Slavery Reparations

[MrFun]

Ramo, if you read the author's argument I posted, you would realize that his propositions are international in scope. That means, that as cases develop, there is always a possibility that we can also bring forth Middle Eastern governments too.

[Ramo]

[Caligastia]

These are the answers I get from what you posted:

1. How will it be accurately determined who is "suffering due to past slavery"?

All africans wether they owned slaves themselves or not.

2. Who will be expected to pay reparations?

Anyone whos ancestors were remotely connected with slavery.

3. How will it be accurately determined who should pay what amount of reparations?

No answer for this one.


Doesnt seem very fair to me...

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by MrFun
Ramo, if you read the author's argument I posted, you would realize that his propositions are international in scope. That means, that as cases develop, there is always a possibility that we can also bring forth Middle Eastern governments too.

More governments will have to pay? Oh good.

[Ramo]

Ramo, if you read the author's argument I posted, you would realize that his propositions are international in scope. That means, that as cases develop, there is always a possibility that we can also bring forth Middle Eastern governments too.

If you read the author's argument that you posted, you world realize he stated this:
"but that should not undermine the overall truth that the rape of Africa was the responsibility of the European nations that established and promoted the trade."

Where's the mention of the Arabic gov'ts that also established and promoted the trade?

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Caligastia
These are the answers I get from what you posted:



All africans wether they owned slaves themselves or not.



Anyone whos ancestors were remotely connected with slavery.



No answer for this one.


Doesnt seem very fair to me...

For your last question, the answer is already in the part of Proposition Six and Proposition Seven that I presented on here.

And Ramo, you're right -- the author does not mention Arabic governments--not even in the full copy I have. I realize that -- but I'm arguing that if the author wants to be consistent, then the international scope of this issue has to include today's Middle Eastern governments.

[Caligastia]

Originally posted by MrFun


For your last question, the answer is already in the part of Proposition Six and Proposition Seven that I presented on here.

Sorry, but its all so vague that it really doesnt answer to my satisfaction.

[faded glory]

Also important to mention, Blacks sold themselves into slavery. Usaully after tribal wars, the women and prisoners were sold to the Europeans for a few trinketts.heh.....

[MrFun]

Blacks did not sell themselves as slaves. They were kidnapped by rival African tribes and then those tribes sold the black captives to European or Arabian slave traders.

The various wars fought between the African states and tribes was a rich opportunity for Europeans, Arabians, and a minority of Africans.

[faded glory]

This seems to contradict

Originally posted by MrFun
Blacks did not sell themselves as slaves.

this

They were kidnapped by rival African tribes and then those tribes sold the black captives to European or Arabian slave traders.

wanna try again?

[Transcend]

By the same logic, I think the French have a right to demand reparations from the English for the misery they caused during the 100 years War.

By the same logic, Russians, Persians, and Chinese should demand reparations from Mongols for the destructions they caused.

By the same logic, Blacks should demand reparations for slavery rather from Arabs and Turks, as opposed to Americans.

By the same logic, Germans should demand reparations from the French for the mess they caused during the 30 years War.

I'm all against reparations for actions committed centuries ago, otherwise there will never be peace on this planet.

[DinoDoc]

This should be an adequate response to Mr Fun's article

Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Blacks is a Bad Idea for Blacks - and Racist Too

One

There Is No Single Group Clearly Responsible For The Crime Of Slavery

Black Africans and Arabs were responsible for enslaving the ancestors of African-Americans. There were 3,000 black slave-owners in the ante-bellum United States. Are reparations to be paid by their descendants too?

Two

There Is No One Group That Benefited Exclusively From Its Fruits

The claim for reparations is premised on the false assumption that only whites have benefited from slavery. If slave labor created wealth for Americans, then obviously it has created wealth for black Americans as well, including the descendants of slaves. The GNP of black America is so large that it makes the African-American community the 10th most prosperous "nation" in the world. American blacks on average enjoy per capita incomes in the range of twenty to fifty times that of blacks living in any of the African nations from which they were kidnapped.

Three

Only A Tiny Minority Of White Americans Ever Owned Slaves, And Others Gave Their Lives To Free Them

Only a tiny minority of Americans ever owned slaves. This is true even for those who lived in the ante-bellum South where only one white in five was a slaveholder. Why should their descendants owe a debt? What about the descendants of the 350,000 Union soldiers who died to free the slaves? They gave their lives. What possible moral principle would ask them to pay (through their descendants) again?

Four

America Today Is A Multi-Ethnic Nation and Most Americans Have No Connection (Direct Or Indirect) To Slavery

The two great waves of American immigration occurred after 1880 and then after 1960. What rationale would require Vietnamese boat people, Russian refuseniks, Iranian refugees, and Armenian victims of the Turkish persecution, Jews, Mexicans Greeks, or Polish, Hungarian, Cambodian and Korean victims of Communism, to pay reparations to American blacks?

Five

The Historical Precedents Used To Justify The Reparations Claim Do Not Apply, And The Claim Itself Is Based On Race Not Injury

The historical precedents generally invoked to justify the reparations claim are payments to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, Japanese-Americans and African- American victims of racial experiments in Tuskegee, or racial outrages in Rosewood and Oklahoma City. But in each case, the recipients of reparations were the direct victims of the injustice or their immediate families. This would be the only case of reparations to people who were not immediately affected and whose sole qualification to receive reparations would be racial. As has already been pointed out, during the slavery era, many blacks were free men or slave-owners themselves, yet the reparations claimants make no distinction between the roles blacks actually played in the injustice itself. Randall Robinson's book on reparations, The Debt, which is the manifesto of the reparations movement is pointedly sub-titled "What America Owes To Blacks." If this is not racism, what is?

Six

The Reparations Argument Is Based On The Unfounded Claim That All African-American Descendants of Slaves Suffer From The Economic Consequences Of Slavery And Discrimination

No evidence-based attempt has been made to prove that living individuals have been adversely affected by a slave system that was ended over 150 years ago. But there is plenty of evidence the hardships that occurred were hardships that individuals could and did overcome. The black middle-class in America is a prosperous community that is now larger in absolute terms than the black underclass. Does its existence not suggest that economic adversity is the result of failures of individual character rather than the lingering after-effects of racial discrimination and a slave system that ceased to exist well over a century ago? West Indian blacks in America are also descended from slaves but their average incomes are equivalent to the average incomes of whites (and nearly 25% higher than the average incomes of American born blacks). How is it that slavery adversely affected one large group of descendants but not the other? How can government be expected to decide an issue that is so subjective - and yet so critical - to the case?

Seven

The Reparations Claim Is One More Attempt To Turn African-Americans Into Victims. It Sends A Damaging Message To The African-American Community.

The renewed sense of grievance -- which is what the claim for reparations will inevitably create -- is neither a constructive nor a helpful message for black leaders to be sending to their communities and to others. To focus the social passions of African-Americans on what some Americans may have done to their ancestors fifty or a hundred and fifty years ago is to burden them with a crippling sense of victim-hood. How are the millions of refugees from tyranny and genocide who are now living in America going to receive these claims, moreover, except as demands for special treatment, an extravagant new handout that is only necessary because some blacks can't seem to locate the ladder of opportunity within reach of others -- many less privileged than themselves?

Eight

Reparations To African Americans Have Already Been Paid

Since the passage of the Civil Rights Acts and the advent of the Great Society in 1965, trillions of dollars in transfer payments have been made to African-Americans in the form of welfare benefits and racial preferences (in contracts, job placements and educational admissions) - all under the rationale of redressing historic racial grievances. It is said that reparations are necessary to achieve a healing between African-Americans and other Americans. If trillion dollar restitutions and a wholesale rewriting of American law (in order to accommodate racial preferences) for African-Americans is not enough to achieve a "healing," what will?

Nine

What About The Debt Blacks Owe To America?

Slavery existed for thousands of years before the Atlantic slave trade was born, and in all societies. But in the thousand years of its existence, there never was an anti-slavery movement until white Christians - Englishmen and Americans -- created one. If not for the anti-slavery attitudes and military power of white Englishmen and Americans, the slave trade would not have been brought to an end. If not for the sacrifices of white soldiers and a white American president who gave his life to sign the Emancipation Proclamation, blacks in America would still be slaves. If not for the dedication of Americans of all ethnicities and colors to a society based on the principle that all men are created equal, blacks in America would not enjoy the highest standard of living of blacks anywhere in the world, and indeed one of the highest standards of living of any people in the world. They would not enjoy the greatest freedoms and the most thoroughly protected individual rights anywhere. Where is the gratitude of black America and its leaders for those gifts?

Ten

The Reparations Claim Is A Separatist Idea That Sets African-Americans Against The Nation That Gave Them Freedom

Blacks were here before the Mayflower. Who is more American than the descendants of African slaves? For the African-American community to isolate itself even further from America is to embark on a course whose implications are troubling. Yet the African-American community has had a long-running flirtation with separatists, nationalists and the political left, who want African-Americans to be no part of America's social contract. African Americans should reject this temptation.

For all America's faults, African-Americans have an enormous stake in their country and its heritage. It is this heritage that is really under attack by the reparations movement. The reparations claim is one more assault on America, conducted by racial separatists and the political left. It is an attack not only on white Americans, but on all Americans -- especially African-Americans.

America's African-American citizens are the richest and most privileged black people alive -- a bounty that is a direct result of the heritage that is under assault. The American idea needs the support of its African-American citizens. But African-Americans also need the support of the American idea. For it is this idea that led to the principles and institutions that have set African-Americans - and all of us -- free.

Thus concludes the cut and paste war.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Ah yes, the wonderful Horowitz response! I like that article... you can't really say much about it... the only responses was that 'Oh, oh, Horowitz is a racist' .

[MrFun]

Originally posted by faded glory
This seems to contradict





this



wanna try again?

I thought you were making the claim that black individuals voluntarily sold themselves as slaves. But, we agree then -- blacks kidnapped other blacks as part of slave trade.

And here are a few counter-points to the article posted.

1) I already stated before that a minority of blacks benefitted from the slave trade and from slavery itself. That does not mean that the present generation of blacks do not deserve reparations.

2) Blacks played a prominent role in the abolitionist movement: Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, were only two exmaples of black leadership.
*Plus, the underground railroad required the courage from the many blacks who chose to run away from plantations.
*Runaway black slaves forced the issue of slavery onto whites on both sides of the argument over slavery.
*And the successful revolt and independent black republic of Haiti in the early 19th century. Black slaves revolted from French rule, and abolished slavery.
*Black soldiers also fought in the Civil War to help preserve the Union, and to help liberate slaves from southern plantations.

Blacks were not helpless people completely subjected to the whims of white people. Hundreds of thousands of blacks took action in whatever way they thought was feasible.

[Al B. Sure!]

alright there was too much in this thread for me to read at one go. I skimmed through much and have to say this...

The idea that reparations should be given on the assumption that blacks today still suffer from previous wrongs is a difficult one to defend or contend. Objectively, the idea that any black person today suffered directly from slavery (ie- they were slaves themselves) is untrue, and this is the general legal basis behind all other reparation precedents. However, there is the issue that indirectly blacks still suffer.

Though freed, the vast majority of black american following the civil war were impoverished and lacking in education. They had no initial capital nor the capital of the mind that is education. Essentially, though such organizations as the Freedman's Bureau made attempts (some of which such as their short-lived education programs actually had much success), the Reconstruction period did not help blacks attain a position of social, economic, or political equality with whites. Obviously, thus, blacks for the next several decades had much against them compared to native born whites (i contend immigrants had perhaps as many problems as free blacks in the late 19th century). With the natural progression of the standing of blacks over time, many blacks improved in their lives. A blackman who worked hard could give his child an education and this child could then get an even better job and so on. Though it took many years, the emergence of blacks as equals to whites began to appear in the last half of the 20th century.

Now here, however, comes the disagreement. Have blacks attained equality? Or are they still behind? If they are, how may they rise up? Through natural improvement over time or through governmental intervention (reparations, affirmative action)?

I contend that the life of the average blackman in america is improving rapidly and, if not equal to that of a white man, is nearly so. Though there are plenty of poor blacks, there are just as many poor whites or people of other races. The black middle class has emerged and there are more and more members of the black upper class. Times are improving I think on the whole. No need for anything special.

However, it can not be denied that there are still plenty of poor blacks (and others) who must be paid attention to. I dont think such things as 40 acres and a mule would do much good to the poor in the ghettos. **** reparations. What the poor need are new economic oppurtunities and new moralities. Businesses should not be scared to give job oppurtunities to the urban poor... banks should not be scared to give loans to enterpreneurs... all poor should try to teach their children to not turn to crime... all fathers should take care of their children and not leave them... then and only then, by focusing on improving the core problems, will there be some improvement.


thanks