[Paleopsych] Re: on islam

[HowlBloom at aol.com]

In a message dated 7/31/2005 12:58:23 AM Eastern Standard Time,  
shovland at mindspring.com writes:

Don't  forget that there were vast reserves of gold
in Africa that fueled their  growth for a long time.
They traded a lot of it to India via  Madagascar.



good point, Steve.  Gold and ivory were treasures the empire of  Islam sucked 
from Africa in abundance.  These export items were carried the  hundreds of 
miles from central africa to the ports of Zanzibar or Mombasa on the  shoulders 
of newly-enslaved women, children, and, in much smaller numbers,  men. Those 
men and women were tied in long chain gangs by ropes around  their necks.  
They were underfed. 
 
If one fell because of weakness, she or he was hacked to death on the  spot.  
She who fell failed as a transport mechanism and failed as a  potential 
export.
 
 
Here’s a North African eyewitness account quoted in a  South African 
Christian Magazine.  In North Africa, the freight was not ivory and gold.  It was mere 
firewood.  “In 1818,  Captain Lyon of the Royal Navy reported that the 
Al-Mukani in Tripoli ‘waged war  on all its defenceless neighbours and annually 
carried off 4000 to 5000 slaves.a  piteous spectacle!  These poor  oppressed 
beings were, many of them, so exhausted as to be scarcely able to  walk, their legs 
and feet were much swelled, and by their enormous size formed a  striking 
contrast with their emaciated bodies.  They were all borne down with loads of  
firewood, and even poor little children, worn to skeletons by fatigue and  
hardships, were obliged to bear their burden, while many of their inhuman  masters 
with dreadful whip suspended from their waist.all the traders speak of  slaves 
as farmers do of cattle.the defenceless state of the Negro kingdoms to  the 
southward are temptations too strong to be resisted, a force is therefore  
annually sent.to pillage these defenceless people, to carry them off as slaves,  
burn their towns, kill the aged and infants, destroy their crops and inflict on 
 them every possible misery.all slavery is for an unlimited time.none of 
their  owners ever moved without their whips - which were in constant use.drinking 
too  much water, bringing too little wood or falling asleep before the 
cooking was  finished, were considered nearly capital crimes, and it was in vain for 
these  poor creatures to plead the excuse of being tired.  Nothing could 
withhold the application  of the whip.  No slaves dared to be  ill or unable to 
walk, but when the poor sufferer dies, the master suspects that  there must have 
been something 'wrong inside' and regrets not having liberally  applied their 
usual remedy of burning the belly with a red-hot iron.’”  (Retrieved July 
14, 2005, from the World Wide Web  
http://www.christianaction.org.za/articles_ca/2004-4-TheScourgeofSlavery.htm  Christian Action Magazine)
 
----------
Howard Bloom
Author of The Lucifer Principle: A  Scientific Expedition Into the Forces of 
History and Global Brain: The Evolution  of Mass Mind From The Big Bang to the 
21st Century
Recent Visiting  Scholar-Graduate Psychology Department, New York University; 
Core Faculty  Member, The Graduate  Institute
www.howardbloom.net
www.bigbangtango.net
Founder:  International Paleopsychology Project; founding board member: Epic 
of Evolution  Society; founding board member, The Darwin Project; founder: The 
Big Bang Tango  Media Lab; member: New York Academy of Sciences, American 
Association for the  Advancement of Science, American Psychological Society, 
Academy of Political  Science, Human Behavior and Evolution Society, International 
Society for Human  Ethology; advisory board member: Institute for 
Accelerating Change ; executive  editor -- New Paradigm book series.
For information on The International  Paleopsychology Project, see: 
www.paleopsych.org
for two chapters from  
The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition Into the Forces of History,  
see www.howardbloom.net/lucifer
For information on Global Brain: The  Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big 
Bang to the 21st Century, see  www.howardbloom.net

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/paleopsych/attachments/20050803/58152dcf/attachment.html>