Excellent attempt to promote rational discussion. What the piece misses is that the public and political debate over this contentious issue is not about developing an actual plan to take money from some Americans and give it to others to compensate for the terrible legacy of slavery. This will never happen in any conceivable way. The whole purpose of the debate is to keep the race pot boiling, to divide Americans into warring tribes, to fuel the political theater that politicians, demagogues, activists, and academics on all sides have perfected playing to their respective audiences, and to feed the maw of media always hungry for clicks. This is not unique to reparations, there are many irresolvable issues that fit this model - all of them contributing to the demise of our broken democracy and the rampage of our deranged media. THAT’S the conversation we should and would be having if the aforementioned forces hadn't set us at each other's throats.
Just a thought. You might enjoy subscribing to M. Bari Weiss's Substack ($50). That's where these things ARE being debated, rather heavily. From BOTH sides of the aisle. https://bariweiss.substack.com/
Yah. As You say, M. Frezza. It's sad, but True. I think it's because if people actually SAW what the woke people stand for, THEY wouldn't stand for it. So the battle rages on. ICBW, tho.
Also left out is the culpability of black African tribal leaders who sold blacks from other tribes who were caught in warfare to white traders. Also how does one address blacks who were also slaveholders of blacks - a number of which have been recorded throughout history?
Of course, the argument that people like Kendi are making is that even recent white immigrants are benefiting from structural racism that black people are currently paying for, so they DO owe reparations. I don't buy this argument, but you probably need to address at some point.
...that is if 'structural racism' exists. I have yet to hear a cogent argument that this is 'a thing'. Yes, the black community has its troubles but many are self-inflicted which has caused a cycle of harm. Moreover, blacks are worse off today than pre-1960's when it comes to family life, family formation, illegitimacy rate (75% today!), etc. There's a saying, "You make your own bed and you lay in it".
I have heard Dr. Glenn Loury say that Black Americans are the richest and most influential group of Black people in the world. To arrive at that observation, he has, for example, looked at GDP of certain sub-Saharan African nations.
My point here is that not only white people, but Asians, Hispanics.....and Black people have benefited from slavery. How would the accounting be done for that. Should it also be opened to families descended from immigrants in the 19th century who lived in abysmal conditions and were ruthlessly exploited....other groups in the same situation.
Thank you, Mr. Love, for explaining so much, so well. For a couple of years, I've been wanting to read a comprehensive assessment regarding reparations. Now I consider a few gaps in my awareness much better filled.
Reading the argumentative comments below, my head swirls a bit with the charged emotions & lines of thought which start to wander out of my comprehension...but still always try to read these kinds of things with as much objectivity & compassion as possible. It is from each others charged emotions that we can sometimes learn so much. Even if they are not the most effective means of trying to convey what lives in our heads & hearts...
I'm very grateful to you & the team at FBT to continue helping me get a deeper & wider sense of such vital issues in our world.
Wishing you all the best in your work & with your upcoming book release. I'm looking very forward to digging in. ❤
I'm from England and I'm interested in the debate, though it's an internal one to the USA so I won't comment too much. But obviously colonial reparations are a potentially massive issue for us in the UK, and the case for it does not suffer as much from most of the difficulties in identifying victims and quantifying compensation that you would have within the USA.
However, I would say that the much more obvious case for reparations from the US govt (as well as the UK and others) is an international one, from the legacy of numerous egregious atrocities committed in recent decades e.g. Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, Libya. Estimates of innocent victims of US-led foreign policy interventions in the last 50 years are hard to make but I've seen the figure of 20 million deaths.
Thomas Sowell has already addressed this issue of reparations. It is, to paraphrase Sowell, foolish and wasteful and will not give Black Americans the self respect that no one else can give them. Also, many Black Americans have been hurt by this from con artists obtaining their information and using it to saddle those Black Americans who gave their personal information thinking they would get reparations, and instead have been saddled with debt. Time to end this foolishness over slave reparations.
I am not sure where I stand with this. The article was really informative. I think I wonder where the slippery slope will end up. My family were for centuries all milkmaids/labourers. They will have been badly treated by feudalistic land owners. What if the women were raped?? My question is really that if reparations are due and fair (and they might be) will reparations be due for other things and where (and when) should it stop? I hear Douglas Murray quote (I haven’t checked this, mind) that slaves in the south of England had x4 the life expectancy of poor white workers in the north). There is therefore going to be a lot of people paid reparations that might not deserve them, and lot of white low paid groups which have lived in poverty and oppression of other causes for generations that do not benefit when they probably should…
I think the point above about making reparations to countries we have invaded and hurt in our lifetimes makes more sense or this will end up in confusion and resentment and more conflict, surely??
From my limited understanding, a lot of black areas in the USA are high in crime, low in employment etc which is actually due to them being poor areas. Rather than trying to determine reparations that are from history, would it not be better to make life fairer as it stands?? Ie. Burying the hatchet, might this mean learning forgiveness? Allowing resentments and debts to be determined in a lifetime after which they are released and God can solve them??? Surely we are playing god to try and make blanket judgements about things which happened so long ago and we have so little evidence for direct wrongs for, or indeed who is right to pay for them!??
Thank you for this. It puts a lot of my own feelings into more eloquent words than I can manage.
What's everyone's thoughts on Evanston, IL's solution? $25k to eligible people, spendable on home repairs or property payments. The first wave is $400k combined, and the total goal is $10mil over 10 years. Qualification is based on being a direct descendent of a black resident in the area between 1919 and 1969, and that resident having suffered from discriminatory polices. Funding comes from a tax on recreational marijuana.
I think its a good start - clear destination, qualification conditions, and funding source - but it could be one of those social programs in disguise.
These have been my views on subject of reparations for long time. What brought them back to mind was comment from Bayard Rustin. Can’t remember. Was he a mentor to MLK? I know he worked with him. Advised him. I recall having a lotta RESPECT for him. Point is, reparations are “evil” from practical, legal, theoretical, ethical, and MORAL perspectives.
Practical:
PERMANENTLY, IRREVOCABLY drive WEDGE BETWEEN POOR WHITES AND BLACKS.
“Bayard Rustin, for example, saw that strategy as arising from a misdiagnosis that wrongly elevated racial conflict over the centrality of class conflict and a misprescription that would further weaken the prospects for progressive working-class unity by exacerbating racial resentments.”
~ Randall Kennedy, For Discrimination, Kindle location 528.
And this, “my fine furred friends,” is EXACTLY what has BEEN the results of The BLM-1619 Project-CRT Regime and talk of reparations.
Legal:
14th and Title VII; two or three injunction against Biden’s plan to award money based SOLELY on the color of a person’s skin. Actual NEED wasn’t even CONSIDERED.
It was said there are two Americas, the top 60% and the bottom 40%. That’s not quite correct. This is America:
America 1: The one-percenters and the other nine percent that enable them.
America 2: The next 40%, pretty much anybody reading any of this.
America 3: The bottom HALF.
Q1, ’21 Wealth Percentages:
Top 1% 32.1%
Next 9% 37.7%
Next 40% 28.2%
Bottom HALF 2.0%
Thought experiment: Who amongst the bottom HALF deserves a handout?
Ethical:
Rich Blacks getting money vs. poor whites. Help the poor among whom, too many, are Black. Again, from the Fed: Q1, 21 shows bottom HALF (50%) of Americans hold TWO (2) percent of wealth.
Moral:
Divide or actually BE inclusive and bring Americans TOGETHER.
Excellent attempt to promote rational discussion. What the piece misses is that the public and political debate over this contentious issue is not about developing an actual plan to take money from some Americans and give it to others to compensate for the terrible legacy of slavery. This will never happen in any conceivable way. The whole purpose of the debate is to keep the race pot boiling, to divide Americans into warring tribes, to fuel the political theater that politicians, demagogues, activists, and academics on all sides have perfected playing to their respective audiences, and to feed the maw of media always hungry for clicks. This is not unique to reparations, there are many irresolvable issues that fit this model - all of them contributing to the demise of our broken democracy and the rampage of our deranged media. THAT’S the conversation we should and would be having if the aforementioned forces hadn't set us at each other's throats.
Just a thought. You might enjoy subscribing to M. Bari Weiss's Substack ($50). That's where these things ARE being debated, rather heavily. From BOTH sides of the aisle. https://bariweiss.substack.com/
Yah. As You say, M. Frezza. It's sad, but True. I think it's because if people actually SAW what the woke people stand for, THEY wouldn't stand for it. So the battle rages on. ICBW, tho.
Also left out is the culpability of black African tribal leaders who sold blacks from other tribes who were caught in warfare to white traders. Also how does one address blacks who were also slaveholders of blacks - a number of which have been recorded throughout history?
Of course, the argument that people like Kendi are making is that even recent white immigrants are benefiting from structural racism that black people are currently paying for, so they DO owe reparations. I don't buy this argument, but you probably need to address at some point.
...that is if 'structural racism' exists. I have yet to hear a cogent argument that this is 'a thing'. Yes, the black community has its troubles but many are self-inflicted which has caused a cycle of harm. Moreover, blacks are worse off today than pre-1960's when it comes to family life, family formation, illegitimacy rate (75% today!), etc. There's a saying, "You make your own bed and you lay in it".
dd
just now
I have heard Dr. Glenn Loury say that Black Americans are the richest and most influential group of Black people in the world. To arrive at that observation, he has, for example, looked at GDP of certain sub-Saharan African nations.
My point here is that not only white people, but Asians, Hispanics.....and Black people have benefited from slavery. How would the accounting be done for that. Should it also be opened to families descended from immigrants in the 19th century who lived in abysmal conditions and were ruthlessly exploited....other groups in the same situation.
Thank you, Mr. Love, for explaining so much, so well. For a couple of years, I've been wanting to read a comprehensive assessment regarding reparations. Now I consider a few gaps in my awareness much better filled.
Reading the argumentative comments below, my head swirls a bit with the charged emotions & lines of thought which start to wander out of my comprehension...but still always try to read these kinds of things with as much objectivity & compassion as possible. It is from each others charged emotions that we can sometimes learn so much. Even if they are not the most effective means of trying to convey what lives in our heads & hearts...
I'm very grateful to you & the team at FBT to continue helping me get a deeper & wider sense of such vital issues in our world.
Wishing you all the best in your work & with your upcoming book release. I'm looking very forward to digging in. ❤
So thoughtful. Thank you for your leadership!
I'm from England and I'm interested in the debate, though it's an internal one to the USA so I won't comment too much. But obviously colonial reparations are a potentially massive issue for us in the UK, and the case for it does not suffer as much from most of the difficulties in identifying victims and quantifying compensation that you would have within the USA.
However, I would say that the much more obvious case for reparations from the US govt (as well as the UK and others) is an international one, from the legacy of numerous egregious atrocities committed in recent decades e.g. Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, Libya. Estimates of innocent victims of US-led foreign policy interventions in the last 50 years are hard to make but I've seen the figure of 20 million deaths.
Thomas Sowell has already addressed this issue of reparations. It is, to paraphrase Sowell, foolish and wasteful and will not give Black Americans the self respect that no one else can give them. Also, many Black Americans have been hurt by this from con artists obtaining their information and using it to saddle those Black Americans who gave their personal information thinking they would get reparations, and instead have been saddled with debt. Time to end this foolishness over slave reparations.
I am not sure where I stand with this. The article was really informative. I think I wonder where the slippery slope will end up. My family were for centuries all milkmaids/labourers. They will have been badly treated by feudalistic land owners. What if the women were raped?? My question is really that if reparations are due and fair (and they might be) will reparations be due for other things and where (and when) should it stop? I hear Douglas Murray quote (I haven’t checked this, mind) that slaves in the south of England had x4 the life expectancy of poor white workers in the north). There is therefore going to be a lot of people paid reparations that might not deserve them, and lot of white low paid groups which have lived in poverty and oppression of other causes for generations that do not benefit when they probably should…
I think the point above about making reparations to countries we have invaded and hurt in our lifetimes makes more sense or this will end up in confusion and resentment and more conflict, surely??
From my limited understanding, a lot of black areas in the USA are high in crime, low in employment etc which is actually due to them being poor areas. Rather than trying to determine reparations that are from history, would it not be better to make life fairer as it stands?? Ie. Burying the hatchet, might this mean learning forgiveness? Allowing resentments and debts to be determined in a lifetime after which they are released and God can solve them??? Surely we are playing god to try and make blanket judgements about things which happened so long ago and we have so little evidence for direct wrongs for, or indeed who is right to pay for them!??
Thank you for this. It puts a lot of my own feelings into more eloquent words than I can manage.
What's everyone's thoughts on Evanston, IL's solution? $25k to eligible people, spendable on home repairs or property payments. The first wave is $400k combined, and the total goal is $10mil over 10 years. Qualification is based on being a direct descendent of a black resident in the area between 1919 and 1969, and that resident having suffered from discriminatory polices. Funding comes from a tax on recreational marijuana.
I think its a good start - clear destination, qualification conditions, and funding source - but it could be one of those social programs in disguise.
My OPINION of Reparations and the damage they do. Still needs a LOTTA work. Got about a dozen items. Still:
*************************************************************************
*** Change Log
***
*** 08/20/21 Started.
*** 09/20/21 Light edits. May need to expand.
***
*************************************************************************
The Case AGAINST Reparations
These have been my views on subject of reparations for long time. What brought them back to mind was comment from Bayard Rustin. Can’t remember. Was he a mentor to MLK? I know he worked with him. Advised him. I recall having a lotta RESPECT for him. Point is, reparations are “evil” from practical, legal, theoretical, ethical, and MORAL perspectives.
Practical:
PERMANENTLY, IRREVOCABLY drive WEDGE BETWEEN POOR WHITES AND BLACKS.
“Bayard Rustin, for example, saw that strategy as arising from a misdiagnosis that wrongly elevated racial conflict over the centrality of class conflict and a misprescription that would further weaken the prospects for progressive working-class unity by exacerbating racial resentments.”
~ Randall Kennedy, For Discrimination, Kindle location 528.
And this, “my fine furred friends,” is EXACTLY what has BEEN the results of The BLM-1619 Project-CRT Regime and talk of reparations.
Legal:
14th and Title VII; two or three injunction against Biden’s plan to award money based SOLELY on the color of a person’s skin. Actual NEED wasn’t even CONSIDERED.
Theoretical:
As I’ve “said” before, NUMEROUS times. From the Fed: https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distribute/chart/#quarter:123;series:Net%20worth;demographic:networth;population:1,3,5,7;units:shares
It was said there are two Americas, the top 60% and the bottom 40%. That’s not quite correct. This is America:
America 1: The one-percenters and the other nine percent that enable them.
America 2: The next 40%, pretty much anybody reading any of this.
America 3: The bottom HALF.
Q1, ’21 Wealth Percentages:
Top 1% 32.1%
Next 9% 37.7%
Next 40% 28.2%
Bottom HALF 2.0%
Thought experiment: Who amongst the bottom HALF deserves a handout?
Ethical:
Rich Blacks getting money vs. poor whites. Help the poor among whom, too many, are Black. Again, from the Fed: Q1, 21 shows bottom HALF (50%) of Americans hold TWO (2) percent of wealth.
Moral:
Divide or actually BE inclusive and bring Americans TOGETHER.
TY (thank You) M. Love. :)
www.theaasrt.org