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Reparations for Slavery

Lakryte said:
African Americans today who are descendants of slaves are worse off because of slavery. And again, your focus on "current" African Americans is irrelevant. If a company wrongly refuses to pay one of its workers, and that worker then dies, the estate (i.e. descendants) of that worker can still sue and recover those wages. The passage of time doesn't provide an excuse.
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How are blacks in Africa whose ancestors were not sold into slavery doing compared to their distant cousins in the USA?
 
TurtleDude said:
How are blacks in Africa whose ancestors were not sold into slavery doing compared to their distant cousins in the USA?
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Systems of servitude and slavery were common in parts of Africa, as they were in much of the ancient world. Who gets paid first?
 
grip said:
Systems of servitude and slavery were common in parts of Africa, as they were in much of the ancient world. Who gets paid first?
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I think Able's descendants should sue Cain

Wait a minute, Able didn't breed.

Maybe the snake for getting defamed in the first book of the bible?
 
Let's just say it's God's fault. Good luck collecting on that one. ;)
 
Re: Slavery & something different

southwest88 said:
No, the Emancipation Proclamation didn't end slavery in the US. The 15th Amendment to the Constitution did that, ratified March 1870.

On reparations to slaves - I don't think we can ever unsnarl descendants of slaves & owners sufficiently. Better, I think, to put in or revive the National Defense Student Loan program, & search for STEM talent wherever we can find it. & help potential students with scholarship or loan applications, or directly fund tuition in fields that are short of graduates. Direct funds can be paid back, & loaned out again.
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A mere technicality, the Emancipation was it.

Not interested in deflections.
 
Re: Slavery

OldFatGuy said:
A mere technicality, the Emancipation was it.

Not interested in deflections.
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A common misconception - the Emancipation Proclamation was tailored to apply only to the slaves in states then in rebellion against the US - there were border states that stayed in the Union, but still allowed slavery. Lincoln didn't want to alienate the latter governments, nor make life more difficult for their governors, & so …

That was why the Constitutional Amendment was necessary to abolish slavery everywhere in the US.
 
Exquisitor said:
Well if being for reparations is going to get me votes in the primary, then I'm for them, what can I say?

Of course if the Asians are earning more they're in no need of reparation.

Jobs, jobs are reparation; jobs for inner city black folk.

The question is not whether reparations, that is what and not how, but how reparations?

How can I pay you?

How can someone else?

If we had a leisurely Treasury, I wouldn't care if they took half a years revenue and set it aside for those who suffered, but I don't know if this is right.

Blacks sold blacks to slave traders, what does this have to do with me?

We all benefit by what was built.

What about the iron workers, the railroads, the Pinkertons?

My grandfather was a miner and died of black lung.

I could get some of that two Trillion.

If we split it up 327 million ways we could each have six hundred thousand dollars.

Vote for me As Azapizzazz, but not in 2020 because I have a Saturn return coming.

No, I'm clowning at you I sure don't want to be President.
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More like $6,000 each.
 
Re: Slavery

southwest88 said:
A common misconception - the Emancipation Proclamation was tailored to apply only to the slaves in states then in rebellion against the US - there were border states that stayed in the Union, but still allowed slavery. Lincoln didn't want to alienate the latter governments, nor make life more difficult for their governors, & so …

That was why the Constitutional Amendment was necessary to abolish slavery everywhere in the US.
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No misconception, it was the death knell. Silly to think specifics matter to history.
 
Virgil Jones said:
I doubt that the democrats are actually serious about pursuing this impossible idiocy, I think they are positioning themselves in the primary. When the general election starts they will drop this nonsense
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I think at times the democrats propose some of these crazy ideas because they know there is no way those ideas will ever become law. So they propose this mess and then later blame its failure on republicans. Kind of like the DACA kids, they had 2 years to have taken care of it when President OBama first came into office but nothing was done to settle that question except build barriers and put children in cages at the border. Hmmmm!
 
If only we could get all the slaves and slave owners together and let them work out a solution and finally put an end to this issue.
The cost of the exhumation would be worth every penny spent.
 
Individual said:
If only we could get all the slaves and slave owners together and let them work out a solution and finally put an end to this issue.
The cost of the exhumation would be worth every penny spent.
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an Interesting episode of the Walking Dead?
 
Objective Voice said:
This issue of reparations for former slaves (of whom NONE are alive today) or families of former slaves is :bs . Yeah, you read that right...I said :bs and here's why:

1) It's N-E-V-E-R going to happen. The White power base decided long ago since it gave the Black man his freedom AND civil rights, it doesn't need to give his ancestors reparations. Besides, since there are few records Black people can access directly to prove they were a true descendant of slaves, the odds of any Black person actually winning reparations today is 10000:1 and even then how do you tally the accrued cost?

2) Just mentioning the issue in public discourse is enough to spark divisiveness between the races let alone push the Black vote moreso toward one side of the political divide than the other.

I gave up on the mere thought of my people ever getting reparations from the U.S. government after I left high school. I realized waaaaay back then since we didn't get it during the Reconstruction era, it was never going to be happen...EVER! It's better that the Black man make his own money, buy his own land, build up his own economic security than to keep waiting for any of this to be given to him.
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1. Compensation is not given for that which is legal.
2. There is no legal claim to reparations.

Anyone entertaining the idea of receiving reparations clearly isn't thinking straight.

Africans have a long history of being willing participants in slavery long before the Western man came along. That was part and parcel of their culture. If the US owes any compensation for participating in a lawful activity, then so does most African nations to a far greater extent.


Objective Voice said:
Most Black people realize that no White man today injured their Black slave ancestors. The U.S. government did by continuing to sanction the act of slavery when it could have abolished the practise: 1) right when the new nation was founded in 1775; and, 2) Twenty-five years after the U.S. Constitution was ratified. In both cases, the American government bulked. Hence, it took a civil war to end the :bs .
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Not a valid argument. While the US government was most certainly the governing body set up by the people, you do not hold it or the people responsible for allowing long standing legal activity. It took the people to change the laws to make this long standing legal activity illegal.




ecofarm said:
Black people have finally got their feet under them and have realized other groups who were disenfranchised have been compensated so as to mitigate their marginalization. When black people were disenfranchised, they were not in the same state of organization enjoyed by Native Americans. They didn't have leaders with clout to negotiate a resolution. They were swept under the rug without any compensation whatsoever.

Well, the time has come. As we did with Native Americans, actions should be taken to mitigate marginalization.
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That is a stupid argument which draws on false equivalencies


Native Americans Tribes had Treaties violated.

Japanese Americans were compensated for being incarcerated in internment camps.
And the payments were individual in nature not as an ethnic group.


Slavery on the other hand was a legal institution. You do not compensate for legal activity just because you changed the law and freed those slaves.




Lakryte said:
what was cheaper is irrelevant because slaves weren't paid and thus they and their descendants are owed compensation.
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Invalid arguemtn.
Slavery was legal and you do not pay property.


Lakryte said:
African Americans today who are descendants of slaves are worse off because of slavery.
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That is a belief, not fact.


Lakryte said:
Obviously not true. People have all sorts of obligations to each other. I cannot force you too work as my slave. If I do, I will owe you the value of your work as compensation for my wrongful acts. Wrongful acts create obligations to remedy those wrongful acts.
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The act was not wrongful at the time but was instead legal.
You do not compensate for legal acts.


Lakryte said:
Again, simply false. The disparity in wealth between whites and blacks has its roots in slavery. Many people that are in poverty today would not be in poverty had their ancestors not been slaves.
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That is a belief, not fact.

That is like saying; Given the conditions in Africa, most of the descendants of the original slaves would not likely be alive had their ancestors remained in Africa.
 
Actually if anyone is due reparation for treatment during this era it is the Irish. They were treated far worse than the Blacks. They were forced to work the worst and most dangerous jobs. The attitude of the time was that slaves have value, Irishmen do not. In fact, so many Irishmen were killed and maimed in work accidents during this era that the Knights of Columbus was formed to provide for their widows and orphans.
 
Lakryte said:
Obviously not true. People have all sorts of obligations to each other. I cannot force you too work as my slave. If I do, I will owe you the value of your work as compensation for my wrongful acts. Wrongful acts create obligations to remedy those wrongful acts.


Again, simply false. The disparity in wealth between whites and blacks has its roots in slavery. Many people that are in poverty today would not be in poverty had their ancestors not been slaves.
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Absolute nonsense. The children of slaves became millionaires after the civil war so there is absolutely nothing you can point to that even implies that slavery is a reason some blacks are poor in 2019. And I say some because what you don’t want to talk about is the fact that the majority of blacks are living financially stable lives. 27% are living in poverty so what you should be asking is what they’re doing differently than the 73% of blacks who are not.
 
Bodhisattva said:
Then it should be the Southern States that pay and why stop there? Native Americans deserve money... the Chinese, the Irish, etc. Why are the Portuguese and British not paying? They started the Slave Trade... and are black people going to have their taxes paying themselves back or do the get tax breaks that others will not get?
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The Southern States were operating under a legal system the federal government of the United States upheld. Again, pointing to other bad actors does not absolve the federal government of the United States. Similarly, pointing to other groups harmed by racist policies doesn't logically lead to the conclusion that therefore no groups should get reparations.
 
OldFatGuy said:
Cry me a river. The call for reparations is from the Federal government, the entire nation, inclusive of states that didn't exist during the period of slavery. Without a comparative there is no argument.

No one guarantees a fair life. Life is cruel. Buddhists say life is suffering, giggle and walk away. This is a nation today of equal opportunity, not equal outcome.

No one is saying institutionalized slavery wasn't a horror, however that doesn't make the entire nation blamable or a guilty party. The US government owes no debt in behalf of privately held slaves. The government owned no slaves. Laws change, they mutate, slavery has been unlawful since Lincoln's proclamation. Or haven't you noticed. We do not prosecute for deeds past now unlawful, there are no reparations due for what was once lawful. Your sense of guilt is not mine.

Members of my family paid with their blood and lives to end slavery and preserve the nation. We have paid our debt if one existed.
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The entity that is the U.S. federal government is to blame for the slavery it allowed to exist under its laws. That slavery is unlawful now is completely irrelevant to the fact that it was completely lawful under federal law in the past. This has nothing to do with guilt. I do not have to feel guilt to recognize when a debt is owed. At this point you are just repeating points I have already addressed. What your family did does not remedy the debt owed to remedy past harms.
 
TurtleDude said:
How are blacks in Africa whose ancestors were not sold into slavery doing compared to their distant cousins in the USA?
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Had the slave trade not existed, Africans would be much better off as well.

But your point is irrelevant, because we are talking about the harm caused to slaves and allowed under federal U.S. government policy. That wrong exists and must be remedied regardless of how people across the world are faring.
 
Lakryte said:
The entity that is the U.S. federal government is to blame for the slavery it allowed to exist under its laws. That slavery is unlawful now is completely irrelevant to the fact that it was completely lawful under federal law in the past. This has nothing to do with guilt. I do not have to feel guilt to recognize when a debt is owed. At this point you are just repeating points I have already addressed. What your family did does not remedy the debt owed to remedy past harms.
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There is no debt.
 
Excon said:
Invalid arguemtn.
Slavery was legal and you do not pay property.
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Irrelevant. That something is legal does not make it morally right. Black people are not property, they are human beings.

That is a belief, not fact.
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It is a fact that African Americans are worse off than they would have been absent slavery. You can ignore facts, but that doesn't make them beliefs.


The act was not wrongful at the time but was instead legal.
You do not compensate for legal acts.
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Irrelevant. You conflate legality with morality.

That is a belief, not fact.

That is like saying; Given the conditions in Africa, most of the descendants of the original slaves would not likely be alive had their ancestors remained in Africa.
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Slavery is largely to blame for the racial disparity in wealth that exists today - that is a fact. And the conditions in Africa also largely exist because of the slave trade and European colonialism. Africa also has strong claims to reparations from European powers which basically destroyed the continent.
 
Lakryte said:
Slavery is largely to blame for the racial disparity in wealth that exists today - that is a fact. And the conditions in Africa also largely exist because of the slave trade and European colonialism. Africa also has strong claims to reparations from European powers which basically destroyed the continent.
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If you’re going to come in here and talk about the slave trade then at least do it honestly. It was an African institution which predated European entry by nearly 1,000 years. And it continued to exist until the Ottomon Empire and European colonial governments put the kabosh on it. So we’ll be taking those reparations from Africa for the time and expense involved in stopping them from spearing each other on the plains to sell captive peoples in their slave markets.
 
Napoleon said:
Absolute nonsense. The children of slaves became millionaires after the civil war so there is absolutely nothing you can point to that even implies that slavery is a reason some blacks are poor in 2019. And I say some because what you don’t want to talk about is the fact that the majority of blacks are living financially stable lives. 27% are living in poverty so what you should be asking is what they’re doing differently than the 73% of blacks who are not.
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The children of slaves did not become millionaires after the civil war. The fact remains that black people today are worse off than they would have been absent slavery. And the racial wealth gap ultimately has its roots in slavery.

If you’re going to come in here and talk about the slave trade then at least do it honestly. It was an African institution which predated European entry by nearly 1,000 years. And it continued to exist until the Ottomon Empire and European colonial governments put the kabosh on it.
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You are simply ignorant of history. I suggest looking into the colonization of Africa by European powers and the havoc it wreaked.
 
Napoleon said:
If you’re going to come in here and talk about the slave trade then at least do it honestly. It was an African institution which predated European entry by nearly 1,000 years. And it continued to exist until the Ottomon Empire and European colonial governments put the kabosh on it. So we’ll be taking those reparations from Africa for the time and expense involved in stopping them from spearing each other on the plains to sell captive peoples in their slave markets.
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You are 100% correct. Except that slavery in Africa has never ended. There are still millions of slaves and open slave markets in Africa. It is their culture and has been since the first tribal wars.

Past slavery is not what is holding back the Black population. If fact anyone who has any dealing in corporate or educational America know that Blacks are given advantages that are not extended to others. The biggest problems Black advancement face are single parent families, welfare dependence, drug use, dropping out of school, and gang activities.
 
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