Consequences of Slavery

The Consequences of Slavery

Ditty A. Kone

Strayer University

Hum 400 Religion & Philosophy

Mark Perry

May 13, 2011

                                                Abstract
         The history of slavery is documented most acutely during the period when slaves first arrived to the new land and when the colonies had first developed into the fledging United States of America. This would lead us to believe that slavery had not existed before this period or that the consequences and relevance of it had little historical, social, or economical importance. While some of this might be true, the act of enslaving other human being has existed before the Europeans ever reached and explored the continent of Africa. Historic data revealed that the African people form of enslavement on one another was drastically different than European and American way. Although slavery as we know it has been abolished, the consequences have had and will surely have everlasting effects on you, me and the future of every child. The research paper discusses the different forms of slavery and the consequences it has had on African’s society.

         Slavery is defined as a person being owned by someone, a state of bondage, servitude, or work performed under harsh conditions for little or no pay. Both continental African slavery and external commercial slavery deprived people of freedom. Continental slavery focused on adding people to a group to be productive members of the society and for other reasons beside monetary benefits. External slavery consisted of obtaining slaves for monetary means while inducing physical, emotional as well as psychological detriment to ensure compliance (Reader, 1997, p. 4). With the emergence of European colonies, a system of trade with American Indians was created and later exploited. The exploitation of the Indian has a sad history that started by the natives trusting people who came as friends but ended up being their conquerors. After realizing that the local Indian population could not meet their requirements, Europeans began to explore other possibilities to acquire cheap labor (Reader, 1997, p. 11). Labor in the colonies was very physically demanding and Europeans would not perform this type of work for long. The slave trade developed due to the shortage of labor in Europeans colonies and the Caribbean. Although slavery started due to shortages in labor, it was a catalyst for greed and corruption. As slavery grew, government bodies introduced law that protected slave owners. I argue that slavery before the Europeans was a natural process that had beneficial consequences and afforded individuals the opportunity to progress in society. The European slavery system has greatly contributed to mass genocide between different African societies themselves and has socially and economically devastated the African continent to a degree which is still has consequences today such as apartheid, and the Civil War.

                                         Egyptians Slavery

         There are several types of systems, forms and enslavement starting with the Egyptians approximately from 1700-1070 BC. In the debt slavery system a person would accept enslavement to replay a debt or escape poverty. This form of indenture ship allowed slaves to keep some of their civil rights and dignity while sometime gaining social and economic security. As any person can reason, the opportunity existed for a slave to be free person when their debt has been paid. Another type of slavery imposed was criminal slavery, which occurred due to the perpetrator committing a crime. In this case, the guilty party would lose his or her freedom and be a slave with no rights, which could be looked upon as being similar to the judicial system currently in use in the United States. Of course there are slave due to wars, for example the Egyptians made their war slaves work in mines of the harshest conditions to obtain gold and copper. Nubia and Sinai slaves performed a myriad of jobs from laborer to government administrators (Ancient Egypt, n.d). A slave who belonged to a wealthy family could be better off than a common peasant. Many slaves who made themselves indispensable to their master and later married into the master’s family after they had been set free. Most people would refer to the Egyptian system of slavery as the natural progression of society, not the harsh barbaric slavery, which European slavery is most notably remembered.

                                         European Slavery 
        The Portuguese made technological advancements in shipbuilding, performed reconnaissance, and mapped much of Africa. The Pope gave them a decree and told them Africa was part of their territory and to take control of it in. Europe was desperately low on labor worker due to the Black Death and people were needed to run the sugar plantation (Kishlansky, Geary, & O’Brien, 2008, p. 13). Portuguese developed settlements in Africa, built churches, schools, and forced the African’s such as the Congolese, Tuareg, and Sena to embrace a culture that was not their own. This helped Christianity against the war with Islam. The African trading port exported silver, carpets, cotton, clothes, and they sought and exported gold, pepper, and slaves. Horses were a very popular commodity and as many as ten slaves were traded for one horse. The dollar ratio for slave to horse amounted to indigenous people being extorted. The trading port built fish plantation and shipped seal skins back to Europe. To Europeans, slaves were just a commodity that had no social standing. They thought the African were savages and did not possess any kind of intellectual ability. In the eyes of the enslaver, this legitimized their immoral actions. By removing thousands of people from Africa, the population was kept unnaturally now and African society was subjected to lose their identity due to foreign influences being forced upon them such as Christianity (Becker, 1999). Worst yet were the diseases, which Europeans brought with them that decimated entire villages leaving little signs that life ever existed there.