Tea at Trianon: There Are 9 Million Slaves in Africa Today

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, June 16, 2020

There Are 9 Million Slaves in Africa Today

I think we need to focus on freeing the people who are currently enslaved. From Caldron Pool:

There are approximately 9 million men, women, and children living in modern slavery throughout Africa, according to a report issued by the Australia-based Walk Free Foundation. The foundation’s Global Slavery Index revealed there is an estimate of 9,240,000 enslaved across the continent, living as forced labourers, forced prostitutes, child soldiers, and as child brides in forced marriages. According to the report, Africa has the highest rate of prevalence for enslavement, with 7.6 people living in slavery for every 1,000 people in the region. The report also revealed that the rate of forced marriage (4.8 victims per 1,000 people) was higher than the rate of forced labour (2.8 victims per 1,000 people). (Read more.)