No Fucking Apology Will Be Coming, Archbishop.
“One of Britain’s leading churchmen yesterday urged Tony Blair to apologise on behalf of Britain for its part in the slave trade. The Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, urged the prime minister to go further than he has so far. Mr Blair this month expressed regret for Britain’s role in slavery, but did not make a formal apology.
“Britain is our community and this community was involved in a very, very terrible trade,” Dr Sentamu told the BBC. “Africa as a community was involved in a very terrible trade, the church as a community was involved in a terrible trade. It is really important that we own up to what was collectively done. This is the moment in which you say ‘By the way, I think our forebears did a terrible, terrible thing’.” (Guardian)
No, no, no. Fuck off. Slavery ended two hundred years ago. The nearest relationship anyone could have to a slave under British rule is a several-greats grandparent. No-one has owned a slave, and no-one has been a fucking slave. No-one alive now has been directly affected by slavery. It was admitted that it was wrong when the fucking thing was ended two hundred years ago.
He says “it’s important that we all own up to what was collectively done” but we haven’t fucking done anything! Two hundred years have passed! The only way that any living person could have been affected by slavery is if they let themselves be, and put themselves mentally into that position. And that is not our fault, but theirs. What you are suggesting is that we apologise for what our great great etc ancestors did. Are you implying that the families of criminals should apologise for a crime they did not do?!
Slavery under Britain happened in an entirely different social context from what exists now. But slavery existed in America until much later, and was of course followed by segregation and lack of civil rights until the 1960s. Since Britain never had segregation or deprived blacks of any civil rights, you should instead be congratulating Britain on doing so well in the early period in race relations. It’s just a pity we then got political correctness and the CRE who went and fucked it all up.
So fuck off back to that nice little church where you preach to a smaller and smaller congregation. Because no-one cares any more. Morality has moved beyond the Church, and we no longer need religion or religious leaders to tell us what is right and wrong. Also, stop trying to be ‘trendy’. It doesn’t work.
These claims that Britain should apologise for slavery really pisses me off. I’ve written about it again and again. And I’ll probably have to do it again, knowing the fuck-wits who peddle this shit.
Apologies for the bad language.
UPDATE: Below is a clip from David Cameron at the Wilberforce Address, via 18 Doughty Street, in which he says: “I don’t believe that one generation can meaningfully apologise for something that a previous generation did.”
Sources: Guardian, InTheNews.co.uk, tvnz.co.nz
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Hundreds of years before europeans were taking blacks as slaves north africans were taking europeans as slaves. It’s well documented that over 200 years hundreds of thousands were taken, some say it was 2 million. Where is their apology for OUR suffering?
If the church wants us to apologise for something our ancestors did shouldn’t the church be trying to get jewish people to apologise for killing jesus? Isn’t that just as logical?
What are they complaining about? Do they have any idea how much it costs to ‘cruise’ across the Atlantic these days. They got it for free, ungrateful sods!
On a point of accuracy: you say, “Slavery ended two hundred years ago.” It was, in fact, the slave trade that ended 200 years ago; slavery continued to be legal in British colonies for another 26 years.
Far better than apologising would be if world and church leaders stood together to fight the human-traffiking that goes on today, and that involves far more people than during the height of the slave trade.