Can't stop thinking about reparations

Let's start with:

A 2016 Marist poll found 58% of black Americans were in favour of reparations, while 81% of white Americans opposed the idea. A 2018 Data for Progress survey also found reparations to be unpopular among the general public, and especially so among white Americans.

Being opposed to a cash payout reparations tends to push the number up even higher.

Bayard Rustin, who organised the March on Washington and was a friend of Martin Luther King Jr, called reparations a "ridiculous idea".Mr Rustin told the New York Times in 1969, "If my great-grandfather picked cotton for 50 years, then he may deserve some money, but he's dead and gone and nobody owes me anything".He later expanded on the views, writing that a payout would demean "the integrity of blacks" and exploit white guilt.

The issue here being time at least five generations of US blacks have been free (i.e. were slaves). Sure we can talk about the discrimination in the South, but what do you do with a Kay Coles James or a Madam C.J. Walker? The name Pat McGrath came up during this search.

You don't need a white person to debate this issue since I know that blacks have opinions on the topics, but Ta-Nehisi Coates found a great topic to grab some attention. Unfortunately most of the talk is divided by race. It would be nice if some conservative blacks weighed in on the topic.

Coates mentioned debt, which is one thing which started me thinking about this topic. The Western Countries wrote off Africa's debt back in 2005, but the countries are now worse than they were BEFORE the write offs. While the reasons are different, the bottom line is the same:

Unless something is changed the debt will return worse than before. 

In other words, people can throw as much money as they want at a problem, but fuck all will happen unless the underlying causes are addressed.

On problem with the US is the myth of abundance, in particular and abundance of land so that rich people can move out of the cities. That means the cities are left to decay (I blame most of Detroit, Flint, and Saginaw's problems on the industry the built those cities: the automobile).

Mr. Coates needs to integrate himself since there are poor whites living in those places. Of familiarise himself with Fred Hampton who understood the issue 50 years ago.

I wouldn't say that whites are better off economically by looking at a graph. I am no where near a Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, or other 1% than Ta-Nehisi Coates is to Pat McGrath. And Pat McGrath still doesn't raise the income of poor blacks. On the other hand, those people skew the numbers when you look at averages. The average white person in Appalachia is in no way affluent.


There's a lesson in here somewhere, but I think that reparations will fail when it comes down to it.  it's something that sounds intriguing, but is doomed to failure if anyone tries to implement it.

A guess on why Slavery, Indentured Servitude, and Transportation aren't properly discussed in the US

It makes people uncomfortable to think that someone's ancestors didn't come to the US willingly. Slavery, indentured servitude, and transportation run against the narrative of people coming here for the "American Dream". Unless you mean the American Dream of someone else who receives cheap labour.

The US is far too in love with its national myth of opportunity and unlimited resources. The narrative runs that people come to the United States because they can work hard and enjoy the benefits. The reality has been that people work hard and someone else gets the benefits.

Tell someone who wants to know your ancestors immigration story that they came over in chains as a slave and they get all uncomfortable.

And Transportation is something no one is willing to talk about, but I would scream out my convict heritage like an Aussie boasts about being an ancestor of the first fleet if I found out one was in my family tree. But people also get really uncomfortable when they find out that a lot of pre-Independence immigrants were felons.

Bottom line is that unwilling immigrants aren't what people want to hear about.

I'll admit I am a confused white guy when it comes to reparations.

Another big issue with this topic is that there is also no consensus on the Black (?) or African American (?) side. Case in point, Kay Coles James is President of The Heritage Foundation. She is also a black woman, and a Republican, which can cause some people's head to explode if they wish to believe that gender or race influences their opinion.

Where this comes in is in terms of conservative black people, which sounds like a contradiction in terms (sort of like Very religious Jews siding with conservative Christians in the US).

It is also the exception which proves the rule ("prove" meaning "tests") in that she is a black woman with a highly impressive CV going by the write up here: https://www.heritage.org/staff/kay-coles-james.

I'll mention Candace Owen, but that's it.

OK, Black Conservatives are definitely NOT on the same page as Ta-Nehisi Coates, or even me. But they do raise the question is it racism or is the issue something else which reparations aren't really going to address.

Part of the reason I mention Kay Coles James is that she is a black woman from a southern, former slave state who has done well in society.  Perhaps that is due to when she grew up.

On the other hand, this white guy, who was born in Detroit has had his own share of eating 50 cent burritos and being leveraged to the hilt with debt during periods of unemployment.

Is that my white privilege at work?

Anyway, the black conservative opinion on this topic runs like this:

Perhaps we should remember the legacy of a former slave who rose up from slavery to advise presidents – Booker T. Washington – who never asked for reparations. Washington preached dignity through work – to become so skilled that you earned respect. “Nothing ever comes to me, that is worth having, except as the result of hard work,” he said. That’s what pulled Washington up from slavery. It doesn’t have to work for just one man.

My point isn't that I don't think that slavery was bad or that there is no discrimination, but there is more than one opinion. Likewise, the past 160 odd years have changed the playing field to make this a very complex issue to address.

The bottom line is that any reparations may not be monetary: they may be more symbolic.  Something to make people feel good about historic events which we must acknowledge, but cannot change.

Slavery, Indentured Servitude, Transportation, and reparations

There is a reason why the topics of slavery, indentured servitude, and transportation are neglected: because one of the United States' many myths is the myth of the immigrant coming because of the American promise. People arriving against their will goes against that myth. Someone boasts how their ancestors came for the opportunities found in the US has to deal with the fact that segments of the population arrived against their will.

Slave ships and auctions are the antithesis of Ellis Island, which is probably another myth as well.

But slavery, or people as commercial objects, is an integral part of US immigration law. The US has jus soli because of slavery and Dred Scott. The Fourteenth Amendment was a result of slavery. It haunts immigration policy because anyone born in the US is automatically a citizen: no matter whether their parents were lawfully present in the country.

There is the indignation by some people about children being placed in "cages", yet those are the holding cells used by the police in the US.  Now, how would those people feel about people who arrived in this country chained together?

I am not going to get into a debate about people who are lawfully present or not, but treating migrant workers as property for the benefit of others leads to terrible consequences. Sure, there should be a process to allow workers into the country if there happens to be a lack of workers: but is there no unemployment in the US?

Bottom line, the US has a love of exploiting workers, which is a big part of the discussion. And that fact is highly uncomfortable.

See also:

• Why Schools Fail To Teach Slavery's 'Hard History'
• Indentured Servants: Stafford Hall
• Mary Sarah Bilder, Struggle over Immigration: Indentured Servants, Slaves, and Articles of Commerce, The, 61 Mo. L. Rev. (1996) Available at: http://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/mlr/vol61/iss4/1 
• America Cannot Bear to Bring Back Indentured Servitude

Glasgow University and its "programme of restorative justice".

The major problem with talking about reparations, besides the time factor, is what form would they take? Glasgow Univerity found that donations to the 1866-1880 campaign to build the university's current campus at Gilmorehill incluided 23 people who gave money which had some financial links to the New World slave trade. "Some financial links" is an interesting term: especially since the period in question includes the 18th and 19th Centuries.

The Abolition of Slave Trade Act, which made it illegal to trade slaves throughout the British Empire and banned British ships from involvement in the trade, was passed by the British Parliament on 25 March 1807. Britain officially ended trading slaves on 1 March 1808 (the slave trade still went on illegally for some time). Slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire by the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, with exceptions provided for the East India Company, Ceylon, and Saint Helena. Those exceptions were eliminated in 1843. Slavery was still practised in the United States until the end of the US Civil War in 1865.

While illegal, slavery is still practised in the world, which is something any serious discussion of this topic needs to include. Likewise, slavery took many different forms. Both issues are something that any realistic discussion of this topic needs to address.

Glasgow University isn't the only academic institution in United Kingdom to look into how it profited from the slave economy. Yet Glasgow University also points out that it supported abolition. So, there were two aspects of this. The University "profited" from the slave trade while condemning that trade.

On the other hand, "restorative justice" seems to be looking into the system of forced labour, which I hope includes people who went as "indentured servants" or were transported for "criminal offences".

Anyway, it sounds as if the real outcome of this will indeed be to promote discussion of the topic, which has pretty much been buried in both the US and UK. we could get into a debate about which culture has minimised the role of slavery in its development. Slavery did indeed contribute greatly to the prosperity of those countries, along with western society.

I think the bottom line is that any "reparations" or "restorative justice" is likely to come in the form of an acknowledgement of the role of slavery in Western Society, not monetary. Maybe there might be some social reforms, but I wouldn't be too hopeful about that.

 But addressing this topic in a candid and honest way might indeed be the best course of action for any 'restorative justice".

See also:

• As Glasgow University owns up to slavery wealth, others urged to follow
• Glasgow University's 'bold' move to pay back slave trade profits
• Glasgow University to pay £20m in slave trade reparations

An interesting take on the origins of the United States,

I really like Professor Gerald Horne's stuff.

Reparation for slavery is not a simple topic.

As I said before it was the Transatlantic Slave trade, which means it goes beyond just the United States: especially if you are discussing the people who traded slaves.

You can listen to this episode here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3csynsp. The person in question is Spanish and his family was trading slaves after the trade became illegal.

And now that you are distracted by the concept or reparations...

What exactly is the status of The Voting Rights Act of 1965?

Serious question since this is something which happened recently enough to be in our lifetime. It also has a real impact on current events where as reparations are pretty nebulous.

 Wouldn't it make more sense to be discussing this since it has a very real effect on minorities and US politics?

 Which leads to the next question: WHY isn't it being discussed?

Hey, Ta-Nehisi Coates: this is why your argument for reaprations is nonsense.

OK, first off, we are talking about the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, which goes a lot further than just the 50 US states and Territories. Slavery was international. After all, where did the slaves come from?

Why, Africa, of course. Which is your first hurdle. What was the level of those nations' complicity in the trade? Are you seriously going to ask countries such as Benin to pay its fair share of reparations? 

For over 200 years, powerful kings in what is now the country of Benin captured and sold slaves to Portuguese, French and British merchants. The slaves were usually men, women and children from rival tribes — gagged and jammed into boats bound for Brazil, Haiti and the United States.

Digging into the depths of African complicity in the trade basically rips any pan-Africanist veneer off your argument. You want to make Third World nations pay for your lifestyle? Have you been to any of these countries?

Or just France and Switzerland?

Seriously, dude, you need a reality check if that is the case.

And we don't need to leave Africa to see how this topic will devolve into a case of silly buggers given that Africans were complicit in the slave trade. The African World Reparations and Repatriation Truth Commission called for the West to pay $777 trillion to Africa within five years back in 1999. Which was made even weirder by the United Nations sponsored World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance held in Durban South Africa in September 2001. This conference resulted in  a resolution stating that the West owed reparations to Africa due to the "racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance" that the Atlantic slave trade caused.

Go figure!

Next, Slavery helped pay for the industrial revolution, which means most western societies should be footing the bill: not just the US.

As I pointed out in my previous post: the next question is who would qualify. Since Prince Harry's and Meghan Markle's son is descended from slaves: would that mean that someone from one of the richest families in Britain would get reparations? How would that play out if descendants of Caribbean slaves didn't get reparations?

So, who gets and who pays "reparations" is a seriously thorny topic: especially if we toss in the amount of time which has passed since the end of slavery.

Then there is the mechanism for reparations and what form would they take. But the problem is that poverty isn't just limited to inner city blacks, as Fred Hampton was well aware. Urban decay doesn't just effect black people.

The thing which hits me is that this subject is far more complex than the US media is capable of addressing. Toss in that the Democrats are embracing this over more pressing issues, such as the environment (which also relates to race: look into the environmental justice movement). Poor people are more likely to live near environmental degradation.

The real upshot is that many of the manifestations of "reparations" would also have to include people other than those who are descendants of slavery (or indentured servitude, or  transportation). It also needs to be more than just monetary and embrace issues such as education, urban renewal, better housing, the environment, jobs, etcetera.

On the other hand, stirring up division just might help get Trump re-elected along with a republican legislature. Nothing like people wanting a nebulous concept for something which ended 156 years ago.

Two lessons: it is with the best intentions that the worst work is done.

And be careful what you wish for: you might get it.

Would Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor qualify for slavery reparations?

Serious question. Would a member of the British Royal Family who has an African-American heritage qualify for reparations if it was proven he was descended from slaves?

Likewise, would the WHITE descendants of indentured servants qualify since indentured servitude was similar to slavery. Let's toss in the people who were transported to the North American Colonies prior to the War for Independence.

The major problem with reparations for slavery is the time between emancipation and modern time. Sure, there were "extenuating circumstances" in post-slavery discrimination, but how far does that go toward mandating "reparations"?

We can also get into the reparations which were given directly after slavery.

But the most obvious argument to show how ridiculous this proposition happens to be is that a member of the British Royal Family would qualify for reparations.

Yeah, I will concede that there has been discrimination, but maybe we need to have an open discussion about race, economics, and opportunity in the US.

Because the last thing I want to hear is a college drop out telling me he didn't have economic advantages because of race. especially when I look at Coates' accomplishments.

I might respect his argument more if he went to University of Maryland Law school and couldn't find a job worthy of his credentials.

See also:

• The Education of Ta-Nehisi Coates (The Chronicle of Higher Education)

Ta-Nehisi Coates once again shows his ignorance

It would be "whitesplainin'" if I went too harsh on Ta-Nehisi Coates: especially since there are people like Darryl Pinckney, Cornell West, and Adolph Reed who do the job much better than I can.  I am not sure how Coates would explain how someone like me with a JD from University of Maryland and an LLM from the University of Exeter ended up with the shitty law career I had.

Seriously, I applied for a job that was advertised in the ABA journal for someone with pretty much all my credentials, yet I never had so much as an interview. I found out later that a large law firm had placed the ad. It was something called a job cert ad to try and prove there were no US citizens who had the qualifications the firm's candidate had for an H1B visa.

I threw a spanner in the works of that process.

That is a digression into immigration law though, but the point is that there are more than enough jobs which aren't filled for a lot of reasons. That is despite what one person pointed out: that he, as a US Citizen, taught the people who received the H1B visas. His point was that there was likely to be someone in the US who had the qualifications to do the jobs that the H1Bs were being issued for.

The real issue is that Coates frames everything in terms of race, but that should make him even more aware of the fact the Electoral College was created to preserve slavery: why else would smaller states be afraid of larger states having too much power?

But what has me going is We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy. Coates neglects two events which could have clued him in to the possibility of a Trump presidency. The first being the 2000 election, where the popular vote loser became president. This was with more shenanigans than happened in 2016 as the disputed Florida election ended up being decided by the US Supreme Court.

Obama's reign was another bellwether event. How could he miss that there was some sort of deal between Obama and Clinton which would result in Clinton being the 2016 Democratic Party nominee? It was obvious that the democrats preferred to lose with Clinton than win with Sanders.  And Obama somehow "defeating" Clinton should have gotten Coates' racial radar tingling.

But it wasn't really that Clinton was unpopular since she won the popular vote by one heck of a margin. She lost in the racist Electoral College. But that is something everybody is ignoring: especially Coates. So, while white people are upset about Russians, Coates is hyper-aware of the "racial divide".  But do either really exist? Is there another explanation which isn't Russians or race?

One the other hand, Clinton lost to a black man and would have lost to a Jew had the system not been rigged in 2016. If that wasn't a big warning sign that Trump stood a chance: I don't know what would be!

I am not sure what part my ancestors played in Bacon's Rebellion, but I know there were some who were in Virginia at the time. That was the real watershed event where the powers that be learned that using race was good for keeping the people down. Sort of like using fear of immigration to stir up the masses (I would wager the person who got the job I mentioned earlier was a white, European).

Anyway, the divide has always been class in the US, but it was easier to keep the classes down when they looked on another  group as somehow inferior.

Anyway, the warning signs were out there, Mr. Coates, you were too busy being distracted by race to see it coming.

See also:
The Afro-Pessimist Temptation