Slavery: Is there a Monopoly of Suffering?
by Amir Taheri
June 28, 2020 at 4:00 am
[Jesse] Jackson, [Sadiq] Khan and Mrs. Obama are simply wrong.
Let's start with Mrs. Obama's claim [that she was in "a house built by slaves"], the easiest to dismiss. The White House she lived in for eight years was first rebuilt in 1902 and achieved its present shape in the 1950s, long after the US abolished slavery in 1865 and granted former slaves citizenship in 1869. There may have been some blacks, later to be dubbed African-Americans, among the builders; but they were no longer slaves.
Slaves, most of whom in history were white and not black, were not the only victims. Even people who were neither slaves nor slave-owners paid a heavy price in slow economic development and poverty. When it comes to slavery, no one has a monopoly of suffering.
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16165/slavery-suffering
