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My ancestors were poor , they were paid very low wages essentially making them slaves or indentured servants. They didn't even get free housing and food like the other slaves. I deserve reparations
The conversation about reparations isn't about slavery. That would make it too easy to dismiss since the last person who was a slave died a long time ago, in about 1971. The issue is how Americans have learned to accept what slavery did to the DNA of American society, politics, education, religion, and economics.
When I hear conservatives say slavery was a Democratic problem so they should solve it, I say to them emancipation was a Republican initiative so they should finish the job they started. The problem that slavery caused for America is too big for politicians to solve. Pretending it can be fixed is the problem.
True. Sometimes reasonable, competent adults need to man the F up, get a job, provide for your family and work to improve yourself and your personal situation-instead of counting on politicians to "solve" things with handouts. Fortunately, the vast majority of Americans, of every race, do so. Most people don't spend time blaming their personal failings on things that happened 150 years ago.
"This country" does nothing without first harming its current citizens. Exactly everything the government does first requires harming some number of citizens in order to fund whatever that thing is. Thus, reparations represent a very focused effort to harm all US citizens in order to create the political illusion of an apology. It is political self-flagellation taken to a financial extreme.
So a previous wrong will be somehow "corrected" with a current wrong? Really?
Why do you feel this harms current citizens? When reparations were given in the past, were the current citizens harmed? Why isn’t this argument made when we give billions to Israel for example?
Perhaps we should mandate that government pay reparations to anyone who was a slave anytime up to 1865, and who personally comes into any government office with documentation proving it, in 2019.
Maybe run ads "If you were a slave anytime until 1865, or know someone now who was, please tell the ex slave to come in to your local government office with proof. Thank you."
Isn't it ironic how the Democrats who were responsible for perpetuating slavery, are the ones demanding others pay for it now.
Yes I said perpetuating, because no American was responsible for slavery, as it was other countries coming here to colonize this land, whether it be the Spanish, Dutch, English, etc.
So if anyone should be held responsible, it should be those countries who engaged in it in the first place, by bring slaves here before America was ever founded.
But you wont hear the Democrats bringing up those facts, nor their parties continuation of slavery. Heck the Republican party was formed to break the chains of slavery, from the very first presidential candidate Fremont, to the next one, Lincoln.
They also fail to mention that the first black members of Congress were Republican, namely;
Sen. Hiram Revels (R-MS), Rep. Benjamin S. Turner (R-AL), Robert DeLarge (R-SC), Josiah Walls (R-FL), Jefferson Long (R-GA), Joseph Rainey and Robert B. Elliott (R-SC)
The white Democrats were so enraged that they former the Ku Klux Klan to help put an end to it.
Up until Democrat LBJ cynically figured out a way to manipulate blacks into voting for Democrats, most blacks were Republican.
But why let facts get into the way of emotion driven false narratives of today, perpetuated by Democrats.
BTW - Anyone reading this post and doubting it, look it up yourselves. However be warned, you might not like what you find if you call yourself a Democrat!
Good question. I’m not sure how that would work. But perhaps black/white individuals would also receive reparations due to the one-drop rule used in the past.
But some people have more "drops" than others.
Does someone who's fully black in appearance, genetic phenotype, and family history get the same amount of compensation than someone who is only half black or 25% Black?
Please refer to the article posted with regards to the military benefits available only to white service members in the past. However, I am grateful to your husband and children for their sacrifices.
Not sure what the specifics would be but since the U.S. adhered to the one drop rule, your kids would likely receive something for their AA side.
I don’t deny your family’s history of payment. My point is simply that when many whites point to government programs as being for African-Americans, they conveniently forget how they benefited from them to the exclusion of others for decades. The white middle class was basically built off of government programs.
Thanks - and actually my ex husband is the one that is an African American, and an officer in the US military, though he's probably going to retire soon. He's never been denied any benefits because of the color of his skin. And that's my point - NO ONE ALIVE WAS EVER A SLAVE OR SLAVE OWNER, and the Civil Rights Act was passed in the 1960s - around 50 years ago.
Hey, get this - my AA kids will inherit money that came down from their great grandmother. You know how she got that money? Working in a dime store for fifty years. She lived in the same small clapboard house for fifty years too. Her story is typical of many "white folks."
They will also one day inherit money passed down through their dad's side of the family most likely - all African Americans for generations back.
Does someone who's fully black in appearance, genetic phenotype, and family history get the same amount of compensation than someone who is only half black or 25% Black?
Who knows. Guess that would be figured out somehow.
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