Slavery reparations proposals could cost US more than $17 trillion

[cleaver]

Now you focus on the consequences of decisions, not the decisions that led to consequences.

Obviously I left an opening to exploit there. But that's an inevitability, isn't it? Right up there with the chicken or egg quandary.

Truthfully, I think you're engaged in mental masturbation now. "But what if.....?" That's a game I choose not to play concerning other peoples lives. I'm busy enough playing it with my own.

Individual, get it?

yes. i get it. i do. believe me.

and i admit - in the last few -
to playing on the lighter side that i know, as well,
you can (and often do) demonstrate...

suffice us to agree
that these commando fire bombings
that generally pose to pass for honest discourse
around these boards
are mostly mental masturbations
with a quick finger on the refresh button
to see how well one lit-scored.

put the horse to stable too...

i'm tired and have accomplished very little;
other than exercising
what would otherwise have been spent
into some other e-sock.

happy trails....
until we meet again.

 

[bellisarius]

yes. i get it. i do. believe me.

and i admit - in the last few -
to playing on the lighter side that i know, as well,
you can (and often do) demonstrate...

suffice us to agree
that these commando fire bombings
that generally pose to pass for honest discourse
around these boards
are mostly mental masturbations
with a quick finger on the refresh button
to see how well one lit-scored.

put the horse to stable too...

i'm tired and have accomplished very little;
other than exercising
what would otherwise have been spent
into some other e-sock.

happy trails....
until we meet again.

And meet again we will, of that I'm certain.

 

[OldJourno]

Dig them up and execute them? Novel idea.

Kinda goes with the "tear down the statues" phase some of us are going through, only crumblier.

 

[bellisarius]

Kinda goes with the "tear down the statues" phase some of us are going through, only crumblier.

That made SOOOO many lives better. Bet their income jumped to a new tax bracket.

 

[beew]

I think that most people agree that asking descendants of Whites who never owned slaves, second generation Nigerians and Asians to pay for something that only 1% of White colonists profited from - won't work.

But in America and worldwide, certain minority groups are being held back by the system. Or people are left homeless or poor by America's or Germany/Britain's wars.
How to address that?
It's another "damn if you do, damn if you don't issue".

Because it will inevitably come from the pocket of the majority working class, during times when they already feel disenfranchised and angry about where their lives are at. (see Occupy Wall Street and Yellow Vests protests).

I'd say take it from the taxes of trilionaires, and leave the White working class alone.
But then I'll have BotanyBoy, not BadBabySitter on my back.

 

[oralaccents]

23 & Me... Discover how much slave dna is in you...and have your Reparations cheque, same day.

 

[SpeareChucker]

If you have been taught that you're a 'victim', and you internalize that notion, it relieves you of having to take any responsibility for your failures. As a matter of fact it relieves you of having to make any effort at all.

Hoffer 101

I don't understand:
If they're aiming for votes, aren't they shooting themselves in the foot?

I would assume that AfricanAmericans and their relatives/friends would vote (I would too, in their place)
But Whites, Asians and Hispanics will turn to the opposition - otherwise, it would hurt their purse.

Not whites. "Educated" whites believe in this shit just to maintain their social standing and privilege.




**Not intended as meddling in matters of the US system
I'm just fascinated by the global Left turn today.**

 

[SpeareChucker]

do you not see that this issue has you twisted into an empirical spin cycle as well?

stomping your foot "no"
and playing the (politically) ignorant "darkies" card
doesn't adequately address any of the underlying issues that give
a resonance to a general concept of reparations.

why?

because there are indeed a set of underlying undeniable factors
that make such a ridiculous proposition (direct cash pay-off)
politically expedient to periodically roust from the ash heap.

if there were not such a tenable factual basis
to propagate some issue of possible redress
then it would not resonate so.

before we knee-jerk foolishly to what is clearly a political stink bomb,
(and truly a disingenuous political expediency)
should we at least come to some basic agreement as to the underlying
facts that continue to give oxygen to the embers?

we don't often do the hard work here.

we've found it more fun to be arsonists.

So, it's a binary choice.
Yes
or
no?

and

merely discussing the impossibility of an outcome
is
foot-stomping music?

Not even elevator MUSAK?

 

[SpeareChucker]

R U
one of "those"

white people

I​

alluded to?

Binary choice here...

 

[beew]

Let those nations deal with their own problems... someone doing despicable shit doesnt mean the despical shit you did is no longer shitty

As I said, such a measure could have international repercussions.
Selective focus and witewashing of inconvenient parts of history.


1. It's been tried:
"In 1999, the African World Reparations and Repatriation Truth Commission
called for the West to pay $777 trillion to Africa within five years.

In September 2001, the United Nations sponsored the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance held in Durban South Africa. The Durban Review Conference sponsored a resolution stating that the West owed reparations to Africa due to the "racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance" that the Atlantic slave trade caused."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reparations_for_slavery#United_Kingdom


2. They didn't mention the trans-Sahelian and eastern slave (Arab Muslim) trade:, which caused much more devastation to Africa than White Christians did:

Tidiane N’Diaye: The Veiled Genocide (2008)
"It is more than 13 centuries, without interruption, that the Arabs have enslaved the black continent. [...] The trans-Sahelian and eastern slave trade has been much more devastating for the African people than the transatlantic trade.
It is a chapter in African history that is still taboo, and most Muslim intellectuals are reluctant to discuss: the slavery of black people by the Arab world.
And what resonance today? Since today an estimated 45 million people are still enslaved. It's essentially in the Arab-Muslim world. [...] "

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/20...api_taft_p1_i0

 

[beew]

Apparently descendants of Black slaves to England sought justice in a different way:

"In 2004 descendants of Africans enslaved in America enlisted lawyer Ed Fagan in a class action lawsuit against insurance market Lloyd's of London, among other British and American corporations, stating that by insuring and financing the slaving ships they were complicit in genocide."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reparations_for_slavery#United_Kingdom


The case wasn't successful, unfortunately, showing that governments are more prepared to take money out of the pockets of the working class, than corporations or those who directly Caused the problems.

 

[Luk]

Whether it's logical or moral, it would be impossible to make it right. This is where my white guilt kicks in.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Whether it's logical or moral, it would be impossible to make it right. This is where my white guilt kicks in.

During my youth, I did some rotten things, and I feel some guilt now, but I feel none over what happened 150 years or more ago. I certainly had nothing to do with it, and I'm reasonably sure my ancestors didn't either.

The idea that anybody owes any kind of reparations to the continent of Africa is nothing short of ridiculous. Most of the abductions and sales into slavery were done by other Africans, including Arabs.

 

[beew]

I'm White too.
But why should I be made to feel guilty for the massacre of aboriginals,
whereas Arab or Samoan immigrants get a pass?

I mean, in the eyes of the GB Left we're either second class esl's, or privileged whites
According to how the wind blows.

 

[BotanyBoy]

can any of you honestly say that the residual effects
of the post slavery slow step to functional opportunity equality
has reached an "end point"?

Yes.

Which is why nobody here or otherwise has been able to name any "White" privileges without reaching back to Jim Crow.

looked into a prison lately?
or a ghetto?
the "darkies" fault, right?

Yea...it is their fault.

They made the choice, they are personally responsible.

the two most predominant symptoms remaining
are in education and wealth.

Again, personal responsibility.

boot-strap up....?

great.

it's no more answer than any other prescription
to a bunch of ungrateful college pukes...
who could, without generations of structural disparity,
find place in a college classroom...

My father was an Asian war/genocide refugee.....he managed to go to school and become an engineer, back in the 70's.

How is that possible?? In super racist horrible horrible Nazi America??

I'm the first in 4 generations of my family to not be enslaved or under direct threat of going to a death camp, also managed to go to a state school and a private graduate program and make both of them my bitch.

How is that possible!?!?~?

you have got to face the diagnosis first..

What diagnosis??

boot-strap up, "darkies"...
you should be grateful for the miracles
this society provides...
.

That's right....welcome to the real fuckin' world.

If you want anything better than minimum wage or a GED
https://media0.giphy.com/media/nEz4Qks2OmAWQ/giphy.gif

 

[BotanyBoy]

Whether it's logical or moral, it would be impossible to make it right. This is where my white guilt kicks in.

You feel guilt about what other white people did well before you were born because you too are white?

That's the most insane shit.

 

[cleaver]

So, it's a binary choice.
Yes
or
no?

and

merely discussing the impossibility of an outcome
is
foot-stomping music?

Not even elevator MUSAK?

R U
one of "those" white people

I​

alluded to?

Binary choice here...

you do know better than this.
you do.
but if this is to be a semantic sword fight...?

let me first dispence with muzak...

i was about to go into a bit here;
a personal anecdote - all true - funny.... anhhhhh.

let me just say that:
if one could - as one can -
chance upon
the muzak'd melody to 'springtime for hitler'
in a slow moving elevator
up to an impending root canal...
then,

muzak has its place, i guess.
wonderfully weird things can come from such... tolerance.

:::::


now to your semantics:
i'm not sure what you are asking?

there are several answers offered in the thread to the reparations question
that are definitive, but not necessarily binary.

there is:
no,
no - because...,
maybe - but....,
probably - but...,
and yes.

my first premise in answering the general question
went to a part of the 'no' and 'no - because" arguments
that said, in part, that:

- they had nothing to do with slavery
- they had not benefited by slavery
- it was a long time ago
(the 'not my problem' school)

and more pointedly
- that the issue itself - as raised - was a pander to 'the ignorant' for votes

it is on this last point - and through it, the other ones - that i responded.

my "binary" - if that is what you want to call it -
is that, yes... a direct payout is a ridiculous endeavour - for many reasons...

but,
the underlying truth - that still gives a claim for reparation resonance -
is that
there have been - and persist - structural, social and political tendrils
that have continued to subjugate - not just descendants - but a race -
since the first june-teenth.

and further...
that the 'not my problem' school has generally benefited generation-ally
by that subjugation...

opportunity
has been negatively impacted - has been generation-ally retarded
- for those institutionally, socially, structurally and politically subjugated -
far more so by that subjugation
than by any lack of initiative, desire, intelligence or talent.

in your parlance,
the liberties - guaranteed by 13, 14, 15... and later 24
have been socially, structurally, politically...
effectively, institutionally usurped - by race...

to - what we should all hope and strive towards - an ever diminishing degree.

the federal government has a long, demonstrable history of "owning"
if not always effectively - or even positively acting upon - the remaining disparities.

it is undeniable though that:
- such racial disparity persists... descendant of slavery
- a race has been institutionally impacted...
- those not impacted have benefitted - without doubt - by the subjugation of a race (despite any protestation of good intent or absolution of 'ownership')
- there is a societal debt - to our citizens - to ameliorate not only the remaining institutional and social impediments
but also those tangible legacy effects that continue to stifle their equal opportunity.

in another thread, i advocated an apollo program-like national goal
revamping and improving our public education systems
not as reparation, or a massive 'handout'
but rather as a color blind infrastructure initiative
that both brings our next generations (back) up to the pinacles of international standards
and as a net positive investment in our nation's future...

and as access to exceptional education, more than any one thing,
leads to access to the greatest opportunity,
a natural bridge can be laid from the most lasting legacies of persistent subjugation
and it's generational cycle of entrenched poverty/lack of opportunity/effective social segregation.

access = opportunity

and the cost is for all to bare -
not as a traditional $reparation$
but as a societal investment - in human infrastructure.

"socialism" "socialism" "socialism" - yeah.... blah blah blah

find the semantics to skewer as "polar".

i'd rather suggest that difficult issues are best addressed in the intricate murky greys of pragmatism.

 

[BotanyBoy]

and as access to exceptional education, more than any one thing,
leads to access to the greatest opportunity,
a natural bridge can be laid from the most lasting legacies of persistent subjugation
and it's generational cycle of entrenched poverty/lack of opportunity/effective social segregation.

access = opportunity

And what exceptional or even generic education do the descendants of US slaves not have access to in 2019?

 

[cleaver]

And what exceptional or even generic education do the descendants of US slaves not have access to in 2019?

oh,
you're right.
it's the "darkies" fault.

they opt to be poor.
they choose to go to jail.
they mooch on 'the system'

you've said, just above, that they're "responsible"

oh. yes.
i understand where you are coming from.

:::

i feign to do this,
but you should know....

that arguments like this
and in many other threads
make you appear to be
a kind of...

zumi for the right;

and for that,
despite what interesting points you might have to make,
easily and as equally dismiss-able.

i say this, not as a slight...
but rather as a cordial reminder
that every point posited is not a battle line.
every position offered is not a challenge.
every one in opposition is not an enemy...

and not everything is either black or white.

 

[Luk]

You feel guilt about what other white people did well before you were born because you too are white?

That's the most insane shit.

Comprehension has never been a friend of yours.

 

[BotanyBoy]

Comprehension has never been a friend of yours.

Where did I go wrong?

 

[Luk]

Where did I go wrong?

Let us start with your parent and widdle it down from there.

 

[BotanyBoy]

oh,
you're right.
it's the "darkies" fault.

they opt to be poor.
they choose to go to jail.

Well....they do.

Excluding the mentally ill/disabled the only reason anyone in this country is poor is because

1) They are lazy/irresponsible.

2) They are shit with their money.

There are a lot more of the 2nd kind but there are some of the first.

As for jail? Yea....100%.

If you're going to be a criminal, be a good one or suffer the criminal justice system and sans maybe some of the insane folks, they all knew damn well what they were doing.

i say this, not as a slight...
but rather as a cordial reminder
that every point posited is not a battle line.
every position offered is not a challenge.
every one in opposition is not an enemy...

Not a battle line or challenge just an idea worth responding to.

and not everything is either black or white.

Not everything, but some things are.

 

[BotanyBoy]

Let us start with your parent and widdle it down from there.

Ok so I was right, you're nuts.

 

[Luk]

Ok so I was right, you're nuts.

No, dipshit. It's a feeling I have. I said it's impossible for reparations to happen, you agreed with me, but then attacked me for no reason.

This is why no one takes you seriously.

In Liberal California, I watched my black/brown friends and families be disregarded and spurned by racists in local government, schools, and everyday life. The racist white people have made me feel guilty about their heinous acts since I was a child.