I've never "gotten it" about reparations for slavery and such.

[grumpyduck]

Granted what happened in many cases was dead wrong on many counts according to modern thinking. But I don't understand how giving money or something to people two or three hundred years later helps anyone or rights the wrongs. In courtroom terms, it's more like punitive damages instead of compensatory damages -- long after the responsible parties are dead. I must be missing part of the story. Anyone care to elaborate?

[grumpyduck]

3. That reply was totally uncalled for.

This is a chat room and I was asking a question.

[patricia92243]

5. You are correct!

[emulatorloo]

7. Additionally that user wasn't helping at all. The internet is full of shitty info put up by lying

bloggers.

[WarGamer]

26. Some people tend to forget that...

nothing wrong with your question.

It's a complicated subject.

[Ocelot II]

2. I think the concept is that the original injury of slavery deprived people

of several generations' worth of economic opportunities that they could have passed on to their descendants; but instead, since their ancestors had little or no money, land or education even after slavery was abolished, their descendants never had the advantages of any inheritances that many White people had. The idea of reparations is to compensate living people for that loss.

[wryter2000]

8. And obvious cases continue well into the last century

Depriving black WWII vets of GI benefits to buy houses deprived them of the means of gaining wealth (home ownership) that white vets got. Redlining deprived them of home equity because their houses are undervalued.

Home ownership is the main way for middle class folks to acquire wealth they pass along to their children. Children without that are at a huge disadvantage.

[Girard442]

4. What tipped my thinking was learning that a couple of Southern states were actually black-majority..

...and a goodly number of them very nearly were. Until then, I wasn't particularly receptive to the argument that much of the wealth of this country was built on the backs of peoples of color, but I am now.

Granted, administering the thing would be a nightmare, but then slavery was kind of nightmarish too.

[Torchlight]

6. Here are the sources I used to understand the issue

From Here to Equality, by Bill Darrity

The Case for Black Reparations, Boris Bitke

and Redeeming the Promise of Abolition, by Catherine Franke

I think the issue is complex and intertwines politics, economics, and cultural studies in a very tight weave, and without a fundamental primer of both the perspectives as well as the Promise vs. Results social contract (seen at its most effective during Radical Reconstruction) can be akin to jumping into advanced trig with only a passing familiarity of long division.

The above source elaborate on all that very well, very rationally, and very enlightening.

[happybird]

14. Thank you

[yardwork]

49. Also, How to Be An Antiracist, by Ibram Kendi.

Lots of accurate history, data there.

[Demobrat]

9. I've always thought of it not so much

as reparation for slavery as reparation for hundreds of years of unequal access to education, good jobs, homeownership, and other means to build wealth.

The end of slavery didn’t mean equal opportunity. Giving people a chance to catch up at this point seems like a decent thing to do.

[Unwind Your Mind]

44. Yes, this nt

[grumpyduck]

10. Thank you to the previous few posters.

Something I never looked into, and a very complex subject. Thanks also for the reading materials.

[Scrivener7]

12. I think Ocelot's is a good post too. It succinctly states the complex reason.

[grumpyduck]

15. Yeah, I started off writing "the previous three posters,"

then edited to "the previous four," and finally just said "few."

Thanks to everyone for the thoughtful responses!

[Scrivener7]

16. Good question, though. I think your lack of clarity on the goal of reparations is shared by

a lot of people.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

11. .

But I don't understand how giving money or something to people two or three hundred years later helps anyone or rights the wrongs.

One of the biggest reasons, if not THE reason, there's a wealth gap along racial lines in this country is because white people have had a 400-year head start. Reparations can help close that gap.

It's not a question of individual responsibility or guilt. It's a way to eliminate current injustices that have roots going back hundreds of years.

[emulatorloo]

13. Kick and rec, you are getting a lot of good replies and information.

[TheRealNorth]

17. How far do we go back? Or are there privelleged/protected classes of people?

For many of us that are white, if we go back in history, many white people were serfs that were economically exploited by their governing lord. Hell- if you are of Russian decent, that exploitation was also going on until the 1860's. Part of the reason Europeans came to America is so that they could escape that exploitation (and in some cases, perpetuate it by assuming the role of lords and ladies over the slave and native population)

In my opinion, this is a dumb divisive issue that only serves to divide people and paper over racism rather than deal with it.

[Straw Man]

30. It depends on what you mean by "we."

For many of us that are white, if we go back in history, many white people were serfs that were economically exploited by their governing lord. Hell- if you are of Russian decent, that exploitation was also going on until the 1860's.

I think that the Russian state owes reparations to the descendants of serfs, as well as to descendants of the kulaks that were slaughtered by Stalin. The Soviet state exploited them every bit as ruthlessly as the czarist regimes did.

[meadowlander]

32. There is a qualitative difference between being economically exploited and enslaved.

I'm Irish. My ancestors were tenant farmers driven off their land during the famine while the colonising powers at the time continued to export food instead of feeding the people producing it. They were economically exploited.

But my ancestors were not kidnapped, taken to another country, raped and bred like cattle, ripped away from their family networks, beaten, branded, and killed for trying to leave.

And as a white person, my grandparents and parents had access to education, jobs, housing and other economic benefits that lifted them into the middle class - benefits that were not available to the descendants of slaves.

So no, it's is not a "dumb divisive issue". It is the original sin of the American experiment and until we are honest about it and make a genuine effort to make amends those wounds will never heal. That is the only way we can "deal with it".

[Just A Box Of Rain]

18. The best arguments are that slavery and the many decades of discrimination that followed

(and that continue to exist) have robbed black families of both generational wealth and the sort of opportunities in education and in the economy that are considered "normal" for white families.

For many middle class Americans the greatest source of generational wealth is ownership of property. In African American families red-lining, unfair loan practices, and de-valuation of home values has been endemic.

Did you see the recent news story of a home evaluation where a black owner got wildly different quotes when he presented as the homeowner vs when the home was stripped of racially identifying items and they used a white person to pose as the owners? This is not unusual (unfortunately) and this stuff percists to this day.

Add in low funding for schools in black neighborhoods, lack of public services, and discrimination in employment and the gap in black wealth is explicable.

How could it be otherwise?

The subject deserves a longer thatise, but I hope this meager response provides at least a glimpse of some of the issues involved here.

[spicysista]

19. The case for reparations isn't just about chattel slavery.....

"THE CASE FOR REPARATIONS
Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal. Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.

By Ta-Nehisi Coates"

If you're interested, it's a great read. Here's the link for you: https://www.theatlantic.com

Good luck to you on your education journey!

[WhiskeyGrinder]

20. This is the best primer, right here; a great place for anyone to start, especially if they don't

believe reparations are necessary.

[spicysista]

24. Mr. Coates makes the case in a very accessible way.

[femmedem]

35. Yes! That article taught me so much!

Great recommendation.

[Rhiannon12866]

21. John Conyers' bill on reparations, introduced 30 years ago, is now being discussed in Congress

According to Mary Trump's book.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

22. The reparations were supposed to be forty acres and a mule which they never received.

The value of that in 2022 dollars is significant

[ismnotwasm]

23. Would you be open to a couple of book recommendations?

[femmedem]

25. My own family history helps me understand it.

Last edited Tue Sep 13, 2022, 07:27 PM - Edit history (1)

My grandfather had a GI bill that allowed him to buy a home in a suburb that most likely had racial covenants precluding Black people. And even if it didn't, it would have been hard or impossible for a Black family to buy a home there. Realtors wouldn't have shown them homes in that neighborhood.

So my grandparents' house appreciated quite a bit, while homes in urban Black neighborhoods did not.

Then my dad was able to move up rapidly in IBM then (early 60s) even though he didn't have a college degree--a path I doubt was open to Black employees. That meant my parents were able to buy a house when they were in their early twenties. They bought and sold a few houses while I was growing up. One house cost them 19k and they sold it a few years later for 26K. They bought a house further into the country for about the same amount of money, and sold it for over 50k when when my sister and I went off to college.

Meanwhile, my grandfather died young, in his fifties, and my mom inherited some money, in part because her parents' house had appreciated so much. Between a scholarship from IBM and my parents generosity (along with my own part-time jobs) I was able to graduate from college without any debt.

Then another relative died, and I inherited enough for a downpayment on my first house. Again, that person's house had appreciated, building wealth that could be passed down through generations.

I should add that I work in a nonprofit historic preservation organization. We have files on many houses that were lost to urban renewal, including a whole demolished neighborhood that was primarily Black. We have the appraisal forms that determined how much homeowners would be compensated. Those forms say that one of the considerations was that it was a minority neighborhood. That was legal then, but it still happens today. So while my family kept building wealth as our homes appreciated, those families were undercompensated. I know of one Black man who lost his home to urban renewal and was so poorly compensated that he was never able to buy a home again.

And why did this happen within living memory? Because of prejudices that date back to when Black people here were enslaved, and the way those prejudices were codified in zoning regulations and racial covenants and access to credit and employment policies.

[maxrandb]

27. The problem is that it wasn't addressed 200 years ago

Who knows how Reconstruction would have been implemented if President Lincoln hadn't been assassinated.

I hate to reference Nazis, but what happened after the Civil War would have been like if, 5 years after Hitlers defeat, the Allies allowed Nazis to take over positions of political power in half of Germany.

The States that declared war on the United States of America, were basically allowed back into political power without truly acknowledging their defeat.

It's a little simplistic of me, but it wasn't very long after the Civil War when the Union said; "no worries, all forgiven". It also wasn't long until any political and economic power that the former slaves had gained was violently ripped away from them.

It really shouldn't matter if it was 6,000 years ago. If the wrong has never been righted, it still smolders. It's still wrong.

To this day, Israeli's are chasing down Nazi war criminals and bringing them to justice.

[magicarpet]

28. Our allegiance to that which is right, correct, and proper,... ...

... rather than to that which is wrong although how very mighty.

Respect and adherence to this type of philosophy if what advances a society from a state of barbaric behavior to a state considered far more civilized. It really all depends on what type of society you want. One is based frequent episodes of strife and turmoil the other is more harmonious and easy going.

If an individual or a society brings injury and causes damages to another person without reason or cause. In a more civilized society that injured person is generally reimbursed for financial, emotional, and/or if a particularly egregious or malicious injury, punitive damages might well be imposed.

+++×××+++×××+++×××

Here is a case in California where a black couple ran a successful beach resort and hotel. This was located on Pacific Ocean Beach front acreage they acquired.

Year later after successfully operating and growing this on going resort the entire property and hotel was taken from them without valid reason and without just compensation for the market value of the resort and buildings.

Here is a story how decedents and relatives of the couple who had there resort and lands improperly taken in the 1920s, finally got compensated for that wrongdoings earlier in 2022. These people in this community today should be applauded for having righted the wrongs of their ancestors who improperly seized this property from the original owners many many years back.


+++×××+++×××+++


California
California returns beachfront property taken from Black couple in 1920s
Board unanimously agrees to complete transfer of parcels in area known as Bruce’s Beach, which was a resort for Black Americans

Sam Levin and agency
Wed 29 Jun 2022 10.36 EDT
2 months old


Los Angeles county officials have returned ownership of prime California beachfront property to descendants of a Black couple who ran a resort for African Americans in the 1920s until the local government seized their land.

The LA board of supervisors on Tuesday unanimously approved the transfer of the parcels in area once known as Bruce’s Beach in the city of Manhattan Beach. The site, steps away from one of southern California’s most pristine beaches, is now a county lifeguard training headquarters and a parking lot, and the transfer allows the county to lease back the property with an option to buy it for millions of dollars.

The successful transfer, which was years in the making, is a victory in the fight for reparations in California and is a win for racial justice in a beach city that remains less than 1% Black today.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/29/california-returns-beachfront-property-taken-black-couple-bruces-beach#referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&csi=0&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fus-news%2F2022%2Fjun%2F29%2Fcalifornia-returns-beachfront-property-taken-black-couple-bruces-beach

[unweird]

29. Recommending the responses to this post

Great information here for those of us on our journey to woke enlightenment. Thanks y’all.

[femmedem]

34. Hey, that's not worthy of you.

That's a way of cyber-bullying someone whose financial circumstances you don't know. And if you are doing this because you disagree with the post, why not discuss that instead?

[Skittles]

36. because I know what the deal is

and it AIN'T WORTH IT

[MrsCoffee]

42. +1

[Brenda]

33. Interesting

Last edited Wed Sep 14, 2022, 07:25 AM - Edit history (1)

1. I've never "gotten it" - we see
2. slavery "and such" - what exactly is "and such"
3. in many cases was dead wrong

[Skittles]

37. THANK YOU

yup

[Zeitghost]

47. How does this help?

n/t

[MarineCombatEngineer]

48. It doesn't and it's uncalled for. nt

[ForgedCrank]

38. This is a

good thread from my viewpoint because I've often wondered the same thing, but was afraid to ask because I get alerted on so much.
Me being in an all white rural area leaves me with a lot of empty perspective and void of relative experience, it's not something I deal with commonly and I don't have anyone I can ask.

[madville]

39. It's not a problem direct cash payments can fix

Better access to education, low interest home loans, child care, etc would help much more but then that should be available to everyone.

Plus just say $100,000 for every Black American, you are talking about well over a trillion dollars. It would anger everyone who doesn’t get it and it would contribute to inflation.

Anything of the sort needs structured programs in place to administer the compensation as a real benefit like scholarships and home down payments. Cash payouts would mostly end up being spent without much to show for it as far as addressing the root issues.

[FreepFryer]

40. "slavery and such"? Jesus, man. (nt)

[Brenda]

41. No fucking shit!

What is "and such?"

[MrsCoffee]

43. +1

[likesmountains 52]

45. Can you elaborate on "and such"?

[Zeitghost]

46. The problem with direct reparation payments

is the implementation. Who qualifies? Is it need based? Is it race based? What if you're mixed race? What if you and all you relatives are blue eyed, blonde haired WASPs but your 23 & Me says you're 1/128th West African because Great-Great-Great-Great-Great Gandma was a slave? Does President Obama, who is mixed race and who's family comes from Africa much more recently qualify? What if your ancestors were enslaved, but in another country like Jamaica?


I'm not trying to make light of the situation, but you can see that it becomes real messy, real fast if we're taking about directly compensating individuals. Lines would need to be drawn and I don't see any fair or easy way to draw them. I think the far better option is to invest in all impoverished communities regardless of race and try to better all Americans rather than get bogged down in divisive race politics that will only serve to further the right's agenda of divide and conquer.

[uponit7771]

50. US Federal Gov **DID** pay reparations already !!! ... to the slave masters