White Christian European enslavement and brutal treatment of millions of Africans is well documented.
Quote:Current estimates are that about 12 million were shipped across the Atlantic,[4] although the actual number purchased by the traders is considerably higher.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_slave_trade
But let's ignore that and make up some stuff about Muslims taking 850,000 slaves. We will post a wikipedia article that references this article which says:
Quote:According to observers of the late 1500s and early 1600s, there were around 35,000 European Christian slaves held throughout this time on the Barbary Coast - many in Tripoli, Tunis, and various Moroccan towns, but most of all in Algiers. The greatest number were sailors, taken with their ships
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/white_slaves_01.shtml#two
The greatest number were sailors - probably working on enemy government navy ships.
Quote:There are no records of how many men, women and children were enslaved
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/white_slaves_01.shtml#two
No actual records! Well then lets just make some numbers up.
Let's go from 35,000 mostly sailors captured by pirates and inflate it to 850,000. Who needs facts? It is the the Islam-bashers way to invent facts.
Now let's look at how Muslims treat slaves compared to how Westerners keep slaves
Western Slavery
More than 1 million African slaves kidnapped by European Christian died in the terrible cramped condition aboard ships crossing the Atlantic Ocean
When they arrived in the Americas they faced beatings, rape and terrible tortures.
Nearly 1 million died at the ports shortly after arrival.
They then faced similar treatment as well as forced labour onced purchased by their new Christian master in America
Islamic Slavery
Quote:Your slaves are your brothers and God has put them under your command. So whoever has a brother under his command should feed him of what he eats and dress him of what he wears. Do not ask them (slaves) to do things beyond their capacity (power) and if you do so, then help them.'
- Bukhari
Quote:...And if any of your slaves ask for a deed in writing (authorising their freedom), give them such a deed if ye know any good in them...
- the Quran, an-Noor, v.33
Quote:Napoleon Bonaparte is recorded as saying about the condition of slaves in Muslim countries:
"The slave inherits his master's property and marries his daughter. The majority of the Pashas had been slaves. Many of the grand viziers, all the Mamelukes, Ali Ben Mourad Beg, had been slaves. They began their lives by performing the most menial services in the houses of their masters and were subsequently raised in status for their merit or by favour. In the West, on the contrary, the slave has always been below the position of the domestic servants; he occupies the lowest rung. The Romans emancipated their slaves, but the emancipated were never considered as equal to the free-born. The ideas of the East and West are so different that it took a long time to make the Egyptians understand that all the army was not composed of slaves belonging to the Sultan al-Kabir."
Source: Cherfils, Bonaparte et l'Islam (Paris, 1914)
Quote:P. L Riviere writes:
"A master was enjoined to make his slave share the bounties he received from God. It must be recognised that, in this respect, the Islamic teaching acknowledged such a respect for human personality and showed a sense of equality which is searched for in vain in ancient civilization"
Source: Riviere P.L., Revue Bleaue (June 1939).
Quote:On the attitude of Muslim master with his slaves, Will Durant says,
"...he handled them with a genial humanity that made their lot no worse - perhaps better, as more secure - than that of a factory worker in nineteenth-century Europe."
Source: Hurgronje C., Mohammedanism, (N.Y., 1916), p. 128 as quoted by W. Durant, The Story of Civilization, vol. IV (N.Y., 1950), p. 209.
[ eg. The slave of the Muslim was better off than the free man in England in the 19th century, which probably means better off than a Workchoices slave.
So a poor Christian sailor coming from a welfareless Europe in the 17th century was probably better off as a slave of a Muslim master because his master was required to clothe him, feed him, and not brutalise him.
Many of the sailors on European ships were effectively slaves anyway as they were conscripted into naval service. The European navies were quite brutal in their treatment of conscripts so it would probably be a relief to be captured by Muslim pirates.