The Africans, brought to the Americas, were tricked, captured, shackled and sold into slavery. They endured the abominable Middle Passage in the putrid holes of ships and upon arrival in the West Indies and America were sold on the blocks to colonial farmers. As slaves on the plantations, Africans were mere units of labour, whipped into submission in order to cultivate and harvest sugarcane. Some were taught skills to man the factories that produced sugar, molasses and rum, while others had to run the households of the white planter class, clean the houses, cook the meals, serve their owners and even suckle the babies of the white mistresses, who could not be bothered with such physical mothering commitments.

These unfortunate human beings were methodically dehumanised by their masters, overseers, church ministers and other authority figures of plantation society in order to keep them in their places. If the European coloniser wanted to have a clear conscience about his treatment of black slaves, then he would have to ensure the ongoing degradation of the slaves in his possession. They reasoned that the Africans were an inferior race and heathens, so they, the white masters, were justified in exploiting them mercilessly. In his book ‘Black Jacobins’, the late C.L.R. James documents in horrific detail some of the categories of cruelty meted out to slaves for the amusement of the bored and indolent white society.

Although it is more than a century and a half since the manumission of slavery, the residue of the hurts, the humiliations and the indignities suffered by African slaves still linger in the consciousness of the Black Diaspora. Moreover, the systematic discrimination perpetrated on black people by individuals and agencies in several parts of the world serves as a constant reminder to the descendants of Africans that their right to exist and to participate meaningfully in all facets of human society are aspects of a struggle that has to be waged from day to day. Writing in the publication ‘Africa’ sometime in the early 1980s, one author pointed out philosophically that the black person, in reality, is the only true existentialist since he, alone, must create meaning in a world that is constantly forcing him to accept his non-existence.

‘Racial profiling’ the term that was probably coined with black people in mind, has to be one of the most distressing social concepts of this age. It means in essence that black people must be presumed to be no-good, under-achievers at best and criminals, thieves and terrorists at worst. That is why in some countries, successful African men are routinely pulled off the roads by Police just because they happen to drive the quality of car that is “too good” for a black person. That is why a highly successful president of an American corporation was tossed some car keys by a white man, and asked to park the white man’s vehicle in the parking lot. The president of the corporation, who was black, happened to be standing outside his building, when this occurred.