Update (9/13): John Derbyshire on religious slavery.
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Black people in Africa are acknowledging their ancestors’ role in the slave trade.
It’s about time.
In an effort to attract black tourists, the African country of Ghana wants black Americans to know how sorry they are for all the trouble. 
In my unpopular but right-on-the-money opinion, western countries, that is, white people, have apologized for slavery ad nauseam and bent over backwards to make up for it. It’s about time black Africans bear some of the burden, if only symbolically.
One could argue that their sins are worse. They sold out their own brothers and sisters! But I doubt many black Americans care. Guilt-tripping other black folks isn’t as profitable as guilt-tripping whites.
Then again, I’ll bet a lot of people didn’t even know that black Africans were involved in the slave trade until they saw the movie Roots. I certainly don’t remember reading any such thing in school. From the Toronto Star:
UNESCO, the United Nations’ culture and education agency, estimates that 17 million people were forced to leave western Africa in wooden ships bound for the Americas.
Millions more died anonymously, far from home and without proper burial, during the brutal overland march to reach the slave trading forts like Elmina Castle [in Ghana], where blacks were kept shackled in dungeons, then branded with hot iron rods before being packed like “pieces of ebony” into waiting ships.
Most textbooks exploring the history of African slavery blame the trade squarely on Western colonial powers and the New World colonies that trafficked in human cargoes…The fact that Africans sold their own people into slavery is mostly ignored.
Ho-hum. That black Africans and Arabs were and are still involved in the human chattel trade (and other vile things) is uninteresting to the world. (Also see Sudan’s Slaves.) The white man is the blue-eyed devil, conquering, oppressing, chaining, and killing. He is the one people envy and hate, the one for whom they blame their misery. As brutal and corrupt as African rulers are, I’ll bet somehow the people they brutalize still blame “colonialism.”
Oh, but isn’t it fitting that Ghana called its advertising campaign “Project Joseph,” a reference to the Bible story of Joseph, whose envious brothers sold him into Egyptian slavery?
The young Hebrew went through many trials and tribulations, as they say, and remained faithful to his God, despite all temptations to stray. Joseph eventually became a leader in Egypt and prospered, becoming Pharaoh’s “second-in-command.”
There was a famine in Canaan, and Joseph’s brothers went to Egypt to buy food. Joseph was in charge of selling the food, and he recognized his brothers, who didn’t recognize him. (Joseph’s story picks up at Genesis 40 and continues through Genesis 50.)
After much drama, Joseph’s brothers eventually recognized him, and the family reconciled. He tells his brothers not to be angry with themselves for selling him out, because God sent him to Egypt to save their lives and preserve them as a people. What his brothers intended for evil, God intended for good.
And that’s exactly the way I feel about the American slave trade, given that blacks in America as a group have prospered in ways they never could have in Africa or anywhere else on the planet.
Apology accepted, Ghana.
Addendum: If you ever think that something should go without saying, dismiss the thought and just say it. Don’t take Ghana’s apology so literally, for crying out loud. It is symbolic. It doesn’t erase the past or compensate for it, nor is it meant only for black Americans who can trace their ancestry back to Ghana. I don’t really care about the apology, and I don’t plan on visiting Ghana. This post makes points far more important than tourism and publicity.
Another Addendum: Did I tell you my accepting Ghana’s apology was meant to be tongue-in-cheek? I scoff when institutions and governments apologize for slavery. Unless the person who committed the wrong apologizes to the person wronged, it’s all entertainment. Read my comments about Congress apologizing for lynching.
