is slavery the human condition?
When Mikki considers that slavery existed in the earliest of human societies, formed the basis of every civilization and modern nation and still exists in many cultures -- and would undoubtedly still exist in ours were it not for laws prohibiting human trafficking and workplace abuses – she asks whether it is the human condition to enslave or be enslaved?“The history of slavery in England is particularly strange because by 1600, under Elizabeth I, the last form of slavery (villeinage) had disappeared and the Brits stood proud as a free nation, and yet, within 25 years, under James I, the surplus poor of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales started to be sold to the plantation owners in Virginia and Barbados as slaves and shipped in chains out of a country they loved, to die en route or within the first year of arrival.”
“As if being preyed upon by their greedy and cruel kinsmen wasn't bad enough, the local population also had to deal with foreign kidnappers,” says Mikki. “On June 20, 1641, the village of Baltimore in County Cork, Ireland was attacked by pirates from the North African Barbary Coast, their location being betrayed by a kinsman.”
“Over 100 people were kidnapped and taken to a life of slavery in North Africa where the white skins of women were prized in the harems and the stout arms of the men were put to use pulling oars in galleys.”
“Also, villagers living on the south coast of England were continually being preyed upon by Arab slavers and in 1641 they petitioned Charles I to protect them from abduction,” says Mikki, “but he was far more concerned with Scottish affairs -- and was soon to lose his head -- so they wasted their time.”
“It was not until England developed an empire in the 1800s and ruled the waves that these Arab slaving raids ceased to be a threat and living in seaside towns became popular,” says Mikki. “The white slave markets of North Africa, however, continued to thrive and still do.”
Read more by Mikki on this issue:
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