african-american slave heritage?

Question

yes, it totally sucks that the ancestors of us african-americans were slaves. but, everytime i hear people going on about how "for all you know, my ancestor could have been a king over in africa" it gets on my nerves. because no, our ancestors could NOT have been kings. most likely they were slaves in africa too. when america took slaves from africa, they didn't kidnap them. they BOUGHT them from people who had already taken them as slaves. so, our ancestors were slaves over there too. this isn't to say that we shouldn't be proud of our african heritage--we should be. but i think we should stop going on and on about it. yes it sucked. big time. but we're free. our ancestors fought VERY hard for our freedom in this country and THAT'S what we should be proud of.

I know I'm giong to get a lot of flack for this question, but i'm honestly curious as to what other african-americans think

(I'm african-american, by the way)

bigdee: while a little harsh, you do have a point. i don't really refer to myself as "african-american" (i mostly did so in this question to help quell the outburst that's likely to happen). yes, i'm proud of my african heritage, but i've never been to africa, i couldn't tell you which countries my ancestors came from (because it was multiple countries) and i consider myself american. i mean, it's not like i want to go live in africa or anything. i like it here. i am full-blooded american and that's all there is too it :)

Answer 1

I never got the obsession with being related to royalty anyway. In most cultures that have royal families, those families are inbred and have a host of genetic disorders lurking about. I'm more proud to be Cherokee because we never had royal families. We were always democratic, electing our leaders and having women in decision-making thousands of years before the US decided it was right. Also, inbreeding (marrying into your clan in this case) was punishable by death.

Answer 2

yes your right and I'm really sick of blacks in this country calling themselves "African Americans" when in fact you are only Americans like the rest of us. my great grandfather came here from Italy and yet i dont refer to myself as an "Italian American" most of you couldn't find your country of origin on a map!