theworriedwell
I think it would be hard for anyone on here, or elsewhere, to show how they or their ancestors were directly disadvantaged by the Romans.
My husband, and many like him, can show you the plantation where his ancestors were slaves he can tell you the name of the man who raped his great great grandmother and fathered his great grandfather, a child he kept as a slave. You can visit the slave castle in West Africa where his ancestors (well some of them) started their journey to the new world.
The Roman invasion also did positive things, roads, towns, a written history. I don't think slavery did anything positive for the Africans who were taken or the ones left behind.
That is why reparations are different.
Thanks worriedwell, you explained this so well, particularly as you could use personal experience. I recall working with a young man in 1981 who had achieved his degree with support from schemes in place to help immigrants whose basic education had been disrupted. His had because he’d arrived in the UK from Jamaica age 14, to join parents he hadn’t seen for 10 years. He stayed with grannie whilst mum and dad trained and established themselves in the uk. His lady name was his slave name. It was my first real exposure to the legacy of slavery. I’d read about it, had a wonderful history teacher when we learned about the horrors of the slave trade - in 1961. But I was aware we had. Etbsl family history back to the mid 19th century. We knew our ancestors travelled north for work in the mills, after agricultural work dried up in the south. We knew their children had been briefly in the work house when parents lack of work meant no food. My colleague knew his ancestors were slaves.
I can’t get angry or smug about Azeem Rafiq and the ‘fall from grace’ some seem keen to accuse him of. Racism, misogyny, all need calling out, Rafiq’s story is the heart of that. Let’s be calm, acknowledge that s**t happens. Reflect, consider, own our own stuff and move on hopefully, in a more positive wsy
