Same Shit, Different Day: Reflections on the “De Slavernij” Debate

So, yesterday I went to a debate on the NTR series “De Slavernij” (The Slavery) about which I wrote a brief blog entry a few days ago. I was curious to hear how the production team approached this delicate subject within the Dutch historical canon – the role that the Dutch played during the Transatlantic Slave Trade has received scant (national) attention. I was also interested to see, hear whether the production team managed to unearth morsels of information that shed a (different) light on the subject, and what effect the making of the documentary had on them.

As it stands the Dutch state still has to issue a formal apology to its former colonies and the descendants of enslaved Africans for the role it played in the Transatlantic Slave Trade and to the enslaved and colonized peoples of Indonesia for the colonization of the Indonesian archipelago. It is incomprehenisble that the Dutch state has yet to apologize for the brutality and psychological harm that both the enslaved Africans and the enslaved and colonized Indonesian peoples suffered during the imperialistic pursuits of the Dutch state. To add insult to injury many “national symbols” which hark back to slavery and colonialism, like the image “Tribute of Colonies” on the Golden Coach and Zwarte Piet, are still being paraded around unquestioned. It is not difficult to argue that The Netherlands still needs to come to terms with its fraught history. Even though I had my reservations when I heard that the NTR was developing a documentary series that purportedly detailed the role the Dutch played during the TST, I was glad that the subject was finally being broached in the most public of arenas: television. You could say I actually looked forward to the first episode.

To say that I was disappointed by what and how it was presented is an understatement. The episode opened with an investigation in “contemporary slavery”, which was promptly followed by the comment that slavery has existed throughout history and this telling statement: “Je kunt veel zeggen van de Nederlanders en de Europeanen maar de slavenhandel in Afrika hadden ze niet uitgevonden.” (translation: you can say a lot about the Dutch and the Europeans but they were not the ones who invented the slave trade in Africa) – a statement which unquestionably placed what we were about to see in a certain frame (I’m not even specifically talking about a white racial frame). That statement implies a preoccupation with guilt, which to me is, apart from being a senseless preoccupation, a warping one when making a documentary (whose most important purpose is the creation of a factual report). At any rate, from then on different segments segued into each other in rapid succession forming a Dadaistic whole. I had not anticipated – based on the title of the documentary – that  it would also address “contemporary slave trade”, human trafficking and the story of captured Christians who were enslaved by Barbary corsairs… The title, when interpreted within the Dutch context, connotes, if not plainly denotes, the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Not only did I find the title misleading, I found that by addressing these various kinds of slavery in the same frame (especially taken with Daphne Bunskoek’s statements at the beginning) the production team was implying that all these kinds of slavery are somehow on an equal footing with each other – which is not the case and only complicates matters. Furthermore, for a documentary that purports to detail a history of slavery I found the narrative strikingly narrow and one-sided – the documentary focuses, from a historical perspective, solely on the slave trade in Africa. It thus creates the illusion that Europeans did not enslave  and traffick people prior to the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Prior to the Transatlantic Slave Trade European slavers enslaved among others Muslim Albanians, Bosnians, Bogamils. And the concept that Eastern Orthodox Christians were more susceptible to servitude remained current among Europeans well into the period of the transatlantic colonization (Seymour Drescher, “Abolition: a History of Slavery and Antislavery”, 2009, p. 13). Prof. Den Heijer in his role as expert omits this piece of pertinent information and thus sketches a specious historical account. When he was expanding on the Barbary corsairs he failed to mention that during the Dutch uprising against Philip II, Balthasar de Ayala, jurist of international law, advocated placing the rebels beyond the pale of Christian liberty (Seymour Drescher, “Abolition: a History of Slavery and Antislavery”, 2009, p. 13). Thus making it OK to enslave them. Heretics could be enslaved, and sold to the Barbary pirates as slaves.  Although Philps II never condemned the rebels to the status of chattels, I find it an important detail if one is trying to be thorough. Because this detail illustrates that there existed not only a discourse on the enslavability of certain peoples, but also the practice of slave trade – which did not involve Africans – within a European context.

Oh, I beg your pardon. I was supposed to be talking about the debate last night, wasn’t I? Well, where to begin?  The guests at the debate were Hein Hoffmann, one of the directors of “De Slavernij”, Lyangelo Vasquez, a researcher, Katinka de Maar, the director of “De Slavernij Junior” (the documentary series, intended for kids, about slavery) and Evelien Vehof, journalist and member of the editorial staff for the Junior series. When asked how they approached this subject both Lyangelo Vasquez and Hein Hoffmann stated that they did not want to focus solely on the physical aspects of the “excesses” (a very charged word in a Dutch historical context), i.e. the abuse, torture, rape of the enslaved Africans, they opted instead to focus on the psychological aspects, i.e. being kidnapped, the taking away of children of enslaved Africans. They wanted to focus on the “grey areas” as well – the life enslaved Africans carved out for themselves on the plantations. Hein Hoffmann added that he wanted people to tell the story themselves without heavy-handed comments of the production team – to which Lyangelo Vasquez readily agreed. This, at least to me, had the whiff of a bucket of steaming bullshit of the most diarrhoeic kind. The reason why I think both Hoffmann and Vasquez were talking nonsense is that the presenters Daphne Bunskoek and Roué Verveer participate actively in the production and narration of the documentary. A documentary is a constructed work – prior to and during its production choices are constantly made. And according to Hein Hoffmann Daphne Bunskoek’s role in the series is to “survey, narrate, and supply an objective, well-informed view”, whilst Roué Verveer’s role is to make the story more personal and less “dramatic”. The tragedy is that he said this in all earnest with a straight face – and whithout realizing that he and his production team were perpetuating a racist notion

On top of that, the “pop” narrative approach – that the production team opted for and which is aimed at drawing in a broad demographic – is in itself a socio-political choice. Furthermore, to amplify the pull factor of this all-embracing approach, the production team decided to embed the Transatlantic Slave Trade in the wider narrative of slavery – as not to alienate the White viewers. Rather than fixing on specific nodes within the Transatlantic Slave Trade the production team fixed on a general narrative. This ideological choice, which is informed by what I call the Mary Poppins ideology, provided the spoonful of sugar to make the bitter truth of the Transatlantic Slave Trade go down. The ramifications of these aesthetic, narrative choices are considerable and further complicate the challenges one faces when making a documentary. The challenges are myriad (what and whose story are we going to tell, who’s going to tell the story, what are our assumptions about the story, who knows what, etc.). And what constitutes adequate socio-historical investigation is always already part of continuous histories of inquiry and justification. Feminist epistemology “identifies ways in which dominant conceptions and practices of knowledge attribution, acquisition, and justification systematically disadvantage women and other subordinated groups, and strives to reform these conceptions and practices so that they serve the interests of these groups.” It seems, and this is mere conjecture based on their answers, that the production team (I’m excluding the historians and experts for now) has put little to no thought in how to structure the complex narratives surrounding the subject of slavery.

Second, the documentary is not filmed in the style of cinéma vérité, nor the style of Direct Cinema, as the use of presenters obviously illustrates. Moreover, by eliding the experience of the enslaved Africans – through the shift in focus (highlighting certain aspects hitherto unknown to, let’s be honest, a predominantly white audience) – the production team creates a space/platform for a slanted view. If we add the moderating comments of prof. Den Heijer, who dismissed blatant racist comments made by Dutch slavers by saying they were “disgruntled”, to this mix then it becomes quite  easy to create the impression that the brutalization and oppression of enslaved Africans was minimal – and the result of “disgruntled” slavers.  What is given is a Eurocentric account of the Transatlantic Slave Trade which hardly suggests a dialectical relationship between the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the modern-day geopolitical situation in the Americas.

When asked why the production team chose to name the programme “De Slavernij” (The Slavery), which suggests the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the director replied that it is in line with the title of a previous programme/documentary, “De Oorlog” (The War). A woman of African descent then remarked that the documentary “De Oorlog” – which was solely about World War II and not other wars as well – did not begin by stating that war has existed throughout history, she consequently asked why the production team opted for including a statement that mitigates slavery when discussing the Transatlantic Slave Trade the production team couldn’t give a satisfactory answer.

The criticism I heard was universal; it was shared by the Black and White people present. The main critique was that the documentary lacked “emotion” – a vague critique, I concede; however, it is a critique that I have expressed as well, and I’ll try to explain what I mean by it. Another point of criticism was that the brutality of the slave trade is consistently downplayed or placed within a historical context – without expressing a strong moral condemnation of the slave trade – and compared to other atrocious acts that took place at that time (the killing of homosexuals e.g.). The general tone of the series is, ‘everyone, who wasn’t part of the elite, had a shitty existence back then’ and ‘every other nation was engaging in slave trade at the time, so what the Dutch did wasn’t so remarkable’. By placing it within a “historical context” (I use quotation marks since the perspective is Eurocentric and therefore limited and biased) without adding a strong moral condemnation to the mix the production team, and by extension the documentary, implies that there is no absolute morality, no fixed moral values, that transcends time. A logical conclusion could be that the Dutch state cannot be held accountable for the atrocities committed in its name and to its glory. This situational morality is rife in certain circles in The Netherlands. The Dutch state, for instance, has argued for a long time that the crimes against humanity committed during the Indonesian War of Independence were subject to statute of limitations – again, as though morality is bound by time. At a certain point Hein Hoffmann said that The Netherlands was “more or less pressured into the slave trade”, which illustrates this lack of accountability.

The shortcomings reveal more than just structural narrative and methodological deficiencies; they also expose the white racial frame, the colonial gaze. As viewers of colour we are forced to look at a history of “the slavery” through the colonial lens. Film states. The images, that we see, are what they are. And therein lies its power and the danger it poses to the viewer. Documentaries especially are an agency of communication intended to communicate meaning (denotively and connotively), to open up/introduce “new” areas of knowledge. Without a proper framework, i.e. a well-defined, clear, inclusive narrative framework, it is going to be damn near impossible to interpret and comprehend the extent of the crime against humanity that is the Transatlantic Slave Trade and how the TST has shaped the world. To me, this documentary lacks emotion because there’s little talk about the lived, the physical realities, of the enslaved Africans. It is Eurocentric to the point that it is offensive. It lacks emotion because it is blatantly clear that an expert like prof. Den Heijer takes advantage of the platform he’s given to broadcast his crypto-racist ideology. But, most importantly, it lacks emotion and heart because the story is told by a disengaged production team; it lacks heart and emotion because it was not made for the descendants of enslaved Africans – but as an anodyne to relieve the guilt of the Dutch state.

• Accountability
• De Slavernij
• History
• The Colonial Gaze
• White Racial Frame