A few notes on the subject of slavery...

Are you getting a bit sick of all the coverage on TV recently about the abolition of slavery?* I know I am anyway-seems like such an arbitrary anniversary of one specific (and not particularly effective) piece of legislation that was part of the process of the abolition.

You can’t turn on the TV at the moment without a seeing a Rastafarian saying “Yes. It was a very unpleasant thing, being a slave”. Well, was it really? I never would have guessed. I thought it looked like great fun-out in the open all day, plenty of fresh air and you get to sing all day as well. It looks positively idyllic, if you don't count the beatings...

The other night on BBCsomething cable for instance I was treated to yet another (about the fourth shown that week) well balanced expose of this heinous trade, this time by none other than the respected historian and academic “Miss Dynamite”. I particularly enjoyed her “black and white” (pardon the pun) view of the trade and her endearingly childlike inability to retain facts and understand reasoned argument.

Anyway, if Blair is going to be made to apologise (and perhaps pay reparations) on behalf on the British Government for Slavery (which is absurd-what's a fair rate anyway and how can it be calculated? "Right then, you say you're great Grandad had his bollocks nailed to a tree for insubordination you say? That's another four quid") I think we should request the various Governments of West African nations to apologise to us for killing and subsequently cooking our missionaries in big pots, then stealing their top hats.

Anyway, call me a racialist if you like…

*Please note that throughout the duration of the slave trade as a European economic phenomenon my own ancestors were peasants dragging cartloads full of coal and turnips whilst being beaten by a man on a horse under indentured service for 18 hours a day. In fact my family were like this until about 1952 when i think about it. So fuck off if you don't think I'm sensitive enough.