Slavery is as old as civilization. As hunter-gatherers, humans could not have held slaves. Only with the advent of settled agriculture it became possible for some people to own other people. Every civilization has had the institution of slavery although one may get the impression that only the whites have enslaved blacks, and that the Americans in particular are guilty of the crime of slavery.
Although that’s a common enough misconception, there’s no justification for it in this day of easy access to historical information. A quick question to any of the AI engines is all you need to learn about the awful history of slavery.
The Atlantic slave trade is the most cited but was neither unique nor even the worst. During the Atlantic slave trade, which lasted from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, around 12 million Africans were put on slave ships, sailed across the Atlantic Ocean and sold into slavery. Of this approximately 600,000 were transported to north America, which means that about 5% of all African slaves from the Atlantic slave trade were brought to America.
The Europeans did not capture slaves in Africa. The job of capturing Africans and selling them to Europeans was done by Africans. Africans enslaved Africans. They were the original slavers. Continue reading “Slavery”
Atanu Dey : Life is a Random Draw 
