If that is how you interpret that then I cannot see where any response would be worth typing (and short winded I ain’t), so take it however it pleases you.
And again, would you really mortgage the future (for that is exactly what you’re doing) to pay for past mistakes that (again and again a thousand times) can’t be fixed?
And as bad as the bailouts are, properly managed we might eventually recoup at least a large percentage of the money. It’s not “down a rathole”.
What would be the benefit to the nation of reparations? That’s not a rhetorical question.
We also do not permit name-calling in this forum. The poster to whom you reponded noted that he had been taught racism, not that he had embraced it, so you have no basis on which to claim he is an “admitted” racist. The claim, “once a racist always a racist” is breathtaking in its illogic and is clearly wrong, so it is ill advised to use it as an argument when engaged in name-calling.
Leaping to a conclusion that a poster who wishes that you, personally, would refrain from posting intemperate and poorly thought out threads in Great Debates is actually calling for the deaths of an entire group of people, (particularly when there is no way for him to have known what perceived race you might be), is without any basis in reason or fact.
Settle down. Do not repeat this behavior.
(Your final sentence presumes facts and attitudes not in evidence and is little more than inflammatory rhetoric–and, in this case, is also a bit silly. You would be well advised to avoid this sort of rhetoric as well.)
[ /Moderating ]
I did not benefit from Jim Crow nor do I know anyone who did. Those who did are, for the most part, dead now as are those, for the most part, who were deprived of whatever they were deprived of. Why should the living be forced to pay for perceived damages to the dead?
And we, as a nation, DO NOT have the ability to pull together billions to bail out banks; IF we are to actually provide those billions to bail out banks, we will certainly have to borrow those billions. And just to make make my position clear, your statement that the banks in question didn’t suffer damages from Jim Crow is as senseless as any of the senseless statements posted in this thread, including mine as well as yours, the OP’s, and all the others; there is no debate to be found in this thread and the sooner the moderators shut the idiotic thing down, the better.
Mistakes can be fixed by not making the same mistake. When you say or do some dumb shit to your significant other or your family do you keep doing it?
Money spent always goes back into the economy which is a desired result…now the trickle down effect…we already know that that doesn’t work.
Easy Phil, I sped right past your smiley face whatever those things are called and made a (small) mountain out of a mole hill. I was intemperate and I apologize for taking offense where none was intended.
That’s like saying white people don’t benefit from discrimenation, kind of silly don’t you think?
The net result is that the billions will be given/loaned/ or whatever you want to call it to some enitity, it doesn’t matter where it comes from.
Lastly, why is it senseless? Is it not true?
Agreed. This isn’t up for debate. The Jim Crow Laws are repealed. Real discrimination can be pursued legally now. We’re not repeating the same mistakes.
‘Miss, we’re ready to leave, can we please have our relevance check?’
I think Reaganomics and it’s trillion dollar national debt can be safely discounted as a great economic system. Last year we all got stimulus checks (or most of us anyway)- how’d that work in fixing the economy? Hint: all indicators [unemployment rate, inflation, etc.] would indicate we’re worse off now than we were then. As far as pumping billions into the economy, well… I think you must have missed some recent news stories, cause that’s kind of what we’re doing now on a ridiculous scale.
So again, how would throwing billions we don’t have at the 1950s fix them?
I can think of MANY ways that it would make the situation much worse:
1- We don’t have the money, we’d have to borrow it. Unsecured debt is NEVER a good idea when it can possibly be avoided and when you’re already in debt up to your eyeballs that statement is exponentially more true and demonstrable.
2- It would worsen race relations like you can’t imagine. I’m not saying it’s right (though I will say it’s understandable), but it would cause a resentment the likes of which haven’t been encountered since the height of integration.
3- It would- and I realize I’ve said this repeatedly but that’s because it’s the very heart of the argument- it wouldn’t remedy a thing about the Jim Crow era. Not one hate crime would be undone, not one missed opportunity would be fulfilled. Nothing.
4- The USA has already done far more to acknowledge and redress its past wrongs than any nation in the history of the world. To minimize what has been done or to say “we’re not there yet” (then get moving, son) is ridiculous.
5- The precedent set would open floodgates for everybody who has ever been a victim of anything, no matter how long ago, or everybody who is the child or grandchild of a victim, to come running.
6- On the list of people who have legitimate grievances against the USA, black people are not quite as high up the list as you seem to think. Cambodians, Chileans, Iraqi civilians, the Vietnamese, the Natives… all way ahead of you. Watts never had napalm dropped on it. Would you like your taxes increased to see their just as just calls for reparations (for far more recent actions) met?
7- It would take money away from social programs that could and would benefit everybody: oil independence, mass transportation, healthcare reform, education (God education, our system is an underfunded disgrace), government grants for scientific research and museums and the arts (I mention these because they’re always first hit), you name it. This money doesn’t appear just because the U.S. Mint can print it.
8- As America goes, so goes the western world and most of the eastern. Our economy is already in a very very very very very bad place. We need less expenditures, not more. To not heed this could result in worldwide catastrophe, and tens of billions of dollars is not a wafer thin mint to begin with.
The only advantage I can think of would be to the children of people who get a lot of money that they can blow on shit they don’t need. That’s not a racist statement but statistically true: most people of all colors and ages who come into windfalls when they’re not used to large sums handle them poorly. To quote John Lennon when asked why he wouldn’t reunite with the Beatles to raise tens of millions for world hunger, “They eat that meal and two days later they’re hungry again.”
I attempted to apologize for my comments regarding banks and money for bailouts; if you want to to ignore my apology, so be it.
My comment that your statement was (as) senseless as this entire thread has been stands; I did say that my own comments were as senseless as all the rest.
Your particular comment is senseless because reparations ain’t gonna happen and you know it as well as I. At the very least, you should know it if you have any common sense at all. Therefore, railing about reparations is, in fact, senseless.
I’m done with this senseless thread and will not respond with senseless answers to any further senseless questions or comments.
I’ll join you. I’ll buy you a drink in the IMHO bar.
I’ve always wanted to share a drink and some conversation with you. Thanks for the invitation.
That is incorrect. I was arguing specifically against your suggestion that reparations should be a punitive measure, not against the use of reparations as compensation.
If you’re wanting to compensate the victims for their loss, you give them money. If you want to punish the people responsible, you punish the people responsible, not everyone else who happens to live in the same country.
It’s not about you or any other taxpayer. It’s about the federal government. It’s about government’s inability, unintentional or otherwise, to prevent other States in the Union from discriminating against other American citizens because the color of their skin. The federal government isn’t a mirage of taxpayer dollars, it’s an institution that has remained solvent since the Civil War and outrages committed by that institution shouldn’t swept under the rug because the elected officials that comprise it have changed hands.
I agree with the the original poster in that there should be reparations for Jim Crow who are still living. I also agree with another poster that it’ll never happen in America. It’s because the unsaid, but certainly not unfelt, stance of the federal government on this issue is that blacks should “Go Forth And Be Equal and Stop Whining About The Past Boo-Boos”.
- Honesty
For all those claiming they didn’t benefit from Jim Crow, do you deny that people were harmed and disadvantaged from this institution? If there wasn’t a benefit to oppressing blacks, then why did it continue for so long?
I hate having to go back to Germany, but who was advantaged by the Holocaust? Was Johannes Six Pack directly benefited by the murder of 6 million Jews? Who was benefited by the Japanese being interned? I certainly didn’t reap riches, and yet like a good citizen my taxes went to them when we were asked to pony up.
I haven’t benefited from China’s money in any appreciable way, but you bet I’ll be asked to pay my share in paying down the doubt. As will my imaginary children and grandchildren…and great-grandchildren.
So obviously all this crying and whining about benefit and advantage is a red herring. Seriously, ya’ll. Ya’ll have to do better than this.
Paying down the debt, not doubt. One day I will be able to write.
Paying reparations doesn’t hurt everybody, it helps everybody. It helps the people that were wronged and it helps the rest of the society see that the government is just.
Were race relations damaged after we gave reparations to the interned Japanese?
You know when race relations were at their crappiest? Right after Emancipation. Does that mean Emancipation was a bad thing? Come on, I know you know the answer.
Do you not realize how arrogant this argument is? “Listen up, black people. We know you have a legitimate case for reparations. But we aren’t going to give you any compensation, because you’ll just spend it on candy and playpretties. And you can trust us, since we’ve always had your best interest at heart. We being the same government that screwed you and your ancestors over for generations!”
For the quadrillionth time, reparations wouldn’t be issued to fix anything. By repeatedly beating this tired drum, you only convince me that you don’t really know what reparations are, in a legal sense.
Not true. Look at gay folks. It’s legal to discriminate against them in the workplace and they can’t get married. Are they living in Jim Crow? No. But we haven’t come as far as we’d like to. Perhaps reparations for civil rights injustices is exactly what we need to be better. Hitting people in the pocket book is more effective than soft-spoken platitudes.
We just forked over hundreds of billions of dollars, Sampiro. Don’t we spend a billion dollars a month in Iraq, or something close to it? Last time I checked, we hadn’t all starved to death.
That aside, this is not a good argument. If someone is owed money, they are owed money. Even if the debtor is flat broke. One day the debtor will not be flat broke and they will be able to pay. Our economy won’t be terrifying for long.
Again, how arrogant of you! This may be true, but just as likely someone might want to establish a trust for their grandchildren. Or buy him or herself a diamond ring. Why should you get to dictate what someone does with their own money? It’s their money.
It’s unfair to make people who are against the war pay for it.
It’s unfair for childless people to fund public schools.
It’s unfair for people who are against abortion to pay for hospitals that perform them.
It’s unfair for people who immigrated here yesterday to pay taxes for activities that occurred last year.
It’s unfair for people to pay the salaries of public officials that they did not vote for.
Unless you plan to make taxes fair for everyone and all situations, this argument is weak.
Say it with me: REPARATIONS AREN’T AN ATONEMENT.
Individuals–regardless of race, socioeconomic background, gender, or creed-- who can show they were denied the protection and benefits of their government should have every right to take their government to court. That doesn’t mean that every individual will have a good case to make. IT doesn’t mean every one of them will get a million dollars. But everyone should be entitled to do so.
Groups of individuals should also have the right to do this. If a class-action lawsuit was brought against the state of VA on behalf of the victims of Jim Crow, I would applaud this exertion of civil rights, even though 1) my own tax dollars would be at stake and 2)I wouldn’t be getting any money. If it was poor whites who brought the suit, I’d be equally happy. The same with white women. I wouldn’t begrudge others the right to sue the government anymore than I would begrudge them the right to sue their next door neighbor. It frightens me that others don’t share this view.
Do you have this same philosophy for your own debts? Can you just call up Visa and tell them, “Let’s just focus on the future, my friend”? Would Visa be justified in suing your ass?
There are people who benefited from Jim Crow who weren’t alive during that period, so I don’t see why it would be so unreasonable to provide compensation to the heirs of the victims of this institution. Jim Crow wasn’t horrible just because it impacted individuals. It held entire families back. So why should families NOT benefit from compensatory efforts?
Actually, no it’s not. When we drop bombs on civilians in Iraq, we give them compensation. Widows get compensation, as do the parents of killed children.
You can sue the government for a lot less than bombing your house and stealing your money. And you can be compensated.
Effective for what? It’s not effective for fixing world hunger, but that’s not the goal behind reparations. Are you saying that because the amount was so paltry, it was meaningless? One million dollars is too much but $20,000 is too little? So why don’t we take the average and call it a day then. 
Note that I’m pretty ambivalent about AA, but I don’t agree that it counts as reparations. To use another analogy, it’s like if the government had stolen your business from you and then, instead of compensating you for it, pointed you to a special program providing low-interest small business loans. Or if the government had stolen your car but instead of buying you another one, it gave you some bus tokens. Black people as a group have benefited from AA, but that provides little consolation to a wronged individual. AA also benefits other folks besides African Americans…it is not a “black” program. The same with other social welfare programs. A poor black person may take advantage of welfare, but what about someone’s who rich and yet was still financially harmed by the government. Do they not deserve compensation?
I agree that the logistics aren’t trivial. But most of the arguments being brought up in this thread are not compelling and appeal more to emotion than reason.
You know how sometimes a store manager will accept an expired coupon, or grant a return without a receipt, etc., just to get rid of a screeching, irate customer?
I’ve got $100 I’m more than happy to donate to the fund, provided I never again have to hear another bullshit word about fuckin’ reparations.
Very true.
Both sides.