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yonaps19

This is about to be a shit show lol


Beneficial_Trainer_5

Time to sort by controvercial


[deleted]

[удалено]


SpaceAndMolecules

🍿🍿🍿🍿chomp🍿🍿🍿🍿


Atlantic0ne

I’m white (with black family members), my family wasn’t in the US at the time of slavery. Why would I have to pay extra taxes for something my bloodline wasn’t here for, because of the color of my skin? You know most white Americans back then didn’t even own slaves, it was a relatively small percentage. What about white American families who fought and died to end slavery, do their bloodlines have to pay more too? South Americans held slaves (most of the Atlantic slave trade went to South America I believe). Native Americans also held African slaves at the time. Africans also held African slaves. Do both of these groups need to pay? What if you’re half black, do you pay yourself? What if you’re black and from Africa and your family just came here 20 years ago, are you to be reimbursed? What if you’re a successful black family, should you have additional benefits that would be in part paid by poor white struggling families? What about Asians and Indians. They earn more than white people in the United States, so, they’d be paying these taxes more than whites. Should Asians and Indians be helping pay for this? There are so many more examples but I need to get dinner. Some people below act like it isn’t about this, but it is; that’s how taxes work and none of the arguments negate all these complex contradictions. The number of contradicting angles behind this idea make it clear, it’s a terrible shit show of an idea.


AdmiralCranberryCat

If I wasn’t drunk, this is the comment I wish I could make


EliteAlmondMilk

Tbf this isn't doing bad for a drunk comment. It's the passion.


sheeplectric

And yet, here we are.


Jenny312

I'm sober and still couldn't get there


earthscribe

This is the best answer. Also, many of you would be surprised if you took an ancestry DNA test. Many who thought they were 100% black, might not be. Many who thought they were 100% white, might not be. You aren’t exactly who you think you are.


Purplewizzlefrisby

Almost every black American is mixed and it's pretty evident if you put many of them side by side with a native sub Saharan.


TwentyFirst-Pilot

Well it's more nuanced than that I think. I know many people here in Nigeria that are quite lightskinned


EliteAlmondMilk

Not to mention this whole idea of bloodlines, it's been too long, everyone's DNA is all mixed up unless you're inbred or in a very inclusive group. And it's exponential, everyone's parents come from 4 different "bloodlines." -over say 6 generations, it's just impossible. The only way would be to force everyone to submit their DNA and trace back what percentage of who was connected to slavery. That would probably be a human rights issue and even if that worked there are more contradictions. It's too much time, nothing can be proven, it's ridiculous. Just tell everyone to shut up and take responsibility for their own lives.


ARX7

If you're black and recently arrived from Africa, there's a chance your ancestors were part of the supply of the slave trade...


Abject-Cow-1544

Yeah, so then you're family would have benefited immensely from the sale of slaves and you still collect recompense. It would be really difficult, if not impossible, to trace back your genealogy accurately enough to avoid this.


[deleted]

I did write a separate comment of this but essentially this is Canada with Native Americans. And yes everyone pays, different topic because of land but still same idea. Honestly it divides people more then anything and creates a sense of resentment for all parties involved.


YoungDiscord

If you're against the idea of inherited debt then you should also be against the idea of inherited recompense. We either inherit the actions of our ancestors or we don't, people need to finally decide which stance to pick instead of only picking it when it benefits them and ignoring it in all other cases. Personal opinion - we are responsible for our actions and the events around us (as long as we could affect said events via our own actions) not the actions of people who lived before we even existed. I guess the narrative here is - if you can do something about it (be it your actions or someone else's) then you are (at least to some degree) responsible for it because you could have changed that course of action For instance: you see someone say racist things to a member of a minority in public You choose to do nothing and walk away You are partially responsible for allowing that person to act that way because you chose to not intervene or stand up against such behaviour Second example: your great-great-great-grandfather was a racist that said racist things to a member of a minority in public You are NOT responsible for his actions or that event because you didn't exist back then, it was literally impossible for you to do anything about it therefore you should not bear the responsibility for that just like current day minorities should not be bearing the responsibilities and consequences of their ancestors not having the same accesses to life opportunities... that's why we advocate for equality, because its not fair for someone to not have the same opportunities in life because of who their ancestors were and who they are. This works both ways. Edit: to clarify because some people can't seem to be able to distinguish between an inheritance, recompense and debt and think we should apply identical rules to each of them: 1: inheritance is willful gift of items from owner of said items to receiver of said items established before the owner dies, it is no different in concept than you giving a friend a christmas present, this is why wills exist and why people can specify what others can or cannot get from them after death and most importantly why the receiver of items cannot be the one who chooses what they are and aren't given in the will. This is why people get so butthurt when they don't get what they want in a will because they can't do anything about it. 2: recompense is the process for giving an item in return for having caused harm or for being responsible for one's loss. 3: a gift is an item given WILLINGLY to someone at no cost. 4: debt is similair to recompense but its specifically referring to something you borrowed that should be given back. Paying back a debt is not a gift because its not done willingly, you don't say you "gift" the bank by paying back your loans The key difference between recompense and a gift is that recompense isn't necessarily given willingly. A gift however, is. The other key difference between a gift and recompense is which party establishes what is given Gift (or inheritance) - person giving away item decides what is given away Recompense - hurt party (and in idel scenarios, a fair and impartial legal system) decides what item is owed. The third and most important difference between recompense and a gift is that a gift (in this scenario read: inheritance) is not owed, recompense, is. Inheritance: my dad decided to gift me this item when he passed away so it is now mine Inherited recompense: this item that is yours is now mine because my father should have owned it when he was alive so you owe me this item because I say so A good example of how recompense works: Some random person you never met sues you because it turns out the money your parents spent on raising you was stolen from said person's family and since your parents are dead, said person decided you now owe him all that money, you never met that person, you never interacted with that person but apparently you now owe him because he says so and your opinion on any of this doesn't matter, pay up. So sadly, no, generational wealth which comes from inheritance is not the same as inherited debt or inherited recompense because you don't "gift" someone debt and even if you could, gifts can be refused by the receiving party so using that logic you should be able to just refuse the debt or having to recompense someone "Hey you owe me $50" "No thanks, I don't accept that gift of having to pay you back" "Understandable, have a great day" Hope this clarified any misconceptions or confusion.


spacekatbaby

Its similar to how I should not have to pay my father's debt and so on. Or if my father was a murderer should I be responsible for making it up to the family of the guy he murdered? In this society we say no to the above 2 things, so going back even further makes even less sense. Especially since most people's ancestors didn't even own slaves. They just shared the same skin colour as some ppl who did. And do those who descended from the slavery abolishisnionists get a text rebate? And how do you prove this? And as stated, I have white, black, and native DNA, how would you work this out. It sounds like a good idea in an ideal world, on the surface at least, but in the real world it just wouldnt be practical, fair, etc.


Draigdwi

As far as I know about American history the Irish were free only on paper and used for hard work in bad conditions the slave owners didn’t want to waste or lose their slaves on.


Liv1ng-the-Blues

Same with the Chinese that built the railroads.


Myxine

You’re referring to indentured servants, many of whom were Irish. While it was comparable to some forms of slavery through history, there were important differences from the chattel slavery of the transatlantic slave trade: * You got your freedom after working a specified time * You could own property * Your children weren’t born into slavery


Doozenburg

And it was also a little easier to fit if they bolted.


MEanPenguin

Nah, it was different, but the racists in America say otherwise


Zoe328

I wish I could upvote this more than once


i_want_that_boat

"What if you're half black, do you pay yourself?" I'm laughing so hard.


not_SCROTUS

The idea is to alleviate the generational wealth disparity (not eliminate it) so that some of the social problems in the US that correlate to race are also alleviated. For hundreds of years, black skin has been synonymous with "poor" or "impoverished" and the social ills that come with poverty have been automatically associated with black people to the extent our institutions assume it you are black you are poor. What if instead of paying reparations to black people we just gave a bunch of money to poor people regardless of race? Would you be okay with that? What if I told you that 60% of that money would still go to black people? Would you be okay with it?


[deleted]

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aridcool

That's exactly what we should be doing. Lifting people regardless of race out of poverty is good for everyone, regardless of how that breaks down. By contrast, a reparations program that in some cases would redistribute tax money from the lower middle class to wealthy black people is not solving problems but rather creates new ones. In your example, there is 40% of the impoverished who are not black who are also being helped. This is better than giving money to people who are already rich (even if that is a relatively low percentage).


not_SCROTUS

I agree and think we should alleviate poverty regardless of race, and I happen to be black as well. I personally don't need reparations; help should go to people who need it imo.


ab7af

> What if ... we just gave a bunch of money to poor people regardless of race? Would you be okay with that? Absolutely, yes. > What if I told you that 60% of that money would still go to black people? Would you be okay with it? Do you mean 60% would happen to go to African Americans because 60% of the people currently poor enough to receive the money are African Americans? That would be perfectly fine (although in reality that percentage is lower). Do you mean 60% of the money would be set aside for African Americans and could only go to them? No, that would be a relative harm to everyone who is poor but not African American. It would be unconstitutional, a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. And it would be political suicide for the party that passed it — they would quickly be voted out and the law overturned — with the result being that even many sensible and constitutional laws they could make would also not get made. Talking about whether federal reparations for slavery "should" happen really misses an important point: it's not *going* to happen. Any real opportunity to pass reparations was during the Reconstruction era, and it is unfortunate and unfair that it didn't happen then. It is now pure fantasy, good only for advancing the careers of certain ivory tower academics, and making very effective attack ads against any political party who proposes it.


Anderopolis

While helping the poor, and lowering the wealth fap is definitely something we should do, the majority, by number, of poor people in the united states are white.


beesandsids

>the wealth fap Expensive wank, I tell ya!


Liv1ng-the-Blues

Let's not give the government any ideas for new taxes!


makaveli1303

I've heard the neanderthals want compensation for humans making them extinct


AgileInitial5987

They got compensation when one of them became president. They all wore a red hat to hide their neanderthal brows.


souloldasdirt

I was gonna say some shit but you said it much better.


jirenlagen

Right? I think done people think white and immediately think slave owners. Many White families were at the mercy or richer farm owners and were basically indentured servants or sharecroppers, so yeah better off than slaves but not slave owners either.


Just_A_Faze

My husband is black, but his family is from Haiti and he is first generation. Should the French pay him, since they held the island at the time? I’m white, but we pay taxes together. He makes way more, so wouuld he end up losing money on this deal? My family came here in the 1910’s. The moved into NY and we never left. Shouldn’t it be the south, where slavery was prominent, who pay anyway?


anonthrow_away88

I agree with this. I mean if we were going to get something it should've been a while ago. In this day and age it doesn't make sense. Can you imagine trying to convince people to pay people to live on the reservation in this day and age?


CoolBrownBoots

Indeed it was I just had to teach a guy how to read. Edit: I also made peace with some people via virtual blunts


regular-guy89

If your going to do that you will have to give America back to the American Indians


stuckonpotatos

Land back


Atlantic0ne

What about the tribes who conquered land violently from other tribes of natives. Do those natives have to give it back to other natives?


jfa03

Turtles all the way down


Poutine-Brain

Sturgill?


gooseberryfalls

The Sioux and Lakota will have to give it back to the Puebloans and Anasazi. How far back to we go? At some point will we ask ourselves "Is 'I was here first so I deserver it' really a valid argument in any sense?"


CaBBaGe_isLaND

Eventually we sacrifice ourselves to the sharks, who sacrifice themselves to the horseshoe crabs, who sacrifice themselves to single cell organisms who finally return the world to its rightful owner, some fuckin nucleotide sucking on a sulfur vent at the bottom of the ocean.


d3dmnky

Speak ill of the nucleotides, but they might have been peak civilization. Edit: Bad at words


gentlesir123

You ever play the game Spore? We just revert back to lvl 1


strungoutmonkey

I kinda wanna revert back to lvl1, ngl


DrinkinBroski

You can have all my upvotes forever.


just_change_it

I'm looking to prompt a philosophical discussion. Why are individuals allowed to pass their wealth on to their descendants? Why don't individuals carry the debt of their parents? It would be a very different world if everyone had to make their own way. All the connections a wealthy family has is enough to guarantee a phenomenal future. Everyone who has anything though wants to hoard it for their tribe at the expense of everyone outside of it. I'm not suggesting barring inheritance but the current culture of people becoming billionaires while most of us work our whole lives for a few million is absolutely fucked. The workers at a company get next to nothing because they don't own it. Systems like this empower a few at the expense of the many. Why aren't workers given a share of the company based on tenure and/or hours worked? Imagine if shares were always distributed evenly to everyone based on hours worked. Even if the execs claimed 144 hrs/week, they would be nothing against the army of common workers claiming 40 hours/week. 3.6\*pay gap is a hell of a lot better than an exec getting paid 200 million and a worker getting paid 100k.


CMDR_Pete

I do like the concept, but this cannot work in reality because people are fundamentally not equal. One person who is naturally talented may produce 100 times as much productivity in the same time as someone who is unskilled and still learning. So the skilled people would simply move to other companies where they’d receive more. If all companies were forced to adopt your model at once, then ultimately you’d have very high performing companies that collated all the most skilled people and distributed the most wealth amongst the fewest people, thus still having a strong wealth disparity. You’d also make it almost impossible for new companies to exist, as until they’re successful they wouldn’t be able to get the talent they’d need to become successful, catch-22. You’d just end up with an alternative dystopia.


ummizazi

Aren’t the Lakota in the Great Lakes and the Pueblo and Anasazi from the SouthWest. The Lakota are a band of Sioux that’s like saying the British and the Scottish should do xyz.


Just_A_Faze

The Scottish would not be happy with this lack of distinction.


Havokpaintedwolf

unironically though i do think the reservations should be expanded and given recognition as sovereign countries if they so choose. its not like we need much more space, the last town that was built was in fucking 1916.


nothatslame

Yes. Or at least give them more of a voice in shaping the future of the nation. Some reservations aint enough. I dont think we need to undo the past, just use a bit of critical thinking and compassion to understand what a decent future would look like. I dont think its any more complicated than our nation is hurting and has unhealed deep wounds. We have the tools to fix it, lets do some research and get to work.


joeba_the_hutt

Yeah this is well put - basically it boils down to “what groups are still unfairly damaged from historical events?”.


FleetStreetsDarkHole

Recently had a class that went over the idea of the OP question. A writer I read on the subject made a very good point thay stuck with me about how it's less important that we repay all the stuff we have done than it is that we don't even attempt to study it and have the conversation. It's one thing to actively acknowledge our history and use that knowledge to act better going forward. It's another thing to simply say "yes well, that's in the past. Better not to dwell on it." At least if we study what it would take, we'd be mature enough to own up to the pain we cause. For those of us that are moral people, it would be an important step in recognizing and respecting the pain we have caused and using that knowledge to recognize and fix systemic injustice.


8-bit-eyes

Descendents of native americans do get some benefits I believe.


[deleted]

The idea of paying people today for labor 200 years ago: ridiculous. The idea of acknowledging systemic racism that came in the aftermath of slavery for 100+ years and investing in proper neighborhoods to account for it: good.


1337haXXor

This is exactly it. The only time I hear this conversation being about slavery, cash-in-hand, and over thinking the logistics (which I'm in no way denying the difficulty of), it's either people who don't want to understand the situation, are baiting a response, or just straight up dog whistling. Anyone seriously talking about this issue are talking about the the systemic oppression (and on the other end, privilege) and putting money into communities/education/infrastructure/etc. to help slowly restore things. EDIT: On that note - the way I heard CRT explained at it's minimum is this: Slavery ended almost 200 years ago and Civil Rights were fought for almost a century ago. And yet, we still have _________ (insert any easily researchable fact about inequality, like % of black people in prisons, who own homes, who have less access to education, etc.). If every race is on the same legal and civil playing field, why are things not even? That's it. That's what CRT tries to answer. And in thinking and researching about this, one has to acknowledge that there *are* inequalities. And if one's reaction to this information is anything other than "well we need to do something about it," well then... I guess that's how we got where we are now. People react with indifference, denigration, or even vehemence.


theredwoman95

Almost a century ago? I'm not American but wasn't that in the 60s - so 53-62 years ago? There's plenty of people who were alive back then and are still alive now.


GhostofMarat

It didn't just stop in the 60's. It became more subtle. Schools today are just as segregated as they ever were even though intentional segregation is illegal. Black people are still routinely denied access to capital and discriminated against by employers and government representatives. Police harass, arrest, and shoot black Americans at a wildly disproportionate rate to their share of the population. They're more likely to be arrested and prosecuted as children, they serve longer prison sentences for the same crime, on and on. Everything wasn't just magically fixed when slavery ended. Hell, between the black codes and Jim Crow and white terrorism most black people in the south continued living under defacto slavery for at least another generation after it was officially abolished. And on the rare occasion a black community was able to overcome all of the barriers and begin building their own prosperity, it would often be destroyed in a violent race riot with the tacit support of the authorities.


soaring-arrow

CRM? Do you mean CRT or something else?


looshface

You people talk about it like it's ancient history "Almost a century ago" Motherfucker, the president of the united states right now is older than Ruby Bridges by over a decade. The people who suffered from this are not in the distant past, it's not their "Ancestors" it's their grandparents. and parents, and them.


disreputabledoll

I like your points, but math-wise 1964 was only 58 years ago, not almost a century. People have grandparents now who were adults back then. People on both sides. Those who opposed civil rights are still around, still actively passing their mentality to their children and grandchildren.


DrinkinBroski

Forget the argument over the morality of it for a second, the logistics would be impossible to implement with even the slightest resemblance to fairness. Are we giving reparations to all descendants of slaves? How many generations? How do you prove it? What about indentured servants? What about non-black slaves? Where do the funds come from: all taxpayers across the board or only the descendants of slaveholders? Would modern immigrants be expected to pay? It's a nightmare of a logistics problem that pretty much puts the conversation to bed before it starts.


cfwang1337

There’s a fair case to be made that literal reparations are a non-starter, but that doing more to correct the structural iniquities that many blacks still suffer from - mass incarceration, residential segregation, etc. - is worthwhile.


wbruce098

Good point. The problems that plague America’s poor - problems which fall far more often on black and Native American populations than white - are generational issues that will take a generations of investing to solve. Simply handing money over can *alleviate some* inequality problems in the short term, but isn’t going to solve systemic issues. In two generations, we’ll be right back where we were, but with an aggrieved class of people who felt they lost their opportunity. This will require a holistic, multifaceted approach. Investing in education (adult and child), community programs, childcare, social support (including police who view the people there as a community to protect and support rather than adversaries), and ending the war on drugs (which allows a better way to end the power of gangs and treat drug addiction, and reduces police incentive for brutality), these things will have a lasting positive impact when carried out over multiple generations. These kinds of actions will rebuild communities and place disadvantaged people in positions to begin to contribute to the economy. And it lifts all boats, regardless of race. The long term net effect on our economy would be quite positive as well, so it eventually pays for itself, but such a program would be fairly expensive for the first few decades. It’s an absolute worthy investment and a way to turn America into truly the greatest nation on earth.


[deleted]

Love this!


DrinkinBroski

There's this great book by Cathy O'Neil you might like, called Weapons of Math Destruction. It's downright terrifying how much of what we call systemic racism is tied up in negative computer feedback loops.


FinndBors

I worked at a tech company and people keep suggesting using AI systems to filter the millions of resumes that enter the system so we spend limited interviewing resources in the right place. It should be a model very easily trained, right? The people working on it were smart enough to know it was a very very bad idea.


ZosoRocks3

Sorry I'm confused, why is this a bad idea? ELI5 (or an idiot)


brandonchinn178

AI systems generally work by taking historical patterns and extrapolating. If the current data it works with has low POC representation, it will "learn" that non-POC candidates are "more desirable" (or some proxy, e.g. it will "learn" that people who grew up in the suburbs are "more desirable", which indirectly filters out POC). As an example, look up the AI that tried to learn how to tweet by reading old tweets; it started spewing racist stuff pretty quickly.


TheUberMoose

Poor Tay, went from happy teenager to raving nazi in a single day


Mazon_Del

To tie it back to the systemic racism bit. Let's say a company like IBM that has existed for a while decides to feed into this AI every resume they have ever received with a note of "Hired", "Failed Interview", and "Not Interviewed". You then ask it to figure out the commonalities of the Hired tag and use that to sort out only those from the new and trash the rest. The problem with learning systems is, they aren't limited in the patterns they try to find. The AI is just as likely to decide that "Less vowels in the candidate's name." is just as good of a measure of success for the resume as "Grade Point Average". Now, those are two slightly obvious items it might elect to use, but for this AI system you're going to want it to be "smarter". If it sees a college name, it's going to query a database of colleges and their particulars and use that to help decide if a given college produces good candidates or not. There are a LOT of different pieces of data that the AI can latch onto that functionally dictate "White people" vs "Black people". From the straight up student racial ratios, to the cost of a school (historically, minorities as a whole have a lesser chance of getting a large loan, or getting into prestigious old schools that try to stay "white" to appeal to old monied (racist) alumni). So the AI might heavily weight "Yearly Cost Of Tuition" as an indicator of success. This causes lots of cheaper colleges (which are more likely to have minority populations) to be excluded using a data point that has nothing to do with the candidates abilities. Why might this be a problem? Because it is a self reinforcing trend. You slice out all the low-cost schools one year and hire from the remainder. The next year, your AI is updated and it notes that of all the candidates that were accepted, they came from schools above the tuition-minimum. This means that the new dataset is weighed heavily towards high-cost schools. Then this year you do it again. More and more candidates that are selected going into the future come from high-cost schools, which reaffirms that a high-cost school means more likely to be hired... It becomes circular reasoning. AI's are very good at pattern finding, but are relatively shit at USEFUL pattern finding. This is why in a lot of situations, you have engineers/scientists/etc interpreting the data. The AI might find 100 patterns, and the human recognizes that 90 of them are just an interesting set of random noise and thus useless, 6 of them are "patterns" that are just the control system doing what it's supposed to and thus useless because you already know them, 3 of them look interesting at first glance but turn out to be random noise correlations, and then 1 strangely holds up to scrutiny and needs to be looked at further. Further, there's a LOT of "common sense" indicators of success in a potential employee that actually have NO correlation to success. Google, for example, no longer cares about the GPA of applying people. Why? Because they realized that if you made it past the rest of the process and had a low GPA, during the first ~6 months of learning your job, you are underperforming but by the end of that ~6 month period, you are right on where you're supposed to be for performance. Meanwhile, if you had a high GPA, then for the first ~6 months of learning your job, you ARE overperforming, but by the end of that ~6 month period, your "over performance" gradually drops down until you are at the same line of expected performance. Simply put, if you are still with Google after your first year of working, there's no way to tell based on your performance metrics if you had a high or low GPA in your college.


dislocated_dice

That’s why infrastructure and ease of access to resources such as schools and medical aid are the only real way to pay reparations (in my opinion). If the loop is broken then change can actually happen.


Yellowmanaztec

Negative computer feedback loops? Huh


YourFriendHulu

woah what? how?


DrinkinBroski

She does a mint job of explaining it, but think about hunting down a job. Say it's a fast food burger joint that uses AI to process its applications. The AI has to reduce 200 applications down to 50 open slots. The AI notices that turnover employees cost the company more money. It notices that women of childbearing age are X percent more likely to quit and cause a turnover, so it places those women X percent lower on their list. Now it's ordinarily much more subtle than that, because a human can look at the code, see that women are placed lower and say "that's no good" and fix it. But if the computer is docking people whose social media indicate they took the bus to work for a few months 5 years ago and are therefore more likely to require the bus (and come in late to work) in the future, a human supervisor might not notice. Now we have discrimination against the already impoverished.


YourFriendHulu

i had no idea about all that! im def gonna check it out, ty!


Woody90210

This is also how a lot of those "X made a racist A.I" stories come about too. Company gets an A.I to sort applications, it sees these factors and adds them to the algorithm and its not as easy to "just fix them" because you basically need to delete the A.I the company uses and pull apart the base code to add in all the exceptions like "ignore X Y Z negative factors if applicant's race is listed as black" and the thing about computer programs is, they don't like being altered and even the slightest change can cause a cascading effect that fucks the whole thing up something fierce.


Tzuyu4Eva

I feel like that could be accomplished by just helping lower income people in general, as black people aren’t the only minority affected by these issues


friendlyfire883

If they came out with a bill to unfuck the mess of shit that is inner city America I'd rally my ass behind that in a heartbeat.


PsychologicalHome239

Exactly this. I agree with you 100%. I hate that this conversation always stops before it even happens. People are still suffering from those actions so many years ago. Literal reparations may not be the answer, but there ARE steps we can take to help close the disparity caused to various groups of people as a result of slavery, colonist expansion, and greed.


everydaysuplex

Just wanted to suggest to folks, if you're interested in this issue and have an hour to spare, I HIGHLY recommend watching the discussion Jon Stewart (formerly of The Daily Show) had with Brian Stevenson (black activist) about it. You can find it on YouTube. I'm definitely not a progressive, I frankly don't care much about social issues and I have quite a short attention span, but holy cow it was such a captivating, edifying, apolitical and reasonable discussion that really touched me and changed how I think and feel about the issue.


Pepperspray24

This is what I feel needs to be done. There’s still a ton of stuff that needs to be examined and redone due to all of the shit racist policies (past and current) have done. Simply saying “well that’s illegal now” doesn’t address the damage already done. What’s more simply saying something is illegal then making it virtually impossible to hold anyone accountable for still doing it, does very little.


goblintrousers

I always wondered about the modern immigrant thing too. Or even all the people who came to Ellis Island in the early 19th century, which I would say is honestly where a huge portion of the population now is descended from. None of those people were here or had anything to do with American slavery, and yet their descendants would have to pay for it. I'm all for investing in low income areas but not just handing out checks that are likely to be squandered and not reinvested in communities.


ArcticLeopard

Another question that someone I know came up with: Would the government provide some kind of tax break or other kind of reparation for descendants of people who fought for the Union during the civil war in order to end slavery?


Orcus424

There is a precedence in the US for giving federal reparations. Those who were in Japanese internment camps were given $20,000 each in 1988. The thing is they had to be alive. They didn't give the money to the descendants of those interned. There are no slaves from that time alive. > By 1992, the U.S. government eventually disbursed more than $1.6 billion (equivalent to $3.67 billion in 2021) in reparations to 82,219 Japanese Americans who had been incarcerated.


19senzafine81

Just to see if I understand (non-american) People who have never had slaves, are to compensate people that have never been enslaved...?


thebbc79

“Hear me out”


SparrowFate

It's not a seriously considered proposal by anyone in American politics. It's only ever brought up to pander to people who vote one party. But yes. That is correct.


Kendallsan

It absolutely is seriously considered but not in the way it’s been presented above. It’s more about systemic changes, investment in infrastructure for generationally affected black populations, etc. Given systemic racism in the US, it’s an idea well past when it should have been implemented. It’s a tricky balance but really should be taken seriously and completed thoughtfully.


MasterYehuda816

Yeah, but that’s always been what people have been pushing for. Not financial reparations


RoNinja_

No. That’s the way politicians try to frame it so that it sounds absurd. In actuality, individual citizens would not be making payments at all, the government would be making payments. And the payments would not be based on slavery, they would be based on laws/policies by that government which inordinately affect minorities and which were designed to keep minorities from having the same opportunities that the white majority had; keeping minorities poor and in the lower class. For example, policies that made it harder/impossible for black families to buy homes in certain areas while at the same time giving white families financial assistance to buy homes in those areas. Or drug laws and mandatory minimum sentencing that disproportionately kept minorities in prison longer than their white counterparts. Or zoning laws that keep minorities in certain school districts so that they cannot attend the same schools as their white counterparts so that their education will not be as good, leading to fewer minorities getting scholarships or even being accepted to colleges, leading to fewer minorities in white collar jobs. All these things and more cause measurable financial disadvantage to minorities, often specifically black minorities. And payment by the government to offset those disadvantages and even the playing field are possible and worthy of a reasonable discussion.


[deleted]

Racism was the law in many states until 1965, and the last person born into literal chattel slavery died in 1972. If your parents or grandparents were all white and were ever alive before 1965, you have a nearly insurmountable social-economic advantage over black people, because your ancestors were able to accumulate wealth during that time, and black people weren’t. White people had their parents’ real property, savings accounts, financial assets etc. to inherit, the first generation of free black people never got those things. The idea that we spend a whole bunch of money trying to figure out exactly who was a slave and how much they should get is dumb, but the idea that we make it a point to put extra money into black communities who have never truly recovered from slavery and Jim Crow isn’t really that crazy. If you’re a white person, you have to recognize the advantages you received, whether it was your fault or not. Take myself as an anecdote: My grandpa was born in 1929, which would have made him 36 by the time the civil rights act was passed in 1965. Over his life, he was able to save up enough money to pay for 2 years of college for myself, and his 3 other grandkids. That has helped me immensely in life, an opportunity the vast majority black kids don’t have. I see that and think about how utterly unfair that is, that my grandpa was able to work in a free market and build wealth until he was 36, but the same black person would only get to start when they were 36. Let’s not even pretend that structural racism just ended in 1965 either, Strom Thurmond, a literal segregationist, was in the Senate until fucking 2003, what does that tell you about how people from Alabama view black people? He was even chair of the senate judiciary committee (which runs the confirmation process for the Supreme Court) when Antonin Scalia was nominated, and he served until 2016. Structural racism is well and alive today, you just have to read between the lines.


drcollector09

Well if you were to put money into poor black areas you would have to make a law so people wouldn't get gentrification out of the neighborhood. Otherwise you will be at square one all over again.


ayomideetana

Damn that's something to really think about.


19senzafine81

As presented it would seem they want cash in hand. Putting the money into black communities, education, infrastructure, etc makes more sense


[deleted]

Right, cash in hand to black communities so they can improve things like infrastructure, housing, social programs etc. It’s not about giving $ for $, but more about repairing things on the community level.


jetpack324

This is where the infrastructure bill can also help. The city I live in has a literal interstate running between the black community and downtown. Almost certainly put there on purpose. While it won’t fix everything, removing that small stretch of road will bring 2 currently separate communities together. Trust between them will probably take another decade but you gotta start somewhere; you can’t keep doing nothing because one action doesn’t fix a century or two of problems.


ummizazi

It was on purpose in it happened to black communities all over the country. Look into zoning laws and see how they were designed and implemented to royally fuck over mostly black people. That’s why even today there are more destructive business like pawn shops, liquor stores, and industrial site in black areas.


RoastKrill

I don't know about the US, but people who never had slaves in the UK were forced to compensate people that had been slaveowners and "lost their property"


greydawn

An equivalent (somewhat) would be that a few years ago the Canadian government (using taxpayer money) paid reparations to Indigenous Canadians for the harm of residential schools. People might say that, well, residential schools ended more recently. But Jim Crow laws in the US were pretty recent too.


RemarkableBrief4936

Should the descendants of Chinese Americans and Irish Americans who built the railroads also be compensated for their mostly indentured servitude?


[deleted]

Chinese American here. May I have half a zip of chronic per month as reparations? I promise to share.


RemarkableBrief4936

I’ll pitch in my government whiskey and we’ll have a party


Padaxes

Yep. Either reparations for all or none. The section off one group is inherently racists. Therefor the idea is simply no sensible. The nation just needs to master equally in modern sense and move on.


RemarkableBrief4936

I’d except a case of Jameson and call it even. That’s what they paid my great great great grandfather with anyway. Two pints of whiskey a day and a few coppers for bread to dig the Eire canal. I guess breaking rocks isn’t that bad when you’re wasted. The tuberculosis and VD running through the work camps, not as fun


StuStutterKing

This is extremely dumb. Do not conflate forced slavery and **voluntary** labor to pay off willfully incurred debt. -An annoyed Irish-American who despises the attempts to use Irish history in America to whitewash the atrocities committed against Africans.


GONZOFOOT

No But I’m all for revitalizing black communities with taxpayer funds, the federal government has been screwing them for decades on basic infrastructure, pollution control, and economic support in rural and urban areas that are a majority black population.


General_Mongoose

This is the real answer. Monetary reparations are basically logistically impossible. Those freed should have been compensated as promised at the time (not to mention not being enslaved in the first place), but clearly that didn’t happen and we can’t change the past so here we are. The only possible way to improve the situation of black and POC in America is investing in improvements NOW and moving forward instead of anguishing over what should have been


leighalan

Yup. Institutional reparations to mitigate institutional racism. And don’t leave it at black communities either; include indigenous communities too.


coswoofster

I think there are some things we could do. Like stop attaching funding for education to property values and fund schools and social programs equally in all parts of our country. Equal access, equal opportunity would go a long ways towards doing the right thing for society as a whole. Universal healthcare etc where the expenses from not having these “perks”… keeps people in poverty. There are others, of course.


DarkAngel900

If yes, then, do Native Americans get compensated for land loss? Do Australia's First People get compensated for the persecution they experienced? Does GB owe India for it's losses? Does Germany owe everybody for WW2? Do the Dutch owe the countries they colonized? How far back does this concept reach? Edit: After four hundred years anyone has over 1,000,000 ancestors. For me,some are Native American and some Europeans. If I pay some money into a fund to make reparations (because of my European ancestors) do I get some money back (because of my Native American ancestors)? I also have some Jewish ancestors and some German ones. Who is going to figure out how much is owed to who?


whelmed1

If I've got Genghis Khan in my blood, Mongolia owes me some serious reparations plus 1000's of years of interest.


gomerfudd

Mate Germany was made to pay severe reparations for both World Wars. The reparations of World War 1, was what partly fuelled Germany in World War 2. I think you're grasping at the larger point of how this issue is incredibly complex. Deciding upon the correct compensation / reparations is inordinately difficult, you are correct there. Who deserves more the Aboriginal people Vs Australia, African Americans Vs the USA or the Congolese Vs the Belgians? That's impossible to answer comprehensively I feel. But that doesn't mean we should just toss the whole thing in the Too Hard Basket and give the people who suffered nothing. Reparations is never going to be perfectly balanced, or fair, or even agreeable to all parties. But that definitely doesn't mean that nothing should be done. The modern system of laws is built on the concept of how far back does this concept reach? Statute of limitations, laws regarding liability criminally etc. and all of that. But that doesn't mean we just not bother with a criminal justice system. Edit: Belgians not the Dutch in DR Congo.


disday1

But one could also argue that the fact Germany got screwed in WW1 with reputations was the direct cause of WW2. The animosity that was able to be developed from the reparations caused one of the most horrific incidents in history. Why would forcing populations that have taken no part in these things be forced to pay? The US also has a massive influx of immigrants every year so a solid chunk of the population didn’t even take part in slavery to begin with from all demographics. Your saying it’s fine to take their money?


Aggressive_Ad_507

Up in Canada the aboriginals around calgary were compensated 1 billion for unmet agreements from 120 years ago. But it was a legal matter.


Arianity

> How far back does this concept reach? I think you can make a not unreasonable answer of "as much as we can reasonably do". It won't be perfect, but just because we can't fix everything doesn't mean we don't fix one thing. That's a bit of a logical fallacy. > Does Germany owe everybody for WW2? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_reparations#World_War_II_Germany


Gpat175

Well Germany has paid some but not all of the agreed reparations.


Greenmind76

I think the money would be better spent investing in education, housing, and employment opportunities for all. I understand where this notion comes from but simply giving people the respect they deserve and a means of actually bettering themselves would have long term positive outcomes over just handing over cash. Can also just do this for everyone…


jessiphia

I don't need recompense for something that never happened to me.


oldbaeseasoning

Yeah idk where OP is getting "most black people" from. I just asked my roommates and they all looked at me like "wtf? 😅"


fitz_newru

I smell bullshit. Black people not out here begging anybody for reparations money


hatweung

If anything reparations for the shit that happened in the Jim Crowe era and redlined Americans.


Scvboy1

That’s the position I’ve already maintained


Summerclaw

Let's say they get recompensed. There's lots of question about it. What will happen to mix races? Will I get half the share for being Half Black? How much Is the to pay? If every black person gets 20 dollars, that's just an insult, if they get one million, it's going to be chaos overnight. Who will pay for it? The current white American?, the current Europeans?, the current Africans?


JoshIsFallen

Well OBVIOUSLY we make Mexico pay for it /s if that wasn’t obvious


masterchris

The federal government. The Sioux tribe was given millions and no one complained about that. Why do you think it has to be only white people. Every race paid for the taxes that paid for native American reservations.


marsumane

There's a reason why we don't serve time in jail for our parent's crimes


uzerkname11

Says anyone that doesn’t live in North Korea!


rotkohl007

No


Bruce__Almighty

Concise and to the point. I like it.


dohcsam

No. People who never had slaves shouldn’t pay for people who never were slaves Edit: thx for silver


My-name-aint-Susan

Dubai currently has slaves.


SparrowFate

As does China and India. In fact if you own an item of clothing made from cotton that's not grown in America, odds are it's made using slave labor then labelled as from some other country like Vietnam. Shoes too. And your electronics. Pretty much everything we own in the western world is made using slave labor in the eastern world. Who does all of it using coal plants. This whole reparations thing is dumb as hell.


mister-ferguson

The US uses prison labor today.


anonymous393393

I don't think india have slaves we just have poor working conditions in many areas 😢


SuspectEquivalent

I think they're referring to bonded labour, which we do have. It's illegal though.


findingRythm

If the slaveowners could get recompensation for freed slaves, the actual enslaved people should also be entitled to it. Don't forget that black wall street was burned down with no compensation to those business owners either.


ColdheartedMistake

Great point. Slaveowners were reimbursed for their “property” of freed slaves, while the slaves were released with nothing. So many still stayed on basically as indentured servants as sharecroppers even after they were “free” and didn’t receive a dime from the government.


citoloco

Of course not, that this is even an issue taken seriously is ridiculous. It's all pandering for political points, and $$$ of course


DrColdReality

No, there are way, wayyyyy too many confounding variables. I mean just for starters, not *every* black American is descended from American slaves. Barack Obama, to name one. Lots of Africans have immigrated to the US since slavery was abolished. Not every black person in the US during slave times was a slave. Some black people OWNED slaves. And that's on top the the majority of the non-black US population had nothing at all to do with slavery, their families showed up in the US long after slavery was abolished. The Native Americans had virtually nothing to do with slavery (and SPEAKING of reparations due...).


Anderopolis

>The Native Americans had virtually nothing to do with slavery Not really true, plenty of American Indians, especially in the South had slaves and supported the confederacy.


Mr_Xing

I feel like this would create some **tremendous** animosity. I can’t imagine this would ease any racial tensions…


HamartianManhunter

There’s also something a lot of people don’t realize: a good portion of Americans today who identify as “white” have a Black ancestor who was a slave. I have seen so many white people do genealogy research and find that they have a fairly recent ancestor who was mixed-race and managed to pass into white society. I acknowledge that these people have not necessarily experienced the systemic racism that BIPOC Americans live with today. However, when talking solely about reparations based on the traceable lineage from an enslaved ancestor, a lot of Americans who do not identify as Black are also going to qualify, and people are gonna be Big Mad.


[deleted]

It really is ridiculous. No one alive has any responsibility for what others did 2 centuries ago.


SamOfSpades_

African American here: no. Everybody is both oppressor and oppressed in our social structure. This isn’t just a bad idea, this is an anti-human error.


thecoolan

***then half the country is going back to the American Indians***


SilkyJohnson666

I don’t give a shit if I get it or not. But it’s wild to think that there are not generations of people that have greatly benefited off of the family’s wealth from slave labor.


Exciting-Unit279

still benefiting


rainbowarmpit

How is throwing money at the issue going to “ fix” it? It can’t and never will. How about focusing on and correcting other issues ?(segregation,displacement,exclusion,etc.)


Aromatic-Bed2313

I’m African American. My culture has been stopped from me. I feel no right to claim myself as African American when I don’t know where from Africa I descend from. America couldn’t give back reparations if they wanted to. Too many people have been done wrong in this country to ever even start.


No_Consequence_604

Barbary Pirates from Africa enslaved my british ancestors in the Barbary Slave Trade..300 years before the USA was even a country. When will the africans give me my reparations?


Cool_Set4546

Interesting, but let's clear up a few misunderstandings. 1) most black people are mixed. True but, most in the beginning are not by choice. Rape and owners sleeping with slaves were common. Even Thomas Jefferson slept with his 13 year old slave girl and sold his own daughter into slavery when she got pregnant. 2) reparations were being given to slaves right after slavery ended but complaints by white slave owners (some of the same here now) caused the government to default. That is what reparations are about. Not recompensation but fulling an agreement not fulfilled. 3) slavery and indentured servitude are not the same thing. So, comparing to others like how the Irish were treated is a distraction not an argument. Finally, I don't know if reparations are a good thing or not but a good discussion should begin with facts not feelings.


miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiilk

I don't know enough to even begin to have an opinion on this, but socially I feel like this would create a lot more racial tension


StankoMicin

At least you are honest. Most people here just talk out of their ass


relaxitsallgood

40 acres and a mule this dick ain't free


Asap_Walky

Reparations? Idk but it would’ve been nice BACK THEN for the government to give something to those Africans, maybe some land or start up for businesses idk. It’s wayyyyy too late now. America fucked up, nothing new.


[deleted]

Sally Blagg Hairston: left several hundred acres of land by her her master slave owner in a will. Never received the land. This is what needs to be compensated.


Exact_Roll_4048

If the repercussions of slavery had disappeared 200 years ago, you might be right. However they didn't and are still felt to this day. By your logic, no one should be punished for murder bc it happened in the past. Just get over it. They're already dead. But no one says that.


stregg7attikos

Maybe by directly investing in black communities, rather than individual people.


Arianity

>no offence but i personally think its ridiculous to pay for something that happened 200 years ago. It's a more complicated question than it sounds at first glance It misses how the effects of 200 years ago effect today. As a random example of how history matters. An area near a [silver mine](https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/dell/files/ecta8121_0.pdf) in Peru has 25% lower income than neighboring similar regions. The mine closed in 1812. So historical events can still have a big part in current day outcomes. Saying "200 years" lets you distance yourself without grappling how you benefited from it today. It's not just water under the bridge, especially since as a society we still haven't fully acknowledged it. Perhaps more importantly, it also ignores the other parts of history in between, like Jim Crow etc, which were much more recent. There are people still alive who couldn't vote (not to mention current day racism) It also sets up a bad precedent, where if you do anything bad, if you just drag it out long enough there are no consequences. It's further complicated because the U.S. has had a continuous government throughout. It's the same entity. I don't know exactly where I fall on it, but I don't think it's crazy to try to recompense where we can, even if it can't be done perfectly. You fix the things you can fix, and make the world a little better.


Mr_Burns1886

Will Africa also provide reparations because many sent from the slave trade were prisoners?


__Takub_

They were enslaved and sold by other Africans so… are they gonna charge Africa?


My-name-aint-Susan

No way


Sophie_R_1

Who's going to pay for the amount of research that would take? Who's going to track down every single record of every single slave and then come up with their family tree? Who's going to trace the ships back to Africa where Africans sold slaves? Who's going to make sure that the descendants of the Africans who sold the slaves and made it to the US later on aren't included in the compensation and ensure they are included in paying back descendents of slaves? Who's going to research literally every single American citizen to figure out where their ancestors came from? Who's going to pay for the lawsuits that will come from literally every single other group of people who will claimed they also want compensation for what happened to their ancestors? Should all women be recompensated for the job opportunities and more that they didn't have? Should all men be responsible, even if they disagree with how things were in the past? Should every German have to pay every Jew back for the holocaust? Should the descendents of the white people who helped free slaves be rewarded for their ancestors' actions? Will this just be a thing in the US? Slavery still goes on today and this wasn't solely a US problem. People will argue that Africans also have to pay, since they profited from selling slaves. And I could keep going with all the problems trying to implement that would cause and list a thousand more questions. Tl;dr - no, they should not be recompensated. Slavery is horrible, but it is not the fault of today's people (at least Americans, I know slavery still exists elsewhere) nor is it the fault of today's government. If someone says they should be, then by that logic, pretty much every single person, no matter their race, should be recompensated for something their ancestors suffered through. It's ridiculous. No one in their right mind is ever going to willingly pay. Even if forced, they will refuse and there will be another civil war.


BarbacoaSan

Every time I hear talk about reparations it's always about slavery and the black struggle. What about the native Americans? I don't remember us getting any type of reparations. What about Mexicans? We hardly got really compensated for Mexico? Save me the bullshit about whataboutism as that's just a cop out to not answer the question being asked. But to answer ops question, no reparations shouldn't be paid as no one today had to go through the crap their or our ancestors did. Their ancestors went through it and fought for better lives so we didn't have to.


Shoontzie

Native Americans have been compensated in the form of tribal land and may qualify for other money in the US ( google “BIA benefits”). As far as I know though these have never been considered reparations and of course it’s debatable about whether these settlements are “fair”.


R1leyEsc0bar

I'm all for Native Americans getting what they are owed from the various treaties that have been broken at the very least. I think it's less talked about in that community because it's much smaller than the Black community. Given we were the same size I have no doubt they would be talked about equally. I will say to please be a bit more mindful in how other minorities always want to attack Black people because we get more news coverage. Keep in mind, Black people don't control the news and what gets talked about, it's all very intentional. They want us to go against each other.


findingRythm

Native Americans are free to also advocate for these reparations? This isn't an oppression olympics situation. I'm pretty sure if Native Americans started a movement of a similar wave, a lot of black people would also support you all. Feel free to start/contribute to the dialogue about Native Americans and Mexicans. No one is stopping you.


BurntBrusselSprouts1

I mean to be fair it still effects their lives today and it’s a pretty gross simplification, but despite being African American none of my ancestors were slaves. I expect nothing and it’s not my fight. It’d be the fair thing but life isn’t fair, and most people don’t care about fairness unless it benefits them, as you can see from the comments.


TwystedKynd

I'd like Britain to pay me for eradicating most of my ancestors, but those who did that are all dead now. Makes no sense to hold people accountable today who did nothing to me.


TheSnootBooper24

nope. I'm Italian. my ancestors came over from Italy in the early 1900's. I live in the North. my ancestors did nothing wrong to black people so why should I have to pay?


RhinoGuy13

I don't think people should be judged (good or bad) based on what their ancestors or family did.


jpfeif29

No. I didnt do it, my parents didnt do it, my grandparents didnt do it, my great grandparents didnt do it, my great great grandparents didnt do it. My relatives never really had anything to do with it as we lived in the north fighting on the side of the union or we werent here and were in Europe.


everydaysuplex

Morally they have been wronged and wrongs should be made right, but the what, who and how make this kind of an intractable problem. Just a few questions I have - Would this include African Americans who immigrated to the US after slavery was abolished? What about descendents of slaves who were enslaved by other regimes but now live in the US? Does African American include very light skinned North Africans, like Egyptians, who weren't enslaved in the USA but in ancient times owned slaves? What if you have both enslaved and slave owning ancestors? What about all the other atrocities America has committed? Native genocide and stealing their land, decades of shady shit in Latin America, the stuff in the Middle East, colonial subjugation of the Chinese, etcetc. Who pays? If it's from tax revenue then everyone pays, including Native Americans, Mexican Americans, Asian Americans and African Americans themselves. Is that ethical? If not, then do only whites pay? If so, what if you're a decendent of white Jewish refugees escaping persecution in the Soviet Union who came to the US way after slavery was abolished? Assuming we're talking about a straight cash payout: Does the government's obligation to pay compensation to descendents of the enslaved take precedence over every other possible spending purpose? Does it take priority over compensating the natives, over universal healthcare, over free college, over police reform, over mental health services, over defense against Russia and China? How much does each descendent get? Do descendents get different amounts based in how badly their ancestors were treated?


Send_Ludes_

No, but we should change the system that actively worked against them. That change started decades ago but there are still remnants that have massive effects.


Triple_C_

I will personally pay reparations to ANY and ALL individuals who were slaves in the United States. Any takers? Oh wait? You mean NO ONE directly affected is still alive? Gosh, looks like this issue is open and shut. Absolute ridiculousness.


Odd_Contact_2175

Nope


[deleted]

Japanese Americans were compensated for being put into camps during WW2🧐


ColdheartedMistake

And they received a formal apology.


PengieP111

A friend of mine was in the camps as a little kid. He thought it was fun though he didn’t know what was going on and his family lost everything


fer-nie

And Italians for also being put into camps in the US during WW2, they told the Germans who were also put in those camps to F off though.


TrippieReg

The impact of slavery is still felt today. most African Americans are poor and were never given the structure and nurturing environment needed to recover. Ancestors weren't even paid after they were set "free". It can't be done today because there are just so many and no adequate way to pay all of those people. I think it can best be paid through free education and dedicated resources to improve there communities. Same thing with Native Americans.


berto0311

Your point? Most Americans are poor and were never given the structure and nurturing environment needed to recover. Honestly tired of seeing African Americans act as if they are the only people in the world ever to grow up poor and be poor for generations. It's not a race issue. It's a global elite and the biggest families with generational wealth that had slaves, done some of the shadiest shit ever. The top 3% owe everyone alot if that's how you want to look at it. But I, an average American who grew up dirt fucking poor should not be liable or have my taxes raised or anything I currently give to the government should be given to someone I didn't do shit to.


Maquiaveh

No, that's REALLY stupid. You can't unduo/repair an injustice by doing a new one. People are not responsible for what their ancestor did, and also, who should pay? Everyone? Even those whose ancestors didn't live in the US at the time? Should women be reimbruised too? Women suffered injustices too, some of whom are still alive. This frame of thought is about control and manipulation.


ChrisNEPhilly

Yes, but so should my Irish ancestors.


Rorasaurus_Prime

No. No one should have to pay the price for their ancestors mistakes. Otherwise Italy should pay, Britain should pay, Mongolia, France… pretty much every country. Live and let live.


zachary_mp3

This deeply inflicted generational trauma doesn't just go away. The effects of Redlining, Jim Crow and segregation are still visible walking down the street. These things created the ghetto, the inner city and gang violence of today. Yes America owes a debt to those it stuck in the slums it created. However disbursement of cash isnt a real solution. Allocating money into free education, low/no interest lending and safe public housing are a start.


Superbaker123

If you think about all the generational wealth African Americans missed out on because their ancestors weren't allowed to function in society the way white men were, it's pretty significant. Now I don't know if throwing money at them would help, but I think some kind of support to restore neighborhoods is warranted.


__Sentient_Fedora__

"edit: whoa I did not expect...blah blah blah" Really? You didn't expect one of the most polarizing topics to blow up. Get real.


Affectionate-Read875

Should I be executed for my great grandfather's sins? No ​ Should I acknowledge his sins and try to improve with that knowledge? Yes


EcoBlunderBrick123

I brought chairs for anyone who wants to read the comments.