There was an article a few months ago about how terrible it was that we were giving state funds to compensate former slavers. There is a background piece here. It makes it clear that we should be ashamed of the fact that we paid off slave owners but never compensated slaves.
I see things a different way. The objective at the time was to free slaves. At the time there was not universal agreement that it had to take place. The government effectively bought support to do it (much the same as they did to establish the NHS).
According to the web site I just don’t understand slavery. But I believe that is because they are trying to impose our current values on decisions made in a totally different political climate. I believe it was the lesser of two evils. Just like the abolition of the slave trade could not include the freedom of slaves if it stood any chance of success (trading in slaves directly from Africa was made illegal long before the abolition of slavery).
There are often two ways to look at things. I saw a programme tonight about sandwiches which had an issue with carbon emissions for transport.
It struck me that there are two ways to deal with carbon emissions from transport. You can either demand a reduction in transport. Or you could demand that transport becomes less carbon producing. In the month when the first hydrogen powered train took to the rails in the UK I think the second route is looking easier to achieve than the first. Formula 1 have announced they will be using net zero carbon fuels within three years.
The one take away I have from this is the importance of keeping the focus on the goal, whether it is freedom of slaves or zero carbon rather than on the means to get there. Sometimes the road to the goal is not the one we feel fully comfortable with.