There is rather too much gesture politics around the "slavery monuments must come down" movement. If you are to be consistent and tear down anything linked to slavery then, for example, the pyramids in Egypt would need to go, as would statues of many British monarchs, every Roman Emperor, etc.The simple fact is that recorded history goes back roughly 5500 years and for roughly 5300 years slavery was an established, normal and widely used practice on a global basis. There were many attempts by many countries to abolish slavery going back nearly 3000 years. And yes slavery and slaves markets existed in Africa long before the transatlantic slave trade existed.The transatlantic slave trade cannot be understood or studied in isolation and crucially we misunderstand it (and indeed all history) if we interpret it based on 21C morals/views rather than the standards of the time.What we can say is that the transatlantic slave trade and the aftermath of its abolishment (for example Jim Crow laws) still has a present day effect on people in a way that earlier large scale slave trading, at least in West Europe and US, do not. That can justify the taking down statues which were erected after the abolishment of slavery specifically to hark back to that period or with the intent of displaying a white supremacist message. For example, the statue of Colston in Bristol should go but the statue of Rhodes in Oxford should stay
Justin Stephenson ● 2333d