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Were you against reparations for the Japanese Internment?
If not, why not?
Do you think that no black people suffered property damage or medical conditions as a result of our country's racism against them in the 1940s (or 1950s or 1960s or 1970s)?
Were there reparations for Japanese-AMericans? I heard/read that the internment strategy had less to do with the war, and was more motivated by desire for a land grab, as many Japanese were farmers. I don't know where they went "home" to after they were released, as their assets had been seized and taken over by others. There's a housing question for you.
Were you against reparations for the Japanese Internment?
If not, why not?
Do you think that no black people suffered property damage or medical conditions as a result of our country's racism against them in the 1940s (or 1950s or 1960s or 1970s)?
I'm all for these past history correcting reparations, provided someone else volunteers to pay for them.
Balzac said "Behind every great fortune, there is a crime." I believe this applies to nations as well. Can you identify any major country today which is occupied and controlled by the same people since the beginning of written history? One place where someone wasn't displaced in order to make room for the current occupants?
Nation building requires on a large collective basis, a series of actions which when viewed on an individual basis, are crimes. When all history is chockablock with crimes, when all nations currently feature criminals or the descendants of criminals...where do we begin to repair it all? Why do some of the crimes require redressing while others do not?
Shall we return Texas to Mexico, who returns it to Spain, who returns it to the Comanches, who return it to whichever tribe they drove away when they arrived? Shall we return England to the Celts?
If we fix some things, why those things and not all things?
I'm all for these past history correcting reparations, provided someone else volunteers to pay for them.
Balzac said "Behind every great fortune, there is a crime." I believe this applies to nations as well. Can you identify any major country today which is occupied and controlled by the same people since the beginning of written history? One place where someone wasn't displaced in order to make room for the current occupants?
Nation building requires on a large collective basis, a series of actions which when viewed on an individual basis, are crimes. When all history is chockablock with crimes, when all nations currently feature criminals or the descendants of criminals...where do we begin to repair it all? Why do some of the crimes require redressing while others do not?
Shall we return Texas to Mexico, who returns it to Spain, who returns it to the Comanches, who return it to whichever tribe they drove away when they arrived? Shall we return England to the Celts?
If we fix some things, why those things and not all things?
Your post didn't respond to what I asked.
Should we, as a nation here in the USA provide some compensation to black Amreicans (for the eras of 1940-1980) who had their property taken from them - like the Japanese Americans did and who were harmed physically as a result of racist white policies and indifference such as Civil Rights workers?
I am not speaking of nation building or any far off wrong doings. I'm talking about people who are alive today who were harmed and who were ignored based on our own nation's overt racism and support of terrorism agaisnt black Americans.
I'll also add that in Alabama, which is where Angela Davis grew up - they have a program that compensates the "victims" of crimes. It started in the 1980s. Some of the Civil Rights survivors, including those who were at the 16th Street Baptist Church when it was bombed, applied for medical benefits via that program and were denied. That bombing (and others) and the terrorism against black people was encouraged and supported by state and local government offices.
It is interesting to me that you and others want to not answer those questions about people who are still alive and who suffered during their lives. You are fine with paying the Japanese and the Jews and other non-black people, but won't even consider the still living black people and their injuries and loss of land.
Were there reparations for Japanese-AMericans? I heard/read that the internment strategy had less to do with the war, and was more motivated by desire for a land grab, as many Japanese were farmers. I don't know where they went "home" to after they were released, as their assets had been seized and taken over by others. There's a housing question for you.
In 1988, President Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act to compensate more than 100,000 people of Japanese descent who were incarcerated in internment camps during World War II. The legislation offered a formal apology and paid out $20,000 in compensation to each surviving victim. The law won congressional approval only after a decade-long campaign by the Japanese-American community.
Ironically, per the article, the Japanese were inspired to lobby for reparations due to the activities and actions of black Americans and our struggle for Civil Rights, which came to a climax between 1950 and 1970. Many minority groups and women took courage from that climax and the actions of black Americans. If anyone IMO should be provided reparations in this country IMO it is those black Civil Rights workers who risked their lives and many lost their parents and the children who marched and who were imprisoned and beaten an attacked just so that they could be treated as a regular American.
Today our guest is a woman who is often referred to as the fifth victim of the bombing. Sarah Collins Rudolph was 12 years old when the church was attacked. She was standing next to her sister, Addie Mae Collins. Sarah Collins Rudolph was hit with shards of glass, lost an eye, was hospitalized for months. Today she continues to live in Birmingham, Alabama
Please note that Addie Mae Collins, her sister was killed in the bombing.
Quote:
SARAH COLLINS RUDOLPH I don’t know why, but I have been seeking for compensation for years, and—but I never did get anything. And looked like the people just looked over me. They didn’t realize that being in a bomb at the age of 12, I lost a lot of things, you know, concerning my health, you know. And also I wanted to be a nurse, but by having post-traumatic stress syndrome, that never did happen, because that bomb just really changed my whole life. And I had to work as being a maid simply because I wasn’t as smart as I were, because at first, before the bomb, I was an A student, but after the bomb, I just couldn’t think like that anymore.....
I had had injury in my left eye. I have had glaucoma for years, where I have to take pills—I mean, pills and also drops in my eyes every day. But last June, they operated on it and put an incision in my eye to drain the fluid, because my pressure had been up for a long time. And also, yes, Birmingham was—it was a way of life back then. We would hear bombs going off, and we would see the police beating blacks with billy sticks and water hose. And it was just a terrorist place, really, to live in. But we stayed. We wanted to leave, but we just didn’t have the money to do it, to go. So, things are a little better now. So, we’re still here in Birmingham.
AARON MATÉ: You went to the Birmingham City Council last year for help. Your husband asked for help in covering your medical bills. What was their response?
SARAH COLLINS RUDOLPH: At first they said, "Go to the county." See, we stay in the county part of Birmingham. "Go to the county, because they don’t do things like that here in the city." But anyway, the City Council people said, "Well, we can help her." They do it all over in other cities. They get funds to help people that’s been in a terrorist attack. He said, "We can do it here." But when they offered me something, it wasn’t what I had expected, because it was very little, because, you know, during these 50 years I’ve suffered a lot. And I just wanted to let them know that it was time for restitution, because the city was involved in all this—the fire department, the police department. They was involved in all the terrorist act that was going on in Birmingham, because during that time, we couldn’t—we couldn’t call the city police and ask for help, because we weren’t going to get any help, since they was involved.
Last edited by residinghere2007; 12-08-2016 at 07:57 AM..
On the land grab portion of the comment above, please note that land was indeed grabbed from the Japanese Americans and a majority of them never got back their property.
Also, will mention that the same thing happened to black Americans. Many of them had their land stolen from them by white Americans under threat of violence.
Not sure if you have read this piece, but it details much of what I am speaking of.
Will also note again that I am more than certain that reparations for black Americans will never happen, but that I do feel that that is due in part to an indifference to racism and discrimination when it is faced by black people in this country. There is the idea that blacks are inferior to all other "races"in this country and are not deserving of any "special treatment" when really we are the only demographic that has never received any longstanding "special treatment" in society other than slavery then nationwide racism.
This is a long read. Most people don't read the entire thing and just see the title and talk about slavery like most of the people in the thread did at the onset of seeing the word "reparations."
From the article:
Quote:
In 2001, the Associated Press published a three-part investigation into the theft of black-owned land stretching back to the antebellum period. The series documented some 406 victims and 24,000 acres of land valued at tens of millions of dollars. The land was taken through means ranging from legal chicanery to terrorism. “Some of the land taken from black families has become a country club in Virginia,” the AP reported, as well as “oil fields in Mississippi” and “a baseball spring training facility in Florida.”
Should we, as a nation here in the USA provide some compensation to black Amreicans (for the eras of 1940-1980) who had their property taken from them - like the Japanese Americans did and who were harmed physically as a result of racist white policies and indifference such as Civil Rights workers?
I am not speaking of nation building or any far off wrong doings. I'm talking about people who are alive today who were harmed and who were ignored based on our own nation's overt racism and support of terrorism agaisnt black Americans.
I did answer your question, the answer was no. Do you think if you keep asking my response will change?
My position was that all of past history involves crimes and I do not see a reason why any particular ones need retroactive correcting rather than any others. That would include any crimes involved in nation building, or ay crimes involved in the internal development of that nation....there, does that answer your question about racist policies as opposed to national displacement actions?
You on the the other hand really didn't answer mine....why do some crimes of the past require modern corrections while others do not?
Should we, as a nation here in the USA provide some compensation to black Amreicans (for the eras of 1940-1980) who had their property taken from them - like the Japanese Americans did and who were harmed physically as a result of racist white policies and indifference such as Civil Rights workers?
I am not speaking of nation building or any far off wrong doings. I'm talking about people who are alive today who were harmed and who were ignored based on our own nation's overt racism and support of terrorism agaisnt black Americans.
I'll also add that in Alabama, which is where Angela Davis grew up - they have a program that compensates the "victims" of crimes. It started in the 1980s. Some of the Civil Rights survivors, including those who were at the 16th Street Baptist Church when it was bombed, applied for medical benefits via that program and were denied. That bombing (and others) and the terrorism against black people was encouraged and supported by state and local government offices.
It is interesting to me that you and others want to not answer those questions about people who are still alive and who suffered during their lives. You are fine with paying the Japanese and the Jews and other non-black people, but won't even consider the still living black people and their injuries and loss of land.
This is what investigative journalism is for. This should be brought to light in the media. I think a good place to start, reparations-wise, would be at the very basic level of making restitution to wrongfully-accused and later released prisoners. Those people have their lives interrupted and stolen from them, and the system later just says, "oops, sorry". If we can't even do something as basic as that, (and in many cases there was clear and proven intent to falsely accuse), the rest of it's hopeless.
Sigh, I've already stated that I am well aware there will not be reparations.
Also, I am well aware that my own demographic has achieved a great deal even while living under an oppressive society. I do not need to look to the Chinese or any group at all since they were not treated in the same way and especially were not post WW2 all over the country. I am very proud of how far black Americans have come as a demographic.
But the fact remains that whenever a discussion about "reparations" is discussed people only want to talk about slavery, when, as I stated, that was not the most detrimental thing to the black demographic that occurred and there are still victims of American state sanctioned racism who are black who are alive today.
FWIW, please note that the Japanese Americans incarcerated in camps during WW2 were provided a settlement. During that same period black Americans were stuck in specific neighborhoods, denied educations for their children, charged with crimes and imprisoned for crimes they did not commit, murdered for crimes they did not commit, murdered by white mobs (both WW1 and WW2 black vets were attacked when they came back home after those wars), had bombs destroying their homes/neighborhoods and had their rights routinely ignored and dismissed by our federal, state, and local governments. I can fully understand why the Japanese were compensated for their losses, as I'm sure you are as well. Yet, you cannot fathom the idea that black people had the same and worse experiences as the Japanese for over 100 years post Civil War, yet those harmed never received compensation for the wrongs committed against them? And you don't think that those alive today deserve to be remedied? I especially do believe that those who suffered from state sanctioned terrorism should have some Medicaid for the injuries they sustained. Even John Lewis has stated he suffers from migraines due to the beating he sustained by police on the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma. Andy Young has similar tales of pain he endures as a result of the beating he took in St. Augustine, FL. There are tens of thousands of other black people who were physically harmed during the climax of the Civil Rights Movement from 1946-1970.
The Japanese were paid reparations by the US Government because of the unconstitutional imprisonment by the US Government. There was a specific action by the Government which was the reason for the compensation. More over, if you read about it, the only reason there was any compensation at all was that the Japanese American researcher who was granted access to the archives in the 70s found a governmental memo clearly stating that there was no justifiable reason to intern the Japanese Americans from the military security perspective. So she was able to show that at the time of interment the US Government knew that what they were doing was wrong, unconstitutional, and didn't serve any purpose other than revenge against a specific group of people. Without that document, nothing would happen.
The Japanese who were discriminated against, or physically attacked, by the individuals, public institutions, or state / city governments did not receive any reparations. It was strictly a compensation for the specific act by the Gov't which the Gov't itself at the time knew to be unnecessary and wrong.
Boy do white southerners have alot to say about black people.
At this point just avoiding an escalation of stop and frisk will be a victory for non-whites. Reparations? What a laugh, we're still working on basic civil rights!
That's a very good point.
Personally, I'm in favor of the concept of reparations, but I don't see it as being at all practical...as has been outline in several posts already.
What I find interesting about this general topic is who most often participates in such discussions -- White people who have never invited a Black person into their home and have never been invited into the home of a Black person...yet they know all about race relations. They will say they have Black friends, and when pressed on it, it comes down to the clerk in the grocery store or the guy at the gas station or the fellow at work with whom they associate in the most superficial manner. In my profession I had a lot of Black colleagues with whom I closely associated both professionally and at a personal level. I don't recall a single one of them ever bringing up the topic of reparations. But I've had other White people bring up the topic.
Then there is this false argument about heaping much of the blame on Blacks in Africa who dealt in the slave trade. From a moral standpoint, of course there is plenty of blame to be placed there. But we in this nation have and had no control over "that end" of slavery. We had control over "this end" of slavery, and what was done in this nation by American citizens was about as immoral as one can get. The fact that slavery had been around for centuries and in various places all over the world is irrelevant. Owning other human being is wrong. Period. Some people ought to stop making excuses for what we did in this nation. And it is fair to say we. Go read the concurrent thread about patriotism (or any other thread about patriotism on this forum...there are many). We like to go back and talk about what "we" did in settling this nation, and during the Revolutionary War, and developing the Constitution, and World Wars I and II; but then when it comes to slavery or what we did to Indian Americans it's oh no, that wasn't us.
This argument about not holding this country responsible for slavery because the trade began in Africa is nonsense' it's about like not holding Ford responsible for a faulty car because some of the tin was mined by some local in Malaysia, and some of the rubber sap used was collected by another peasant in Malaysia.
The two biggest sins of this nation have never been satisfactorily addressed -- slavery and what we did to the American Indians. The whole concept of American Indian reservations (now we call them "nations", though they are not) continues to be a disgrace today. Civil rights in this nation are a disgrace today.
I don't mind so much that we seem unable to come up with solutions...both topics are really difficult. But I do mind that some people make excuses about not needing to come up with solutions. And until we seriously begin to address the issues, they will continue to come back and slap us in the face. As Pogo said, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."
While discussing "reparations", I would like to talk to some Western Native American tribes about my Grandfather's brother. He went West as a young man, and was never heard from again. It is believed that he was killed by Indians.
It that is true, they stole my Great Uncle from me, and I want paid for that! No, I can not prove who killed him, but they can't prove they didn't, either!
This is nothing but a vapid excuse. Because guess what, if you could even prove that he was killed by Indians, and which tribe killed him (perhaps legally under their common law), than I would say to go ahead and make your claim. However, when most people talk about specific reparations, they talk about mothers, fathers, son, daughters, grandmothers, and grandfathers. They don't get into uncles and aunts and cousins. And when it comes right down to it, you don't care about your Great Uncle. You just want to argue.
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