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| -Great Cultural Revolution | |
| America's First Black Billionaire Wants His Reparations Check, Now | |
| 2021-06-30 | |
Robert L. Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television and America’s first Black billionaire, wants a check. He wants it from the government. And he wants it to come with an apology for slavery, Jim Crow, and hundreds of years of racism. The 75-year-old media magnate owns several homes, heads an asset management firm, and was the first Black person to own a majority stake in an NBA team. He doubts that check will ever come, but he sees a new kind of reparations—being called by a different name so as not be “divisive” or “controversial”—happening already. The new “reparations” is critical race theory education, it’s the housing grant program in Evanston, Illinois, it’s the $5 billion of targeted support and debt relief for Black farmers, and it’s the $50 billion in corporate pledges in the wake of George Floyd’s murder dedicated to combating systemic racism and inequality. (Even though just $250 million, or 0.5%, has actually materialized so far.) “That’s what’s happening to the reparations—it’s been cut up into small pieces of things that look and feel like, ‘We want to end systemic racism, we want to end police brutality and shootings and to provide financing to Black small business owners,’” Johnson tells VICE News. “And then people can say, ‘Well, we really don’t need reparations because when you put all of these things together, it’s reparations. It’s just not one big bill or asking this country to stand up and apologize, and you’re not asking people to pay out of their paychecks.” But that’s the problem, Johnson says. He calls the current approach “placebo paternalism.” “Reparations had two components: The first was atonement, and the other was monetary,” he adds. “With no doubt whatsoever, it was supposed to come from the government representing the people of the country. It was reimbursement, or recompense if you will, for the harm.” The fight for reparations has evolved significantly since The Atlantic published Ta-Nehisi Coates’ “The Case for Reparations” in 2014. It has grown from a struggle to raise awareness and build sympathy for the cause, to a campaign that seeks to calculate exactly what is owed and how it should be distributed and demand full payment. Andre Perry, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, is leading a research project that will quantify the economic harm caused by slavery and its centuries-long legacy of racism. He views the recent compensatory actions more as steps in the right direction toward a government reparations program than a substitute for or a diversion from one. “The injury around racism occurred at federal, state, and local levels as well as other institutions—colleges, companies, churches—so each has a responsibility to address past wrongs,” Perry says. “We can’t wait for the federal government to issue reparations. In fact, for me, reparations won’t come from Washington, it’ll go to Washington.” Related: Reparations: 2021-06-24 Biden': 'If you think you need to have weapons to take on the government, you need F-15s and maybe some nuclear weapons.'' Reparations: 2021-06-24 LGBTs of color to charge white LGBTs $50 to attend Pride Parade Reparations: 2021-06-21 Juneteenth Celebrations Around the Nation Marred by Shootings, Death | |
| Posted by:Flainter Omert3830 |
| #15 You miss the point MM: slavery may not be formally legal, but it's not unknown in Saudi |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2021-06-30 16:31 |
| #14 Fine, you get $50k. In return you forfeit all US citizenship, property, holdings, etc ever made here in the US. You get on a plane to Africa with your clothes and your check. That's it. Everything you 'made' here in the racist US is forfeit. |
| Posted by: Silentbrick 2021-06-30 16:13 |
| #13 how many Soodies live in USA? Let Jorge Boosh make their apologies... |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2021-06-30 13:51 |
| #12 And how much have we spent since Johnson's "Great Society" spending programs? Let that go toward the $14T, I bet some are due a refund. |
| Posted by: Spoter B 2021-06-30 12:28 |
| #11 Black Entertainment Television Absolutely no takers west of the pacific as far Africa, and I'll bet none there too. |
| Posted by: Dron66046 2021-06-30 12:13 |
| #10 There is no one alive today in America who is or was a slave holder. Wanna bet (hint, how many Soodies live in USA?)? |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2021-06-30 11:07 |
| #9 The entertainment industry across the board is trash and 90% of the problem, and itself seems to be full of sex slaves, especially of the underage kind. Piss off. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2021-06-30 11:04 |
| #8 There is no one alive today in America who is or was a slave holder. There is also no one alive today in America who was or is a slave. |
| Posted by: warthogswife 2021-06-30 10:47 |
| #7 And he wants it to come with an apology for slavery I'll arrange for the slaveholders to make that apology to you personally; maybe a seance would do it... |
| Posted by: Raj 2021-06-30 09:29 |
| #6 /\ Lyndon Johnson knew exactly what it would take to solidify the vote. No need in posting his historic quote. We all know what the SOB said and what political party he represented. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2021-06-30 08:04 |
| #5 We have been paying reparations ever since Lyndon Johnson's New Society in the nineteen sixties. An unexpected consequence, as Johnson damn-well knows, was the destruction of the Black family. |
| Posted by: Gerthudion Whomoper3485 2021-06-30 08:00 |
| #4 A billionaire -- who made his money selling ghetto culture -- demands innocent people pay him for a crime he never suffered. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2021-06-30 07:38 |
| #3 Ohferfokssake....bitch & moan, bitch & moan. The utopia of Lilongwe, Malawi awaits you. Hurry, air fares are skyrocketing. Don't forget to write. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2021-06-30 07:28 |
| #2 Millions for repatriation not a penny in reparations |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2021-06-30 07:21 |
| #1 Are these people crazy? Unconscious agents of the (super secret) white supremacist organization? |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2021-06-30 03:35 |