Just a few points of relevance to the whole racism/slavery obsession of black history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolition_of_slavery_timeline http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serfdom#Dates_of_emancipation_from_serfdom_in_various_countrieshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery1) Neither slavery in general, or black slavery in particular, are unique to the Europeans who liberals love to heap all blame onto for black slavery.
The black slave trade was begun by black kingdoms in Africa long before Europeans were involved. They moved slaves to coastal areas where at some point Europeans began purchasing them and shipping them to the Americas.
But Europeans were only involved in the slave trade on a large basis for about 200 years, and by the late 1700's/early 1800's most European powers and the U.S. northern states had abolished slavery (most of the New England states had abolished slavery in the 1780's before the U.S. was fully formed as a nation).
It was black Africans who began the trade, black Africans who sold them at all times to the Europeans, and Europeans never ventured into Africa beyond the coast in pursuit of slaves.
And it was black Africans who continued the trade for hundreds of years, long after Europeans were completely out of the business.
2) As is sourced in the above-linked dates for various nations worldwide that passed laws abolishing slavery, the serfdom, slavery and indentured servitude of whites/Europeans occured roughly when abolition of black slavery occurred, at most a few decades prior. and really, the only notable exception to that was the Confederate South, who paid a devastating price for clinging to black slavery.
3) the U.S. Constitution even allows for indentured servitude of whites, and actually included clauses that guaranteed a later question of the constitutionality of slavery at some point. So arguably, for those who like to bash our founders as white slave owners, most after the 1780's were not slave owners, and others paved the way in their actions for the complete abolition of slavery.
Indentured servitude only faded in the decades prior to the civil war, roughly when black slavery faded.
All of which undermines the whole "white privelege" argument that slavery was some unique burden only suffered by blacks.
I say all this to dispell the myth that is perpetuated in black culture, in movies and tv entertainment, in music videos, and on and on. It disturbs me how black Americans wallow in past racism, and with hostility form their own separate America and subculture, and with "Black History Month", their own separate history and heroes, that galvanizes a perpetual resentment of white America.
Are our experiences really that far apart and different? Or is it just convenient for scapegoating's sake, to create an image of whitey --past or present-- having it so much better?
