Soulstarr - I admire Jeremy Paxman as a devils advocate but tha bit he said about the Jewish holocaust being in living memory was so anal it had piles. If time has got anything to do with it why on earth do these people feel the need to commemorate the abolition of slavery...I mean that was 200 years ago:?:?

just thought I'd mention this observation of mine. There's a dangerous game being played out there and it entails the very liberal and superficial use of the word slavery.....yes, that's slavery meaning cheap labour. What happened to our ancestors makes slavery look like legitimate minimum wage. When a european argues his defence of african slavery, this is all they see, cheap labour. Most people (including the brotha on newsnight) fall into the trap of debating with europeans from this perspective.

When a european pleads his cause and mentions the word African slavery the very first thing you do is tell them what Africans were put through was not slavery, slavery was the tip of a huge iceberg. What we need is a name for this iceberg that encompasses the slavery (cheap labour), the rapes, the imprisonment, the torture, those thrown overboard, the murders, the shortened life expectation, the abuse, the eradication of history and identity, the genocide, the....

Maafa is used in a particular circuit and I've seen the use of the expression African holocaust which may have more of a western impact but for me I'm yet to find a word that truly describes it for me. Whatever word it is, make sure that it is this and not slavery (cheap labour) that you debate when dealing with these hypocrites. And everytime they tallk sh1t like 'oh, but everyone had a bit of slavery, or the scots, the english, the irish, the indians were slaves too; or africans sold africans, don't even bother with the long explanations and the long argument, just tell them straight up that they are still talking about slavery not (for arguments sake) 'maafa'. You can regret slavery like what Tony Blair has done but maafa/holocaust is where you start talking about the merits of an apology and reparations.

Maafa generally translates to the African holocaust which for me further dilutes the seriousness and the depth of what needs to be articulated. Holocaust is synonymous with the German treatment of the jews - does anyone know whether this word even existed before this event? I believe what happened to Africa needs its own description, slavery and holocaust does it an injustice and holocaust to me (and the average man) psychologically sounds like we're riding the backs of the jews which can mentally blind us into unwittingly debating from a perspective that the jewish thing happened first.

Compare what happened to the jews with what happened in Rwanda but to compare it with what happened to our ancestors tells me someone is having a friggin laugh. You never see how when Toyin buss out yesterday Tony and the Queen look frighten like puss! They can fool some people some of the time but they can't fool all of the people all of the time.