Imagine if other countries also press for repatriations from our MPs for what their ancestors did. They’ll all be bankrupt !
Im very much not comfortable with this precedent of generational guilt.
There were plenty of local people who expedited the slave trade on behalf of the superpowers, are their families being sought for reparations as well?
Where do we draw the line? Just white slavers? What about the ancient egyptians using slaves? What about the romans? Do welsh families get reparations from england/italy? Do england get it from the french for 1066?
Are native americans getting all their land back?
It just doesnt have a logical end point. Once you open the generational guilt box it gets messy very quickly.
I think Richard Drax should pay compensation to any Jamaican whom he has enslaved. But I doubt he owns any 400 year old Jamaicans TBH.
Will Jamaica also ask African countries for reparations? It was Africans who abducted and sold their own people to be enslaved.
Will Jamaica also give reparations to their natives? There were natives there before anyone else.
Will Jamaica pay us reparations for ending the slave trade and freeing the slaves?
Africans also practised slavery before the arrival of Europeans.
Anyone who thinks reparations are a good idea has not thought about the problem sufficiently. It’s an utterly moronic concept.
Will Jamaica cease to exist? Its creation and current population are entirely the product of slavery!
What a shocker, a Tory is rich because of immorality.
​
Oh no wait that’s exactly what was expected.
Yeah he should give the plantations he *still* owns to Jamaica and Barbados.
I’m personally looking at suing the Papal state for the Roman invasion. Bastards.
If the Barbadian government actually seizes any of this guy’s property they can say goodbye to any foreign investment for decades. It would be such a bad decision.
Not worth it just to get an unprofitable, non-working plantation back.
Soon as I find out which Viking clan rampaged though my town I’m going to be rich
That said part of me wants the Native Americans to roll up to the White House and demand their land back
I think framing it as reparations is doing the idea a disfavour.
Instead it should be viewed as benefiting from the proceeds of theft. If you buy a stolen item from another person you are no more entitled to that item than the thief was and the original owner has a legitimate claim to have it or the value of it returned to them.
Being realistic about it, that’s not going to work for the vast majority of cases, but where a causal link between the wealth of a slave trader and that of their modern descendent can be proven I could see a case being made for the value of lost earnings to be made by the slave’s modern descendants. This being especially the case for people who live in the countries their ancestors were trafficked to.
One of the few reparations claims that actually makes sense.
I like that he tries to say its all ancient history – but he still owns the family plantation. Funniest shit I’ve read all week.
FYI: this MP’s ancestor was the inspiration for Ian Fleming’s Bond villain Hugo Drax.
Liverpool & Bristol should have to pay, as they made the most out of slavery.
Once they’ve finished with that, he also needs to apologise for his ancestor Hugo’s conspiracy to destroy London with a nuclear missile, not to mention his attempt to short the pound and profit from the disaster he intended to create!
More seriously: good.
Drax says: “no one can be held responsible today for what happened many hundreds of years ago”
Maybe not directly, but as someone who profited, it could easily be argued that people who have had intergenerational disadvantage due to your ancestors’ profitable actions should indeed take a slice of the pie on which your success was founded, as a moral right.
It is tricky to work out where to draw the line, but if your family’s profit from the slave trade is well-documented and obvious then it’s probably an easy one.
Depends entirely on how these laws are implemented. If a family involved in slavery still owns tons of former plantation land or assets that can be directly traced back to the slave trade etc then I certainly won’t weep if those assets are taxed by the state.
If it’s something where any random street cleaner could be sued for everything they own because someone can find one relative in their family tree who once profited from slavery then yeah, it’s dumb.
It’s all about the process.
Fantastic idea – when do I queue up to receive my reperations from the Italians, the Danes and the French?
How does one reasonably determine the amount of the reparations? Indeed, if there are any losses to be recovered which is doubtful.
Obviously it would be tricky but I wish a Law would be passed banning reparations for the transatlantic slave trade for good. As this debate Never stops.
Surely they should be angry at their own countrymen who sold the slaves?
Complicated one and the details and how far you go back and how/who you actually give reparations to is difficult….but this example in particular seems blatant, it’s direct link to slavery in which 30,000 slaves died there in 200 years and his family got Paid when it was abolished and again it’s a direct link, obviously not his fault but it’s also not like the descendants of the slaves who helped built his families fortune had a fair chance.
I think the best option is for him to turn it into a public building or museum of some kind, seems fair and in a selfish way is good PR for him.
(For anyone bringing up “what about ancient Egypt” just shut the fuck up)
I think reparations, specifically the nationalising of assets within Jamaica and other colonial nations would end up having significant negative consequences that need to be considered.
So Jamaica get the assets back and distribute them or farm them for their own jobs, welfare and economic benefit.
There are many other companies, particularly british companies that have relations and businesses in these colonial nations due to common wealth ties and relationships there. I think if Jamaica and other countries take this one step further and start targeting other assets in a cash grab, it could hurt them significantly. Foreign investment will take a hit. That is an unquestionable fact. Companies do not want to be involved in politics full stop. They do not want to deal with aggressive foreign governments. That is a fact. Cheap labour can be found anywhere in those areas. No need to risk investing in a government that nationalises stuff when they can just move their operations elsewhere.
Also there is no guarantee actual jamaican people benefit directly from these reparations. It is likely that their parliaments are just as corrupt as ours and these assets get passed to existing wealthy elite. Which is still a negative even if the risk is more attractive than leaving it in the hands of a tory.
It’s genuinely amazing how few people people have read the article. This man already has hugely benefitted from his family’s involvement in slavery. It’s surely reasonable that he and his descendants shouldn’t continue to make big money on a slave asset.
The British already paid reparations by buying the freedom of all the slaves in the empire through taxpayer money.
Should Wales seek reparations from England. Should England seek reparations from the Danes?
History is a mess, and using it as a stick to get cash from others doesn’t progress anything. Current day crimes are plentiful enough. If they were this concerned about slavery they would be in up arms about actual slavery that still is going on in many parts of Africa, the middle east and Asia.
Everyone shits on the west, but where are the Jihads against the Chinese treatment of the Uighur people? Why does no one talk about the current stuff like the cocoa plantations in Western Africa, that shit is actually happening today but lets have a go at some Tory prick with an evil sounding name.
I’m not sure I agree with reparations in this case due to the long time which has passed and it’s likely down to a nationalistic movement which will pass. However, I have a major dislike of families such as this with generational wealth, especially in the UK, where they seem to often dabble in politics. They’re not representative of the population and their wealth should be dismantled each generation through punitive inheritance tax.
28 comments
Imagine if other countries also press for repatriations from our MPs for what their ancestors did. They’ll all be bankrupt !
Im very much not comfortable with this precedent of generational guilt.
There were plenty of local people who expedited the slave trade on behalf of the superpowers, are their families being sought for reparations as well?
Where do we draw the line? Just white slavers? What about the ancient egyptians using slaves? What about the romans? Do welsh families get reparations from england/italy? Do england get it from the french for 1066?
Are native americans getting all their land back?
It just doesnt have a logical end point. Once you open the generational guilt box it gets messy very quickly.
I think Richard Drax should pay compensation to any Jamaican whom he has enslaved. But I doubt he owns any 400 year old Jamaicans TBH.
Will Jamaica also ask African countries for reparations? It was Africans who abducted and sold their own people to be enslaved.
Will Jamaica also give reparations to their natives? There were natives there before anyone else.
Will Jamaica pay us reparations for ending the slave trade and freeing the slaves?
Africans also practised slavery before the arrival of Europeans.
Anyone who thinks reparations are a good idea has not thought about the problem sufficiently. It’s an utterly moronic concept.
Will Jamaica cease to exist? Its creation and current population are entirely the product of slavery!
What a shocker, a Tory is rich because of immorality.
​
Oh no wait that’s exactly what was expected.
Yeah he should give the plantations he *still* owns to Jamaica and Barbados.
I’m personally looking at suing the Papal state for the Roman invasion. Bastards.
If the Barbadian government actually seizes any of this guy’s property they can say goodbye to any foreign investment for decades. It would be such a bad decision.
Not worth it just to get an unprofitable, non-working plantation back.
Soon as I find out which Viking clan rampaged though my town I’m going to be rich
That said part of me wants the Native Americans to roll up to the White House and demand their land back
I think framing it as reparations is doing the idea a disfavour.
Instead it should be viewed as benefiting from the proceeds of theft. If you buy a stolen item from another person you are no more entitled to that item than the thief was and the original owner has a legitimate claim to have it or the value of it returned to them.
Being realistic about it, that’s not going to work for the vast majority of cases, but where a causal link between the wealth of a slave trader and that of their modern descendent can be proven I could see a case being made for the value of lost earnings to be made by the slave’s modern descendants. This being especially the case for people who live in the countries their ancestors were trafficked to.
One of the few reparations claims that actually makes sense.
I like that he tries to say its all ancient history – but he still owns the family plantation. Funniest shit I’ve read all week.
FYI: this MP’s ancestor was the inspiration for Ian Fleming’s Bond villain Hugo Drax.
Liverpool & Bristol should have to pay, as they made the most out of slavery.
Once they’ve finished with that, he also needs to apologise for his ancestor Hugo’s conspiracy to destroy London with a nuclear missile, not to mention his attempt to short the pound and profit from the disaster he intended to create!
More seriously: good.
Drax says: “no one can be held responsible today for what happened many hundreds of years ago”
Maybe not directly, but as someone who profited, it could easily be argued that people who have had intergenerational disadvantage due to your ancestors’ profitable actions should indeed take a slice of the pie on which your success was founded, as a moral right.
It is tricky to work out where to draw the line, but if your family’s profit from the slave trade is well-documented and obvious then it’s probably an easy one.
Depends entirely on how these laws are implemented. If a family involved in slavery still owns tons of former plantation land or assets that can be directly traced back to the slave trade etc then I certainly won’t weep if those assets are taxed by the state.
If it’s something where any random street cleaner could be sued for everything they own because someone can find one relative in their family tree who once profited from slavery then yeah, it’s dumb.
It’s all about the process.
Fantastic idea – when do I queue up to receive my reperations from the Italians, the Danes and the French?
How does one reasonably determine the amount of the reparations? Indeed, if there are any losses to be recovered which is doubtful.
Obviously it would be tricky but I wish a Law would be passed banning reparations for the transatlantic slave trade for good. As this debate Never stops.
Surely they should be angry at their own countrymen who sold the slaves?
Complicated one and the details and how far you go back and how/who you actually give reparations to is difficult….but this example in particular seems blatant, it’s direct link to slavery in which 30,000 slaves died there in 200 years and his family got Paid when it was abolished and again it’s a direct link, obviously not his fault but it’s also not like the descendants of the slaves who helped built his families fortune had a fair chance.
I think the best option is for him to turn it into a public building or museum of some kind, seems fair and in a selfish way is good PR for him.
(For anyone bringing up “what about ancient Egypt” just shut the fuck up)
I think reparations, specifically the nationalising of assets within Jamaica and other colonial nations would end up having significant negative consequences that need to be considered.
So Jamaica get the assets back and distribute them or farm them for their own jobs, welfare and economic benefit.
There are many other companies, particularly british companies that have relations and businesses in these colonial nations due to common wealth ties and relationships there. I think if Jamaica and other countries take this one step further and start targeting other assets in a cash grab, it could hurt them significantly. Foreign investment will take a hit. That is an unquestionable fact. Companies do not want to be involved in politics full stop. They do not want to deal with aggressive foreign governments. That is a fact. Cheap labour can be found anywhere in those areas. No need to risk investing in a government that nationalises stuff when they can just move their operations elsewhere.
Also there is no guarantee actual jamaican people benefit directly from these reparations. It is likely that their parliaments are just as corrupt as ours and these assets get passed to existing wealthy elite. Which is still a negative even if the risk is more attractive than leaving it in the hands of a tory.
It’s genuinely amazing how few people people have read the article. This man already has hugely benefitted from his family’s involvement in slavery. It’s surely reasonable that he and his descendants shouldn’t continue to make big money on a slave asset.
The British already paid reparations by buying the freedom of all the slaves in the empire through taxpayer money.
Should Wales seek reparations from England. Should England seek reparations from the Danes?
History is a mess, and using it as a stick to get cash from others doesn’t progress anything. Current day crimes are plentiful enough. If they were this concerned about slavery they would be in up arms about actual slavery that still is going on in many parts of Africa, the middle east and Asia.
Everyone shits on the west, but where are the Jihads against the Chinese treatment of the Uighur people? Why does no one talk about the current stuff like the cocoa plantations in Western Africa, that shit is actually happening today but lets have a go at some Tory prick with an evil sounding name.
I’m not sure I agree with reparations in this case due to the long time which has passed and it’s likely down to a nationalistic movement which will pass. However, I have a major dislike of families such as this with generational wealth, especially in the UK, where they seem to often dabble in politics. They’re not representative of the population and their wealth should be dismantled each generation through punitive inheritance tax.