> There is some weird kind of selective amnesia in the west, we at the same time downplay our achievements and put the focus on our perceived errors.

There are those and those, and each side says something like this about the other, the real minority is realistically seeing the whole picture.

Also self-reflection isn't a bad thing, we can only change ourselves and then influence others (hopefully without force :)).

Arabs had a good go at it? As in past tense?

Last I checked slavery is still very common in many arab nations as we speak?

What about the pan-African and Mesoamerican traditions of enslaving everyone? Slavery was pretty much everywhere in the world. Then Christians invented the idea of not enslaving fellow Christians, then Muslims did the same (which really helped the spread of both religions!).

Mathematically speaking, you reading this are the descendant of enslaved peoples. They could be so far back that it doesn’t affect your economic status, like being a Mamluk in Egypt, or a Carthaginian in Rome, or a Hebrew in Egypt. But all of humanity was touched by this non-peculiar institution.

The Arab slave trade was huge and racist in its own way (where poorer, usually darker skinned peoples were enslaved and traded by wealthier, lighter skinned peoples.) Western European colonial ambitions definitely wounded the area significantly but the Islamicate world was still practicing slavery after Western Europe had largely banned it and stopped practicing it. It's recent enough in Islamicate history that traditionalist groups lay claim to slavery as a custom even now in the region.

You only managed to delete your comment - not the thread. Future readers are left with no context.