200 years of abolition of slavery by Britain
This is a timely reminder by Jon Davies of the critical role played by Britain in abolishing slavery from the face of the earth. March 2007 marks the two hundredth anniversary of the Act for the Abolition of Salve Trade of 1807.
There is a parallel here between the British role in abolishing slave trade in the 19th century and the American role in the War on Terror in the 21st century. Then the British empire sent Navy ships and boats to every parts of every ocean and blocked every sea route through which slave trade was being practiced. Similarly now, the United States has 'outlawed' the acceptance of Islamic terror, blacklisted terror charities, blocked international transfer of funds to terrorist outfits, posted its army and customs checks in every port and airport to ensure that Islamic terrorists do not pass unchecked. Jon Davies also reminds us the following:
No European, no Christian, now, needs telling how very wrong slavery and the slave trade were. We are aware that both individual slaves, and slave uprisings played a large part in the abolition movement - it wasn't all just us nice white folks. We are aware, too, that neither in 1807 nor in 1837, did slavery simply vanish because we the British said it should. After all, it wasn't until 1990 that the Organisation of the Islamic Conference announced that slavery was wrong... <<read more>>
Islam uncritically accepted slave trade and every Muslim child knows that Prophet Mohammed brought home several black salves; for reasons of accuracy, let's accept that he also freed many of them. However, we do no see any concerted attempt in Islam to abolish slave trade as inhuman. However, in celebrating 200 years of abolishing salvery, let's celebrate the paralle between the British role then and the US role now in the War on Terror.
