#slaveship

The Zong Massacre.

THE TREES WITH SORROWFUL ROOTS

Since the progress of genetics, we are surrounded by websites offering to uncover our entire family tree.  

I have always felt uncomfortable finding the ancestors I share with a plethora of people. I fear the undesirables and criminals that reside among them. And I imagine their misdeeds creeping up towards me, towards my moral conscience.  We are undoubtedly not responsible for the behavior of our ancestors however the fact that I come from them makes me symbolically involved in their actions, whether they were good or bad actions.  

It is a difficult experience for descendants of slaves to discover the origins of their ancestors. These ancestors are survivors of the slave ships, the whipping and rapes.

African-Americans are overwhelmed with emotions when they visit The Door of No Return in Ouidah, Benin or the old slave-trading center on Goree Island in Senegal. This place shows the grim slave-quarters where Africans were parked before crossing the Atlantic Ocean in chains.

How do you offer a descendant of a slave a family tree without the indescribable violence and the profound injustice coming from their past? Should we remind anyone that most of these family trees have no African names? They were all eradicated with the help of a club or a hanging rope. Then, the slave owners gave their name instead, claiming them as their property. Now, how can the family tree finds its way back to its roots? The only way is by traces of blood, by DNA.

The consumers of European extraction has a different experience most of the time. The majority are praising genealogy websites for helping them finding that first ancestor who got on the Mayflower ship. Their family trees, even with a violent past, do not include slave ships, systemic lynching and the eradication of their identity.

European farmers, sharecroppers, well off citizens run away from the plague, from starvation and wars. Jews had to flee the pogroms and all mistreatment reserved to religious minorities. They all experienced their share of atrocities. But the persecuted, the despised rebuilt their lives in the Americas. Once on this shore, they were welcomed and could walk with no chains on their feet. The Africans experienced the opposite. Naked and tied up, they were no longer farmers, nor sharecroppers or well off citizens. Once captured, they became ebony wood transported to the American continent to be brutalized even more, even by the people who were persecuted in Europe.

Genealogy websites are not presenting these facts. The commercials are oriented towards what sells the most : a glorious past. Most of the time, we could see seniors looking at their great grandfather picture, the hero who lost his life for a good cause. Their pride is valid but it is one side of the story of genealogy.  

We commemorate the struggle of African-Americans, we name streets after their heroes, we paint canvas, write books but no one repay for the wrong done to the descendants of slave throughout the Americas. Not even the Africans. They should be at the forefront of the justice for slavery movement. We could have different opinions on how to go about reparation but no one should be opposed. The exploitation of Africans during at least 4 centuries demand a form of justice. 

Genealogy websites are a reminder that it is impossible to turn all citizens into admirers of their forbears. There are undeniable factors that keep the fire of revolt burning, the volcano's lava percolating through the mind of the outcasts. What do we do with the people left behind on the side of the road of human decency and justice?

Instead of leaving them in their struggle, we should join forces to correct the wrong that affect their lives even today.

1317. Josh Rouse - 1972 (Rykodisc - 2003)

Un disque pop trop bien léché très ennuyeux par son manque de chansons, à quelques exceptions près.

Slaveship

Spotify