Reframing Reparations
The following are some of my thoughts on the issue, and on the framing of the issue, of reparations for the descendants of slaves in the United States. While I am in favor of reparations, I welcome people to argue the point. I mean, thats what were here for, right?
Also: while any discussion of reparations is underpinned by issues of poverty and wealth inequality in general, and things are admittedly more complex when one takes a wider view than is presented in this post, if we hunker down on this issue specifically, I still think the only reasonable conclusion is to implement reparations.
I contend that we approach the issue of reparations the wrong way. According to most commonsense ideas of justice put forth in modern society, the assumption would be that reparations should be done in the absence of strong arguments against it, not that reparations should be done on the merits of contrived arguments; each of us encounters the argument for reparations on a regular basis, and our systems of laws assume the value of collective justice in their codes. The issue appears to be mostly where we demarcate those wronged and what can be done to make things right; if you grant that something can still be done, then your idea of justice likely impels you to act.
In spirit of this new framing, I will address the following argument against reparations (although it is not particularly strong, even if it is pervasive): that since people make their own choices in a fair society, ultimately, we can only blame the choices of currently existing people for their respective predicaments. This argument is somewhat similar to, and compatible with, one of the most commonly held viewpoints of Americans on the topic: namely that since modern society treats people of color fairly, they don't deserve reparations. I suspect that if we asked the more thoughtful respondents to elaborate on that they would probably produce an argument like the one I just described.
That one cannot draw a crisp, unambiguous causal line from the plight of a former slave to that of one of their descendants, a crack-addicted prostitute living in a ghetto for instance, is not evidence of a lack of such a line; it merely suggests that there is some complexity to the path of the line, and to outright deny the existence of this line is reflective of an odd skepticism. Sure, each person occupying it has made their own choices, and society is fairer than it was, but to deny the fundamentally knowable, traumatic, long-lasting effects of hundreds of years of slavery on a people, and the massively destructive policies and practices they have experienced since then, is to extend skepticism into foolishness. Do you think you would have done better than the disproportionate number of people of color living in poverty? And if yes, why? I firmly believe from personal experience that no one is above, say, soliciting for crack in the local homeless encampment under the bridge.
The legacy of slavery and the continued oppression of people of color in the United States is a blotch, and if one has any sense of justice one would want to do whatever one could to try to make it right, regardless of any perceived distance afforded by time. That undoubtedly includes some form of reparations.
Also: while any discussion of reparations is underpinned by issues of poverty and wealth inequality in general, and things are admittedly more complex when one takes a wider view than is presented in this post, if we hunker down on this issue specifically, I still think the only reasonable conclusion is to implement reparations.
I contend that we approach the issue of reparations the wrong way. According to most commonsense ideas of justice put forth in modern society, the assumption would be that reparations should be done in the absence of strong arguments against it, not that reparations should be done on the merits of contrived arguments; each of us encounters the argument for reparations on a regular basis, and our systems of laws assume the value of collective justice in their codes. The issue appears to be mostly where we demarcate those wronged and what can be done to make things right; if you grant that something can still be done, then your idea of justice likely impels you to act.
In spirit of this new framing, I will address the following argument against reparations (although it is not particularly strong, even if it is pervasive): that since people make their own choices in a fair society, ultimately, we can only blame the choices of currently existing people for their respective predicaments. This argument is somewhat similar to, and compatible with, one of the most commonly held viewpoints of Americans on the topic: namely that since modern society treats people of color fairly, they don't deserve reparations. I suspect that if we asked the more thoughtful respondents to elaborate on that they would probably produce an argument like the one I just described.
That one cannot draw a crisp, unambiguous causal line from the plight of a former slave to that of one of their descendants, a crack-addicted prostitute living in a ghetto for instance, is not evidence of a lack of such a line; it merely suggests that there is some complexity to the path of the line, and to outright deny the existence of this line is reflective of an odd skepticism. Sure, each person occupying it has made their own choices, and society is fairer than it was, but to deny the fundamentally knowable, traumatic, long-lasting effects of hundreds of years of slavery on a people, and the massively destructive policies and practices they have experienced since then, is to extend skepticism into foolishness. Do you think you would have done better than the disproportionate number of people of color living in poverty? And if yes, why? I firmly believe from personal experience that no one is above, say, soliciting for crack in the local homeless encampment under the bridge.
The legacy of slavery and the continued oppression of people of color in the United States is a blotch, and if one has any sense of justice one would want to do whatever one could to try to make it right, regardless of any perceived distance afforded by time. That undoubtedly includes some form of reparations.
Comments (68)
I strongly disagree. For the record, I am a 72 year-old, white, liberal American. Am I correct in assuming you are also white?
Quoting ToothyMaw
Presumptuous - how are you the spokesman for commonsense or justice?
Quoting ToothyMaw
Apparently most Americans think black people are treated fairly now, which is ridiculous. That's not a good reason for not paying reparations, but there are good reasons.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Outrageous. If nothing else, this statement shows the lack of seriousness of your argument. I think most black people would be angered by using crack whores as representative of their race in modern America.
Quoting ToothyMaw
No, I definitely do not. I am very fortunate to have been born middle-class and white. I have trouble enough living in the world of advantage where I currently find myself.
Quoting ToothyMaw
It's not the distance in time that matters, it's the fact that white people don't like or trust black people now and that dislike is reflected in our laws, attitudes, customs, and traditions.
Quoting ToothyMaw
No, it doesn't.
Now, my thoughts on reparations.
There are approximately 47 million black people in the US, including those of mixed race. How much are we going to give each of them? $10,000? That would cost a total of $470 billion dollars. How much difference would $10,000 make? Sure, it would make a big difference for many people and a very big difference for some. Would it change the racial atmosphere for the better? Would it erase the racial disadvantage? No. We'd end up back in the same world we started in with a vast well of white resentment added to what is already there.
And that's the main reason not to pay reparations - the only way to effectively address the problem is to change white people's attitudes. To give white people and black people a common purpose. Reparations will do just the opposite. We've already seen much of America kick-back against what they call "wokeness," the essence of which, as I see it, is that everything wrong is white people's fault and it's ok to treat them with contempt. Maybe that's what you call justice - give them a taste of their own medicine - but it won't work.
It's not about slavery, it's about how black people are treated now. Reparations won't work, they'll make things worse.
It's not that they've been screwed from day one, it's that they are being screwed right now.
Quoting tim wood
Well, it hasn't worked so far and recently the government's ability to implement even existing affirmative action programs has been reduced by legal decisions and changes in law. I don't think there is currently any possibility of expanding it. Besides that, just like reparations, it will just increase white resentment.
Consider Mrs un. Her father was an Afro-Caribbean descendant of slaves, her mother a white
woman from a slate-mining town whose ancestors were exploited by the local land-owning family who also had slaves working on a plantation in the Caribbean. Mrs un might have to pay reparations to herself. She might have to resent herself for noticing. It's maddening, literally maddening.
Engineers are allowed to have a defeatist attitude, we're just supposed to justify it rationally, which I think I've done.
Yes, I am also white.
Quoting T Clark
I am using that example to represent some of the most extreme conditions - the predicaments I alluded to in the preceding paragraph - some people of color face. I do not think that it is at all "representative of their race", as I am not trying to represent a race in my argument. And you are not really addressing that argument here. Also: do you know the meaning of the word plight?
Quoting T Clark
For me, reparations aren't just about erasing the problem, it's about justice - due compensation. It doesn't have to fix everything; it is a goodwill gesture towards making things a little righter. If we want to change the plight of people of color - especially those who have it the worst - then we clearly do in fact have to change white people's attitudes and strip down the parts of the institutions that still disadvantage them.
Quoting T Clark
This seems a little glib. Yes, giving people a common purpose is often times an effective way of breaking down barriers, but what about when the material disparity between two groups is the result of, and is enabled by, the agenda of the dominant group? A useful ally is not necessarily a respected comrade - or even a human being treated with a commensurate amount of dignity.
Quoting T Clark
I think most Americans don't care much about errant social justice provided it doesn't directly affect them. And note that, nowhere in this thread, nor in my OP, has anyone expressed the sentiment that white people are responsible for everything that is wrong and should be hated. Yet you felt as if you had to invoke the spooky specter of wokeness. Strange. It's almost like it's a lazy device used to bolster insubstantial arguments.
I mean, clearly no one living today is at fault for slavery, but yeah, that kind of was white peoples' fault, wasn't it? Just not yours or mine?
Quoting T Clark
No, the justice is for the people most heavily affected by slavery and continued traumas. I don't think a single white person today should suffer for the crimes of any slave masters that existed before them.
If this were true, then why are the majority of people of color in favor of reparations? Would reparations not be giving the people who suffered the most from slavery and racist policies what they think they deserve? And would that not be more than just an attempt to assuage guilt if the intent were to provide these people such an outcome?
People tend to favour getting something for nothing. But a better remedy would be a proper education of the history of white racism, and white people taking the responsibility for that and behaving differently. That you ask this question suggests that you think some sum of money can compensate for centuries of total exploitation. There is not enough money in the world, even if every white person were bankrupted, and all their assets sold off.
Much of Washington D.C. was built by slave labor. There is some serious back-pay owed, perhaps even to the descendants of those who were forced to work on it. Apparently documents which record who worked there still exist so it is conceivable that their descendants could be found and the US treasury pays what is owed.
But beyond that it cannot go. None of the victims nor the perpetrators are alive. Restitution is impossible.
First off, no, I don't believe that, and second, should we not try to compensate people at all even if it isn't nearly enough? Do you think that no reparations is the same thing as some reparations?
I was wondering when you would turn up.
Quoting NOS4A2
Okay, consider this:
If you, and all of your family members, and all of your friends' family members, and yours and their grandparents, and yours and their grandparent's grandparents were subjected to slavery for hundreds of years, only to be abused and treated as second class citizens even after being freed, never to see a dime in compensation for virtually all of that work, would you want your descendants to be disproportionately impoverished and derided as part of a legacy you could not have possibly changed? Or would you at least want them to be compensated somewhat for the exploitation you had suffered?
I understand that no one person has occupied the space between slavery and the modern day, but I don't think we would have to guess what they would think about it if they did: people should get paid for the work they do and compensated for the serious wrongdoings they incur - even if the capacity to do so is somewhat obfuscated by time. If you see something wrong with extending reparations to people born after the initial wrongs have taken place, then I assure you that you hold important distinctions more arbitrary than that in your head.
I see no problem with an aggrieved party seeking damages and retribution from their exploiters wherever and how it can be done. Should the estates of slave-owners and the wealth that they stole still exist, perhaps that can be done. And if you feel guilty for those crimes I see no problem with you paying others reparations.
But if youre going to implicate anyone but the guilty parties and seek damages for anyone but the victims, maybe even their descendants, youd be attempting to correct one injustice with another.
No, we should not. It is offensive to suggest that it can be done. And can we maybe address the case of mixed race folk both paying and receiving reparations presumably in some amount proportional to their ethnic origins?
I understand what you were trying to say, but I stand by my judgment it is insulting and demeaning.
Quoting ToothyMaw
As I said, it won't work and it'll make things worse. We don't need justice, if that's what reparations really is. Is money to middle class black people but nothing for poor whites and Hispanics justice? We need to make things better.
Quoting ToothyMaw
It's not glib, it's vague. I wasn't trying to provide a list of possible solutions. Here are some - Universal Basic Income, political support for labor unions, changes in tax policy, political action to get rid of racial reactionaries. Most efforts should be aimed at class differences, not racial ones. Improving workers finances won't solve the problem, but it will make it a different problem.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Wokeness isn't spooky and it isn't a term I like, but it's the term typically used these days and you know what I mean. What's the right word? If you think it isn't a real thing, then you don't really understand what's going on. Trying to make white people feel guilty gave Ron DeSantis the opening to claim that slavery benefited blacks.
And, your protestations of innocence non-withstanding, reparations is part of the same package.
Quoting ToothyMaw
I acknowledge my share of responsibility, not for slavery, but for the way black people and other minorities are treated today.
This is another one of those presumptuous, condescending statements we were talking about. You can't set yourself up as a spokesperson for black people.
Also, the reparations money would presumably come from taxes, so my taxes will go up to give people like...Oprah and Kanye reparations?
This is good. But the exploiters are no longer alive, clearly.
Quoting NOS4A2
I think you know that I'm suggesting that our government ought to pay for these damages.
Quoting NOS4A2
Not doing that.
Quoting unenlightened
Okay, well, it remains that we can do something, even if it isn't nearly enough, if we were to just resolve to do so. In fact, I think doing nothing is far more offensive. We can't be bothered at all to, say, offer more housing grants for people so as to help uplift them because it is offensive to try to help them? What kind of backwards reasoning is that?
Quoting T Clark
What about it is insulting and demeaning? Is it offensive to acknowledge the realities of people who are systematically marginalized like "crack whores" (your words not mine)? I mean, nothing will leave you poor and marginalized like a crack addiction, and I would say this of any white person too.
Quoting T Clark
I'm not disputing that we need to do the things you claim we need to do to make things better. I just think, as I have said before, that if we were to care to apply our standards of justice consistently, we would support reparations.
Quoting T Clark
Yes, I agree, all those things would be good.
Quoting T Clark
Quoting T Clark
I think that if someone can be persuaded that slavery benefited people of color at all, then they are a hopeless moron that could be persuaded of almost any right-wing bullshit regardless of the way some small number of people frame their arguments for reparations.
Quoting T Clark
Maybe it is presumptuous, but I am not claiming to be a spokesperson for anyone. I'm just trying to have some empathy. If people don't feel the way I do about it, or think that it is a useful question, I'm okay with that. I can try to reel it in a little.
Quoting AP - DeSantis is defending new slavery teachings.
You mean the taxpayer, which also includes many of your victims. Its not clear how that will rectify any injustice.
And is trying to make this fairer even feasible? I agree that we should if we could, but we would need more information than we have to avoid just giving benefits to those with certain backgrounds, which will cause at least some political backlash, and if that is inefficient, then shouldn't we just spend that money on creating a fair and equal world that's better for everyone?
I think that's optimistic. I hope not.
Quoting LuckyR
What do you mean you don't trust them? What obligation do they have to use the money to benefit people in the future? If I gave you a windfall, what would you do with it? I suspect you would spend it on something you want or need or put it in your bank account. $470 billion is a lot of money and it would certainly provide an economic boost, but how much long-term impact could it have?
Quoting LuckyR
This is a very good point. I should have included it in my list of good reasons not to give reparations.
For those who received the payment, they would feel it as inadequate for repairing the suffering of their ancestors (which it, no doubt, would be), and for others (specifically lower class people who didnt receive the payout), it would feel unfair that they didnt get anything but many more rich and privileged did.
And finally, to everyone else, it would feel as though they had been cheated out of their chance to truly make things right, because now the chance of any reparations being made again are very slim.
I would argue that a civilization is founded upon common moral ideas. Since your moral ideas are outside the western view, that would make you a barbarian from the point of view of westerners like myself.
Reparations also could not be implemented without theft. So, you are advocating for theft. And you are advocating for theft from me, because I am a white person. It is extremely ugly to try to convince the potential victim of a robbery that you are morally justified in robbing him.
Welfare is bad for its recipients. It makes them dependent. Black families were doing better back in the 1970s before the welfare programs started to really take off. More of them were married in stable families and had jobs. There was less gang sh*t and looting. A common thing that happens in poor communities is that the mothers realize they can get more money from the government if they're single, so they kick the dad out of the home to get the money. Then the children grow up messed up because there was no father in the home.
Blacks are already receiving welfare. If I understand correctly, because of the welfare state, only White men and Asian men as groups pay net taxes. All other groups are net drains on the tax base because of welfare. So, they have ALREADY been receiving reparations (and I'm not happy about it).
Now suppose I were forced to see people in terms of their race rather than as individuals, because the rest of my society forced it on me. Why should I fight for the enemy team? I might sooner be in favor of reintroducing segregation/slavery than of reparations.
This idea also shows a complete lack of historical knowledge. Most slaves in history were white. Or more specifically, a lot of them were slavs. I might be wrong on this, but I think the word "slav" and "slave" might be related, because of how common it was for slavs to be taken as slaves by muslims. Vikings sometimes sailed down the Volga river to kidnap slavs and sell them to muslims in Baghdad. Do the Scandinavians and Muslims owe Russia reparations?
The muslims on the Barbary coast also sometimes kidnapped whites all across the Mediterranean. I suppose most of the descendants of these slaves are still mixed into the muslim population. Do the muslims owe themselves reparations?
In the black slave trade, African kings kidnapped their own people to sell them to Jewish traders, who then sold them again to white American plantation owners. Do the Jews and Africans still living in Africa owe black Americans reparations?
Probably some of the lighter-skinned blacks in America got that way because one of their distant ancestors was r*ped by their white owner. So, they are descended both from slaves and slave owners. Do they owe themselves reparations?
The population gets thoroughly mixed over a long period of time, so that probably everybody had slave and slave-owning ancestors if you go back to the Bronze Age. Does everybody owe themselves reparations?
There are also some whites who never owned slaves or had colonial empires (at least not since the Bronze Age). Finland never had a colonial empire. And so far as I'm aware, my ancestors were Americans who settled in Kansas (a free state), and some of the more recent immigrants came from England and the Czech Republic. So, it's likely that none of them owned a black slave. Even if a person is guilty for the sins of his ancestors, I don't think my ancestors committed this particular sin. And none of the Fins did.
I believe when the idea of reparations comes from black people, it is grab for power and money. When it comes from a white person, it probably means that he still feels guilty about original sin, but isn't a Christian anymore, so that he finds some other BS to feel guilty about other than Adam eating that apple.
Can't tell if moron or troll. You have 100 posts and have been a member for 5 years, so it seems very unlikely that you would lurk so long just to get this one off.
Quoting T Clark
Yeah, I wasn't aware that it extended to brainwashing children. That's messed up.
Quoting T Clark
That's why we should continually advocate for change and constantly remind people of the grotesque, unjust disparities between different groups of people - in terms of both class and race. Reparations and effecting political change are not mutually exclusive. Do you think someone who cares about the working class like Bernie Sanders would just retire to some beach in Florida if we implemented reparations? Or would he continue to fight for people, black, brown and white, to have better lives? If people begin to listen less, then we dial it up until they listen again. For me it's pretty much that simple.
I categorically think we should help disadvantaged people in general, and reparations is just one part of that. But, like I said to T Clark, it is also about justice. If we want to claim we believe in just treatment, then reparations are a no-brainer: people should be paid for the work they do, and if they cannot be paid for the work they do directly, we should compensate the people most proximal to that theft of wages.
Quoting Igitur
I think that if we improve everyone's lot through policy, then people are less likely to lash out over perceived unfair treatment. If everyone just got a check from the government to sustain them while they mostly get to pursue whatever they want, for example, they probably wouldn't care that much if we tried to give the descendants of slaves something extra. So, yes, we should make the world fairer and more equal, and in turn I think that that will make the distribution of reparations less controversial in the absence of a way to make it a really efficient, fair process.
Undoubtedly the most important thing, really, is to make the world better for people, but I would like to see reparations not just because it would do that, but also because it would be the just thing to do.
I'm struggling to imagine how massive one's blinders must be to even take this idea seriously.
Like I said in the OP, it would be on the basis of being the descendants of slaves, not merely on skin color. Furthermore, I believe that slavery, and the destructive policies that kind of piggy-backed on it, are severe enough to warrant compensation given my pre-existing ideas of justice. If you agree with me on the effects of slavery and policy, and have a sense of justice like mine, then I think you are the one with blinders - more specifically, a selective view of when to apply that sense of justice.
If you thought slavery were as deleterious as I say, and had generational effects lasting to today even, would you agree that reparations could be justified?
Also: I'm no intellectual, let alone a serious one.
No - a hundred years ago, maybe - and I am rather skeptical about people claiming victimhood in this case. It's not like the US hasn't ran countless programs trying to elevate people out of poverty. At some point people will have to take responsibility for their own lot in life. Tough shit.
If you want something to feel guilty about the US has no shortage of atrocities it has committed in the here and now, and has never so much as apologized for. The victims are often still alive, and usually not doing well. Vietnamese mothers are still giving birth to deformed babies as a result of Uncle Sam's Agent Orange treatment.
Nah. Better ignore all that tangible suffering and instead go on endlessly about something with no clear living perpetrators and victims, so that no shit ever gets done, and if shit ever were to get done it would be a perversion of justice anyway.
First off, clearly many of the descendants of slaves believe that they should be compensated, as the overwhelming majority of people of color believe the descendants of slaves should receive compensation.
Second, you aren't answering my question directly: I'm not asking if you think the effects of slavery last until today, I'm asking if you would agree that reparations could theoretically be justified, and you seem to imply that you think it could have been a hundred years ago.
If that is the case, I lay out the following argument:
(1) There is a relationship between the magnitude of the evil of an action and the magnitude of its bad effects such that more evil actions generally have worse, longer-lasting effects.
(2) I believe the magnitude of evil of slavery is such that it could have bad effects lasting until today.
(3) Thus, if you claim that the bad effects of slavery are no longer in play, and thus were not as severe as I claim, then we at least partially disagree on the magnitude of evil of slavery, or you object to (1).
If you do not object to (1), then you need to explicitly defend the position that slavery is less evil than I say it is, or else grant that reparations could be justified today much like your claim that they could be justified a hundred years ago. And I say slavery is one of the evilest things one can enact on a people.
Quoting Tzeentch
Yes, that makes me feel guilty too. And I would be in favor of righting that particular wrong if it could be achieved.
Upon re-reading your comment I think you are saying directly that reparations could be justified a hundred years ago. My argument still stands, however.
I think this is a good example of one of the reasons paying reparations is a bad idea. There are enough people out there who feel as you do that it will damage relationships between black and white people more than it will help.
I don't live in the US, just to be clear.
That's why I can never quite understand why American politics is so absolutely rife with it.*
*Until I put my cynical hat on and realize polarization is the goal.
As I've said many times before, white people as a group don't like or trust black people as a group. Claiming the solution is to just treat people like people and behave as if we live in a colorblind society is, to put it as charitably as I can, naive to the point of delusion.
One might have to ask themselves from where this desire comes to view people, rather than as individuals, as inherently part of a non-existent abstraction onto which one has slapped all kinds of nasty labels. The answer is usually pathological in nature.
If I were to say: white people ought not discriminate against black people as much, and ought to listen when black people claim they are experiencing discrimination, would that be dehumanizing? I mean, I'm not saying either group is less than human, am I? That seems to be the kind of position you think you are attacking, but your objections would fall flat short of someone saying something massively stupid.
What I'm saying is more along the lines of this: people living in the United States, who are almost certainly the beneficiaries of slave labor, ought to compensate the descendants of slaves, many of whom likely agree such an action would be just.
"The descendants of slaves" is a well-defined group, not some vague abstraction that subsumes people's individuality. The same goes for "people living in the United States". Neither group is:
Quoting Tzeentch
Quoting Tzeentch
Okay, nobody has unreasonably abstracted anybody in this thread as far as I know. So, you can drop that, please. Furthermore, the desire to throw these roadblocks up whenever a decent discussion could be had about resolving systemic issues facing minorities, or righting wrongs related to those issues, is actually indicative of a pathological inclination towards aggressively trying to 'keep the peace'.
Yes, and clearly so.
The practice of trying to simplify large demographics into monolithic groups with a fixed set of characteristics is inherently dehumanizing. and inherently racist. It's the definition of racism, in fact - it's just taking place under another guise.
Not to mention, it's beyond patronizing.
Quoting ToothyMaw
All people living in the US? Does that include people living in abject poverty? Quantify exactly what benefits you believe they received.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Bullshit. T Clark is clearly insisting on the use of skin color as a means of dividing people into monolithic groups.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Roadblocks, my ass. You're apparently unable to see how problematic this baseline approach to the problem is.
The United States has paid reparations, so there is some history to consider. I'm not conversant enough in that history to say which is what; but I agree that we cannot really make up the tragedies of the past, and the only thing we can do is look at how things are now and attempt to make them better. So white people, alive today, could help black people, alive today, rather than pawning it off on some organizations or policy of good will when they have no idea what will come of such things.
What would that look like?
Well, a more honest conversation than "How much money ought the government pay to this group?" I think, though I don't know.
Quoting Tzeentch
Quoting Tzeentch
Sometimes people say things like this so they won't have to take responsibility for social conditions in the society where they live.
Edited
I kind of agree with you here, both in the definition and that it will not be easy to implement.
The idea of fining or punishing those with some sort of responsibility in slavery seems remote, all are dead. To pass the bill to their families would be the next step then maybe, but they are now mostly far removed from the fortunes made in those days. It would be difficult to prove that their wealth is a direct result of slavery in most cases.
To try and pass the bill to anyone that had in some way been benefited by slavery would mean that even the decedents of the peasants that went to work in the cotton factories would have to pay.
To say that a whole country is responsible and that the governments should pay the bill means that the everyday person in the street would have his taxes used for something that he has no responsibility for.
A very difficult problem indeed.
To attempt to restore the victim to some status quo ante would in my opinion be even more complicated. Even if their ancestors were traced and the victims were offered the chance to live the life that they would have occupied in the present if slavery had not sidetracked them, most would be a lot worse off than they are now.
On a slightly different note, has anyone ever heard of cases of claims for reparations being made against the African slavers that did a lot of the capturing of the people then sold them to the white men, or the slavers that captured and used them even before the white man appeared?
As I've made clear, I don't live in the US, so my taking of responsibility has nothing to do with it.
You're saying things that are overtly racist, and frankly some of it is just plain weird.
Who are these 'Black People' who apparently form a homogeneous group of needy victims looking to be saved and taken pity on, with skin color for some reason being the primary trait we define them by?
Maybe my small European brain can't fathom the profundity of combatting racism by making people's skin color and race their defining features.
That US identity politics is so rank we could smell it from across the pond. Thankfully though, people here saw through that shit.
What are these "juicy apples", that so apparently form a homogenous group of sweet fruits looking to be peeled and eaten, with skin color for some reason being the primary trait we define them by?
Quoting Tzeentch
I think we can talk about black people without saying that being black is the defining feature of being a black person. Same goes for white people.
Where did I attribute a fixed set of characteristics to anyone? White people discriminate against black people regularly, and this discrimination is particularly one-sided and pernicious. If I were to say that men ought not rape women, would you say that that is dehumanizing and sexist? I mean, sure, not every man is a rapist, but we know that if a woman is raped, it is almost certainly by a man, right?
Yes, I think that must be right; your small brain cannot fathom that to address racism is not racist. You are by no means alone.
People aren't fruit. We don't treat fruit as individuals. We do with people. Kind of proving my point there, buddy.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Which begs the question why you can't stop talking about this feature that apparently doesn't define the groups, but which you chose to name the groups after anyway.
Quoting ToothyMaw
Mostly this is just a vacuous statement. But yes.
Really what you are implying is "Men are rapists" - strictly speaking true, because some men are indeed rapists.
However, it's your failure to delineate and the insiuation that connects all men to rape that is particularly pernicious.
This is exactly how the worst kinds of propaganda function, by the way.
Quoting unenlightened
People here are not addressing racism, but perpetuating it.
That you took what I wrote so literally is surprising. It was intended to show that I think your arguments are absurd, unserious boilerplate garbage and worthy of ridicule.
Quoting Tzeentch
The reality is that, historically, people have been subdivided into groups based on their race, and, because of all the insane shit that has happened, and the slightly less insane shit going on today, we are kind of forced to deal with these abstractions. Do you think I enjoy talking about people of color as a group? Because I don't; ideally there would be no reason to do that.
Quoting Tzeentch
I would argue that there are characteristics connected to masculinity, and thus men, as a group, that largely cause some of them to assault women. So, even if not all men are rapists, many men have the relevant attributes rapists have to at least some degree (and those attributes might even be good in limited amounts). I think this kind of analysis applies straightforwardly to white people discriminating against people of color: white people largely have a blind spot that allows for discrimination against people of color by virtue of viewing the issue the way you do: that we live in a fair society and if poor people of color cannot uplift themselves, it is due to their own choices and shortcomings. You don't have to be a raging racist to be complicit in this mechanism, and so I think it is mostly acceptable to talk about white people at large in negative ways.
So you're a sexist too.
Great.
Noting where I said that it is masculinity, and not something inherent to men: how am I a sexist for saying that?
You should respond substantively, instead of getting indignant. Or at least be substantive in your indignance.
Quoting Tzeentch
I'm not sure which pattern you are referring to, as I have indeed repeated myself a number of times in this thread.
The point of invoking that example was to show that we can indeed connect a group identity to the really bad acts of a subset of that group, even without predicating the capacity to do those acts to some inherent quality of the group. Men largely have the characteristics associated with masculinity, and some of those characteristics manifest in bad things, such as rape. So, while clearly not every man is a rapist, many men possess the characteristics, to some degree, that might lead a man to rape a woman. There is a sort of continuum for many traits, which, in this case, would be some mix of physical aggression and entitlement.
This way of looking at it is even more straightforward in the case of the relationship between (the not monolithic groups of) white people and people of color:
Quoting ToothyMaw
Europeans have their own extensive and continuing history of colonialism and exploitation.
As individuals in modern times, trying to reverse in some way the injustices of racism to these people would be a long way from appeasing the horrors of the actual uprooting their ancestors. One would be a way to compensate for recent events, the other would have to address the reasons or causes of them being placed in the recent situation
Quoting tim wood
I remember in the late 60's having a police car following the school bus as it started its new route to pick up kids in Afro American neighborhoods as well the the white kids from theirs. None of the Afro American kids were going to the white schools so the buses had to make 2 drop-offs. It was not a comfortable situation for a teenager.
But I still remember that in the 3 schools I attended in the USA, all students and teachers were white. But there was still discrimination of many sorts. Those from old families looked down their noses at almost everyone. The reasonably well off looked down their noses at the white trash. The city dwellers, the swamp and bayou living Cajuns had different points of view. Outsiders, like my family, were welcomed mostly as long as you did not go against their way of life. I got people angry sometimes for failing to follow their rules and earned a couple of bloody noses too.
And there were still "whites only" signs in a lot of shop windows.
Personally I think that almost everyone has been discriminated against in some way or other, the universe is not a fair place. In one town in England I had to go to a different school than my best friend across the road. Just because I lived across some imaginary line I was sent to a school and lost by best mate, who can I sue?
Have you ever heard of this gentleman? Some of his words were quite prophetic, but by today's standards, racist.
https://anth1001.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/enoch-powell_speech.pdf
Agreed.
Quoting tim wood
And how to calculate the cost of previous generation is the biggest problem, recent events might be easier.
Could the word of the affected count as evidence of their suffering compared to others? Would statistical comparisons give a better idea of the effects?
Just how far are they willing to go to call an action racial?
Afro Americans were given a lower class of education for generations, that led them to be able to perform lower paid jobs, which in turn made it impossible for them to acquire a house, this meant that they had to live in low rent neighborhoods with low quality schools and repeat the cycle in the next generation.
How far back is it possible to go and still calculate the difference that would have been made in their lives today. If an Afro American was given a good education three generations ago, would comparing that family to the rest of the Afro American population give us an idea of how bad the damage is? Or would it be better going back further or just one generation?
I have no idea how anyone could be compensated for the loss nor what assistance could be given.
Quoting tim wood
That is sort of like a father that has just shot one son in the stomach and the other in the head, then saying "If it was not for me, you would not be here to die."
The are millions of ways to die, but only one to get a life. That is not fair.
How, for instance, could the damage done by the internment of US Japanese citizens during WW2 be in compensated any form?
If we try to figure out exactly what the present generations have lost because of that, what would we find?