Zinn chapt 2 "color line"

Thesis: “There has not been a country in world history in which racism has been more important, for so long a time, as the United States. The main overview of this chapter is how slaves became slaves, how they were treated and how they were selected. Some key points are:
The color line- where questions arise such as how did it start? How might it end? Or is it possible for whites and blacks to live together?
Slave trade- a very messy business, where slave traders would go and capture people from Africa and bring them back to their country to sell. On the journey it is estimated that about 1/3 of the people would die do to the horrendous conditions. Not just used in the America’s but also it was big in western European countries.
Feudalism- consisted of hierarchies/lords, vassals. Africa also had a feudal system- strongly supported with tribal life.
In this chapter Zinn discusses how slaves were treated, the horrible conditions of the slave ships, how the black man was taken advantage of, and why the white plantation owners were so scared of revolts. He starts off with explaining how our capitalistic views became the backbone of the slave. The white mans drive of making profit and finding ways to create a lot of crops which leads to needing a lot of help. The English first thought about using the Indians but realized that it would not be a good idea. Yes the white man could over power them with their technology but as soon as they put the native people to work it was over. It would be very hard to keep the Indians under watch because they would run away and have no problem with surviving because they knew the land and could take care of themselves. As for the black man, he was taken from his country and brought to this new place which was very unfamiliar and would not know where to go if he/she was to run away or how to take care of themselves. This made it a lot easier for the white man to keep control. Don’t get me wrong there were plenty of runaway black slaves but they kind of stuck out like a sore thumb. One of his main arguments was about the slave trade itself. He gives a few descriptions about the slave ships and the so called “death marches.” The slave traders would go over to Africa and round up as many slaves as they could, stuff them on to a ship, and send off to various countries. The conditions were so bad one person wrote it looked like a slaughter how due to all the blood and dead carcasses. Many blacks would jump over board and end the suffering. When done with that they would sometimes be forced to walk hundreds of miles in shackles. Where about 2 out of every 5 would die. Zinn then talks about how many of the plantation owners were in fear of revolts. The slave population was growing so much that if formed correctly, it could be very powerful.
How would the slave traders make a profit if all of these slaves would either die on the slave ships or on the marches?
What made African people such a primary target for slavery?
I found this article to somewhat boring. I have already heard a majority of this kind of stuff and it didn’t really grab my attention. I mean I knew about how awful the slave trade process was, what happened to runaway slaves, why the whites would fear revolts, and why Indian would be a good choice for a slave. This chapter did not really present any new ideas.