The Founding Fathers knew the cultural gulf was too wide, hence the creation of Liberia and the hope of return. Cheap labor is never cheap, and it's not just cotton, it's gold, diamonds, farming and domestic help as well.| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: Politix |
| Reparations would change the status quo of racism |
| 2014-12-23 |
| The presentation doesn't mention it but the author John Palchak is director of the local Catholic Charities entity. In 2014, there are people in America who hate their brown-, black-, red- and olive-skinned neighbors. There probably are. There aren't as many as the author assumes there are. There are more blacks participating in the "black experience" than whites. Most of us don't spend much mental effort on race until somebody comments "white girl bleed a lot." This bigotry becomes racism and permeates the status quo if it is institutionalized. "Microaggressions" are aggressions so tiny they can't be seen with the naked eye. Often the "aggressors" aren't even aware that they're doing it. The "knockout game" I suppose would be a "macroaggression" if it's not simply an aggression. I survived one once before it became all the rage, in a Washington Metro station. I was probably unconsciously microaggressing. Racism is found in public schools and the criminal justice system, for example. It creates two separate and unequal societies — one white that works and one black that suffers. Blacks make up 13.2 percent of the population and are responsible for 52 percent of violent crime. Whites (77 percent of the population) receive 72 percent of bachelors' degrees, 56 percent of them to women. Blacks have 10.3 percent, about 2/3 (65.8 percent) women. That gives black males about three percent of basic education. Nationwide, black students graduated at a rate of 69 percent; whites graduated at a rate of 86 percent, and Hispanics graduated at 73 percent many of them using English as a second language. Cause, meet effect. ...one white that works and one black that People talk about changes the events in Ferguson may bring. I was indignant when the first reports came out. Then I saw the video and the "gentle giant" story went "poof!" as we saw him roughing up the clerk. Then we saw the shot pattern. Then Al Sharpton showed up. The governor appoints a commission to study the issues. Articles appear every day from journalists, educators and politicians decrying the inequality and calling for one school system, a public review board for police, a higher minimum wage for fast-food and entry-level workers and greater access to college education without the unfair burden of enormous student loans. The "unfair burden" applies to everyone and the actual education is actually paid for at a disproportionate rate by Pell grants and similar programs. We have "one school system." It's administered by local school boards, usually at the county level, which should be most familiar with the problems, and usually paid for by property taxes. In most cases school boards are elected officials or they're appointed by elected officials. You get what you pay for. While these are valid suggestions for change, they will not affect institutionalized racism in the United States. Such changes would carry forth the racism bound to them. That statement probably makes sense in the original Gibberish. Changing racism requires a different perspective about the people who are stigmatized. Observation and empirical evidence doesn't count. A perspective change means understanding racism is part of the status quo, finding it unacceptable and creating a new worldview. The problem, Johnny, is that charges of racism have been forced down the collective throats of conservatives for six solid years, along with attacks on the one ideology which if permitted to work, could severely alter the racial dynamic in the nation... The Civil Rights Act was passed in the 1960s. That was 50 years ago. Surely something's changed since then? It has. Bigotry has in that time become unfashionable among whites. I read a rather charming western while waiting for planes a couple days ago: The Ranch at the Wolverine, by B.M. Bower, published in 1914. At one point the hero compliments his lady love by telling her that she's "working like a nigger in a cotton field." Conditioned as I've become over the years, the phrase threw me off. I've become used to seeing "n-----" or "the N word," or something similarly fastidious. It made the hero's use of the word "d---" amusing. There weren't any "people of color" in the book, except for a couple "half breeds"--Indians rather than blacks. One of them a stolidly dependable good guy and his wife working on the lady love's ranch, the other one of the rustlers. I like westerns and I like old books. They reflect the writer's world view, the culture he's living in. Read The Virginian again and look at his 1902 culture preserved in literary amber. Linger over Judge Henry's talk with Miss Wood about vigilante justice after Steve is strung up. "I want you to be just as willing to be put right by me as I am to be put right by you. And so when you use such a word as principle, you must help me to answer by saying what principle you mean. For in all sincerity I see no likeness in principle whatever between burning Southern negroes in public and hanging Wyoming horse-thieves in private. I consider the burning a proof that the South is semi-barbarous, and the hanging a proof that Wyoming is determined to become civilized. We do not torture our criminals when we lynch them. We do not invite spectators to enjoy their death agony. We put no such hideous disgrace upon the United States. We execute our criminals by the swiftest means, and in the quietest way..."It's probably a microaggression to quote the judge's sympathy with the victims in the "semi-barbarous" south. The judge probably harbored the same assumptions about race as most other people of his age and class, but they didn't cloud his mind or ruin his objectivity. Some people spend too much time picking at scabs. Doing that will make them leave scars. That makes them ugly. We've had fifty years and spent trillions on a "war on poverty" that made race relations worse than they were when there were separate white and colored drinking fountains. If no improvement is ever good enough there's no incentive for any improvement at all. |
| Posted by:badanov |
| #29 Would Obama have to pay? It is far more likely that his ancestors were slavers who captured and sold slaves than my ancestors being slave owners. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2014-12-23 22:06 |
| #28 At least here in Louisiana there were significant numbers of slaves held by black plantation owners. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2014-12-23 21:05 |
| #27 I read somewhere that less than two percent of families in the south owned one or more slaves, according to a "slave census" conducted back in the 1800s. We've had three generations of this sort of exchange whereby taxes collected are transferred from one sector of society to another. Back when it started, I don't know the reasoning for it, but now it is said it is because of "historical racism". And that on top of admonitions about using the wrong words with reference to other races, constant admonitions, were issued to whites, but not to non-whites. 60 years and no resolution in sight. You'd think after such a long time it would dawn on both those paying and those receiving that transfers such as this are more punitive than remedial, and serve only to encase in stone whatever hateful sentiments that continue to justify it. Now, those transfers are an expression of the hostility of the state towards its citizens. |
| Posted by: badanov 2014-12-23 20:54 |
| #26 I already pay reparations: FICA, FED taxes, State and local, Property, Sales, Utility.... and I owe part of 18 trillion that went to others. If you are trying to bring people together the notion of having one person pay (who did not enslave anyone) to another (who was not enslaved) is the worst possible idea ever. Does anyone think John Roberts understand this concept? |
| Posted by: airandee 2014-12-23 20:35 |
| #25 2 branches of my family. One got off the boat and bled while liberating the slaves, the other came here leaving everything except family behind, to escape the Nazis in Budapest just prior to WW2. And every generation of us on both sides has served in the military since we got off our respective boats. I figure I owe them nothing. Lets see them justify that. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2014-12-23 18:43 |
| #24 Do NOT mistake "Catholic Charities" yoyo's like these for the Catholic Church. These are usually Social Justice Warriors who wrap themselves in the appearance of Catholicism without taking any of the substance (faith, sin, forgiveness, the Trinity, transubstantiation, the 7 Sacraments, strict Pro-Life, no gay "marriage" etc). Mention any of those and the official stance of the Catholic Church and they run screaming. This guy is no more likely a genuine faithful practicing Catholic than is any random Berkeley protestor or ISIS footsoldier. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2014-12-23 18:40 |
| #23 John Palchak is director of the local Catholic Charities Ah, another reason for me to be glad I left the church. There seems to be a new one every day. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2014-12-23 17:28 |
| #22 The Founding Fathers knew the cultural gulf was too wide, hence the creation of Liberia and the hope of return. Cheap labor is never cheap, and it's not just cotton, it's gold, diamonds, farming and domestic help as well. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2014-12-23 13:33 |
| #21 On a Bumper Sticker seen in the Western part of Maryland, far from the PC center: : "If I'd have known it was going to be this much trouble, I'd have picked the cotton myself!" |
| Posted by: Jeatle Scourge of the Sith7082 2014-12-23 13:23 |
| #20 I'd be happy to pay reparations and even throw in a one way air ticket in exchange for the passport and birth certificate. |
| Posted by: Vespasian Oppressor of the Visigoths8235 2014-12-23 12:57 |
| #19 Reparations have been taking place since the inception of The Great Society in the 60's. No matter how full the trough, it will never be enough. Maybe an offer of $100k cash for a one-way to Liberia would solve a number of current and future problems. |
| Posted by: Hupineger Glomomp7489 2014-12-23 12:20 |
| #18 Do we get a credit for Al Sharpton's unpaid taxes? |
| Posted by: Matt 2014-12-23 12:14 |
| #17 You came to the promised land entirely build by highly skilled cotton pickers and brick makers, you still gotta pay. Sure, I'll pay. In base metals propelled by chemical reaction. Just waiting for the balloon to go up, like a lot of people. |
| Posted by: Woozle Scourge of the Wee Folk4194 2014-12-23 11:25 |
| #16 #13 My great great grand pappy came over on a boat, after the CW-1 mess was settled. Weren't none of our business. Posted by: Woozle Scourge of the Wee Folk4194 || 12/23/2014 10:43 Comments || Top|| You came to the promised land entirely build by highly skilled cotton pickers and brick makers, you still gotta pay. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2014-12-23 11:17 |
| #15 I also noticed there are no racists that hate whites. HMMM, the struggle to destroy the this nation continues... |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2014-12-23 11:01 |
| #14 A question I've long had about reparations: who should be eligible? For example, Obama's father is from Kenya. His ancestors were never slaves of Americans. Should he be eligible? How about someone who immigrated to the US any time after 1865? |
| Posted by: Rambler in Virginia 2014-12-23 10:55 |
| #13 My great great grand pappy came over on a boat, after the CW-1 mess was settled. Weren't none of our business. |
| Posted by: Woozle Scourge of the Wee Folk4194 2014-12-23 10:43 |
| #12 Perhaps the reparations could be credited against the Great Society trillions wasted? When will that balance due get paid? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2014-12-23 10:14 |
| #11 Pretty much, but on too small a scale to wash our souls free of your great great grandpappys sins. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2014-12-23 10:03 |
| #10 Wasn't the whole Pigford nonsense nothing but a hidden reparations scheme? |
| Posted by: Woozle Scourge of the Wee Folk4194 2014-12-23 09:11 |
| #9 Alan, I do believe Reverend Wright had some choice words for Italians. I suspect he hated them for being too pale, though. By "olive" I suspect they mean Middle Eastern. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2014-12-23 08:32 |
| #8 "Olive" skinned?? Who hates the Italians? One of the first lessons taught in my Econ 101 course was that if you gave everyone in the city the same amount of money, by the end of the week some would be rich and some would be broke. In this scenario who would be which? |
| Posted by: AlanC 2014-12-23 07:38 |
| #7 In2014, there are people in America who hate their brown-, black-, red- and olive-skinned neighbors. Notice the absence of 'yellow'. That's right. Asians the new "Whites". That embarrassing color in the Left's rainbow of selling racism. People actively discriminated against for nearly a hundred years (can you say Chinatown, internment), that today are denied equal opportunity in those hot beds of progressivism, academia. Too many successful gifted and over qualified who are turned away for unqualified members of the special interest oligarchy (aka diversity in Newspeak). |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2014-12-23 07:23 |
| #6 Reparations -- Danegeld -- would make it worse. It would be an admission that blacks simply aren't as capable, that they're children who need to be carried. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2014-12-23 06:32 |
| #5 IMO the fundamental problem in modern Western societies is that where are too many white collar jobs. And every moron who doesn't work with his/her hands considers him/her self an intellectual. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2014-12-23 03:13 |
| #4 While we are in FIFY Mode: In 2014, there are people in America who hate their white-, brown-, black-, red- and olive-skinned neighbors. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2014-12-23 02:10 |
| #3 From a Cost–benefit analysis (CBA) aspect, the author's single, one-time buy out scheme is actuarially unsound. The rolling entitlement and welfare programmes currently in place provide a much greater long-term return. Statistic show that large, single payment options tend to simply be squandered. Besides, pissing it all away in small increments is much less painful. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2014-12-23 01:22 |
| #2 one white that works and one black that suffers A rather damming admission. Black society needs whites to make it work. |
| Posted by: phil_b 2014-12-23 01:20 |
| #1 In a single year, the current occupant of the White House nets over twice the author's suggested compensatory award. All of that money does not appear to have done a thing to belay his racism and hate. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2014-12-23 00:27 |