Life is a Journey: Live it (Part 121)

The other autobiography
Tobias Wittmann directed the conversation to another pressing topic, which he did not understand and needed further information about: “Currently, the African states discuss the issue of the Transatlantic Trade as the worst humanitarian disaster in human history and demand reparation from the states which had benefited from the slave trade.“

I took a deep breath and looked around. All eyes on me. „This is a very complex issue...But I will try to make certain things clear. The African countries of the African Union demanding reparations do not have the backing of their people, as these people did not vote in a referendum authorising their leaders to go to the United Nations in New York and demand condemnation of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, asking, in step two, for reparations. Some Africans argue that declaring it as the worst humanitarian disaster would not be right, for instance, in the Second World War, around seventeen million people were killed. And many more humanitarian catastrophes can be mentioned. These black African critics argue that African leaders want to divert the discussion about their failed politics and mismanagement and enrich themselves when the reparation payments come onto the African continent, which means their actions are personal, not genuine.

Now, who should pay the reparations? Let's have a closer look at it. In the end, they will ask countries that benefited from the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Okay... let's assume they will ask the USA as a state, as well as some European states. The black slaves were not bought by the USA as a state or any European country as a state, but by private individuals with the blessing of the respective state or by the states turning a blind eye to the horrific activities. According to them, the slave trade in those days was legal.

As individuals from, let's say, the USA bought individuals from slave traders in Africa, these white slave traders, as individuals or companies, must subsequently be held responsible, not the states which only turned the other way but did not order or encourage white slave masters to buy from Africa any slave for their cotton farms in Georgia or Alabama, Jamaica or Cuba. I take a wild guess that these slave masters are dead already, and their companies exist no more. Just a wild guess. Of course, their names can be established in most cases and the people that benefitted from these private activities. The lives of these individuals were good or very good, once based on the blood of the slaves. Some might even have established a private empire in the course of history, rooted in the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Many North Americans did not directly or indirectly benefit from the Transatlantic Slave Trade. They made their fortune with farming, hnadcrafting of goods or finding oil on their land, invented products and services. Financially and morally, they have no link to the Transatlantic Slave Trade to live a good life. How to separate these people from those who are down the line of generation from history to now, are the beneficiaries of the blood black slaves lost in the USA? Why should these innocent Americans collectively be punished for something they never benefited from and never were part of? Does it make sense? Is it fair?“

Tobias Wittmann commented: “I never thought about this aspect. But...I guess you got a very good point!“

„Very confusing. Very complicated,“ said Susanne Fröhlich, opening a bottle of red wine. Only she wanted to taste the fermented grape juice; the rest refused.

„The African Union is not discussing how much to take away from individuals or specific companies; they want to ask countries to accept collective guilt and therefore financial punishment in the form of reparations, even if maybe half of the population is not responsible for any moral crime and never benefited directly or indirectly from the blood of the black slaves. Now they will find themselves in a corner where they do not belong.

Let's assume it could be established through the generational line that I, as an individual, have directly or indirectly benefited from the blood of the African slaves. With the knowledge of today, I might have strongly opposed the atrocities committed by my forefathers and might have set some slaves free...I mean done everything that no black man would be a slave...why should I get punished morally or financially for what I would have stood against if I had been born back in those grusam days? Now that I... let's assume this and dive into this scenario...I benefit from the blood lost, can I reject the development into which I was born because of the benefits to us as white of the slave trade? Destroy the factories, hospitals, social and political system, refusing deep inside of me never wanting to live in a society which is built on the blood of African slaves, rather going back to a simple life and start from scratch, so as not to be morally responsible for the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Is that possible?

What is also not considered is how much the individuals and companies that used African slaves benefited from them, which translates into money. The criterias as what? The prices for which they were bought, the money lost while the slave could have worked in his native country? And who in the end is getting all these reparation? The children of the slaves who died in America, Jamaica and Cuba?

The Kings and chiefs of Africa were those who once sold their people to the white man. Do they benefit again from the Transatlantic Slave Trade?“

„Are you sure..., “Charles Darwin Jr. was careful to ask. „Are you sure you want to go there and expose the truth?“

„Yes...I am not scared of anything...but God,“ was my simple answer. „God is love and the ultimate truth. Not us humans. We are weak and go our own way. Ways which make our life more comfortable. But only the truth...“

„Only the truth can set us free!“ ended Tobias Wittmann, my sentence. „Only the truth...only God. Fear him and not man!“

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