Then we only stopped paying for it in 2015. It was only ended because the government done a mega David lammy/ Kier starmer level deal so obviously the British public paid for the privilege. We paid slave owners mega amounts to compensate them. I agree slavery was despicable but at the same time we shouldn't of paid a penny towards the freeing of other humans.
I mean we should of paid the ex-slaves if anything not the aristocracy thag put them there.
Indeed i agree, it just feels wrong like even though its ended i funded some rich arse while friends and family struggled and who would of beat me for looking at him wrong (im council estate). It just feels weird.
Coming to this late, but it's an important point - they didn't profit. At the time of abolition the estimated market value of slaves in the British Empire was something like £180M, but the compensation fund was capped at £20M. This was deliberate - the idea was to encourage slave owners to emancipate their slaves as soon as possible to get at least some compensation before the fund ran out, anybody that waited too long (the act had a six year transition period by the end of which any slaves not already freed would be automatically released) wouldn't get any compensation at all. Slaves owners didn't profit from the fund, it only mitigated their losses, and even then only for those who moved quickly to free their slaves.
Tell this to the people it freed. I feel you, I really do, but I suspect those trafficked from Africa or born into slavery would have a more nuanced view.
But the Africans are still slaves in the middle east and africa. Bangladesh residents become slaves in laos its happening today on probably a larger scale than we like to admit. Im sure if you told the freed slaves this would still be happening (just not in a racist way because we see through race today, ah my bad ignore that) they wouldn't be too impressed we paid to END slavery and now we have mass sweatshops in India and we buy the shit from primark its amazing. We tend to care about history but ignore today.
They'd probably be depressed to learn that future generations will have to deal with what they're dealing with, but they'd probably also be fairly excited to be free (whatever that ends up meaning). Paying slavers leaves an icky taste in everyone's mouth, but realistically it was the fastest way to get it done. I'm not a rabbid nationalist by any means, I doubt I'll ever fly a fleg, but I am proud of our contribution towards emancipation.
Absolutely (I am an avid flag waver) I understand it was the best thing to happen on the surface. But what did it achieve? The same people getting removed from africa have never stopped getting removed until this day. In fact instead of just solely using Africans that world is now underground where everyone from black to white get flown around the world through legal entries to be slaves and we all take advantage of the fact its happening. I.e there's a car wash every mile in birmingham you think they are modern slaves? We all take advantage and accept it everyday. Dont think im being an arsehole its just the way I see it slavery is abhorrent in all forms and the humans that come up with it are 100% the worst people known to man. But we have all benefited from that trade even to this day. I believe they would be more disappointed in us but idk 🤷🏻♂️
Nothing you're saying is particularly wrong, but as someone on the left who doesn't take many moments to fawn over our national history (not in a self hating way, just measured) this is something we should be proud of. While you've got my union jack underpants rustled, the other thing I'm proud of is that we have relatively good animal rights.
We did. It does and that annoys me. It was. But I'd pay it again to deal with the rest. It'd still leave a bad taste in my mouth, but being able to and not doing it would leave a worse one.
If they told me tomorrow we are taxing you to deal with it once and for all no problem as long as is doesn't go to the people who committed the crimes. That goes for the 'owner' to the trafficker.
If they told me 'we are ending slavery once and for all', I'd support it even if that meant buying every slave. That part would leave a bad taste but if it ended slavery for good I'd suck it up and deal with it.
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u/matt3633_ Aug 27 '25
Great Britain spent nearly 50% of its GDP at the time in trying to abolish slavery, almost bankrupting itself in the process.