Equiano Olaudah, also known as Gustavus Vassa, died in London in 1797 at 52 years, and a free man, a family man, a successful merchant, an author, and historian. After years of adventure, misfortunes, fortunes, and reclamation of his life, Equiano convinced his masters that he was worth his freedom. In his autobiography The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, Equiano notes that he was indeed fortunate. In respect for the adversities that his kind (the slaves) were going through, he did not want to sound boisterous of his position, but to thank the Providence for his lucks. Born irreligious, and introduced to Christianity by the White men, Equiano was quick to notice that the teachings in the bible were against slavery. Equiano established a connection between his race and the early Jews and the Christian Europeans, and he thus argued against slavery, stating that "Let the polished and haughty European recollect that his ancestors were once, like the Africans, uncivilized, and even barbarous. Did Nature make them inferior to their sons? And should they too have been made slaves? Every rational mind answers, No" (Equiano, 2005, 43). These sentiments, from the perspectives of the slave, but as the White man noted, slavery was beneficial to their economy, as it provided free labor and advanced White supremacy. These, among other reasons, were the attempts by many White men of the 18 th Century to justify the barbaric acts of slavery.
The first excuse for slavery was that the victims of slavery were inferior human beings that could be made more useful by engaging them in meaningful White Man's labor. According to the proponents of the Atlantic slave trade, slavery pouched the useless men from Africa and converted them to utilities for economic progress in the Western world. These arguments were rooted in the perceived racial distinctions between the two races. The white men believed that the black men were genetically made for hard labor, and their position in the chain of humanity was that of subservience. Equiano notes that, ironically, the bible told the story of the oppressed and preached the message of hope. In the same breath that oozed confidence and freedom from the bondage of sin, came actions that put fellow men into physical servitude and inhumane treatment. Equiano in over three decades of servitude was exchanged for silver through the hands of various masters and just like property; every master betrayed his trust despite his attempts to bond with them. Slavery was thus an act of making the Black man a commodity of business, just like a common property, which provided utility for a limited time, and then passed forward to the next user.
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The other argument was that slavery was God's plan, and thus a natural phenomenon that bequeathed each man of his status in the society. The fundamental interpretation of the scriptures was blind to the fact that slavery, as proclaimed in the bible, was not subjective to one race, but was a social and economic practice that pitted the poor and the unfortunate to servitude, and those who earned their freedom would live as free men. The slaves in the Israeli culture were Israelis and the collaterals of war. Some slaves were born from slaves and despite their position as the servants in the economic circle, God warranted them the same rights as humans. If this interpretation were to be held in its literal sense, then it would be prudent to have slaves from White families, serving in cotton farms as slaves, and similarly, white slaves serving chores and labor in African households. However, this was not the case, as slaves were majorly Blacks serving the whites, not as collateral from a political battle, but as captured men, robbed of freedom from their lands. Equiano, who was kidnapped as an eleven years old boy, opines that "a town called Tinmah, in the most beautiful country I had yet seen in Africa" (Equiano, 2005, 51). Slaves were thus free men, robbed of their freedom from their beautiful utopias, which was contrary to God's plan.
Another proposition for slavery was that it was liberation from poverty, hunger, death, and suffering, and that serving a master, who assured one of protection and Providence was better than dying in poverty. The Western definition of poverty is "The state of having little or no money and few or no material possessions" ( Cambridge dictionary, 2019 ). This definition is myopic since it quantifies happiness and attaches it to material and monetary possessions. In this definition, the West Africans, like Equiano, who survived on subsistence farming and barter trade, were sick, and thus, the Western interventions were an act of salvation. Ironically, the Europeans selected muscular men, well-built, and healthy enough to survive the devastating environments of cotton agriculture in the US and other European countries. The irony lies in the belief that the African's were poor, yet they were healthy and physically endowed to handle the extremities of many kinds of weather. Slavery was thus a transfer of contented men, from their African wealth, and turning them to poor men by the standards of the Western definition of poverty.
In conclusion, the notion of slavery was misguided and thus perpetrated the barbarism for years. When given a chance, the black men like Equiano proved to be just as good, if not better, at pursuing education, business and family, and understanding religious teachings. Slavery was not by any definition justified.
Reference
Cambridge dictionary. (2019). POVERTY: meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary. Retrieved November 26, 2019, from https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/poverty.
Olaudah, E. (2005). The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African. Retrieved 26 November 2019, from http://abolition.nypl.org/content/docs/text/life_of_equiano.pdf
