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Four American women have attracted what could be described as a global condemnation after they were seen “twerking for the ancestors” at the historic former slave dungeon in Ghana.
The incident took place at Cape Coast Castle, a historic slave trading post, and was captured on video. The video shows the women dancing with joy and twerking at the site where slaves were kept in illegal dungeons before being shipped into slavery to either Europe, the United States of America and other countries.
The world got to know about their acts when one of the group members, KhaParisDior, on June 19, shared scenes of all four friends visiting the revered site as they kept saying in the video that they were doing it to “honour the ancestors”.
KhaParisDior in her post captioned the clip as best as she could: “So today I got to experience The Slave Castle in Cape Coast! It’s wildddddd seeing how they did our ancestors! Treated them worst than animals!! It’s sad but of course, we had to twerk for our ancestors cause PERIOD!!!!!! Happy Juneteenth from the motherland ❤️ I think everybody should go at least once in a lifetime.”
However, if she was expecting multiple thousands of likes, she got the reverse; as it sparked a backlash instead with many people expressing their anger and disappointment at the women’s behaviour. Some have called it disrespectful and inappropriate.
“Going to a castle, slave dungeon in Africa, And shaking your booty is disrespectful, black American sisters are disrespectful to the millions of our ancestors who were shipped into slavery, and it should be condemned”, Don Salmon admonished on Twitter.
Your parents failed you. Don’t ever return to Mother Africa until all of you correct yourselves. You are the reason African Americans will never receive reparations for our ancestors blood because you have no clue how to honor your people….,” Beverns wrote under the travel blogger’s post.
One Muhammed Speaks tweet stated that “Cape Coast is a solemn place. I don’t understand how they could have smiled let alone tweaked there.”
While the video has gone viral on social media, some others have even defended the women, saying that they were simply celebrating their heritage and paying tribute to their ancestors.