Afrikan children, educated him and her against his full-Afrikan brethren abroad and in his/her home and then used them as liasons for the enslavement process.
Why not talk about that since you're so interested in "Afrikans selling Afrikans."
My focus in life is media. Afrikan men, women and children seeing positive stories no matter what tribe or nationality they come from. And that is how I make money. I have had enough focusing on slavery and tribalism. If that is your focus on life, to divide Afrikans amongst historical ethnic lines in a negative light then fine that is your perogative.
I rather show for example how Shango and Xevioso and Horu and Arobinagu are all aligned through historical and cultural analysis and have traveled all over the world. Maybe as a fiction book or a graphic novel to entertain children. No other "race" focuses on intra-racial divisions, perhaps because of the one-drop law was only applied to Afrikan people that said if you had parents from an outside race influencing you, you could still have equal say. Historically analyzing how tribes are made and how exclusive they are that has been a very damaging and unfair law as far as unified Afrikan culture.
I am going to focus on Afrikan monoculture outside of the 2% history that was European slave trade and hopefully some tangible cultural positivity and progress comes from helping other Afrikans tell their positive stories.
A person is who they are. I'm a Nigerian-Afrikan inside the Afrikan market and an American citizen as well. Enjoy your life and best wishes.
Chizoro Ehieze-Okeke For the most part your opinions are pretty good, but to say we should forget about slavery, and all the other evils that have happened to us, is not good advice. No other group practice forgetting wrongs other groups have committed against them. We can still work, and not forget.
Chizoro Ehieze-Okeke "Slavery is a European concept"
"no amount of trying to shift responsibility is going to relieve the 'white man' of his role in crimes against humanity."
"you took the side of the Whites"
there were more quotes but some of the uglier posts were deleted
also your assumption that i do not support or encourage black owned businesses is evidence that your perspective is a one size fits all who don't agree with me mentality. I am here because i typically like most of these articles, except this one, because it attempts to cover up evil committed by African kingdoms that resulted in even worse crimes against humanity. So because i pointed out that this article is trash, everyone attacked me with a barrage of insults and assumptions. I haven't even tried to defend myself or really express my views because i am horrified by how easily people can get worked up into a mob mentality simply due to an ugly part of history that they would choose to ignore. I call you all racists because of the intense hatred i see of white….anything really. You however make more sense than the other commentators but you took their side. You're the only one who even mentioned African culture or markets. The rest just got butt-hurt that somebody would dare be critical of a bunk article
Also when dealing with overly emotional people, it's a little hard to not play devil's advocate. There has been no reason for me to express my real beliefs when i can just see how long i can drag this out by saying the right key words and getting the expected responses.
Luigi Testa The only quote which belongs to me is "Slavery is a European concept."
I can account only for myself and the studying I've done and the words I put forth.
"Slavery" IS a European concept. It comes from the words Slavs who were enslaved. I don't know if they had:
1) one-drop Law that said one Drop of Afrikan blood made you less than human
2) Rape as a NATIONALIZED weapon of war to MANUFACTURE a new caste of people to divide Afrikan people. AND the power to enforce the degradation of Afrikan culture. Henceforth 150 years later every immigrant can reproduce their original culture and create markets and industries for their culture but Diasporan-Afrikans are constantly lost in the dominant culture and trying to get jobs. And when Immigrant-Afrikans do manage to come in they have no one to help them wide-scale and they too face discrimination. And they are told to stay away from the Afrikans who descended from enslaved Afrikans because they are criminals. IN 2014!
Henceforth Afrikan people are the poorest people on the planet and must work together to unify the culture and move forward to produce industries out of the culture.
As a Nigerian-Afrikan and first generation American who has studied American-Afrikan history…. you have no idea what was done to these people in an organized military fashion.
There were LAWS written by the CHURCH that said betraying other Afrikans who want to be free will grant you your freedom and make you a GOOD CHRISTIAN.
These people were called every name in the book except American-Afrikans. It is a dignified name, there for people who want it and an olive branch. The Diasporan-Afrikans created Pan-Afrikanism and the good ones who have survived psychic and physical RED (Racist European Domination) and want to regenerate Afrikan culture are the ones I work with. I don't blindly support businesses because of the color of your skin. If you are regenerating Afrikan knowledge of self then I will help you because the problem is not just local, it is a global system set to destroy identity and create industries to exploit moneys and Afrikan people just happen to have been at the bottom of these "Culture Wars" making people rich.
United States and France are in Culture Wars right now. Do we call France racist for recognizing culture dictates your customs?
ONCE YOU LOSE YOUR CUSTOMS, YOU LOSE YOUR CUSTOMERS. So if France integrates its culture then they are vulnerable to racists who control and own the culture but feel the need to discriminate. Afrikans must retain culture and the moneys that come with it and help each other out when possible.
American-Afrikans come to acknowledge Afrikan identity late in life and some are distraught and angry at the loss of potential. Being a Nigerian-Afrikan I recognize the loss of potential because of they are educated into starting their identity and killing off all their ancestry before slavery.
That is an unimaginable amount of psychic violence and I am here to rejuvenate American-Afrikan culture and increase Pan-Afrikan positivity. ASHE. Respect. One Love.
Pan-Afrikan PsychoSemantic Programming Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CN7ZSR7oQ-M
American-Afrikan's Economic Base: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5KO8oeMIgo
Dr. Umar Johnson | 'American-Afrikans' & 'Pan-Afrikanism' | Jesse Lee Peterson | 4-23-2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99441lXkqaU
American-Afrikan's Miseducation | Sistah Souljah : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDGeLfxXEu0
Brian E Ebden To quote you"Then to claim that the Rwandan genocide was the Belgians is laughable at best and downright stupid at worst. Rwandans killed each other and to blame anyone else is beyond foolish. For once take responsibility and move forward".This statement from you sir shows how ignorant and stupid you are and actually proves how clandestine your being on this thread refuting release and sharing of suppressed truth on Africans' past.You are actually trying to rap me on Rwandan history and genocide which i lived.Rwanda Genocide was propagated by the Belgians using an apartheid style ID cards from the 50's elavating a majority race againist the others while aiding them with hateful school cullcullum and weapons.The genocide took 30 years in systematic preparation by Belgians and French and happened in 100 days by puppet Hutus(not all)killing Tutsis.Mainly it was about extermination of Tutsis who by the way had proved hard to subjugate exhibited in their demeanor.You are in no position to teach me or anybody else about Rwandan history because you have no clue what happened there,how and why.And again Shaka Zulu was a fierce warrior but the bullshit propaganda you are spreading about him was first read in a book written by a European.A man called Cecil Rhodes and many other invaders actually murdered close to 2 million Africans in southern Africa than Shaka and set a way for robbery of thousands of sq km of indigenous people than you claim on shaka
Very interesting!!
The fact of the matter is everyone on this post is correct to a degree. All of the methods mentioned were use to enslave Africans and sell them to the Europeans. What hasn't been mentioned is what was told to me by a Gambian. He stated that just like in "Roots", their African heritage is passed down by word of mouth from generation to generation. Different things happened to different nations, or tribes. He also told me something that shocked me. Just as Kenyon Martin has stated, African slavery was not brutal, it was more biblical where laws had been established as to how you were to treat your slaves. It was still a punishment. He even said that some slaves volunteered to go to the Europeans because they thought they would be treated better, but when one volunteer escaped from the European slavers before their ship set sail, he returned to the village and told the rest of the tribe of the horror he suffered at being chained up as soon as they put him on the ship. This is when african chiefs quit voluntarily trading with the Europeans and the Europeans began forcibly taking Africans into captivity. Now I'm sure it wasn't just one Gambian that escaped and spread the word throughout Africa, we know that many slaves jumped ship and tried to swim for freedom, so there were probably many escapees who returned to their native lands and relayed this information. I have also talked to a Nigerian who told me the stories about them selling their enemies and outcasts into slavery. So I repeat, if you talk to Africans from different countries and different tribes, you will find that all of the methods mentioned by all of the people here were used to enslave people, voluntarily and forcibly.
Dr. Runoko as an African, I do not really believe that the African sold their brothers and sisters. The person who did the buying is the only one with a written statement the African did not read or write and there was no record that they could have left for us to know that they were involved in the buying and selling of their people. Their wife, children, mothers, fathers brothers and sisters came and someone really want me to believe that we sold our.
There is truth to this article, sad to read some of your posts claiming it is false while insisting on the European version of events. Some of such people are the same ones who will preach about how they were african kings and queens before slavery that built pyramids and great cities, as if the europeans told them that this. I ask those who insist on accepting that Africans sold other Africans to name me one person / leader who stood up against the european slavers? I'm yet to meet anyone who has. Yet there are lots of examples of resistance by african leaders against slavers. The reason you don't know them is because you were more occupied listening to the Eurocentric version of events so you now believe that Africans did this to Africans.
Even the guy who mentioned that Dahomey was actively involved in the slave trade failed to mention how the same king destroyed a Dutch ship and sent them back home with a warning to their king to stop the slavetrade in his kingdom after discovering that they were being sent away to work as slaves, far wors than he had imagined. You only got the first bit cos for you to have been told by HIStory means you would get both sides of the story.
I am sick of reading and seeing african Americans talk crap about the slave trade without even reading one book on African history written by AFRICANS. That's how even that dickhead Louis gates claims the same thing but he failed to say he was serving his Jewish masters…yet it didn't work for him when he was locked out of his own house.
The same gates who claims to have written an encyclopaedia of African history yet the book was rubbished by nearly all major African historians. It was another book sponsored by his Harvard Jews. If you want to break the cycle of ignorance it needs to start from understanding your history and that way you will look at yourself and those like you very differently so you can understand who the real enemy is preventing you from your potential. Well done on your thesis Runoko.
That's a nice run down of events as mentioned on Wikipedia Scott. Name me 2kings of Dahomey and one great thing about the kingdom without referring to google. Since you are so versed with Dahomey and its slave past.
This is interesting. Enemy survivors have been made slaves of the victors since the dawn of warfare. But perhaps the European slave market incentivized a constant state of war for nascent kingdoms in Africa. The outside money or goods going to the various feuding parties certainly must have been a factor in arresting development of larger, stronger and more technological societies that could have resisted European armies.
What is wrong with this for an answer,, those who helped in the capture of others more than likely did it for simply survival purposes.I well imagine they were threatened..Does that not seem quite logical to you? It does to me and I have read of this a few times a log time ago..Now if you google this you will probably hit paydirt on this one.
One also got to live and not be "kidnapped" ones self. I think that an amazing incentive.
Happily Brian Ebden? I highly doubt it I think the more accurate word would be fearfully.
I personally think with the way things are in the world today racially,, which you know is just horrible.Everyone, all colors etc have to fight this fight as well,,, this is a human condition and some of us are hurting like hell and dying…UNITE.
I BET YOU CANT NAME ME ONE AFRICAN KING who resisted slavery? even this same king of dahomey eventually rescinded his actions and warned europeans to stop the acts.. did they listen? why don't you know any african kings or queens who resisted slavery from the beginning? because eurocentrics only want africans to remember other africans as complicict, in a way to claim we were all in it together. lying fools
I can understand the reason behind not wanting to think that Africans had a hand in the business of slavery but what I can't agree with is the revisionist approach to the facts. If it will make people feel better I would want to add that those who did the selling could not have known the fate of those who they sold. They might have viewed it in the way slavery was conducted on the continent for centuries. A conquered people were made to serve the conqueror. They owned land and were allowed to have their own wealth. They were not abused as Europeans did to Africans. Europeans were probably the first to practice the type of slavery that we had in the western world.
though I enjoyed your thesis it is only partly correct. slavery in African which is also what is called the Middle East is roughly 4 to 5 thousand yrs. old. We can read about Black Slaves in Biblical times in Europe, sold by what we now no as Arabs. So to say that the European corrupted the African Continent for slavery is not absolutely correct. As you have stated '' if you want to understand history one can't look at history with the same mentality, as we have today ''. Africa has always been a continent of many continents, no common language, except the drum, as it were with the American Indians for long range communication Net Work. so for us to say that Africa was not a unified continent during the time of enslavement by the European, during the trans-Atlantic slave trade is not entirely absolute, because all one need to be a nation is a common language of communication, not necessarily a common ancestry, or a common set of cultural para-dims. Though I understand that your thesis is on Africa and the African Slave Trade, but historically Negros's was on the continental self of the Americas long before, anthropological records has established 50,000.00 yrs, before what is know as the Native American, who crossed during the great Ice Age. So the thesis is missing major part of our history and genetic pool. What troubles me is that it assumes that we are all Africans or arrived at, what is now known as the Americas as slaves.
I find it equally disgusting and non-factual as well. There were large wars by Africans against the Slave Trade. One such action was undertaken by the Nigerians which is now but a small nation, but included Chad, Mozambique, Somalia and the great Congo warriors. What troubles me is that we would rather believe the Caucasian depiction of history – that the Americas, both North and South America Blacks are children of the enslaved, rather than children of inheritance of these lands. I am deeply troubled that we have turned our heads from our inheritance towards the African Continent as the only great history we have. We have a great and astounding history in the Americas, not as slaves, but as inheritors, engineers, doctors, mechanics, entertainers, entrepreneurs, farmers, nation builders.. The Greatest trick the Caucasian has ever pulled on the so called African-American is to disinherit him form this continent by way of the slave trade fallacy.
People who say that Africans sold other Africans to Europeans don't say it in a way that they mean that they were acting as agents for European benefit. They mean it just like it has been stated here. The fact that it has been so hard and taken so long for Runoko to come to this conclusion is mind boggling to me. I understood this when I was 15 and started reading up on the subject. African and Black solidarity is indeed a new concept. Europeans had European and White solidarity before us and it was set in stone for them with the "occupation" of the Moors and their constant battles with them. Also take note of how small the European territory is compared to Africa and all the lands where black people have historically dwelled. We are coming to form this black and pan-african identity (and are still hardpressed to accept it) in order to combat Eurocentrism and White Supremacy. Even in the Americas many black people don't want to be seen as black, especially Hispanic blacks. So I can understand how Africans of various ethnicities and backgrounds are hardpressed to see each other as the same people just because they are all black. But that doesn't take away from their role in the slave trade. The truth is how you stated it. One kingdom conquered and attacked other kingdoms and took the vanquished as slaves. They then sold them to a ready market on the coast instead of other local and foreign African markets. What Runoko and others have to realize is that the real crime is not that the vanquished were made slaves. The real crime is how those slaves and their ancestors were mistreated, tortured, exploited and marginalized once they arrived in the West. And how mistreatment, torture, exploitation and marginalization continues based on the visible non-European and black origins of the descendents of those slaves.
Look at all the fair skinned "Arabs" who are almost in their entirety descendents of European, Greco-Roman and Persian slaves. At face value you wouldn't have a clue that that was the case, which is a testament to how well the black Arabs treated their slaves. Now when the script is flipped and their numbers as well as European colonialism puts them in a favored position, look how they treat the more original black Arab elements and those elements who may have come from slaves imported from black lands and still show it. Its about treatment and assimilation of slaves, not the actual enslavement; especially when the enslavement is from being vanquished in war and is a tool to neutralize potential threats.
I agree 100 %.
You are 100 % correct Ibrahimi.
Not only Europeans but Arabs too enslaved people living in Africa.
Europeans did not need to be in Africa
But there is another aspect of this that is also not discussed. It's like concluding that Iraqis or Libyans are voluntarily selling oil to the West. When someone holds a gun to ypur head your options are limited so you either accept your role to do the "dirty work" or your fate won't be much different.
The Europeans were not the first to indulge in the African slave trade.The Arabs were the first to use Black Africans for plantation agriculture. Africans did sell each other and they were as vicious as the Europeans. So it is better to understand that people of African descent in the diaspora will not get a better deal from the the Africans born in Africa. They can however keep on dreaming that the African Slave traders did not know what they were doing. The modern day acts of ethnic cleansing among black Africans confirms my position that the black slave traders are on par with the white slave traders. This lesson here is remember black slavery and be vigilant since the white man will not hesitate to make black people slaves and the the the black people will not hesitate to sell other blacks to the white man.