Slavery and a big Marxist Myth

Prosper de Souza, speaking through an interpreter to Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. about Don Francisco de Souza, infamous slave trader of the 1800s -  “I’m proud of what he did.  Because he saved the lives . . .  Because, according to me, he saved thousands of people.  The king of Ouidah would have sacrificed all of them.  So he has done a good thing by sending them away from the country.” Begins approximately the 21:23 mark on the video.  The originals are available on YouTube and embeded farther down.

View the HD version here.
We have all heard the story, that Europeans landed on the west coast of Africa and kidnapped the natives to sell in Europe and the Americas.  In case you have not heard that one, the clip of Professor Angela Davis should bring you up to speed.

However, the kidnap story is false, as Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. shatters this falsehood in "The Slave Kingdoms", part of "The Wonders of Africa" PBS series from 1999.

Another item related to this, which Prof. Davis has spoken about, I found odd in my youth.  Whilst a young soldier in Army Basic Training it seemed that quite a few of the Black soldiers, only from large American cities, never from the countryside, asserted that they were African royals.  The logic went something along the lines of a distant relative was a king in Africa, captured by Europeans and sold into slavery in the USA.  Therefore, that person was a royal without a throne.

Here is an often quoted piece attributed to Prof. Davis, and I think I saw some video of her saying this, but I cannot for the life of me find it in online searches as of this writing.  Also, finding where and when she said it is proving elusive too:

We have inherited a fear of memories of slavery. It is as if to remember and acknowledge slavery would amount to our being consumed by it. As a matter of fact, in the popular black imagination, it is easier for us to construct ourselves as children of Africa, as the sons and daughters of kings and queens, and thereby ignore the Middle Passage and centuries of enforced servitude in the Americas. Although some of us might indeed be the descendants of African royalty, most of us are probably descendants of their subjects, the daughters and sons of African peasants or workers. - Angela Davis

From the work and interviews of Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. the likelihood of a royal slipping through the African execution system is slight at best, but possible.  To add a bit to Dr. Davis' last sentence, the African-American descendants of slaves are for the most part descendants of prisoners-of-war and criminals.  Similar to Fidel Castro "solving" his prisoner problem in 1980 with the Mariel Boatlift, save for any reciprocal payment.

If you want to view the Slave Kingdoms series without my comments or clipping, check them out here: