Friday 17 January 2014

12 Years of Slavery or an enduring condition?

By Robert Loe (Twitter @Robert_Loe)


Quote

“Where Slavery is, there Liberty cannot be: and where Liberty is, there Slavery cannot be” Charles Sumner


News

Yesterday, nominations for the 86th Academy Awards were announced in Los Angeles with Steve McQueen’s ‘12 Years a Slave’ named in nine categories. The film, and the original harrowing story penned by the central character Solomon Northup, has left critics transfixed.

The significance of this film is far greater than the Oscar ceremony. For some it has underlined the racial divisions that still exist in many societies. For others it is a distressing reminder of the past where true reconciliation and forgiveness have not, perhaps, been fully achieved; one American blogger wrote a piece, “Why I wouldn’t see 12 Years a Slave with a White Person”. Yet for others it has been a unifying experience; McQueen spoke of strangers holding hands in the darkness of early screenings, so moved were they by the subject matter.

So what is it about Northup’s story that has captured the public imagination in this way?  At one level, viewers are responding to the degrading and abhorrent practice of slavery. We are reminded of the struggles of abolitionists to rid the world of its practice spurred on by a belief in the need for justice in all relationships across society.

The public are repulsed by a practice they thought long extinct. Slavery, they assumed, was gone and freedom now the hallmark of civilized cultures. Yet, despite the achievements of reformers like Wilberforce, slavery remains a modern day injustice of global proportions, rife even in Western nations. Whilst official figures place the numbers in their thousands, the true numbers of adults (and shamefully children) sold and forced to work, beg, or worse in the UK are much higher.

Liberty might well be described as a freedom from slavery but paradoxically there remains the freedom to enslave oneself. Taking credit may be an exercise of freedom but it comes at a price, as debt is a form of financial servitude to another. Moreover, anyone who has experienced some form of addiction will testify to the enslaving power that diminishes freedom and destroys dignity.

In part, the interest in slavery may come from a deep-seated fear that we may not be as free as we perhaps thought.


Read on...

For a reflection on Christian conscience and political action as illustrated by the abolitionists, read here.


Walk the talk

Consider what you might do to raise awareness and take action against all forms of slavery – including any forms uncomfortably close to home.


The last word

From the Bible, Proverbs Chapter 22, verse 7: “The rich rule over the poor and the borrower is slave to the lender”


Robert Loe is Director of the Relational Schools Project, a new initiative from Relational Research. You can read more information about the project by visiting www.relationalschools.org.