Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Jacob]

I have no idea why you keep quoting Pétré-Grenouilleau's book here, and what you think it brings to your argument. Or indeed, what your argument is.

I think the argument is:

1. Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans was different from UK/ American enslavement of Africans.

2. Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans was not too different from Arab and other Eastern faced enslavement of Africans.

3. Therefore Spanish/ Portuguese slavery was not particularly bad and requires no particular acknowledgement or action, even if woke Anglos think UK/ American slavery does.

4. Woke people are idiots. Also everyone else in this thread are ignorant because they fail to acknowledge  specific differences between Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans compared to UK/ American enslavement of Africans.

[Duque de Bragança]

But the point we were talking about was the recent trend of institutions commissioning studies into their historic ties to the slave trade (CofE, Guardian, Glasgow University, royal family etc) and, as I would see it, Britain's responsibility to its past. I think you could have similar conversations in many European countries - my point was simply that the history in Europe will be different in the US, it is more likely to be a case of following the money.

I don't see the relevance in that context of the Saharan slave trade, for example.

I mentioned specifically the oriental slave trade , of which the Saharan slave tarde was only a part. See the Zanj trade in Eastern Africa/the Indian Ocean with Zanzibar (UK involved as well in ending it).

Notice Grenouilleau mentions why he uses oriental and not muslim/arab.

You do get this argument in the UK normally in the context of wanting to talk about the Atlantic slave trade because it is relevant to our history and someone pointing out the Arab slave trade. I think there's a line between setting out the world economy as it was and role slavery played in it, and the trade in enslaved people from one part of the world to another. But more often in the UK I think it is just "whatabouttery" rather than anything meaningful.

I see, you are projecting UK experiences into what I said,  as I said. Two wrongs don't make a right, but omitting for PC reasons a slave trade is wrong as well.

I also think it re-inforces the racial difference at the heart of the Atlantic slave trade because ultimately the only connection between white Balkan boys taken by the Ottomans and white British slavers in the same period is their race. It seems to me a strange thing to be linking those histories in that way (if anything I imagine it would be more productive to compare the enslaving powers).

The Oriental slave trade is more than white Balkan boys.

The racial difference was already there in the Oriental slave trade (not in in 650 at the beginning), with white slaves having more value than black slaves, the latter being called abd in Arabic.

The trade in black slaves furthered the assimilation between blacks and slaves. Does it ring a bell, that's what happened in the West, with some national nuances e.g Brazil had no segregation à laDeep South nor Apartheid. That does not mean there was no racism, not even Gilberto Freyre says that.

Add in some "justifications" the curse of Ham, some hadith, and you get the inferior Zanj (Black African) figure. Even the great Ibn Khaldun was no stranger to these racial prejudices.

The problem extended to black muslims, despite refutations.
See Grenouilleau p.26 to p.34, first edition.

Besides, there are mentions of "European" (Greek/Orthodox/schismatic or bogomiles) slaves in Cuba in 1600, from the old mediterranean networks by Italian merchant republics from the Ottoman Empire or its vassals.

See Grenouilleau again. Of course, all of that did not happen overnight, nor in a linear way.

[Duque de Bragança]

I think the argument is:

Operative words are I think, pity it is not what I said.

1. Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans was different from UK/ American enslavement of Africans.

The scale is different for Spain, given its lack of holdings in Africa, not the enslavement itself, by buying slaves in AFrica. They relied on middlemen.

The UK grew much faster than that of the Portuguese slow beginning, without middlemen, a difference between Iberians.
When the UK really entered the slave trade, with the Caribbean plantation revolution in the 17th century,  Americas were already discovered.

2. Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans was not too different from Arab and other Eastern faced enslavement of Africans.

Wrong, despite the use of the oriental slave trade in the beginning. The Oriental slave trade had some typical practices such as castration, not really used by others.
It certainly was an inspiration.

3. Therefore Spanish/ Portuguese slavery was not particularly bad and requires no particular acknowledgement or action, even if woke Anglos think UK/ American slavery does.

Wrong again, obviously.

4. Woke people are idiots. Also everyone else in this thread are ignorant because they fail to acknowledge  specific differences between Spanish/ Portuguese enslavement of Africans compared to UK/ American enslavement of Africans.

Wokes are idiots? 
Woke are "useful" idiots, at best.

The rest, as most of your post is putting words into my mouth, is caricature.

[Duque de Bragança]

Try reading earlier posts.

I did, and it still made no sense, or seemed relevant to any of Sheilbh's points. As he reminded you.

Try reading and understanding them then, Sheilbh did so and explained what his disagreement is, in a UK context , I then explained my reservation.

[Oexmelin]

Except that all of your equivocations do not address Sheilbh's points, do not alter substantially his and seem to be based on a cursory/ideologically driven reading of Pétré-Grenouilleau (not to mention quite wrong re: Portugal and Spain). In fact, your interventions, which seem to wish to erect some impenetrable wall between the experience of slavery and the slave-trade in Portugal and Spain, with contemporary issues, seem to strengthen his own point.   

[Duque de Bragança]

Except that all of your equivocations do not address Sheilbh's points, do not alter substantially his and seem to be based on a cursory/ideologically driven reading of Pétré-Grenouilleau (not to mention quite wrong re: Portugal and Spain). In fact, your interventions, which seem to wish to erect some impenetrable wall between the experience of slavery and the slave-trade in Portugal and Spain, with contemporary issues, seem to strengthen his own point.   

I even separate Portugal and Spain in this matter. Try again.
Ever heard of the Controversy of Valladolid? This is more nuanced that your Anglo vision.

That's according to you and your echo chamber, notice "contemporary" issues since you have nothing substantial to add, besides your ideology.

Bref...

[Oexmelin]

 

As I thougt, not serious.

[Duque de Bragança]

As I thougt, not serious.

I take it that you recognise that you are not.

That's in improvement.

[Jacob]

The rest, as most of your post is putting words into my mouth, is caricature.

Believe it or not, I genuinely am trying to understand what you're getting at. It appears I'm not the only one who's having a hard time either.

I think your argument would be helped if you stated your thesis clearly in a few sentences rather than focus on counter-arguing and dismissing what other posters are saying.

[Duque de Bragança]

Believe it or not, I genuinely am trying to understand what you're getting at. It appears I'm not the only one who's having a hard time either.

There's clear partisan bias in a case.

I think your argument would be helped if you stated your thesis clearly in a few sentences rather than focus on counter-arguing and dismissing what other posters are saying.

Already did it earlier, and I specified what I meant. Remember, first allegedly I had no argument but then it was vile whataboutism.

The British experience is not the same as the Portuguese experience and should not be seen as a template.
Not to mention Portugal is no longer a monarchy, so the Crown benefitting from the slave trade angle cannot work.

I could have mentioned the oriental slave raids/jihads rarely hitting Great Britain, unlike Southern Europe where it was a constant threat until 1830 roughly with some peaks, which make comparisons difficult.

[Jacob]

Already did it earlier, and I specified what I meant. Remember, first allegedly I had no argument but then it was vile whataboutism.

I guess I just don't get it

The British experience is not the same as the Portuguese experience and should not be seen as a template.
Not to mention Portugal is no longer a monarchy, so the Crown benefitting from the slave trade angle cannot work.

I could have mentioned the oriental slave raids/jihads rarely hitting Great Britain, unlike Southern Europe where it was a constant threat until 1830 roughly with some peaks, which make comparisons difficult.

Okay, so here is the original point Sheilbh made:

The UK is like Spain, France, Portugal. Slavery and the trade in people was something that happened from trading posts in Africa to the Caribbean (and in the 17th and 18th century, to North America). That it is physically separate, is reflected in a mental comparmentalisation that's still present - I think empire is possibly a tool to compartmentalise. In the case of Caribbean in particular the process didn't lead to countries with a large black population but eliminated the cultural presence of the existing peoples and populating it instead with people who'd been violently torn from their people and memory and place. And it's the great theme of a lot of Caribbean literature - Derek Walcott's The Swamp or Patrick Chamoiseau's Texaco for example.

I've highlighted what I think is the key point.

You disagree immediately with:

Sorry, but what you say might be true for the UK but not for the Iberians.

[after which you add a bunch of interesting details about Iberian related slavery]

However, the points you add - and the themese you develop in your following posts - do not seem to address what Sheilbh's main point is. To restate the point: for the European perpetrators slavery is something that largely happens "over there" - the slaves are from Africa, and they're sold in the New World - while the profits largely accrue in Europe and spur all sorts of development and benefits.

I don't think anyone here disagrees that there are a number of differences between the slave trade as perpetrated by Anglos and the slave trade perpetrated by Iberians - and if they were, I think your posts have illustrated many of those differences.

What I don't understand is how you believe that those differences counters Sheilbh's core point (if indeed you do). Maybe I've missed something, but I don't see how those differences do not result in a situation where the benefits are primarily localized to Europe, while the negative societal implacations largely play out in the New World and Africa. If the argument is that there is a more Oriental facing element to the Iberian slave trade, then that's cool but it doesn't alter the fundemental structure.

On the other hand, if you don't disagree with that and are simply pointing out a bunch of differentiating factors between the Iberian and Anglo colonial empires and their slave trades, then cool. That's interesting, and you're clearly knowledgeable.

On the third hand if your discussion of differences is in support of some larger point separate from what I believe Sheilbh's point to be, then I'm curious to understand what it is. I don't get it right now, but would appreciate it if you are willing to explain it in simple terms since I seem to be having difficulties.

[Tamas]

I think what Duque is getting at is that participation in the slave trade is not of the same perceived cultural significance in Portugal/Spain as it is in the US and the UK. I guess we can argue about the reasons for this -I would guess its a combination of not facing this part of their past on a national level and the fact that they have shed a lot of the after-effects of it by losing their American colonies- but simply this argument here on its own seems to prove him right about the different perceptions of slavery.

[Jacob]

I think what Duque is getting at is that participation in the slave trade is not of the same perceived cultural significance in Portugal/Spain as it is in the US and the UK. I guess we can argue about the reasons for this -I would guess its a combination of not facing this part of their past on a national level and the fact that they have shed a lot of the after-effects of it by losing their American colonies- but simply this argument here on its own seems to prove him right about the different perceptions of slavery.

Ah I see.

Yeah seems definitely reasonable to argue that slavery is perceived differently in Portugal and Spain than in the US and UK.

That it is seen as being less significant, and having fewer present repercussions, seems to me to support Sheilbh's point rather than undermine it though.

[Josquius]

No idea how things are in Ibieria. It is worth noting however that in a Anglo context "but what about the Muslims!" is a common bit of whataboutery far right folk love throwing out whenever slavery is discussed.

I have absolutely no idea what modern immigration is like down there either. Especially with Portugal given its old fascist idea of its colonies being portugal.
With Spain I gather black Spaniards as a sizable group are a fairly recent phenomena?

[Admiral Yi]

No idea how things are in Ibieria. It is worth noting however that in a Anglo context "but what about the Muslims!" is a common bit of whataboutery far right folk love throwing out whenever slavery is discussed.

I prefer to throw out what about the coastal Africans.