Seymour Drescher in chapter 6 writes about the European slave trade and the Holocaust. He writes that many scholars write about the slave trade and the Holocaust together because of the total destruction and denigration that those two races went through. Seymour points out some differences between the two. In studying American slavery, scholars look at centuries of enslaved people while Holocaust scholars look at years. Seymour mentions what ties the two together is the initial enslavement of the Africans and the Jews. Seymour also writes about the transit that the enslaved Africans and Jews took on their way to their fate and how similar each were. I think one of the main differences between the two and what Seymour points out in the chapter is really how and when they died. Most of the slaves that perished died within weeks of being enslaved. For the Jews, they were killed right on the spot. I found the section on racism interesting because at first, race played a little role in the enslavement of Africans while as we know race played a huge role in Nazi extermination. For me, slavery and the Holocaust should be considered separately. Although both devasting and sad, they both have unique qualities that should be considered their own.
Although the Nazis used Jews for forced labor, should we consider force labor in the same way as African Slavery?
Should slavery be considered a genocide when the mindset at the time was not exterminate the African race, but use them for profit?
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