Sorry, that was a counter to your slam that I didn’t know history. I take back the accusation
It’s not just that I agree with Sowell; it’s that he’s right.
Seriously, Sowell has written knowledgably on a remarkable variety of subjects. If more white and black people were familiar with the achievements of Sowell and others, there would be less racism. Imagine what it would be like if the normal instinctive reaction to meeting a black person were, “This person is apt to be unusually wise.”
I am not objecting to a slavery museum, but to a slavery memorial. A slavery memorial would encourage a reaction to a black person, “I should take pity on this person. His ancestors suffered a horrible fate.”
Sowell has argued that a reaction of respect is better than a reaction of pity. And, the difference in one’s own reaction is even more important than the reaction of others. Self-respect sure beats self pity.
Stuffy, you are correct that I am equating the memorial as some kind of apology. That’s how I think it would turn out. A museum would be different, in that it would communicate the nature of slavery. A memorial merely reminds us that it occurred.
The implicit demand for apology would be racially divisive. As I see it, there’s no more reason for me to apologize for slavery than for you to apologize for slavery. We are not our ancestors. Neither of us ever kept slaves. Neither of us ever was a slave.
However, some black people may think I do owe them an apology. I think a slavery memorial would be used to encourage such feelings. That difference in POV would lead to worse race relations. A slavery momorial might help some black people feel morally superior or more deserving, but at a cost of making their actual lives worse.
I generally like Sowell, although I think his points in this particular case are pretty weak. Monstro did a pretty good job of pointing out the fallacy of his arguments. Slavery was a horrible thing and there should be a memorial to its victims just as there should be a memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. Do we say that a memorial to the Holocaust would perpetuate victimhood in Jewish people? If not, then why would a slavery memorial perpetuate victimhood in black people?
The only problem I would have would be a site on the Mall. We need to be careful that we don’t clutter it, but if the exact site is right and the architecture is well done and it doesn’t detract from existing monuments, then why not?
Most of the time Sowell is on target. But not this time.
Step right up to the Freak Show, ladies and gentleman! We got yer Bearded Lady. We got yer Wolfman. We got yer two-headed cow. And if that wasn’t freaky enough, we got yer Black Intellectual! He’s so smart you won’t believe he’s a genuine nigra! He’s got the giant penis to prove it!
Our black intellectuals so special and rare that they deserve their own museum? And just who would we commemorate in the December Museum of Smart Black People? Will Angela Davis and Brother Malcolm be up in there? How about Huey P. Newton? Why do I get the feeling that Stanley Crouch’s ugly mug would be plastered all over the place?
december, this is kind of an absurd question. If not for slavery, there wouldn’t have been millions upon millions of African blacks in the United States (who were regarded as less than human) in the first place. It was deep and widespread racism - as prevalent in the North as in the South - that allowed for slavery to take place, and the same racism gave rise to Jim Crow, the KKK, and any other terrible things.
Does it help Jewish people today to focus on the horrors of the Holocaust? “Come on, you guys, quit living in the past! Get with the program here!” :rolleyes:
Have you got anything particular to base this on, astorian, or is it just your personal assumptions? I’ve been to that museum - and others - and never seen or observed any such response.
Do you have anything to base this on, either? I don’t know if there’s an accepted estimate of how many slaves died on the Middle Passage, but surely somebody’s made one.
If true, these people are obviously crazy and should therefore be ignored. I know many black people want an apology from the federal government, which is mighty different than asking one from individual people like yourself.
According to your logic, Americans are apologizing to the Jews every time one steps into the Nat’l Holocaust Museum. Why should Americans apologize for the Holocaust? Most of us weren’t even alive when it happened, let alone from the country where it took place. Why was American money and land used to apologize to a group of people who weren’t even Americans during the Holocaust? According to your logic, december, I should be feeling guilty about the oppression of your people simply because there’s a museum in Washington D.C.
It’s a stupid argument, don’t you see?
Everything that black people do collectively will make race relations worse, december. You might as well say it: black people are the victims of racism because they deserve it. How else are we supposed to interpret this statement:
So in order to be treated fairly and decently, I need to be like Sowell. That means I have to believe a slavery memorial will make things worse, rather than better, in this society. Well, I guess I’ll just have to risk being labeled an “uppity negro” then, cuz that ain’t happening. Sowell may be your “good negro” but he ain’t mine.
I know I keep beating this horse, but do you feel morally superior, as a Jew, because you have the Nat’l Holocaust Museum? Do you think the saying “Never forget” is a slogan built on moral superiority?
The fact that you have lower expectations of human decency for black people than you do for Jews and everyone else makes me think that you of all people need a slavery memorial the most, december.
I know the poster lives on Vancouver Island, but this may just show why we need a museum here.
Sorry, but you couldn’t be more wrong, grienspace. We’ll ignore for a moment that slavery had to be practiced in the North before it could be outlawed. The reason there was slavery in the South and never nearly as much in the North was just an economic one. Farms in the North tended to be family-run and fairly small. In the South’s warmer climates, you could grow cash crops like cotton and tobacco on a massive scale, and some rich planters did. Principles didn’t come into the issue until a good deal later. Abolitionists were a minority in the North. Most people, though they generally disliked slavery, didn’t think it was such a big deal.
There were few people who really regarded blacks and whites as equal human beings. If you read Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, you’ll find that while she argues vehemently against slavery, her attitude towards the slaves is extremely condescending and racist.
In any case, slavery was a major legal issue. For decades, it determined how territories became American states. States were admitted in pairs (one slave state and one ‘free’ state) for years - it was the only way to preserve an even split and preventing one side from breaking the deadlock. Look up the Missouri Compromise and the Kansas-Nebraska act.
Ever heard of the Fugitive Slave Act? That one is REALLY worth knowing (and it motivated Stowe to write Uncle Tom’s Cabin. This particular federal law made it a crime to assist a runaway slave - even if you lived in a state where slavery was illegal - and actively required citizens to help in the search for a runaway slave if they could. This went for the entire country, and of course, it obviously was passed by the House and Senate, gathering votes from the North as well. It was a compromise/bone thrown to the South. What does this say about the regard given to black people throughout the country?
The United States government - which, as mentioned earlier, prides itself on its great democratic tradition - went to absurd lengths on the issue. For example, there was the issue of how slaves should count toward the population. Southern politicians were concerned that their states would be underrepresented in the House of Representatives because the whites were so greatly outnumbered by the slave blacks. They wanted them to count even though they didn’t consider them real people. Eventually, they made the almost comical compromise of deciding that each slave counted as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of representation. Sheer absurdity.
At this time, anyway, as the US was growing, the South was not “a small region.” It was half the country. Fewer in terms of population, perhaps, but half the states, and the number of slaves was huge. It was certainly many millions, and who knows how many died in transit. Slavery existed in the New World before the United States did, in fact. It lasted over 300 years on the continent in total.
The country was so divided that when Lincoln was elected President in 1860, he wasn’t even on the ballot in the slaveholding states. You can still find north/south resentment in the US in places.
It also, uh, helped lead to the Civil War that killed more Americans than any other war, ever.
And all that makes no mention of how hard life for blacks in America was after slavery. Martin Luther King Jr. didn’t come around for almost 100 years after slavery was abolished, that should tell you something.
I’m sorry for using all this space, but grienspace, your comment makes it sound like slavery was an isolated incident, or not a big deal, in America. And that couldn’t be further from the truth.
If you ever meet a black person who thinks that white people individually need to apologize for slavery, let me know. Until then, I’m going to continue thinking you’re talking out your ass on this point.
Congrats, december. You just reduced this to a purely semantical issue: memorial bad, museum good. You could’ve just said that in your first post and saved us all a lot of time. :rolleyes:
No, because too many people think they are. And not just white people.
A few years ago, I flew back from London seated next to a young black banker, who had a Stanford MBA IIRC (or else a Masters in Industrial Engineering.) During the conversation he mentioned that he was particularly interested in black contributions. He said his MBA training might have included a field a mathematics called Dynamic Progamming. Yet, he was surprised when I told him its co-creator, David Blackwell, was black.
I think it would be beneficial to give more attention to high achievers like David Blackwell and Thomas Sowell and less attention to race hustlers like Louis Farrakhan and Jesse Jackson.
It’s different, but there’s a degree of similarity. Consider those who want reparations, meaning money that does come from individual people. Or, preferences for black people over non-black people.
Yes I do, and it offends some people. Since the Holocaust, an amazing number of other horrendous cases where millions were murdered have either occurred or come to light. E.g., Pol Pot in Cambodia. Rwanda. Stalin’s atrocities became known. Mao’s Great Leap Forward in which tens of millions of Chinese died of hunger. The coming starvation in Zimbabwe. Sudan.
The Holocaust Museum and the slogan “Never Forget” can reasonably be seen as way of saying that the death of millions of Jews was a worse atrocity than the death of millions of non-Jews, a POV that naturally offends some people.
Marley23, you ask, “Does it help Jewish people today to focus on the horrors of the Holocaust?” I don’t think it does. I didn’t focus on the Holocaust when my children were growing up. I focused on things like practicing the piano and doing homework. That’s what my parents focused on when I was growing up, even though the Holocaust had just become known.
You should want to know, if you’re concerned about bigotry.
december ignored my previous post completely. But, anyway, I labor on.
Folks, here is the truth: This is not a OP about the slave memorial. This is one of the few recurring themes in december’s mind. The concept:
Blacks were once mistreated. They fought non-violently against the establishment and earned their rights. Now they are equal. Any scheme or program that now tries to give them a helping hand is “special treatment”. It is “reverse racism”. Any recognition of their past is divisive. Everything is fine now, everything is fine… (fade away)
Everything is fabulous after the Civil Rights movement. Anybody claiming s/he were denied opportunities due to their race is trying to deceive the now equitable and fair system. A Black history month is divisive favoritism. Modern-day blacks are breeding in the cesspool run by Jesse Jacksons. They are sucking the society dry. Black single mothers are welfare queens whose nails need polishing every 8 hours. Whites are discriminated against, cannot find university admissions anywhere, are vastly unemployed…
And, good-minded Republicans wonder why blacks still don’t find the party attractive.
N.B: I am also convinced that the Democrats are not heros. They are doing exactly what the Republicans are doing, i.e., maintaining their voting base for political reasons.
If you want to people to believe that you do know history, you should probably refrain from posting things such as
In which the massive errors in assumption regarding the type of slavery practiced in each location and the mechanisms used to maintain slavery in each of those respective (and quite different) locations indicates a substantive failure to understand what all the fuss is about regarding the peculiar institution of slavery in the U.S.
I agree with you, but I think you missed my point. You asked if it was helpful for black people to be more focused on the horrors of slavery. I was saying that you can make that argument against any museum, memorial or tribute. There IS a value to commemorating the past, even tragedies. What is it? Learning from history, which I think is a necessary and immense value.
I happen to have a whole set of wide and - from what I gather - unusual opinions about the way the Holocaust is taught to Jewish children. I won’t go into them here. I think a degree of victimhood IS encouraged. But I think you’re failing to draw a line between teaching people about the past and teaching people to be victims. They’re not synonymous, and I think for you to presume to know what will happen if such a memorial is created is folly. It’s in the execution that these differences are made.
I don’t necessarily agree with you about the slogan itself, december, but in the nature of calling 'em like I see 'em, I think that you’re correct that this attitude exists, and it’s a stupid one. Millions of others (Communists, gypsies, dissidents) were murdered in the Holocaust as well, but you’d never know it to hear some people talk.
Sudan’s slavery is being pretty much ignored right now.
Focus on the Holocaust didn’t make us pay attention to the other mass murders mentioned in an earlier post.
There’s lots of focus on slavery right now, particularly with the reparations controversy. But, Americans nevertheless ignore slavery in Sudan.
Actually, you’re wrong.
It’s because everything isn’t fine that we should take steps that truly will make things better. In my opinion, the most urgent step is to education work better. But, that’s difficult to do. It’s a lot easier to just build a symbolic memorial somewhere.
Fair enough. One can hope that a Slavery Memorial wouldn’t have such an effect. Nobody knows for sure until after the fact.
There’s a difference between things that exist as opposed to things that we approve of. I wish racial stereotypes and racial prejudice didn’t exist, but they do. By addressing what the prejudices and stereotypes are, I do not mean to justify them. I’m merely acknowledging their unfortunate importance.
I’m sure you disapprove of racial prejudice too. But, simply disapproving of it isn’t enough to end it. In order to fight something effectively, it helps if one understands it.
Ya’ know, I think december’s distinction IS more than semantic. The question of museum vs. memorial is an important one.
If I could summarize what I think december is trying to say in a few short lines, it might be this:
A museum dedicated to slavery is capable of nuance, of an in-depth exploration of the institution designed to provoke people to think about the problem and its considerable aftershocks. A memorial, on the other hand, is by its nature going to be a blunter instrument, designed–as memorials always are–to elicit a predominantly emotional response. Depending upon its design, a memorial might provoke feelings of anger, guilt, or sadness, but not the kind of complicated reaction that one might have to a museum.
A thing that provokes an uncomplicated emotional response can be a positive thing, of course, but december seems to be arguing–and I agree with him–that in this case, such a response would be divisive. A museum, a more in-depth consideration of slavery, would almost certainly be more helpful in the long term. It’s not an inconsequential or semantic difference; it’s a real one, with the potential to have either positive or negative impact on race relations.
December, if I’m mischaracterizing your views, please let me know. I’m new at this.
I don’t think december wants a slavery museum, or he would have so said at the get-go.
A slavery museum would be no different than a slavery memorial in regards to the points that december keeps belaboring.
A memorial, according to december, would be make white folks feel guilty. Why wouldn’t a museum do the same thing?
A memorial, according to december, would make black people feel morally superior to everyone. Wouldn’t a museum, which is even more of a production, do the same thing?
A memorial would make black people not want to look to the future. It would keep them “back in the past”. Why wouldn’t a museum do the same thing?
A memorial would be racially divisive and cause the white folks’ backs to lash. Why wouldn’t a museum do the same thing?
Perhaps if he himself would explain how a museum is different than a memorial, I wouldn’t be so suspicious of his all-of-the-sudden sincerity. I have a feeling, though, he has to call up his pal Sowell before he will do this.
A museum has information, exhibits, pictures, audio-visuals, and physical exhibits. A museum in South Chicago even has an actual Nazi submarine in the basement. A museum informs the mind. It educates.
A memorial merely reminds us that something happened. E.g., the dramatic Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall doesn’t show pictures of the war. It doesn’t give the political background. It doesn’t explain the pro’s and con’s of the war, nor does it address the anti-war movement. It doesn’t educate us on how the Vietnamese people lived or what the impact of the war was on them. It doesn’t address how the Communist government works. It doesn’t address nature of the weapons or the types of battles that were fought. It doesn’t mention Lt. Calley and various atrocities. (One reason for its popularity is that it sidesteps these controversial matters IMHO.)
The OP wasn’t about a museum. There is no proposal in Congress for a slavery museum AFAIK. The OP was about a memorial, because that’s what’s being considered.
I agree with your other points, monstro. I think a museum devoted just to slavery would be somewhat racially divisive. However, it would be far better than a memorial, because a museum would also educate and inform people.
BTW the full name of the “Holocaust Memorial” is the “Holocaust Memorial Museum.” It is indeed a large museum, not just a memorial.
So, (1) holocaust memorials are to be viewed as either useful or useless depending on how many new mass murderers emerge?
Or, (2) are you saying the very focus on such distracts us from the new mass murderers?
Eitherways you are wrong. A memorial does not have to justify its existence by how much the world has improved. Why can’t you simply take it as remembering the losses and sacrifices of the dead? I don’t think it has the power per se to stop another Hitler.
Re: (2), the notion is ridiculously laughable. I can see no proof that building a slave memorial causes Sudan’s slavery problem to be ignored. I’d like more than your belief.
Oh, and nice try bringing in the slave reparations issue. Just to remind you, that is not what the OP is about.
