Lifeisannoying’s Weblog

Whites were slaves too, but they won’t say it! « Charismaallover’s Weblog

 Well , this report grinds my gears. It really does! lately i have been hearing reports from the media, that black people  should stop asking for reparations because white people were slaves in the west indies too. or you could be a Redleg. Redlegs were so named because of the crimson shade their skin turns in the sun.

Ah the redlegs, mostly irish but many english welsh and scots, some had been barbadoe’s  which is  a term coined for a  custodial sentance that is  to, sent them to the west indies for hard labour. Some were taken off  the streets for vagrancy. some were sent away for being prostitutes and many especially the irish and scots highlanders, were send away from their homes because of the english imperial ambitions on their counries. there was also Indentured servants

Redlegs were often indentured, which means that they accepted a contract to  work for a fixed term, where they were expected to work for example 4 years, they would recieve their money in installments, their spouses and children were not expected to work unless they were accepted  upon their own contract. if you escaped and managed to run away or even better got onto a ship sailing elsewhere within the “british” empire you werehome free, whiteness was your badge of freedom.

 Now if these people were caught aiding  the black slaves, the balck slaves would be tortured and killed. the redlegs were given a hiding and then allowed to go on with their business. the case  study for this in the 1600’s in barbados 20 black slaves hung and burnt at the stake , 10 irish indentured servants  released, no punishment as they were “misguided”.

After your contract is complete you are free to become a land owner slaveholder or peasant farmer, if you are a white woman the possibilities are endless, white women are rare and thus your value is  increase you can go from english street prostitute to lady of the plantation in  no time at all. ( i may have upset a whole bunch of white west indians with money now) By virtue of their white skin they could stand in court and give evidence and they could not be punished without a trial.

Now the chances are if you had been barbadoe’d or accepted an indureship contract you knew what was  going on and you knew  what was likely to become of your life.If you were  an igbo minding your  own business and maybe going fishing and you were captured by some men  and sold on over and over and had to sit in a fortress in your own excretement for months then get on a ship and lay in  your excretement for months and then learn a new language and  forget how to use your own and work until you  die or are killed it seems an unfair comparison.

Now the media might say, you sold each other. We did not, there are many ethnic groups in africa and no person with  half a pound of sense sells their own.  now jsut because the people all looked black ( and there fore the same) to europeans  it does not mean they were the same. No man took his wife and children to be sold, no woman sold her man to theives while he slept, no woman did away with her noisy children like that. if was capture others to be sold to avoid being sold yourself, it bred hatred and despair. you sell political disdents and prisoners of war, it was desperate.        sell or be sold.

God knows what those poor people suffered and they lost absolutelt everything and they would have given their own foot to have half the rights of the indentured servants, they would have loved to have their families together, they would have loved the chance to be free after 4 or even 6 years( in the 1700’s the peak of the slave trade the life expectancy of a slave after delivery in the “new world” was 3-5years). they would have loved the chance to work for themselves even as peasant farmers.

So this White slave arguement holds no water with me. It’s rubbish