I am of Scottish heritage. I was born in America, but my roots go back to the Highlands of Scotland and Gaelic culture.
I’m also part Irish, which means a distant ancestor may have been a slave.
Britain sent Irish slaves to the Caribbean to work as “indentured servants” for British colonial rulers. The Irish were treated miserably.
“Whenever they rebelled or even disobeyed an order, they were punished in the harshest ways. Slave owners would hang their human property by their hands and set their hands or feet on fire as one form of punishment. They were burned alive and had their heads placed on pikes in the marketplace as a warning to other captives,” writes Liam Hogan.
The ancestors of King James II, Charles I, and Oliver Cromwell owe me reparations.
Scots were also sold as slaves by the British. In fact, they were slaves far longer than the Africans — for more than a thousand years, beginning with Alba and Pics, distant ancestors of the Scots.
The Romans specialized in the white slave trade. Julius Caesar enslaved more than a million white people from Gaul. Why aren’t the French, Belgians, and Dutch demanding Italy pay reparations?
The Vikings were conducting slave raids in Scotland and Ireland centuries before the trans-Atlantic slave trade. In fact, early slavers provided a business model for the African slave trade.
Why aren’t Scandinavians on the hook to pay reparations for the brutal behavior of their ancestors?
“Ulrich B. Phillips, Life and Labor in the Old South explain that white enslavement was crucial to the development of the Negro slave system,” writes Kelly D. Whittaker. “The system set up for the white slaves governed, organized and controlled the system for the black slaves. Black slaves were ‘late comers fitted into a system already developed.’ Pp 25–26. John Pory declared in 1619, ‘white slaves are our principle wealth.’”
The British used the “Highland Clearances” to dispossess the Scots of their ancestral land and culture. This authoritarian form of social engineering lasted for more than a hundred years, between 1750 to 1860.
By 1792 Scottish landlords colluding with the British had removed tenants to make way for sheep farming. The mass migration that followed was called the “Year of the Sheep.”
In America, you can lose your job, be attacked mercilessly on social media — even be attacked physically — for disagreeing with Black Lives Matter. The smallest micro aggression is considered racism and white supremacy. BLM activists claim white people are born with race hatred wedded to their DNA. They must not only give every Black person they encounter money, but also grovel in guilt at their feet and beg for forgiveness.
In Britain today, anti-Scottish sentiment is a thing. Disparaged as “Jocks,” Scots in Britain have been attacked at football games, carnivals, in their homes, on the street, often for the crime of having a Scottish accent.
In the British media, the Scottish Labor Party is often referred to as the Scottish Mafia. The pejorative is used during parliamentary debates. Members engaging in this behavior include Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling, Charles Falconer, Derry Irvine, Michael Martin, and John Reid.
Of course, I realize there will be no money coming to those of us with Scottish and Irish heritage — and there shouldn’t be, that’s collectivist thuggery.
Here’s something never discussed. The 1860 census in America revealed that a minuscule 1.4% of the population at the time owned slaves. Non-slave owning Whites in the South did not benefit in any way from the slave trade.
I am simply making an easily understandable argument — having the government confiscate money from one group of people to pay for the perceived sins of their ancestors against the ancestors of a second group of people is a criminal enterprise. It’s theft and intimidation.
If polls can be believed, 75% of Blacks want free money to somehow ameliorate the suffering of their long-dead ancestors who may or may not have been slaves. Only 15% of Whites support reparations. In total, less than 30% of Americans support transferring billions of dollars to the descendants (and non-descendants) of slaves.
If and when Joe Biden makes it to the White House, reparations will be at the top of the list.
