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The Caribbean governments do demand reparations. The Caribbean people think that this is just another venue that they want to engage in corruption and party patronage. Caribbean people do not express interest in reparations because they know that there is none to get. Too many urgent problems to waste time with a pipe dream.
The reality is that there were many actors in the slave trade and so who is to be held responsible becomes complicated. Without the active involvement of certain African elites there would have been far fewer enslaved peoples trafficked and certainly NONE from the regions between Senegal and Cameroons.
The Caribbean people are simply WRONG.
Jews, as a group of European got financial reparations for the Holocaust. Germany, Austria, and Poland also offer citizenship to the citizens of Holocaust survivors. Not to mention there's Israel itself. And of course, Sephardim have the right to Portuguese and Spanish citizenship.
Now obviously if money was just going to go pocket some politicians accounts, that's pretty bad. But this was certainly not the case for Jews when they got multiple reparations.
In the United States due to obvious historical persecution, members of federally approved Native American groups get their college tuition paid for by the government, get free medical, and get discounted mortgages. http://www.collegescholarships.org/g...e-american.htm
And yet there are no genuine reparations towards Black people.
The Americans often assume that all Africans live in a jungle inside of a hut "in a tribe." They will also ask ignorant questions like "so you speak Nigerian?" or "do you speak a dialect?" whatever that means. "Do you speak African?" You can pretty much fill in the blank. Black Americans generally like African culture on a superficial level...
How much of that is true for many Blacks in the western hemisphere? Are Blacks in the Caribbean and Latin America any more knowledgeable about everyday life of African people on the continent? We all pretty much receive the same media info about Africa which can be limited and narrow.
Jews, as a group of European got financial reparations for the Holocaust. Germany, Austria, and Poland also offer citizenship to the citizens of Holocaust survivors. Not to mention there's Israel itself. And of course, Sephardim have the right to Portuguese and Spanish citizenship.
Now obviously if money was just going to go pocket some politicians accounts, that's pretty bad. But this was certainly not the case for Jews when they got multiple reparations.
In the United States due to obvious historical persecution, members of federally approved Native American groups get their college tuition paid for by the government, get free medical, and get discounted mortgages. College Grants for Native Americans
And yet there are no genuine reparations towards Black people.
No they are not wrong. There is nothing that can get 14 impoverished nations to compel Europe to pay reparations when ALL of the world's wealthiest nations are against it.
And there is the obvious problem that there is no one alive in the Americas who was either a slave or directly descended from one so it is difficult to litigate. The examples that you mention all refer to people who were directly impacted. There are still people living who were alive in WWII as difficult as it might be for you to imagine it.
The UK isnt going to give us citizenship either, especially after they gave us independence and we proudly waved our flags and kissed them goodbye. And do we want citizenship from Ghana, Nigeria, Togo, DRC or Congo Republic? No! Just about every Caribbean nation is better off with the possible exception of Haiti.
The UK in particular isnt going to pay reparations because claims from India and Ireland alone will bankrupt that country. Research the history of Ireland and it isnt pretty with their famines and forced labor that was sent to UK colonies in the Caribbean and North America.
Anyway,I do think many Black-Americans think Arabic names are African like Hakim,Jabari and Rashida etc.
Black Muslims introduced the myth that Islam was the "black man's religion" and so many bought into this notion that these Arabic names are theirs. What is interesting is that you dont see the type of Muslim names that the Francophone West African Muslims have. That is even though it is from those regions where the first Muslims brought to the USA would have originated from.
There isnt even a mythology of place of origin as exists in the Caribbean as the nature of US slavery meant that fewer slaves were brought directly to the USA and in its peak era relatively few slaves would have been African born. So there would be fewer myths transferred across generations. For instance the Akan names are known in the Caribbean Cuffy (Kofi) and Kwame being among of the more famous. So people wanting "African" names would go to these Akan.
No they are not wrong. There is nothing that can get 14 impoverished nations to compel Europe to pay reparations when ALL of the world's wealthiest nations are against it.
And there is the obvious problem that there is no one alive in the Americas who was either a slave or directly descended from one so it is difficult to litigate. The examples that you mention all refer to people who were directly impacted. There are still people living who were alive in WWII as difficult as it might be for you to imagine it.
The UK isnt going to give us citizenship either, especially after they gave us independence and we proudly waved our flags and kissed them goodbye. And do we want citizenship from Ghana, Nigeria, Togo, DRC or Congo Republic? No! Just about every Caribbean nation is better off with the possible exception of Haiti.
The UK in particular isnt going to pay reparations because claims from India and Ireland alone will bankrupt that country. Research the history of Ireland and it isnt pretty with their famines and forced labor that was sent to UK colonies in the Caribbean and North America.
This African American is suing for the ownership of her slavery ancestor photos that Harvard is profiting from.
Yes, at least some individual West Indians could indeed get restitution of sorts, but it would involve carefully going over their family history.
This woman learned Harvard was profiting off images of her ancestors and is suing........,
She got a lawyer to take her case......,
No one is alive from the conquests of the Americas, and yet Native Americans do indeed get reparations. In parts of Latin America certain numbers of university seats and government jobs have to be reserved for Native Americans and those of African descent. This is a form of reparations.
To a point, I disagree. History means nothing. My grandparents came to America from Russia, escaping the oppression of the Tsar. That is completely meaningless to me, and has made no contribution whatsoever to who I am as a person.
A Black American and a Black African have nothing in common whatsoever, any more so than a White American and White African. They may, incidentally, be able to find some common ground if they both grew up in a place where Blacks were subjected to discrimination or oppression. But no living Black American was directly affected by Slavery, and very few old enough to have been directly affected by Segretation. Similarly, very few Black Africans are old enough to have been directly affected by Colonialism. However historically important those phenomena are, a Black American and a Black African meeting in the street have not been influenced at all in their lifetimes by slavery, segregation or colonialism. No more so than I and a 25 year old Russian have any common experience of serfdom or oppression in Russia.
As an aside, has it occurred to you that Barack Obama did not spend one single day of his childhood living in an African-American household, society or neighborhood, and cannot know from personal experience that that would be like. He is the 44th US president to be raised as a white child by a white family in a white social framework. It would be "unnatural" for Obama to assume that he has anything in common with even a Black American, much less a Black African.
This response just shows how much people need to learn before they speak about other people's experiences. As a black African, I find that there are several areas, quite many where my values are more aligned to the immigrant values, than to African American values. That refers to our family life, values, aspirations, choices, etc. So we may find more similarities with an Indian immigrant than with an average African American.
But to say that Colonialism and segregation does not directly affect both our communities ignores the generational economic impact of these systems that disadvantage the African American and Black African till date. You can look at access to capital, passed down wealth, access to education as well as barriers to climbing the economic ladder.
But to say that Colonialism and segregation does not directly affect both our communities ignores the generational economic impact of these systems that disadvantage the African American and Black African till date. You can look at access to capital, passed down wealth, access to education as well as barriers to climbing the economic ladder.
The USA ensures that black Africans and other blacks will share a bond, whether they wish to or not. The longer the black immigrant lives in the USA the more they see that they considered "black" and not "immigrant".
And before others begin to chime, the same also applies to Canada and Europe. The poor French Antilleans must always prove to white Frenchmen that they are just as French and aren't immigrants.
This African American is suing for the ownership of her slavery ancestor photos that Harvard is profiting from.
Yes, at least some individual West Indians could indeed get restitution of sorts, but it would involve carefully going over their family history.
This woman learned Harvard was profiting off images of her ancestors and is suing........,
She got a lawyer to take her case......,
No one is alive from the conquests of the Americas, and yet Native Americans do indeed get reparations. In parts of Latin America certain numbers of university seats and government jobs have to be reserved for Native Americans and those of African descent. This is a form of reparations.
This woman I don't think won her case. The time and the energy that these cases take is IMHO not worth it.
I just wish that blacks in the USA debate away from reparations from slavery and talk more about the destruction that the post Reconstruction era created and even more relevant, racist acts by the Federal gov't in the post WWII era. Then we will not here about "African chiefs", or "my ancestors never owned slaves" excuses.
Its a disgrace that blacks acquired significant amounts of assets after slavery, only to have this stolen from them when Jim Crow was put in place.
What you describe in Latin America is a quota system which is proven not to work. You know Bolsonaro and the right wing leader in Colombia would end this, assuming that it still exists.
This woman I don't think won her case. The time and the energy that these cases take is IMHO not worth it.
I just wish that blacks in the USA debate away from reparations from slavery and talk more about the destruction that the post Reconstruction era created and even more relevant, racist acts by the Federal gov't in the post WWII era. Then we will not here about "African chiefs", or "my ancestors never owned slaves" excuses.
Its a disgrace that blacks acquired significant amounts of assets after slavery, only to have this stolen from them when Jim Crow was put in place.
What you describe in Latin America is a quota system which is proven not to work. You know Bolsonaro and the right wing leader in Colombia would end this, assuming that it still exists.
It actually is to her. Her case is still ongoing. Who knows what will happen, but yes she is owned that money if those are her ancestors pictures.
The only reason why there are any professional Blacks at all is because the government forced universities to accept people other than white men. Yes, Ivy League and other white universities have to show to the government that they accept people of all races in order to get government funding.
You said you have a degree from an Ivy League school, then you were a beneficiary of it and so was I twice.
For that matter there can be reparations for what was stolen during Jim Crow, if those records exist and if people can prove it.
US immigration policies favored immigration from European nations. The same administration that created the EEOC and other civil rights legislation also ended discrimination in immigration, substantially opening up the US to third world immigration. Without this you might not even be in the country, much less have a degree from an US university.
Re: those affirmative actions programs have created a Black middle class in South America and they exist. South American governments change from right to left and left to right all the time, even if the programs are ended they will come back. And yes it´s a form of reparations, and they have them for Natives too.
Greece is currently suing Germany for reparations for WW2. As noted, Jews got reparations in multiple forms for WW2. Germany even had to write checks to Israel.
The descendents of those who lost German citizenship due to the Holocaust can get German citizenship (ditto Poland). Spain and Portugal offer any descendent of expelled Sephardic Jews citizenship. Israel itself offers any practice Jew citizenship, those with Jewish grandparents or parents can get Israeli citizenship, and even people with distant Jewish ancestry can get Israeli citizenship if they have certain rabbis perform a return to Judaism.
Jewish people are able as awhole to do much better than any kind of Black people in part because they have global support networks that simply are not available to most people of African descent (they are available to me because I´m part Sephardic).
You´re actually short changing Black people because hardwork alone is not going to get anyone anywhere. Many Black people work hard and die of strokes or diabetes in their 50s. And they die poor.
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