British Government's 'Gaslighting' Report on Racism Says Slavery Had Some Upsides
By: Jamie Ross (The Daily Beast)
Of course there were upsides to slavery. That's why slavery was attractive and persisted. Slavery increased wealth, national affluence, and lowered costs for consumers. Slavery lessened the drudgery of mundane work, allowed more leisure, and allowed more intellectual pursuits. Slavery was a shortcut that allowed rapid economic development and a broader prosperity.
The problem was that the desirable benefits of slavery were obtained at the expense of a group of people. Society enjoyed greater affluence and prosperity by taking everything from slaves.
The pie always seems bigger when the slices aren't shared equally. Taking from others is a shortcut that doesn't make the pie bigger.
The current uproar over racial justice is about dividing a shrinking pie. We are repeating the same mistake by focusing attention on shortcuts instead directing our efforts toward making a bigger pie. We can't establish equality by taking from some to give to others; that's how slavery created the mess in the first place.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Last summer, after George Floyd's killing sparked mass anti-racism demonstrations around the globe, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson asked a dedicated team to investigate and report back on racism in the U.K.. On Wednesday, they came back with their findings—that institutional racism no longer exists, and that the slave trade had some upsides.
The report, published by the British government's Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, has been branded as "gaslighting" and "an insult" by anti-racism activists. While the study went as far as admitting that Britain is not yet a "post-racial country," it lauds the country's race relations as "a model for other white-majority countries."
"Put simply, we no longer see a Britain where the system is deliberately rigged against ethnic minorities," it says. "The impediments and disparities do exist, they are varied, and ironically very few of them are directly to do with racism. Too often 'racism' is the catch-all explanation, and can be simply implicitly accepted rather than explicitly examined."
The report went on to say that other factors—such as geography, socio-economic background, culture, family influence, and religion—had "more significant impact on life chances than the existence of racism."
Appearing on BBC Radio 4's Today show on Wednesday, the chairman of the commission, Dr Tony Sewell, explained his questionable findings further, saying: "No-one denies and no-one is saying racism doesn't exist... We found anecdotal evidence of this. However, evidence of actual institutional racism? No, that wasn't there, we didn't find that."
Perhaps the low point of the report is when it appears to find some benefits of the African slave trade—an atrocity in which Britain very much led the way. The government report chirpily states: "There is a new story about the Caribbean experience which speaks to the slave period not only being about profit and suffering but how culturally African people transformed themselves into a re-modelled African/Britain."
The report also criticized anti-racism campaigners, dismissing Black Lives Matter and related demonstrations as the "idealism" of "well-intentioned young people" that risks "alienating the decent centre ground" of British politics. The commission condemned what it described as an "increasingly strident form of anti-racism thinking that seeks to explain all minority disadvantage through the prism of white discrimination."
The report has, predictably, received an extremely bad reaction from anti-racism advocates. Rehana Azam, the national secretary of the GMB trade union, said: "Only this government could produce a report on race in the 21st century that actually gaslights Black, Asian, Minority and Ethnic people and communities. This feels like a deeply cynical report that not only ignores Black and ethnic minority workers' worries, but is part of an election strategy to divide working class people and voters."
David Lammy, a lawmaker for the opposition Labour Party and shadow Justice Secretary, described the report as "an insult to anybody and everybody across this country who experiences institutional racism." He added: "Boris Johnson has just slammed the door in their faces by telling them that they're idealists, they are wasting their time. He has let an entire generation of young white and Black British people down."
Prof Kehinde Andrews, a professor of Black Studies at Birmingham City University, said: "It's complete nonsense. It goes in the face of all the actual existing evidence. This is not a genuine effort to understand racism in Britain. This is a PR move to pretend the problem doesn't exist."
To make matters worse, HuffPost reported that selected journalists were not briefed about the report in advance—including Britain's only race correspondent, The Independent's Nadine White. White was sent an email showing that the commission asked for briefings on their report on racial disparities be sent to a "tight list of journos" only.
Institutional racism in Britain has been under the spotlight in recent weeks after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's allegation that the royal family expressed concerns about how dark their baby's skin would be. Harry said racism in the British media was a "large part" of why he left the country, adding: "Unfortunately, if the source of information is inherently corrupt or racist or biased, then that filters out to the rest of society."
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Focusing our attention on the shortcut of taking from some to give to others only repeats the mistakes of slavery that created the mess in the first place.
What we need is a bigger pie that must be shared equally.
Just not for the slaves themselves.
Yeah, not for the slaves. Slavery was a shortcut that provided benefit by taking everything from slaves.
The shortcut of taking from some to give to others created the mess. We're repeating the same mistake.
Having to pay taxes is not comparable to slavery! The prospering many contributing to the good of the disadvantage few benefits all in the long run. Society is advancing with or without naysayers...
Paying taxes to benefit all is considerably different than paying taxes to provide greater benefit to some. Paying taxes to provide greater benefit to some functions the same way as slavery.
Governments since ancient times have taxed the more affluent to provide for the poor and the sick, for their orphans, widows and aged.
Taxation is not slavery. Courts ruled long ago!
Yep, taxation is not slavery because taxation takes less. But part-time slavery wouldn't have been less damaging, would it? And the benefit obtained from taxation isn't more charitable than slavery, either.
Taxation is necessary; the point isn't to abolish taxation. Using taxation to provide greater affluence for some doesn't benefit all. That's the same mistake made with slavery; taking from some to provide benefit to others.
Affluence and prosperity obtained by taking from some to give to others was the upside of slavery.
Racism, sexism, greed and violence built empires...
Great Britain, The Empire, was won at end of guns.
England believed God wanted them to rule over us.
"Long to reign over us, God save the fuckin Queen".
Of course the US is racist. England conceived us a colony where white men were superior to all others.
The great houses of Britain were built by the blood sweat slaves forced to grow sugar, cotton and corn in their faraway bloodfields they mostly never saw.
Well, see, that's one of the biggest problems with racial politics.
Not all white men are created equal. Scotland, Wales, and Ireland weren't quite equal with England.
That there were always hierarchies of white men is immaterial to the racist system which put any white men above all others. Where for hundreds of years not one single white man was punished for the murder of a black person. That is racism. No matter how you may twist it, you are not the victim!
Some people are clueless. Consider the source.
Ever heard of "the white man's burden" Nerm ?
Yeah. Islam has very similar views toward other people. The spread of Islam is intended to civilize other populations, too.
But that doesn't have anything to do with the fact that slavery provided a benefit by taking everything from slaves.
The upside of racial politics is to provide a benefit by taking from others just as slavery provided a benefit by taking from slaves. Racial politics is making the same mistakes as did slavery.
I'll keep that in mind the next time I live in Iran.