Should the US pay African Americans reparations for slavery

Couldn’t agree more. @bijouxbroussard

@bijouxbroussard The democratic representatives are bringing it up which is why I've sparked this debate. I personally think the US could easily do this for the cost I quote. It may take 10 years though to fully sort out

@Qwerty14 That’s a losing proposition. I’d go as far as to say, anyone trying to make [b]that[/b] an issue wants Trump re-elected.
Btw, less than 1% of the black soldiers were Confederates and were forced. Some even switched sides as soon as they could. More volunteered to fight on the Union side for obvious reason. I found records of my ancestor who fought for the Union side, found out his name and everything. He was a musician.

They can start by paying out reparations to the people still alive who had to live through Jim Crow. I can recall having this elderly teacher in highschool and she was telling us about what her life was like as a little girl growing up under Jim Crow Laws in Louisiana. Completely heartbreaking. @Qwerty14

@bijouxbroussard I personally knew a man that grew up as an indentured servant as a child and it wasn’t really all that long ago. He might be 65 now.
I agree with @bijouxbroussard
That now is not the time to make it forefront and the way the Russians played the #BLM institution last election this would be red, raw meat for them.

@DaughterOfTheDust No the US isn't at fault for states being racist. But technically all people discriminated by Jim Crow laws would get reparations under my scheme anyhow

The U.S. surpreme count orginally upheld the decision for Jim Crow to continue when it went to trial in the late 1800s, so the government is responsible for the continuation of the system when they could have stopped it years before. @Qwerty14

@DaughterOfTheDust I’m old enough to remember the “whites only” signs that still existed when we’d visit family down South when I was a child. And my father (86) remembers the night his uncle was taken and lynched by the KKK. Pop was just a child.

It’s a very sad reality that shows extreme racism is not something of the past that happened so long ago that no one can remember it. My great-grandparents were blessed enough to live into their 100s and I was blessed enough to spend the first 10 years of my life with them. Both of them grew up under Jim Crow (born in 1912) and could recall the horrors of racism in the south. @bijouxbroussard

@DaughterOfTheDust My father’s parents were born in the 1800s, which is mindblowing considering that Pop’s pretty up to date, has his IPad and computer. But I lost them when I was a child. I had my mother’s parents until 1984 and 1994.

@bijouxbroussard I'm sure that there racist blacks that would love to enslave whites if they could.

@GunSmoke9
That is an obscene thought considering that isn’t even close to the reality of the current situation in the US. Why would you even bring that up? Is it to promote a real discussion?

@Pfuzylogic I responded to a comment that said racist whites would enslave blacks if they could. Do you agree with that comment?

@GunSmoke9
That is an obscure question to me.
I don’t control other minds and I don’t entertain hypotheticals that you present.

@Pfuzylogic Are you attacking just me? Why not go after the one that said that white racist will enslave blacks if they could? Maybe you won't because you agree with it.

@GunSmoke9
You are definitely attacking me and if want you did was a counterattack or mock. It was lacking in sensitivity to others on the Post.

@Pfuzylogic Didn't attack you at all. You didn't like my reply to another post, so you attacked me. Why not the other post about that stupid comment she made?

@GunSmoke9
You have no point.

@Pfuzylogic I guess my point went over your head. You are also gutless for NOT going after the other post for saying that white racist will enslave blacks if they could. Why not? Do you agree with that?

@GunSmoke9
I don’t have to follow any suggestion of yours. I found your hypothetical as offensive. It was that simple.

@Pfuzylogic I didn't start the post about whites enslaving blacks. My comment was to show how stupid and wrong her comment was. You get it now? I won't hold my breath waiting for you to tell JB how stupid her comment was. It takes guts to do that.

@GunSmoke9
You were ineffectual in that lame hypothetical.

@bijouxbroussard I didn't vote, I would prefer to listen to what the people at the heart of it would want. On the surface I probably agree with @QuixoticSoul that maybe a payment doesn't address justice most effectively; and even then, how would you distribute it? But that doesn't mean it isn't necessarily valid. The ongoing disadvantage is demonstrably real, and categorically denied by the privileged who also deny their privilege, hand on heart. Affirmative action is the response in feminism to entrenched disadvantage - that'd create some kicking and screaming.

I'd like to see America stop despising the poor. Stop enshrining the privileged. Stop hiding behind, "I'm not racist, but..." It was once a refuge for those who dreamed of human dignity for all. Now big capitalist interests rule like kings and lords and democracy is just an abusive bun fight sideline. [i]"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"[/i] Where the hell did America get so lost?

@Abstraction I’m going to say, that poem was fanciful and only applied to certain people even [b]then[/b].
Langton Hughes’ is more the reality in this instance.
“Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain Seeking a home where he himself is free.
(America never was America to me.)
Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed — Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme That any man be crushed by one above.
(It never was America to me.)
O, let my land be a land where Liberty Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, and life is free, Equality is in the air we breathe.
(There's never been equality for me, Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")
Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?
I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart, I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek — And finding only the same old stupid plan Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.
I am the young man, full of strength and hope, Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need! Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!
I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean — Hungry yet today despite the dream. Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.
Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream In the Old World while still a serf of kings, Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true, That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned That's made America the land it has become. O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home — For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore, And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea, And torn from Black Africa's strand I came To build a "homeland of the free."
The free?
Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today? The millions shot down when we strike? The millions who have nothing for our pay? For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay — Except the dream that's almost dead today.
O, let America be America again —
The land that never has been yet —
And yet must be--the land where every man is free. The land that's mine — the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME —
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain, Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain, Must bring back our mighty dream again.
Sure, call me any ugly name you choose — The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives, We must take back our land again, America!
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me, And yet I swear this oath — America will be!
Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death, The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies, We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain — All, all the stretch of these great green states — And make America again !”

@bijouxbroussard Wow. Reminds me of Cohen, too.

It's coming from the feel
that this ain't exactly real,
or it's real, but it ain't exactly there.
From the wars against disorder,
from the sirens night and day,
from the fires of the homeless,
from the ashes of the gay:
Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.