Time sorts these kinds of problems out sooner or later (probably a little later for this one 
).
I donât think time does. I think rebuttal does.
I say raise the expectations for everyone and give the disadvantaged people of whatever race school vouchers. I say that in such circumstances, everyone will do better and every race will look about the same on test papers.
I donât know what those who oppose school vouchers are afraid ofâŚ
OK so you guys are too fast for me. Anyway I wrote this while you guys were posting and Iâm not gonna delete it darn it!
Tiger if it could be shown that blacks were more violent than the other races in whatever country at whatever time in history then there would be a point in saying that blacks are more violent. That couldnât be done so there is no basis for positing a racial predisposition to violence. That was what I meant. Personally I think that the faster we quit thinking that race means a damn thing the better off we will all be.
If affirmative action is used to help the economically disadvantaged and if in fact most economically disadvantaged people are black then they will be the ones to get the help. Often this will be the case. However the problem is that a lot of whites are poor and disadvantaged too. Why shouldnât equal assistance be given to them. Why canât all kids be guarenteed a good education and decent medical care regardless of race?
The companies who benefited directly off of slavery should have a hand in paying resparations in some form or another to African Americans who are the descendant of slaves.
I mean, Natives got it (Shoddy deal at that) The Japanese who were locked up in internment camps are getting it. Jews, Gypsies and others who survived death camps are getting it from Germany. The Chinese who built the railroads and had a head tax imposed on them should too.
This is of course if we lived in an ideal world. The debate of, âI never owned slavesâ or it âwas a 150 years agoâ is a cop-out. segregation didnât with end Martin Luther King Jr and the civil rights movement of the 60âs. Thatâs why there are still ghettos in every major city. Most donât want to trek down the dark side of history. Thatâs why periods in time are romanticised and we still slaughter each other over archaic beliefs.
You know, that whole doomed to repeat it thing?!
Letâs face it. as long as we have the letâs stick to our own and other xenophobic mindsets and the idea of âreverse racismâ in a system built to support whites regardless of economic background. That conditioned mind set of âitâs them not us or our problemâ is not going away.
Hereâs a good piece on white privilege. All you North Americanâs and Europeans who claim âyouâ or âfriendsâ have been victims of the system because you are white, see if what it says can be refuted.
Peace
Authors claiming biological race-based differences include J. Philippe Rushton (Race, Evolution, and Behavior) and Murray and Herrnstein (The Bell Curve). Hereâs a link to the first:
lrainc.com/swtaboo/stalkers/jpr_rghrs.html
Obviously these are controversial; Stephen Jay Gould is a prominent opponent.
Namahottie, the point is not that there are NO black geniuses. The point is that the distribution of intelligence scores among blacks is different (lower by a standard deviation). You MENSA people should know this.
Whether this is due to nature or nurture is of course controversial, but I donât see how this affects my calculations. I donât care whether the swarthy gentlemen lurking in the street are motivated by biological or sociological factors, I simply wish to know whether they pose a threat to me and my wallet.
Tigerman, for an example of costs and benefits, letâs take the African-immigrant cabbie example (who refuses to pick up young black males). The cost to the cabbie is some lost fares. The cost to the customer is more effort in getting a cab, or else lack of freedom in what to wear if they hope to avoid the problem. Benefits are greater health and safety for the cabbie, and zip for the would-be passenger. Now if Iâm the cabbie, Iâm going to be more concerned with protecting my own self than with helping to make the world marginally better for young black males with a certain look.
Lost benefits to the black job-seeker are higher, but the cost of identifying those blacks who are exceptional, is likely to offset the benefits to the employer of finding and employing them. Not hiring the black is a rational decision, in the absence of affirmative action or other pressures which compel their employment.
Slavery in the U.S. was not originally race-based, but blurred together with indentured servitude and convict labor. Only in the 18th century did Africa loom larger than England as a labor source, which incidentally also made the task of identifying slaves (and pacifying the poor white population) easier. Link here:
bob,
I agree with everything you posted.
[quote=âScreaming Jesusâ]Authors claiming biological race-based differences include J. Philippe Rushton (Race, Evolution, and Behavior) and Murray and Herrnstein (The Bell Curve). Hereâs a link to the first:
lrainc.com/swtaboo/stalkers/jpr_rghrs.html
Obviously these are controversial; Stephen Jay Gould is a prominent opponent.[/quote]
Nobody is denying that there are differences in test schores among the races generally. What is denied is that the reason for such differences is race.
And basic scientific method of the type we learn in grade school would tell us that these results are meaningless when there are many variables that can logically account for these differences in scores.
You donât? You donât think that access to better schools and intact families that expect their children to do well in school influences the way that children score on tests? I should think that such influence would be obvious.
Just by empirical example⌠look at how Asan immigrants with strong family structures and high expectations for their children do on tests and compare that to the performance of the general black population in the US where the family has been destroyed by years of liberal government good intentions gone bad.
If that isnât enough to sway you or even to get you thinking⌠look at the all black all boy high schools in Chicago where the teachers are all black men and where the community has said âenough!â and has raised expectations for these kids⌠these kids meet and exceed the expectations for them.
This is all pretty simple, IMO.
If they pose a threat it is not due to their race. How do we account for the high rate of theft in Taiwan? There are not nearly enough black people here to account for all of the theft that goes on here. Do you think people bar their windows here because they fear the black man? Obviously not. They fear Asian theives⌠Asians! Fuck, are not Asians the best test takers???
This is hardly a race problem. Those drivers would quickly learn what types of Asians and what types of blacks to avoid in other areas/societies/communities.
Nonsense. Good employees come in all colors and if the employer wants the best, he/she must investigate and take a risk⌠and this is true regardless of the race of the prospective employee.
[quote=âScreaming Jesusâ]Slavery in the U.S. was not originally race-based, but blurred together with indentured servitude and convict labor. Only in the 18th century did Africa loom larger than England as a labor source, which incidentally also made the task of identifying slaves (and pacifying the poor white population) easier. Link here:
kentuckysip.homestead.com/whiteslaves.html[/quote]
Letâs be very clear about one thing. Indentured servitude and convict labor, while terrible conditions for those involved, were NOT the same as slavery.
Read the site. Large numbers of them were even called slaves. Indentured servitude was often similar to the type of debt-bondage used to justify much human trafficking today.
The IQ score difference isnât meaningless, itâs just that people disagree as to why itâs there.
Why wouldnât I care whether the gang-bangers outside are motivated by social or biological forces? Because the prospect of educating them and improving their lives, offers no benefits to me (especially when my concerns are more immediate). I personally doubt they have much in the way of long-term benefits (I wish those folks in Chicago luck on that point), but thatâs the point weâre arguing.
Of course companies want good employees, regardless of color. However, they may well discover that certain population groups and/or genders make better employees. Selecting only from among these would save money, probably, or otherwise affirmative action wouldnât be necessary.
Sounds great. Then after that we can pay off all of the gays and lesbians who were teased in high school.
Indentured servitude was limited in duration. Slavery was for life.
I didnât say it was âmeaninglessâ. It is the reason that is important⌠and that reason is not likely due to race.
When slavery was legal in America, any percentage of black blood was enough for a person to be owned as a slave. Unless they could pass as white, even people only one eighth or one sixteenth black were slaves. Therefore the same cut off should be used for reparations. If your percentage of black blood now would have been enough for you to be a slave then, youâre in.
As for what they should get - well, they were promised 40 acres and a mule once; the equivalent in todayâs terms should be offered.
Hmmm I still think that there is going to be a very very hard time getting reparations passed. Anyone able to tell us what kind of legal leg something like this would stand on? And if such a reparations bill passed, how many more are going to be ânext in line?â Personally, I also think that Indian reservations should be corporatized or split up among their member and that they should be able to sell or stay if they want. Right now, they are basically consigned to living on reservations and expected to preserve the ways of the past in the face of modern day life. That would be like asking all Whites in America to dress like it was 1796 and drive horses and buggies. End the Dept of the Interior and close all the reservations down. To me, it is almost like having apartheid.
Second, a new study came out in the UK showing that Afro-Caribbean boys were the worst performers in school at getting and passing A Levels, but then guess what? They found out the native Whites were doing even worse. The final call? POVERTY was the main factor in their low educational scores. This is why we need to team up with the parents (Black, White, Hispanic whoever) to get vouchers passed. We need standards. We need enforcement of those standards and we need to stop this âbigotry of low expectations.â Bush was right about the Middle East. Ironically, it is now those who âcareâ for the Arabs to admit that they were secretly biased and did not believe that Arabs and Muslims would care about rights and democracy to the same degree that Westerners did. It is time for the Democrats and the teachers unions and the civil servants unions to admit that they care more about their jobs than educating inner city children (most of whom are Black but not all). Itâs time to free these children from these shitty schools. That is the problem. It reminds me of welfare as well. Nothing did more to foster single-parent familes (White, Black, Hispanic whatever) than welfare which often forbade women who were married from receiving welfare. They had to get divorced or NOT get married to receive welfare and then we look at all these single-parent families which is the NO.1 REASON for childhood poverty over race, intelligence, whatever, and we have to say that a lot of these well-meaning programs were actually bad and that is why I wonder if affirmative-action might fall into the same category. The Democrats were wrong about welfare, wrong about education and wrong about how to fight crime. I believe they may be wrong about affirmative action as well, but like I said, I would like to know if someone like Colin Powell or Condi Rice benefited from it. IF they did and if they support it, I might be inclined to support it as well. I am still on the fence.
Third, I have read the Bell Curve as well Screaming Jesus so I have to admit that the tests were standardized basic IQ tests. Culture and language ability are therefore less important in these tests than critics like to claim. There were no scores for Latin Americans, Asian Indians or Middle Easterners, only East Asians, Whites, Jews, Blacks in the US and the same groups in their respective countries. The authors posited that IQ was the most important (not the ONLY important factor) in a wide variety of areas, including job, financial stability, crime, educational accomplishment etc etc. It made a very convincing case. I am not sure whether this will hold up in all situations. I think that if I recall it put AVERAGE IQs as such: Africans in Africa 70, Africans in America 85, Whites in America 99, Whites in Europe 99, East Asians in East Asia 103, East Asians in America 104/5 and Jewish students 115.
BUT the study did note that the lower scores for Africans in Africa was precisely because of diet. If children lack protein at the development stage of 0-2 then this directly affects brain size and development so NUTRITION is also an important factor. Letâs not forget that.
At the end of the day, I am sick of this whole Balkanization of America and Americans by whomever. I think that all federal forms should stop asking groups to identify themselves by racial, ethnic, religious or gender categories. Enough!
Final say: Reparations NO! Affirmative action MAYBE.
Asking what two former or current government employees has to say on the subject strikes me as a very odd way of making up your own mind on the morality/costs-benefits of affirmative action. I am actually and quite surprised to hear you say that.
For what itâs worth, though, I believe Powell and Rice both support affirmative action (Powell fairly strongly, and Rice somewhat more circumspectly (i.e. the George W. Bush position)).
My point is that I want to hear from someone I trust about how and if they benefited personally from this AND whether they believe that it is a program worth continuining. Anything that delivered someone like Condi and Colin is going to be something that I am going to seriously look at. That is all.
BUT I still put on the qualifier that INCOME has to be taken into consideration on this. No affirmative action just because you are Black.
Also, when it gets to that point, I am not sure that there will be any real difference in the end. I think that poverty is just as much a factor in poor Whites from Appalachia as inner city Blacks and just over the border Mexicans, etc etc. so ultimately I fully expect that poverty not race will ultimately be the deciding factor. But like I said, I would be very respectful of any opinion that Condi and Colin have on this. Let me check into it. Now, that you have put me on the spot I guess I will have to remove my figleaf of attempted buck-passing to actually make a decision on this. haha I guess I was feeling intimidated about having opinions about racial issues so I wanted to cover my own decision by painting a Black face on it. You were right to call me on this.
A criminology professor in undergrad pointed out something that stuck with me all these years â the shitty part of town in most U.S. cities changed ethnicity with some regularity, as have attitudes toward the people living in those areas. Taking New York as an example, there were Irish, Italians, Jews, blacks over time that were hated by whoever had preceeded them. The Irish, Italians, Jews, and other immigrant groups were poor and these sections of town were crime-ridden. Immigrants were able to move into ârespectable societyâ as they made money and integrated with American society⌠and also once some new group of arrivals came along that everyone could agree to pick on.
Blacks, arriving only gradually from the south in the decades after the Civil War, carried with them not only the stigma of being poor but also the mantle of being former slaves. How do you overcome centuries of being thought of as âsubhumanâ? They had it tougher, and they have consistently (alongside hispanics and some newly arrived SE Asians) been on the bottom of the American pecking order into the present.
All this talk about making blacks pay reparations for crime and riots is a load of racist crap. Thereâs always somebody at the bottom. Those guys at the bottom had high crime and, occasionally, rioted. In the old days, who this was changed about regularly â normally shifting to the new immigrant group into American society. Most of these groups were able to enter normal U.S. society because they were merely poor in a land of opportunity. Blacks have been poor, but most of them have not been able to experience America as a land of opportunity â weâre so busy pigeonholing them as ânot intelligentâ or âtoo violentâ or else getting pissed off at their spelling or diction because the best education they could get at a local-property-tax-funded public school was right on a par with our crappiest rural school districts. Thanks to Screaming Jesus, we have a prime example of what black people run up against every day.
If youâre going to require the blacks to âpayâ for crime and riots, keep in mind that it doesnât really matter what ethnic or racial group does it â if the conditions are ripe, it will happen with any group stuck on the bottom of society. Keep in mind that the crime-ridden parts of town have historically been filled with crime within the group â Irish-on-Irish, Italian-on-Italian, and black-on-black crime. Are you going to ask blacks to pay themselves reparations for all the crime that happened to themselves? As this doesnât make sense given the long history of crime patterns within the U.S., I can only think that this issue is not raised because Screaming Jesus or anybody else has an honest or well-considered argument for such reparations. My assessment is that this proposal for reparations is simply a cheap shot against blacks.
If you supported and participated in social and educational programs that provide a helping hand to disadvantaged youth, many being young black males, might the benefit you receive come in the form of relief from your immediate fear that every young black male wants your wallet?
What a week. I find myself agreeing to a large extent with MFGR again. I think I need help⌠haha
Absolutely.
I think that you are reading too much into the stigma of being thought of as subhuman. Other groups surmounted these obstacles and I would argue that Black society was MORE successful and had more cohesive family structures BEFORE well meaning Democrats starting throwing all the welfare and housing crap around. This to my opinion actually had a deleterious effect on Black family structures. Childhood poverty is based on one major factor: the single parent family, not race or education.
I think that you are missing Screaming Jesusâ point. He is saying that IF the US has to pay reparations for slavery to the descendants of black slaves to the nth generation, then can others turn around and slap reparations claims on them? Do you think that there should be reparations even though no Black living today was a slave?
I have problems with this for two reasons. First, lots of groups including the Irish and Jews were treated with the utmost contempt and starved out of existence in Ireland and gassed out of existence in Europe. They fought back all the harder and I believe that Black groups did in America as well (when they immigrated to the North to find jobs) UNTIL all these welfare programs destroyed the family unit.
I agree but then again remember that in fairness to Screaming Jesus who I normally do not agree with, he is saying that IF reparations are to be paid then should other groups have the door opened to them to list their grievances and demands for reparations as well. I donât think that you answered his question.
[quote=âfred smithâ]
I agree but then again remember that in fairness to Screaming Jesus who I normally do not agree with, he is saying that IF reparations are to be paid then should other groups have the door opened to them to list their grievances and demands for reparations as well. [/quote]
I submit that the wrongs done blacks in America, and the wrongs done to other groups are fundamentally different, so different that giving reparations to blacks would not open the door to every other group to also ask for money. (They may ask, but the govât need not feel morally bound to give.) The nation was built on slavery. The president of the country, as an example, was able to rape his wifeâs fourteen-year-old half sister with impunity because she was a slave. Any country whose founding fathers kept 14-year-olds as sex slaves has a lot to answer for, IMHO.
I am sorry but I still do not think that this has a legal leg to stand on. First of all, atrocities have occurred throughout history and remember slavery was the NORM until the West decided to ban it. In fact, it still is widespread in Africa and other parts of the world TODAY. Why then should the US pay reparations for something that half the states did not sign on to? Why then is only the US govt being targeted? Why not the British because the US was in fact British when most of these slaves were brought over, therefore there was not US government until really 1789 to deal with these issues and then we were forced to compromise. Slave imports were banned shortly thereafter in 1809 but the institution was allowed to exist until 1863 when the slaves were emancipated. Remember we HAVE paid for this. We had a civil war about this and hundreds of thousands of Northerners died freeing those slaves or they might still be slaves. That blood is A HELL OF A LOT of payment in my opinion.
When the slaves in America also target the African governments involved for capturing them to sell to the Europeans who owned the ships which brought the slaves to one half of America (and not everyone in the South owned slaves only a small part did though slavery was LEGAL in their states) then we may get somewhere but there is no legal precedent for paying decendants compensation for those who did the actual suffering.
Until then, I am sorry but I am firmly against reparations for the following reasons:
- The actual victims are no longer alive.
- Those who have âsufferedâ from slavery have also benefited from the system. Those who do not want to accept this should then be paid a certain amount UNDER THE CONDITION that they return to the African country from where their ancestors came. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.
- If Blacks are paid reparations for slavery, other groups with historic grievances should also be allowed to come forward. The parade will be endless.
- IF someone like Screaming Jesus and his ilk can prove that society has suffered higher welfare, crime, drug, blah blah blah costs related to whatever points he is trying to make then I say, those who support reparations have already opened that door, so they will have to fight in court to defend themselves against his charges as well.
Again, who determines or even begins to determine who is âBlack?â And why should Africans who are Black but came to the States in the past 30 years get anything? Why should not Whites who were slaves in the South get paid as well? What about the Indians who were slaves? What about the Blacks who lived in the North? If I can prove that a Black person lived in the North, will they also not only not get reparations but be forced to pay them? If a person is half white and half black, do they also pay reparations? Or do they get half the amount? The questions go on and on.
Realistically, I seriously doubt that any reparations will or ever could be paid, BUT the problem in Black America today is NOT a Black problem only. We have to find a solution. My solution is to do exactly as the Republicans have been for the past decade. Push to reform education, welfare and build strong families. When the single most important factor in child poverty is single parent families, we have to figure out a way to deal with the root cause not treat the symptoms.
The worst schools in the US have resulted in Black students suffering the most. That must change. Do whatever it takes. Strict, religious schools, tough curriculum, forced parental involvement, tough behavioral rules, vouchers, after school programs, anti-drug programs, whatever. But the current system has failed many Black students and that is the cause of their suffering far more than any residual effects of slavery that no one can remember personally or even through second and third person narratives because it happened so long ago. Discrimination may be a different matter but other groups have suffered that as well. There are laws against this and they should be used to their full ability to ensure the protection and rights of all Americans.
It is time to move forward not look back. Victims remain victims if they do not stand up to defend themselves and fight to get ahead. Tough as that may sound, remaining a victim is even worse.
Since no reparations were paid to the British for the loss of the colonies, it was America that benefited from slavery.
[quote=âFSâ]
2. Those who have âsufferedâ from slavery have also benefited from the system. Those who do not want to accept this should then be paid a certain amount UNDER THE CONDITION that they return to the African country from where their ancestors came. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.[/quote]
I submit that had these African coutnries not been destroyed by the slave trade and colonialsim, they wouldnât be such hellholes now - a commonsense view. True, they might not be as rich as America.
[quote=âFSâ]
3. If Blacks are paid reparations for slavery, other groups with historic grievances should also be allowed to come forward. The parade will be endless. [/quote]
Just speaking of the USA, I think not. No other group has suffered the same kind of systematic mistreatment; except, of course, the native American Indians. In this case, hwoever, I believe a case can be made for blaming the British and the French.
[quote=âFSâ]
4. IF someone like Screaming Jesus and his ilk can prove that society has suffered higher welfare, crime, drug, blah blah blah costs related to whatever points he is trying to make then I say, those who support reparations have already opened that door, so they will have to fight in court to defend themselves against his charges as well.[/quote]
These problems would not have occurred without the slave trade. America imported its own permanent underclass.
Use the same definition as the slave-holders and the government at the time did: any black ancestry noticeable meant you were a slave then, so any proportion of black ancestry now means you get reparations. However, ony those whose black ancestors were actually in America as slaves should get reparations, not people who immigrated here later.