Discussion of Racism

[vison]

Thank you, Jnyusa.

"I am thinking that as this election proceeds, we will find out just how racist America really is."

You can say it, I can't.

[Faramond]

I don't think anyone really said that a few angry sermons are the same as centuries of oppression.

I'm glad to see you around again, Jn. Very good post, though I can't agree with any form of inherited sin, even if you find it astounding that people don't think it exists. The whole concept makes me sad --- it's a sure way to keep divisions between people going for generations with no hope for healing ever.

[Jnyusa]

The whole concept makes me sad --- it's a sure way to keep divisions between people going for generations with no hope for healing ever.

I think it has been very good for the Germans that they were able to pay reparations for the Holocaust. That is what has allowed subsequent generations to shed the guilt of their ancestors. They did everything that could be done to make right the consequences of that event, and it also removes any justification Jews might feel for hating Germans as a group rather than hating those who specifically committed the atrocities. And that is good for the Jews too.

It is interesting for me that the one person in Israeli politics whom I considered the most ... off-base in his contempt for Arabs and for non-Jews in general ... the one who screamed most loudly "Never again" and used that as rationale for every abuse committed against the Arab population of Israel and the territories, was also the one Israeli politician who insisted that Israel should accept no reparations from Germany and should never forgive the German people for what happened under Nazi rule. (It was Menachem Begin.)

There is a ... mental health issue at stake here, I think. The child of the oppressor draws the child of the oppressed into that dialogue of forgiveness by acknowledging that the sin happened, and acknowledging who was the beneficiary of it and who was the victim. It cannot be a dialogue if one side wishes to wipe the slate clean and the other says, "not yet." We can argue against inherited sin, but if the victim still feels harmed, we are not going to talk them out of it by saying, "It wasn't me." It is that, actually, that makes the conflict interminable. Just imo, of course.

Jn

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Well, I don't believe in "inherited sin" either, but I do believe in looking at the full picture in understanding and addressing complicated situations. And just to be clear, I don't really believe that anyone truly thinks that a few angry sermons are the same as centuries of oppression. But it does strike me as odd that the people are expressing such outrage over those few angry sermons don't seem to have the same level of outrage about the (in my opinion) much more serious problem of the continuing tremendous disparate treatment directed at African-Americans in aspects of our society.

[vison]

Right now on Manwë we are discussing the Power of Forgiveness. It isn't a particularly profound thread, but it is apt to this discussion.

The thing is, the sins of the fathers ARE visited upon the children!!! Not by a wrathful god, but by reality. If past crimes are not recognized, not brought out of darkness and if no attempts are made at recompense or reparations, then the hatred and fear never go away. Jnyusa is right. This is what I've been driving at all along, but could not say half so well as she has.

Recompense or reparation does not necessarily mean "money". But money is a symbol of power as much as it is a means of exchange.

[Faramond]

I'm going to leave aside "inherited sin" for moment and just talk about the technical aspects of reparations to oppressed people and their descendants.

What form would reparations take? I was thinking about this the other day, and I just don't see how it would work legally. Do you make a payment to every black person in the country? Who exactly qualifies a person as black? How do you prove it? I was reading the other day about the difficulty of some secular Jews in Israel being able in certain cases to prove they were Jewish so they could get married. The government would have to set up some sort of legal specification for racial classification, and I don't know what it would be.

And how would reparations heal things? The example of the Jews and the Germans is good, but it's also differs in a very important way. After the end of World War II Jews were essentially no longer being oppressed by Germans. It wasn't an ongoing problem, especially in light of the subsequent laws passed in Germany after WWII. Well here in America blacks are still victims of racism by whites even after 1964 and handing out some reparations isn't going to change that. I'm afraid it would make things worse, though I hope I'm wrong about that. I'm not opposed completely to the idea of reparations for Jim Crow laws ( not slavery, too long ago ), but I don't know how much good it would do in the end.

I'll tell you what. When most white people think reparations are a good thing, then it will be likely that current racism will have ended to the extent that reparations could be genuine healing, a kind of closure, the way it mostly did between Germans and Jews, and Japanese-Americans and the American Government.

[vison]

Faramond, that's a good post, and those are good questions. I think your last paragraph is the cincher.

[Faramond]

Well, I don't believe in "inherited sin" either, but I do believe in looking at the full picture in understanding and addressing complicated situations. And just to be clear, I don't really believe that anyone truly thinks that a few angry sermons are the same as centuries of oppression. But it does strike me as odd that the people are expressing such outrage over those few angry sermons don't seem to have the same level of outrage about the (in my opinion) much more serious problem of the continuing tremendous disparate treatment directed at African-Americans in aspects of our society.

Think of how different things would be right now if instead of making over-the-top angry and often flat-out wrong statements in his sermons, Reverend Wright had instead talked about the reality of racism right now in the US. He makes it remarkably easy to just dismiss the whole notion of it because the things he says are so stupid --- it's like they were written as a caricature of a black militant minister by Rush Limbaugh. It's not that anger may not be justified by why not speak the angry truth instead of angry garbage that bears faint resemblance to the truth. I mean the US is pretty far from being colorblind but it sure isn't the KKK of America either.

Of course too much is being made of what he said, and it's staining Obama too much.

[Holbytla]

How many people realize, I wonder, that to receive the so-called social safety net, one must first surrender all of one's assets to the State? Wages and salaries are current income; assets are future income.

raises hand

I'm aware. In fact it happened to my mother and our family. My mother had about 5 acres of land that my grandfather had given her. In order for her to collect Welfare and support us, she had to get rid of the land first. I think she got around $2000 for the whole parcel. Today that land is worth somewhere around a half million dollars.

So for being on Welfare for a year or two to support us while she looked for a job with her 8th grade education, she was stripped of her only chance at any kind of future financial freedom.

I'll leave it up to you guys to explain to her why she needs to make reparations for something she had no part of.

And then you can dig up her Irish grandfather that was oppressed when he came to this country and tell him his children, grand children and great grandchildren have to pay reparations because a different group was/is oppressed.

I don't know about anyone elses world, but in my world I see signs of education and reparation everyday. I see laws about equality being passed and enforced, I attend seminars at work about diversity and respect in the workplace, and I see what my children are taught at home and in school.

No that doesn't settle anything, but we are moving in the right direction. We are taking positive steps. It will probably take generations for the effect to be realized, but it is a start.

The whole process should be a means to an end. Some way to eradicate the bigotry and stop the endless crap. The only thing I can see that will end the perpetual back and forth is education and intolerance for any bigotry. That is the whole point right? To end all bigotry once and for all.

[vison]

Holbytla, it is futile to try to compare the sufferings of our ancestors - because god knows some of my ancestors suffered a lot - to slavery.

Our ancestors were not captured from their homelands, shipped to another continent, and sold like cattle. They just weren't. I had a great-great-grandfather who was a bond servant, about as near to slavery as you can get, but when his term was up, he could enter the community as a free man and prosper as he would. This is not true of those whose ancestors were black slaves in America.

The children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren of slaves were subject to more than a century of discrimination and bigotry after the slaves were freed. In my lifetime Jim Crow laws were common. Not a century ago, in my lifetime. This is not ancient history, this is only yesterday. Racism against black Americans is deeply rooted and those roots spread everywhere. Mr. Wright's words would not be so offensive if they were not so true. That's what's troubling people, not his wilder accusations of AIDS plots, etc., but the common, every day realities.

Your mother, as an individual, will never be asked to make reparations to anyone. Nor will you. It is the larger society that must pay for the sins of the larger society. Surely it will be worth it, in the end? No matter what it is, no matter how it is decided, surely something that promises an end to anger and hate MUST be a good thing? Isn't it worth a try?

I doubt that any real program of monetary recompense could ever be formulated, to be honest. Faramond's post brings up only a few of those problems.

[Holbytla]

Mr. Wright's words would not be so offensive if they were not so true

That begs the question of why Obama felt the need to speak out against what Wright said, remove him from his position in his campaign and distance himself from Wright?

Either Obama disagreed with what Wright said or he is kowtowing to racist America.

You can't legislate away the way people feel. You can't write a check to change the way people feel. The only means to an end is education. The rest is curing symptoms.

[vison]

Mr. Wright's words would not be so offensive if they were not so true

That begs the question of why Obama felt the need to speak out against what Wright said, remove him from his position in his campaign and distance himself from Wright?

Either Obama disagreed with what Wright said or he is kowtowing to racist America.

You can't legislate away the way people feel. You can't write a check to change the way people feel. The only means to an end is education. The rest is curing symptoms.

Much of what he said was true, and Mr. Obama was only distancing himself from the wildeyed stuff. I think we all got that.

You can't legislate the way people feel, no. But decades of "education" have not eradicated racism. Jnyusa's post explains why, in part. It is systemic, it is established, it is even necessary: which is part of what Mr. Wright said.

There's nothing wrong with curing symptoms, anyway. You have to start somewhere.

[Jnyusa]

Think of how different things would be right now if instead of making over-the-top angry and often flat-out wrong statements in his sermons, Reverend Wright had instead talked about the reality of racism right now in the US.

Yes, absolutely.

I haven't read the text of any of Rev. Wright's sermons yet ... have only heard the flap third-hand ... but it is really a misfortune if the issue of racism enters Obama's candidacy by way of inflammatory and inaccurate diatribe. My impression is that Obama himself can do much better than that.

What form would reparations take? I was thinking about this the other day, and I just don't see how it would work legally. Do you make a payment to every black person in the country? Who exactly qualifies a person as black?

Faramond, you have sniffed out my ulterior motive. These kinds of determinations provide employment for thousands of economists.

Seriously, there is always a problem when we try to put monetary value on things that transcend monetary value, like lives lost and families sundered.

One of my colleagues, since retired, was a professional court witness on the valuation of life and lost earnings in liability cases ... you know, how much would this six-year old kid have earned if his legs hadn't been chopped off by a lawn mower. We used to talk about this problem of the 'morality of valuation,' if I may call it that, because we shared an office together for about ten years and it's actually not an uncommon problem in economics. What do our utility companies owe the 50,000 people who died of emphysema because of particulate matter in the air? What does Exxon owe the State of Alaska for the Valdiz smash up? It's obviously not a trivial question because the Exxon case has gone all the way to the Supreme Court.

One thing my colleague used to say is that of course we cannot equate a monetary reparation with the 'value' of the loss, but our courts have decided that money is the way liability will be recompensed in the US. It's not perfect, but how else would you do it? So we attempt to develop defensible methods of valuation, and then we employ them. It's not perfect but it's better than the shrug we would otherwise be able to give.

One starting point, I think, in the case of slavery, would be the legislation that granted 40 acres and a mule to freed slaves. This was only paid to about 10% of the people who qualified. So you look at what should have been paid under law and you start there.

How to administer such a repayment? ... not simple at all, I know. But that it is correct in principle to do so I have no doubt. I can also argue that it would be better for our whole economy, that is, the White economy, to do so because wider distribution of assets is always good for growth.

When most white people think reparations are a good thing, then it will be likely that current racism will have ended to the extent that reparations could be genuine healing ...

Yes, that's probably true, but healing is intended for both parties and I don't think we can say that Blacks should have to wait until Whites feel up to it to receive whatever they might be justly entitled to.

I'll leave it up to you guys to explain to her why she needs to make reparations for something she had no part of.

Holby, if my share of the reparations were as little as one penny, I would still want to put that penny in.

The whole process should be a means to an end. Some way to eradicate the bigotry and stop the endless crap.

Yes, that should be the goal. But I think we have to reconcile ourselves to the fact that part of that process involves listening to some very angry people, to letting them finally have their say.

Jn

[Holbytla]

I have spent some time in counselling sessions and I am aware that people are ready to forgive, forget and move on when they are ready to and not before. I know it isn't up to the offender to decide that.

I am willing to listen to what people have to say with both ears open and allow them whatever time it takes to get whatever they want off of their chests. I am not willing to listen to bigoted statements from anyone however. To me that serves no purpose but to perpetuate that root of the problem.

I think it is pretty safe to say that monetary reparation won't ever happen in my lifetime. The feasibility of it is remote and it would be a lifetime of rulings and judgments and appeals. Affirmative action, busing and other social programs are at least an attempt at reparation, and it is more likely that programs like these will be the way reparation happens.

I also question part of the motive for this. If part of the reasoning for this is to appease the guilt of the children of oppressors, isn't that self serving?

I wish it were as simple as writing a check, but I don't believe that will redress the issue. I also find it difficult to understand the justice of it all. In the case of the Germans after WW II, most of the actual criminals are dead or in jail. Many of the Germans that were left after WW II were also victims of the Nazi regime, but it was up to them to make reparations. It is almost like punishing different victims of the same oppressors. The entire country has been victimized by Washington and Wall St. at one point or another.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Think of how different things would be right now if instead of making over-the-top angry and often flat-out wrong statements in his sermons, Reverend Wright had instead talked about the reality of racism right now in the US. He makes it remarkably easy to just dismiss the whole notion of it because the things he says are so stupid --- it's like they were written as a caricature of a black militant minister by Rush Limbaugh.

From everything that I have seen, he has spoken a thousand times about the reality of racism (and acted to combat those realities) for everyone one of those stupid things that he has said. But that doesn't even matter. What makes it remarkably easy to just dismiss the whole notion of it is people's willingness to do so, despite the evidence to the contrary. What does what Wright has to say or doesn't have to say have to do with people be willing to accept what people can discover for themselves?

[solicitr]

The essential flaw in the Great Society approach was that it effectively infantalised those it was trying to help. Stripped of assets, as you point out, but also stripped of incentive to get out of the cycle (for a long time getting a job meant a serious decrease in income, and may still), and created instead the mindset, ultimately childlike, of entitlement without effort.

Contrast FDR's approach. The New Deal offered the unemployed- the most unemployed we have ever had- not hanouts but jobs. The WPA and CCC and so on gave laid-off men an opportunity to earn their income- providing not merely sustenance but self-esteem as well, and in many cases providing valuable job skills.

Why cannot something of the sort be introduced today for the able-bodied? Our infrastructure is decaying, and a new CCC might be just the thing to both replace aging bridges and break the cycle of dependency.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

soli, that is a fine idea.

[solicitr]

Jny:

There was never any '40 acres and a mule' legislation. It was a promise made by General Sherman- which he had of course no authority to do.

[Faramond]

When most white people think reparations are a good thing, then it will be likely that current racism will have ended to the extent that reparations could be genuine healing ...

Yes, that's probably true, but healing is intended for both parties and I don't think we can say that Blacks should have to wait until Whites feel up to it to receive whatever they might be justly entitled to.

Well, I'm thinking mostly of black people when I said that. I mean, do I get to just say that the inherited sin ( which I don't believe in, but for the moment pretend I do ) is gone if meaningful reparations are paid? Are reparations a sort of get out of "white guilt" free card, even though racism is still going on? Reparations won't actually do anything about current racism. I guess the argument for reparations is that they are justice, the closest that can be come. I don't know.

But it's not going to happen, unless by some court decision. So what else is there?

What does what Wright has to say or doesn't have to say have to do with people be willing to accept what people can discover for themselves?

I guess I shouldn't have mentioned Wright in this thread then!

[vison]

I also question part of the motive for this. If part of the reasoning for this is to appease the guilt of the children of oppressors, isn't that self serving?

And what if it is? It satisfies more people in that case.