Jamaicans lead Caribbean calls for Britain to pay slavery reparations

[Locutus]

Caribbean slave descendants, some of whose ancestors worked for David Cameron's distant family, are calling for an apology and billions of pounds in reparations

From his bungalow on the side of a hill in western Jamaica, Willie Thompson surveys the same lush valley that one of his great-great-grandmothers was forced to harvest for sugar cane more than 180 years ago.

“I am an African descendant,” he said, whippet-thin and grizzled at the age of 78. “She came here with the chains on her feet, on a slave trade ship”.

Mr Thompson knows that when Parliament voted in 1833 to abolish slavery in Britain’s colonies, Earl Grey’s government was made to pay out compensation worth almost £2 billion in today’s money.



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Jamaicans lead Caribbean calls for Britain to pay slavery reparations - Telegraph

 

[captain morgan]

I can hardly wait for the UN to open their pie-hole and wade into the fray.

Only a matter of time before I can claim billions in reparations from (insert nation/culture here) for having invaded my culturally historic homeland and inflicting pain and loss of property.

...Come to think of it, Billy Thompson stole my milk money a few times back in grade school... I wonder....

 

[L Gilbert]

lol Payback'a a bitch.

 

[captain morgan]

Funny story... When I was a kid, there was this older guy in my school that kicked the sh*t out of me on a few occasions.... He was older (bigger) and should have known better, but I am sure that my smart mouth helped things along.

Anywho - bumped into him a few years later in University.. I was bigger than him now... We looked at each other and had a laugh about it (mind you, I did make him buy a couple of rounds)

 

[L Gilbert]

Funny story... When I was a kid, there was this older guy in my school that kicked the sh*t out of me on a few occasions.... He was older (bigger) and should have known better, but I am sure that my smart mouth helped things along.

Anywho - bumped into him a few years later in University.. I was bigger than him now... We looked at each other and had a laugh about it (mind you, I did make him buy a couple of rounds)

Awesome. I had the same experience and I not only told Jim he owed me beers but a new toque to replace the one he took from me back then. lol Funny thing is, I went out with his sister a few years after when we got into high school. Julie, Jim, and I are still friends after all this time.

 

[WLDB]

Odd given it ended nearly 200 years ago. None of the victims or perpetrators are alive Hell several generations of their descendants have lived and died since then. When governments apologize for things that were horrible decades or centuries after the event it seems hollow to me. It would have meant a lot more if it was coming from the people who committed the act, rather than their successors decades or centuries later.