What about the blacks that owned slaves? The first person to have a legally defined right to own another man in the US was black.
I would be much more in favor of reparations against the criminals that currently hold office. Start with cleaning up our current injustices, starting with abortion.
Quote: @JimmyinSD said:
@ BigAl99 said:
Reparations can be different than just a check. Yeah agreed I didn't do it, but I still have to own the results. Got a lot of privilege, that it took me a while to realize, fear it or fix it.
My dad got the shit kicked out of him back in the 60s by a bunch of black men when they thought he was in the wrong neighborhood while sight seeing in the south, should I be able to sue all black people because I was brought up in home with a mistrust of black people? Doesnt every black person have to own up to the misdoings of a few people because of something that happened to one of my ancestors?
tell you what, if you have white guilt, go ahead and double (or what ever amount you feel will right the wrongs of your ancestors) and send it to the US Treasury to help pay for what ever you think is fair, but its insane to suggest that the rest of the innocent Americans should be taxed for the beliefs of a few.
by the way, maybe you have had it easier due to your skin color, but was that by your own doing or choosing? and maybe being born white has made some things easier, but it wasnt by my choosing or in no way have i had a hand in perpetuating any laws or ways of life that would hinder any black peoples opportunities. Hell no to reparations IMO. and by the way, even if you dont hand them a check, any sort of financial upper hand (more than are already present) will require somebody to pick up the tab...eventually somebody always pays.
Jimmy that's a false equivalency with what happened to your father. If "they" kidnapped and used him for breading stock and sold his offspring while using his labor for profit, that perhaps would be a little more similar. Now if "they" were an institution that conspired to do this in a systematic and organized manor and created de facto method to maintain their relationship, I bet at some point you or one of your lineage may say hey, you owe me, if y'all ever got the chance.
Here's a question that gets hushed kinda quickly in these discussions:
what about the fact that it was Blacks rounding up other Blacks in Africa, and being part of the slave trade the whole time?
I'm not saying that to exclude the horror-show that was slavery, but I will point out that slavery remained quite active in Africa (among other places) after it ended here. Therefore...calling it a white oppression issue isn't entirely accurate.
This point kinda went off like an H-Bomb in each of my sociology courses a few years ago, and it's kinda frightening how many people had no idea that African tribes were very happily selling off their neighbors. Kids are programmed to believe that all evil in our country is due to white oppression...whereas any real history buff will point out that mankind has a horrible history of enslaving/killing mankind...worldwide.
So, if slavery reparations are required...who pays for the portion that originated in Africa?
Quote: @Zanary said:
Here's a question that gets hushed kinda quickly in these discussions:
what about the fact that it was Blacks rounding up other Blacks in Africa, and being part of the slave trade the whole time?
I'm not saying that to exclude the horror-show that was slavery, but I will point out that slavery remained quite active in Africa (among other places) after it ended here. Therefore...calling it a white oppression issue isn't entirely accurate.
This point kinda went off like an H-Bomb in each of my sociology courses a few years ago, and it's kinda frightening how many people had no idea that African tribes were very happily selling off their neighbors. Kids are programmed to believe that all evil in our country is due to white oppression...whereas any real history buff will point out that mankind has a horrible history of enslaving/killing mankind...worldwide.
So, if slavery reparations are required...who pays for the portion that originated in Africa?
Who could disagree that nations there are still some of the most inhuman places to be a human. Especially a female.
However the argument the white slave holders used for years was they are less human then us somehow. Sub standard...ect. Therefore we are righteous in this cause. We are civilizing them. How can one say we are better then them and yet argue well, they are no better?
Catch 22 kinda don't you think?
Quote: @BigAl99 said:
@ JimmyinSD said:
@ BigAl99 said:
Reparations can be different than just a check. Yeah agreed I didn't do it, but I still have to own the results. Got a lot of privilege, that it took me a while to realize, fear it or fix it.
My dad got the shit kicked out of him back in the 60s by a bunch of black men when they thought he was in the wrong neighborhood while sight seeing in the south, should I be able to sue all black people because I was brought up in home with a mistrust of black people? Doesnt every black person have to own up to the misdoings of a few people because of something that happened to one of my ancestors?
tell you what, if you have white guilt, go ahead and double (or what ever amount you feel will right the wrongs of your ancestors) and send it to the US Treasury to help pay for what ever you think is fair, but its insane to suggest that the rest of the innocent Americans should be taxed for the beliefs of a few.
by the way, maybe you have had it easier due to your skin color, but was that by your own doing or choosing? and maybe being born white has made some things easier, but it wasnt by my choosing or in no way have i had a hand in perpetuating any laws or ways of life that would hinder any black peoples opportunities. Hell no to reparations IMO. and by the way, even if you dont hand them a check, any sort of financial upper hand (more than are already present) will require somebody to pick up the tab...eventually somebody always pays.
Jimmy that's a false equivalency with what happened to your father. If "they" kidnapped and used him for breading stock and sold his offspring while using his labor for profit, that perhaps would be a little more similar. Now if "they" were an institution that conspired to do this in a systematic and organized manor and created de facto method to maintain their relationship, I bet at some point you or one of your lineage may say hey, you owe me, if y'all ever got the chance.
Again, agree with BigAl here.
Imo, the most odious thing about slavery, was the "institutional/national" denial (to slaves) of upward mobility...the American dream.
IOW, black slave families had no opportunity to accumulate any semblance of wealth (property) for our country's first 90 years.
Jimmy, did any of US (you/me) have anything to do with that? NO. And no money should be "taken" from us, for any redress/reparations.
Has our country largely rectified that, moving forward? Mostly YES. 13th amendment, civil rights laws, etc.
BUT, at the end of the civil war, black slaves were promised "40 acres and a mule". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty_acres_and_a_mule
As you can read, that proved illusory, too.
I'm a white American of scandinavian origin. My ancestors did not amass property/capital wealth to bequeath to me, but not because they didn't have the opportunity.
My ancestors didn't possess the entrepreneurship, tho. And that's the story of most of us, to be sure. (no shame).
But for slave blacks... there was a near 0 chance for that property/capital wealth opportunity.
Non-slave "whites" had a dis-proportionate opportunity to wealth/capital/property for our country's first 90 years.
If you were lucky, your white family took advantage of that. (again... I realize ours didn't)
As I outlined above in my first post... if "reparations" take the form of property tax cuts/reductions (less money to govt/smaller govt), prime lending (slightly less money to big banks),
and re-organizing a govt bureaucracy.... what is the harm, to any of us (non-slave descendants)?
But those "reparations" would be YUGE to/for slave descendants, in their lives.
At long last, they (slave descendants) would (finally) have a slight edge in wealth accumulation. My white ass is cool wit dat. 
And my "plan" focusing around abatement of property taxes/easy lending for homes (for verified slave descendants) .... keeps the discussion involved on the original sham, denied.
... "40 acres and a mule".
The GOP & conservatives are missing a major opportunity on this issue, imo.
"Reparations" can be done, where everyone "wins".
We've got YUGE cultural icons like Kanye and Candice.. and Condi and Colin, and Dr Ben.
We get 25% of the black vote, by out-smarting the Dems at their own Santa Claus games... we're in majority office for the foreseeable future, while staying true to
history/conservative family values.
Plus, it's the right thing, to do.
And then what about the chinese slaves? The Irish? Where does the reparation demands end? It's time for all Americans to accept that we have it better than most in other countries regardless of skin color, and to get over it already. It's time to move past racial issues of the past and I dont think more programs created out of race are going to do that.
Just like the Natuve Americans always wanting more, I think any programs created to right any wrong will just lead to more programs being demanded and lead to future generations just making more demands based on shit that never affected them.
Quote: @suncoastvike said:
@ Zanary said:
Here's a question that gets hushed kinda quickly in these discussions:
what about the fact that it was Blacks rounding up other Blacks in Africa, and being part of the slave trade the whole time?
I'm not saying that to exclude the horror-show that was slavery, but I will point out that slavery remained quite active in Africa (among other places) after it ended here. Therefore...calling it a white oppression issue isn't entirely accurate.
This point kinda went off like an H-Bomb in each of my sociology courses a few years ago, and it's kinda frightening how many people had no idea that African tribes were very happily selling off their neighbors. Kids are programmed to believe that all evil in our country is due to white oppression...whereas any real history buff will point out that mankind has a horrible history of enslaving/killing mankind...worldwide.
So, if slavery reparations are required...who pays for the portion that originated in Africa?
Who could disagree that nations there are still some of the most inhuman places to be a human. Especially a female.
However the argument the white slave holders used for years was they are less human then us somehow. Sub standard...ect. Therefore we are righteous in this cause. We are civilizing them. How can one say we are better then them and yet argue well, they are no better?
Catch 22 kinda don't you think?
Well...my point is that there were more than whites involved in the US slave trade, but that's not how the situation is represented; slavery is described in very, black/white terms (pardon the all-too topical expression) when it wasn't nearly that simple.
Also ignored is the fact that there were abolitionists nearly as long as there's been slavery, and that slaves were not owned by the majority of whites.
I took some classes, but I'm no full-on sociologist...and I don't know how to possibly assign values and/or apportion blame for those events. I do, however, see the very real result of people that never owned slaves or supported slavery being assigned blame and fiscal responsibility for it...and both media and scholars continuing to pick at the scabs that will only be healed by time.
I'm well aware that one of the justifications for Black slaves was the assignment of "less than human" status, and that was also how the Spanish justified the even more brutal work-til-dead approach they used on every native they could enslave. That said, are Navajo, Apache, Yaqui, and Pueblo tribes getting reparations from Spain?
I just wonder where it ends, and where the lines are.
Quote: @Zanary said:
@ suncoastvike said:
@ Zanary said:
Here's a question that gets hushed kinda quickly in these discussions:
what about the fact that it was Blacks rounding up other Blacks in Africa, and being part of the slave trade the whole time?
I'm not saying that to exclude the horror-show that was slavery, but I will point out that slavery remained quite active in Africa (among other places) after it ended here. Therefore...calling it a white oppression issue isn't entirely accurate.
This point kinda went off like an H-Bomb in each of my sociology courses a few years ago, and it's kinda frightening how many people had no idea that African tribes were very happily selling off their neighbors. Kids are programmed to believe that all evil in our country is due to white oppression...whereas any real history buff will point out that mankind has a horrible history of enslaving/killing mankind...worldwide.
So, if slavery reparations are required...who pays for the portion that originated in Africa?
Who could disagree that nations there are still some of the most inhuman places to be a human. Especially a female.
However the argument the white slave holders used for years was they are less human then us somehow. Sub standard...ect. Therefore we are righteous in this cause. We are civilizing them. How can one say we are better then them and yet argue well, they are no better?
Catch 22 kinda don't you think?
Well...my point is that there were more than whites involved in the US slave trade, but that's not how the situation is represented; slavery is described in very, black/white terms (pardon the all-too topical expression) when it wasn't nearly that simple.
Also ignored is the fact that there were abolitionists nearly as long as there's been slavery, and that slaves were not owned by the majority of whites.
I took some classes, but I'm no full-on sociologist...and I don't know how to possibly assign values and/or apportion blame for those events. I do, however, see the very real result of people that never owned slaves or supported slavery being assigned blame and fiscal responsibility for it...and both media and scholars continuing to pick at the scabs that will only be healed by time.
I'm well aware that one of the justifications for Black slaves was the assignment of "less than human" status, and that was also how the Spanish justified the even more brutal work-til-dead approach they used on every native they could enslave. That said, are Navajo, Apache, Yaqui, and Pueblo tribes getting reparations from Spain?
I just wonder where it ends, and where the lines are.
Fair enough.
I was over simplifying. I'm already on record here as against paying reparations. I just pointed out a pet peeve. You can't use a 100 years of slavery followed by a 100 years of forced separation because they are less human as an excuse for...well they were no better. You already admitted that. Blame game My mamma wouldn't allow that kinda thinking anyhow. Yes it was not all whites then that did this. Southern whites were worse but some northern were on board.
If countries today start paying for the mistakes in the past. You will find Europe even broker then they are now. Not to mention the Catholic church
Quote: @JimmyinSD said:
And then what about the chinese slaves? The Irish? Where does the reparation demands end? It's time for all Americans to accept that we have it better than most in other countries regardless of skin color, and to get over it already. It's time to move past racial issues of the past and I dont think more programs created out of race are going to do that.
Just like the Natuve Americans always wanting more, I think any programs created to right any wrong will just lead to more programs being demanded and lead to future generations just making more demands based on shit that never affected them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/17/us/irish-slaves-myth.html
Quote: @MaroonBells said:
@ JimmyinSD said:
And then what about the chinese slaves? The Irish? Where does the reparation demands end? It's time for all Americans to accept that we have it better than most in other countries regardless of skin color, and to get over it already. It's time to move past racial issues of the past and I dont think more programs created out of race are going to do that.
Just like the Natuve Americans always wanting more, I think any programs created to right any wrong will just lead to more programs being demanded and lead to future generations just making more demands based on shit that never affected them.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/17/us/irish-slaves-myth.html
they can call it what ever they want, but if a human was pressed into labor without their consent and be forced into subhuman living standards... isnt that pretty much what we are talking about here? I am sure I can find somebody to tear holes in that article if I wanted to play high school debate, but even that article mentions that these Irish slaves or indentured servants ( white guilt term?) were not always entering into that life by their own choosing. They were often sold into "indentured service" by somebody that had already claimed ownership of them (iE slave master)
but that still has me asking, what about the Chinese, or as others have mentioned the Native Americans, I am sure that there are others as well. At what point do we have to say it was wrong (its been about 3 generations ago that it was abolished) but its time to move on and start healing instead of pandering to the past as a means of generating a voter base? IMO after all thats all this is, an attempt to regain support from a growing % of black Americans by once again promising them something they havent earned.
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