What Have You Done To Support Reparations?

[Common Sense]

There are a few individuals on this forum aggresively in support of "Reaprations" from slavery...which is a good thing. My questions is:

What have you done in support of this act?

Simpler terms: What is your contribution for "Reparations" to the benefit of post Black slavery?


"Let those speak now"

[Kemosave]

By David Horowitz
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 19, 2002

In 1943, A Phillip Randolph organized a civil rights march on Washington to demand full citizenship for black Americans. At the time, the descendants of slaves were disenfranchised and legally segregated in the South and legally discriminated against everywhere else. Twenty years later Martin Luther King Jr. led a triumphant reprise of Randolph's protest and delivered what has become second only to the Gettysburg Address as the most famous speech in American history. Within two years of King's march, the Congress passed laws by eighty and ninety percent majorities of both political parties that guaranteed full citizenship rights and political equality to blacks. King himself won a place in the pantheon of American heroes, displacing Washington and Lincoln to become the only American honored with a national holiday in his name — a powerful symbol of the guilt Americans felt for the crimes of slavery and segregation, and a living reminder of the lengths to which Americans have gone and are prepared to go to right the wrongs of their country's racial past.

But since King's day of glory, the Washington mall has become the platform for a series of increasingly embarrassing displays of racial histrionics and anti-American bathos in the name of the civil rights cause. In 1991 America's most prominent black racist and spiritual guru of a crackpot religious cult led an improbable "Million Man March" to the hallowed site. On the mall where King gave his "I Have A Dream" speech, Minister Louis Farrakhan delivered a disquisition on the numerology of the integer "19" and denounced "white supremacy," which he identified as the most pressing problem in America and the world. This was a throwback to the era of racial charlatans like Marcus Garvey and Farrakhan's own mentor, the improbable prophet of Mohammed, Wallace Fard.

Two years ago, the Reverend Al Sharpton claimed the same podium for what he called his "Redeem the Dream" march, an appalling effusion of race-baiting diatribes. Malik Zulu Shabazz, the "Minister of Defense" of the New Black Panthers called for a race war. Farrakhan was absent but sent his "Queen" to represent him at the event. Participants included members of the congressional black caucus and HUD Secretary Andrew Cuomo, along with sometime felon and current boxing promoter Don King, who provided the only levity of the day.

This year witnessed a full-blown return to the buffoonery of pasts remote in time and not so remote. One speaker referred to the event as a revival of the Sixties, chanting "Black Power! Black Power! Black Power!" But the presiding spirit of the day was not Stokely Carmichael or Martin Luther King. It was Marcus Garvey, famous for launching a "Back to Africa" movement and then bilking those who bought tickets on his "Black Star Line" in the hope of going "home." The afternoon included many paeans to Garvey, whose 115th birthday it was, along with a genuine Garvey impersonator in Admiral Nelson hat and ostrich plumes. The only rival to this marvel was a white-robed gentleman calling himself the "Prince of Israel," who began by garbling a Hebrew prayer and then delivered a sermon on the evils of the Constitution and the racism of the American Way.

Malik Zulu Shabazz came for a return appearance, stepping to the microphone, tarted up in Salvation Army drag, which is apparently the uniform of the New Black Panther Party, to deliver the following message: "The President wants to talk about a terrorist named bin Laden. I don't want to talk about bin Laden. I want to talk about a terrorist called Christopher Columbus. I want to talk about a terrorist called George Washington. I want to talk about a terrorist called Rudy Giuliani. The real terrorists have always been the United Snakes of America."

New York City Councilman Charles Barron followed with a confession that he was so mad he wanted to go up to a white person — "any white person" — and "slap them," while explaining "it's a black thing." Barron was determined to show that he had more than mild mayhem on his mind as he repeatedly injected the word "fire" into his sentences and warned, "If they don't pay us reparations now, we're talking about scorched earth."

The theme of the march was "We are owed," and the afternoon provided many imaginative variations on this idea. One black rapper chanted, "Show me the money, or I'll show you my Glock," while another sang "Reparations, reparations … I want my house on the hill and my Coupe De Ville." When the theme of the speakers wasn't demands or threats it was an almost religious invocation of identity, and not the American one at that. A professor named Camille Yarborough, draped in a pink dashiki summed up these sentiments in a bongo-accompanied anthem with the refrain, "We are the people of Africa, we are the family of Africa."

While the platform mainly belonged to the fringe, Congressman John Conyers also spoke, taking time to gratefully acknowledge the presence of "Minister Farrakhan," and to demand "Reparations now!" Conyers is the author of the House reparations bill HR 40, which is the legal charter of the movement. If the Democrats win the House in November, Conyers will be the chair of the House Judiciary Committee and his reparations bill will come to the congressional floor. That is definitely something to think about.

In the end, the best thing that can be said of the "Millions for Reparations" march was that it was a complete flop. At several points in the day, organizers of the march came to the microphone to urge the crowd to move to the center of the mall so that its pitiful numbers would look larger. The AP is reporting there were "hundreds" in attendance. Event "coordinator" Viola Plummer could not stifle her despair: "When I look out, it is an empty field," she said, then put on a brave front to call for a reparations demonstration at the UN in September 2003.

This march displayed the authentic roots of the reparations cause — the fringes of the kooky left. This is a fact of which even Conyers took note of while asserting that it was also a movement whose time had now come. Conyers' position as the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee means that his claim must be taken seriously, reflecting the fact that while the Washington march exposed the shabby, not to say deranged origins of the movement, its future lies elsewhere.

The real fire power behind reparations comes not from Sixties leftovers and the politically disturbed, but from the black civil rights establishment and the African American elites it represents. The spiritual godfathers of the current reparations claim are Harvard luminaries Randall Robinson and Law Professor Charles Ogletree, whose writings and legal suits have energized the movement and made it a serious one. Ogletree's lawsuits will be unveiled in September, and that will be a moment to assess where it might end up.

On the other hand, Ogletree's Harvard contingent shares two common and essential themes with the rag-tag army of misfits who gathered on the Capitol lawn on August 17 and claimed Martin Luther King's day as their own. The first of these is the anti-American animus that inspires both movements. This is evident in Ogletree's article "The Case for Reparations," which appeared in a special section provided by America's largest newpaper, USA Today, on the weekend of the march. Ogletree's case begins with the following fallacious and misleading claims:

"Beginning in the early 1600s, millions of Africans were brought to this country against their will, auctioned off like cattle, kept in bondage and forced to perform hard labor under the most wicked of institutions. As many as 25 million lives were lost. This atrocity was compounded by the US government's resistance to issue even a formal apology in the 139 years since slavery was abolished."

Fact: The United States — "this country" — was not even in existence until 150 years after the first slaves arrived in 1619 — something Ogletree is well aware of and like every other reparations spokesman chooses to ignore. The figure "246 years of slavery" — used by everyone in the movement — refers to the years from 1619 (the arrival of the first slave ship in Jamestown) to 1865, the end of the civil war and the general emancipation of the slaves. But for more than 150 of those years there was no United States. A correct figure for the existence of slavery in "this country" would be more like 89 years.

This is not a small issue for Ogletree's argument since his intention is to make the "government" liable and not individual tax-paying Americans (although this is obviously an impossible distinction to make). If the government of the United States did not exist until 1776 or 1787, how can it be sued for what happened before?

This elision is in itself a statement, one that goes to the anti-American heart of the reparations movement. For Ogletree and his supporters, the American revolution was an insignificant event; the Declaration of Independence merely hypocritical; the 80 years of struggle by Americans who were not slaves to abolish slavery really nothing; the 600,000 lives and enormous national treasure the nation lost in a Civil War to free the slaves were actually not about slavery at all, and therefore should not be part of any reckoning in payment of the "debt."

And one could continue with the litany of acts undertaken by Americans and their government over the next hundred years, which have had world ramifications for minorities and oppressed people everywhere, including the civil rights battles to end segregation and discrimination, the trillions of dollars devoted to economic programs and affirmative action plans designed to uplift the poor generally and blacks in particular. These are all dismissed by reparations enthusiasts as nothing.

The same is true of Ogletree's claim that there has never been an official American apology for slavery, as though white Americans never noticed that an injustice had been done. Forget Thomas Jefferson's foreboding that he "trembled for my country, knowing that God is just" (a sentiment carved in stone on the Jefferson memorial). Recall only Lincoln's second inaugural, hailed generally as the greatest speech in the English language in which he said that slavery was an offense to God, that the Civil War was God's retribution on America for slavery, and that every drop of blood shed by the lash would be repaid by a drop of blood shed by the sword.

Robinson's and Ogletree's studied disdain for these facts reflect a seething hatred for the American heritage and the American achievement which is just beneath the surface of the reparations movement. This sentiment is as contemptible as it is dangerous — especially at a time when the nation is under attack.

The second theme common to all reparations proponents is the idea encapsulated in the slogan of the Washington opera bouffe, which is that "We Are Owed." Everything wrong with the civil rights movement for the last twenty years is summed up in this whine. Beginning with Tawana Brawley and working inexorably towards Rodney King, the principal subjects of civil rights campaigns in the last two decades have been disparate sentences for drug crimes, perceived injustice in the treatment of criminals by local police, and unsubstantiated claims about the disparate impacts of social policies among racial groups (so-called "institutional racism").

Reparations for slavery and its alleged legacies are just the latest unsubstantiated claims: "The legacy of slavery is seen today in well-documented racial disparities in access to education, health care, housing, employment and insurance, and in the form of racial profiling, the high rate of single parent homes and the disproportionate number of black inmates." [Ogletree]

But this argument is spun entirely out of a thin air called "disparities." It is true that 70% of black children are born out of wedlock, for example, and this does constitute a "racial disparity" since the figure for whites is about 30%. But in 1965 nearly 70% of all black children had two parents, and that was 100 years after slavery's end. In other words, while this may be a racial disparity it would take an entirely different argument to establish that it is connected to slavery or segregation or discrimination. Lack of a father in the home, however, is a powerful indicator of poverty and crime. The commission of crimes is rather integrally related to "racial profiling …and the disproportionate number of black inmates." Ogletree's racial indictment of America is a house of cards built with a stacked deck.

Rodney King — the most celebrated civil rights "victim" of the last quarter century was in point of fact a convicted felon resisting arrest. The President of the United States and the U.S. Justice Department took up King's grievance despite his record, despite his race (more probably because of it) and despite the exoneration of the officers involved in the incident by a jury of their peers. The police were tried a second time — a procedure directly against the American legal grain — and Rodney King emerged triumphant. He received his "justice."

Since then Rodney King has squandered all three million dollars he was awarded in reparations. He has shown himself through multiple subsequent arrests to be a habitual criminal and a willfully unproductive member of society. What did his reparations do for him and what does his subsequent history tell us about the incident itself? Was he beaten because he was black or — as the officers contended -- because he was a felon resisting arrest and they were angry because of the 100-mile-an-hour, life-endangering chase he had led them on? Was his treatment a legacy of slavery or a by-product of the mean environment in which battles with urban predators take place? These are the crucial questions that neither Ogletree nor any other reparations advocate is prepared to answer.

When Martin Luther King gave his speech in Washington, he was disenfranchised; he could not eat at lunch counters reserved for whites or sit in buses when whites were standing; or use facilities other than those designated "for colored only." What exactly are Charles Ogletree and Randall Robinson, two men of Harvard, two counselors to presidents, and both the recipients of six-figure incomes owed by America? What are they owed by the ordinary Americans who must pay the taxes for reparations and who in their vast majority had ancestors who either had nothing to do with slavery, or gave their lives to end it? Or dedicated themselves to fighting segregation and discrimination?

Thanks in part to the efforts of the majority of Americans who were not slaves and who are not black, blacks in America today are the richest and freest blacks on God's green earth. Richer and freer than black citizens of any black nation in the world. Seventy-five percent of black Americans live above the poverty line and 50% are solidly in the middle class. In other words the greatest ambition of the civil rights movement has been achieved. The doors of opportunity have been opened and the rules have been made as neutral as they humanly can be to ensure that the competition is fair.

Is there a level playing field? There is no level playing field for anyone. Short of a totalitarian state that controls the families that individuals are born into,there can be none. A free society is inevitably a society of great inequalities, because individuals themselves are greatly unequal. This is a fact that is obvious — or should be — to everyone from the age of five and up.

America did not create black slavery, but ended it. The civil war was won. America has outlawed segregation and discrimination. The civil rights cause was victorious. It's time for everyone including Randall Robinson and Charles Ogletree to get used to it, and to move on to more productive debates.

[Common Sense]

Just as I thought. Those that yap'd the loudest on this forum about Reparations, haven't lifted one finger in physical support of the movement.

[Kemosave]

Hold up Common Sense. I only posted that to show what you are up against. I don't like the WAY that was said but that is the basic thrust of the opposing argument. Break it down. Reply to Horowitz's points one at a time. Then we can all read a rebuttal to this mainstream argument. Alonso made a really good post on this too in another thread.

Also, the possible major backlash against Black people (if suddenly 1/2 of all Black people in America became instant millionaires) by poor and blue collar Whites and Mexicans should be addressed.

[Common Sense]

Hold up Common Sense. I only posted that to show what you are up against. I don't like the WAY that was said but that is the basic thrust of the opposing argument. Break it down. Reply to Horowitz's points one at a time. Then we can all read a rebuttal to this mainstream argument. Alonso made a really good post on this too in another thread.

Also, the possible major backlash against Black people (if suddenly 1/2 of all Black people in America became instant millionaires) by poor and blue collar Whites and Mexicans should be addressed.

My comment was not directed at your post. Your post was well appreciated. Sorry for the misundrstanding.

[Panik]

[quote="Kemosave"]Hold up Common Sense. I only posted that to show what you are up against. I don't like the WAY that was said but that is the basic thrust of the opposing argument. Break it down. Reply to Horowitz's points one at a time. Then we can all read a rebuttal to this mainstream argument. Alonso made a really good post on this too in another thread.

Also, the possible major backlash against Black people (if suddenly 1/2 of all Black people in America became instant millionaires) by poor and blue collar Whites and Mexicans should be addressed.[/quote]

I can see it now. Robberies and kidnappings would be the thing to do for years.

[Common Sense]

Also, the possible major backlash against Black people (if suddenly 1/2 of all Black people in America became instant millionaires) by poor and blue collar Whites and Mexicans should be addressed.

I think money would get squandered just like Rodney king squandered his Two Dollar$.

you know the sayin'. "A fool and his money is soon parting".

['X']

Just as I thought. Those that yap'd the loudest on this forum about Reparations, haven't lifted one finger in physical support of the movement.

^^What is it to prove to you about what we do for the cause?? If I tell you where I'm at or what I do, would you know of where I speak of, or will you go there?? Or are asking, so you can participate in this struggle for justice?? Why should someone prove something to you on this fourm? I MEAN REALLY, WHO ARE YOU?? TELLING YOU ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT WE DO WOULD CAUSE YOU TO DO WHAT??

SUPPORT REPARATIONS!!!!


D.X.

['X']

The Movement for Reparations
By The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan





(Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt of a message delivered by Minister Farrakhan at Plymouth United Christian Congregational Church in Washington, D.C., on August 16, 2002, on the eve of the Millions for Reparations March. It originally appeared in Volume 21, Number 47.)


In The Name of Allah, The Beneficent, The Merciful.

The cause for which we are gathered is bigger than all of us who are gathered and, therefore, it is incumbent upon us to submerge our personalities, even our differing methodologies, religious persuasions or the lack thereof, for the cause that is bigger than us all.

We are not here tonight because of ourselves, we are here because of those who went before us to pave the way for us. We must not be untrue to them and to those who struggled to make life what it is for us—nor should we relegate what we can do today to our children to do tomorrow. We should complete our assignment today, so that our children may work on the next phase of that assignment.


I heard Dr. Ron Daniels say, if there ever were a time that we needed unity as a people, that time is now. We are under assault from every quarter and the only way we can survive is that it must be "we" and not "I."

We will survive if we recognize our need for one another.

The brilliance sitting here and sitting out there is needed. There is not one of us who does not bring something of value to the struggle. We may not all struggle in the same way, we may not have the same length or breadth in terms of impact, but, each one of us is important to bring about a successful outcome for what we desire.

We, who are in the movement for reparations, and I’m very glad to say we, because I definitely know that the Nation of Islam is a part of that movement for reparations. We must not betray our ancestors in the negotiation for what we feel is just and justly due to the children of the slaves.

It’s not about money. It’s about what is requisite to repair the damage. I see the Honorable Marcus Garvey as my grandfather and the Honorable Elijah Muhammad as my father. Both men have impacted on my life and I think that the founders of the Millions for Reparations rally, who met in Durban, South Africa, were not just talking, but there was a spirit moving them. The spirit of those who have gone on, who are not able to be here tonight, but who produced us that we might make an accounting of ourselves in our time period.

***

Liberation is not a one-day journey. Neither is reparation, for reparation and liberation really are synonymous. You won’t be free without the damage being repaired. In order to repair the damage, you must make a proper assessment of the damage.

Whenever you are in an accident, and most of us have been in some kind of accident, your car gets hit. There is a carmaker who knows all the parts that he put in it and how they should function, so that when you turn the key, you get a proper reaction.

But when you’ve been in an accident, you have to stop and an assessor comes out and looks at your car, assesses the damage and tells you what is needed to repair it and make it whole.

There is no question that we’ve been damaged and there’s no question that the damage has been so severe that some have said it’s totaled: "We don’t need to repair this, we need a new thing." But the scripture says, "Behold I make all things new." Sometimes you can take a thing that’s been damaged, to prove the power of your ability when somebody says "total it," you say "no, I can bring it back." That separates the real mechanic from the student.

In the 16th chapter of Ezekiel—he’s an old prophet, but he could see. He talks about some damage, and, I thought, "I would like to look at this damage." He said, "Now when I passed by thee and looked upon thee, behold thy time was the time of love; And I spread my skirt over thee and covered thy nakedness: yea I swear unto thee, and entered a covenant with thee, "sayeth the Lord GOD" and thou becamest mine." It’s talking about something that was naked that needed covering, something that was unclean that needed washing.

In the fourth verse, it says, "as for thy nativity, in the day thou was born, thy navel was not cut, neither was thou washed in water to supple thee; thou was not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou was cast out in the open field, to the loathing of thy person, in the day that you were born. And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou was in thy blood, Live."

That doesn’t make too much sense right now. But let’s look at it a little deeper.

The only reason we are here for reparations is that nothing was done to repair the damage that 400 years of slavery and injustice had done to us.

"In the day that you were born" means that you’ve come forth out of the womb of confinement and gestation. But the day you were born, there was nobody to serve you, to cut the umbilical cord, to wash you, to swaddle you. You were polluted in your own blood. As you are developing in the womb, the placenta is a purification agency that allows good to come into the new life being formed. You are developing lungs to breathe on your own, eyes to see, ears to hear, brains to think, hands to work, feet to walk. But when you come forth, there is some attention that you need.

First of all, the umbilical cord has to be cut to separate you from that out of which you were born.

For 300 years we were confined in what was called chattel slavery. It was a period of gestation in the womb. America couldn’t go on. Like any mother, when it’s time, you’ve got to lay down and give birth to the child, or you die, or the baby dies or both die.


In 1865, they said "you are free." They couldn’t hold us in slavery, that narrow place of confinement. We had outgrown it. So the baby comes to birth, but the cord still is not cut. You have the ability to breathe on your own, to see, to think, but you are still tied to your slave master and his children, not in a proper, but in a very improper way. With nobody to serve your needs, your rights, your interests, you are laying in an open field now. Nobody to wash you with water and you are polluted in the blood of the womb. What is the blood of the womb? It’s the life of slavery that gave you a slave mentality, this terrible feeling of inferiority. There is some damage that has been done. The baby is born, but it’s born damaged. It doesn’t know where it belongs. And if it knows where it belongs, it can’t go there because the cord that’s tying it has not been cut.

In the year 2002, we are polluted by the life of slavery.

Somebody walked by and said, in a day of love, live. He didn’t just say it; he knew what to do to make it a reality. This wasn’t just a jive mechanic. This was somebody who knew that it could have been totaled but he knew how to bring it back. He said, "live." You wouldn’t say "live" if it were alive.

It was in a state of death and only a power bigger than the power of man could come and bring it back to life. He said, "When I walked by." Who is this "I" talking? It must be that I," who said, "Behold I make all things new." This is a terrible condition, something polluted in its own blood. It’s been lying there for 100 and some odd years, polluted in the life of the slave. You’ve been to college but you’re polluted. No matter how many doctorate degrees you have, they have not washed you.

I want you to hear me as your brother. Don’t get arrogant over what the White man gave us because he never gave us enough to wash ourselves, otherwise the job would have been done. The repair work would have been done. Church couldn’t repair you because you’re a n_ _ _ _r in the church. I’m not being disrespectful. But church now is an emotional experience, but not a transforming experience, neither is the mosque, nor the synagogue. Our organizations die from within as well as from without, because there is something sick within that needs to be healed.

All of our degrees are useful, but they are more useful after we have been washed. They are more useful after the umbilical cord is cut, because to cut the umbilical cord allows you to grow into yourself. It’s self-determination, not living under the shadow, nor in the shadow, of America. But living free to be what you are and who God created you to be.

Now in assessing the damage, you have to look at what happened to us spiritually, because there is a spiritual disconnect from the reality of God. You know God, you love God, but the reality of how God works, you’re disconnected from that, because you are disconnected from the law of cause and effect. You think things just happen. You don’t realize that God gives you wisdom to organize and make things happen. You are sitting around waiting for a mystery God to give you what you are quite capable, if united, of giving yourself.

You have been stripped of an understanding of the law of cause and effect, so you believe in a mystery God. Some fellow floating around in the sky and you are floating around on earth, not grounded, not knowing the value of what’s under your foot, and willing to give it up to somebody else that they can use you to build a heaven for themselves on the earth. You’re waiting to die and go someplace to get what you can get on the earth.

That’s a spiritual disconnect from reality.

The Holy Qur’an teaches us that Allah (God) will never change the condition of a people until they change themselves.

How are we going to change? We don’t know how. Somebody has to walk by and say, "live." Not only say it, but produce life, spiritually. Not only are we messed up spiritually, but the life that we lived in slavery was immoral. The enemy never wanted marriage as an institution. Make babies and let the slave master take care of them. Is that still going on? Somebody needs a washing, don’t you think? The slave master went into our women and produced all these different shades and colors and textures of hair and shapes of noses and lips. He made those badges of honor and dishonor depending upon how light you were, how straight your hair was, how close you were to the image of perfection, which was White supremacy. That had a terrible effect on us mentally that needs repair to this day.

Why do our organizations die from within? Because the enemy can easily pit one of us against the other, because we’re so filled with jealousy and envy. When somebody appears to be more talented, we feel we must fight with him or her, rather than join him or her and help him or her.

Then, there are those of us who have been educated on the principle that the more you know, the more money you can get for what you know, so knowledge is not for cultivation. Knowledge is for you to gain the creature comforts of life oftimes at the expense of others. Somebody needs a washing here.

We’ve been here since before the Mayflower. Here are people that came after the Mayflower, on the Mayflower, and take advantage of what America has to offer.

We’ve been here longer than anybody else, except the Native Americans and those who brought our fathers here in the beginning, and what do we have to show economically for the knowledge that we possess and the money that flows through our hands on a yearly basis? That’s why a monetary solution alone will not work. The mentality of the slave is such, that if you gave him money, within a month it would be right back in the hands of the former slave masters and their children.

You have spiritual damage, mental damage, emotional damage, psychological damage, political damage. Did I say social damage? Did I say scientific damage? We’ve been so damaged that the prophets referred to us as dead. Ezekiel offers a picture of us as dried bones in a valley. The bones could hear great teachers and they would shake and they would rattle, but they wouldn’t do anything. You have had some of the greatest teachers that ever walked the earth.

***

In today’s newspaper some of the families of victims of the horror of 9/11 were suing the governments of Saudi Arabia and Sudan and some royal family members for several trillion dollars. They sued because of 3,000 deaths and buildings coming down. Thank you very much. You’re making our case for us. Because, if 3,000 people White, Black, Brown, Red and Yellow, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists, who died in buildings, on airplanes and at the Pentagon deserve trillions of dollars, then put that on the scale of what some scholars say we lost in the Middle Passage coming into slavery. The money figure is staggering to fix this car.

That’s why nobody wants to talk about the level of reparations. They’ll talk about raising a monument. "Let’s have a museum for Black people." Don’t you settle for that. Elijah Muhammad, whether you agreed or disagreed with him, said to me one day that he wanted us to have 8 or 10 states. Let them move out and leave everything. Don’t tear anything down. Leave the institutions, leave everything there and we will move in. And then we want you to take care of us for the next 20-25 years, until we are able to go for ourselves. Now don’t say you (Whites) can’t do it, because you’ve been taking care of Israel for 54 years. And Israel has not contributed to this nation like we have.

Now don’t go off half cocked, "That Farrakhan is at it again." The Honorable Elijah Muhammad said, "Perhaps I know that they won’t give us one state, not even as small as Rhode Island, but that doesn’t stop me from asking." He said, "I want my people to know what justice looks like." Justice is not a White woman. I’m not saying that you can’t fall in love. But what I am saying is we cannot accept their daughter as payment. We cannot accept their son as payment. We cannot accept your weak attempt at affirmative action as payment. We cannot accept welfare as payment. Brothers and sisters, when you add up what we have suffered and what we have contributed to a country, that to this day denies us the principle of justice, such measures are insufficient. Whites may say, "well, ya’ll ain’t never going to get nothing from us." I wouldn’t be so quick to say that. I saw what you did to O. J. Simpson. He got through the court all right. He was pronounced not guilty. But you couldn’t be satisfied with that. You brought him back to court and found him responsible. You started stripping him of whatever money he had that he didn’t hide because you said no, he’s not guilty, but he is responsible.

The present generation of Whites is not guilty. But we have to ask, are you willing to accept responsibility? You say, "Well, I didn’t do anything to those people" No, but you live a privileged life because of something that happened to us.

And to the Whites who would be heartened by these statements, I would love to dialogue with you. I want you to understand what responsibility is, because this is not going away.


ALL PRAISE DUE TO ALLAH FOR THE HONORABLE LOUIS FARRAKHAN.

SUPPORT REPARATIONS!!!!

D.X.

[Pepito_That_Ese]

What about browns ? do you think they should get reparations too ?

['X']

What about browns ? do you think they should get reparations too ?

^^^^No question brother, all people of color has suffered at the hands of white folk!!!! Is there enough space to list all the land stolen from the Brown by white folk, and all other crimes towards the Brown.

SUPPRT REPARATIONS!!!!


D.X.

[Invincible]

the brown are happy to live in U.S because they know how bad Mexico and majority of Southern America is. Also latinos come in all races especially in countries like Brazil and Argentina. And it was the Spaniards who caused most harm to latinos but now are helping them out and there is a common bond and friendship between Southern American/Central Americans/mexican/etc. and the Spanish.

btw do you think slavs (eastern Europeans who had no business in the slave trade but were treated horribly as immigrants for many years in the U.S) should get reperations?

[Common Sense]

Just as I thought. Those that yap'd the loudest on this forum about Reparations, haven't lifted one finger in physical support of the movement.

^^What is it to prove to you about what we do for the cause?? If I tell you where I'm at or what I do, would you know of where I speak of, or will you go there?? Or are asking, so you can participate in this struggle for justice?? Why should someone prove something to you on this fourm? I MEAN REALLY, WHO ARE YOU?? TELLING YOU ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT WE DO WOULD CAUSE YOU TO DO WHAT??

SUPPORT REPARATIONS!!!!


D.X.

You don't have to prove anything to me.... my brotha...... only to yourself.

As far as my cause. My cause is obvious on this forum. It needs no
explanation.

If you encourage support of a worthwhile cause such as "Reparations", you should be willing to openly state "how you support the cause".

Ya dig?

[Beef]

like acme and many others i am getting so so sick of the poor struggling black man story, it is really starting to get old....like common sense said, slavery was probably the best thing to happen to blacks of today...quit complaing and get off your butt and go do something with yourself...i am scottish and irish, i want reperations for the way MY PEOPLE were treated by the english!

what a joke...everyone wants something for free...man i love this country and would die for the stars and stripes but we are really turning into pansies...not all, but a lot...bring back the 20's or even the 50's...when you had to work for what you got...when we actually stuck to the constitution and didnt destroy the bill of rights with liberal non sense....when political correctness was not around...

thank fdr for modern liberalism...he really screwed it up!

[Common Sense]

...i am scottish and irish, i want reperations for the way MY PEOPLE were treated by the english!

I agree. The long shank was an evil man. As I walked through Conwy Castle a few weeks ago, all I could think of was the people he threw in the tower to rot.

[Beef]

yup, your right...

i want my reperations!

[LinozMami]

I believe in reperations to those who actually went through slavery.

[Storm]

...i am scottish and irish, i want reperations for the way MY PEOPLE were treated by the english!

I agree. The long shank was an evil man. As I walked through Conwy Castle a few weeks ago, all I could think of was the people he threw in the tower to rot.

If you go back through history even the English would want reparations from the English! - though considering the first people to declare war on Ireland and annex it to England were the French in 1068 - then maybe it's the French we should be asking for reparations from.......it's all their fault

Storm B.A (History)

Postscript.

I guess my question/point(s) are this:

1. Is there a time period afterwhich reparations should not be granted? Considering's mankind's ability to make war upon it's own kind, and bearing in mind that under the laws existing at the time the people may have done nothing 'wrong' ( I'm not talking about if they're right or not btw - but we have -mostly- 21st Cetury laws and 21st century morality - 18th century actions look different with this hindsight).
Also it's likely to open a whole number of new reparations cases - for example: could Sherman's decendents be sued for Trespass and Criminal damage for the march across Georgia?

2. To touch on a point Common sense and Panik both briefly made - assuming reparations were granted how would it be decided and what cultural effect woul it have?

Considering that the allies demand for reparations to Germany after the 1st world war were what allowed the conditions to arise in which Hitler came to power? ( I'm not sugesting a second Hitler btw - just thowing out thoughts)

3. Also considering lack of records etc how could you prove who was entitled to reparations and who was not?

4. How would reparations work? Considering that the Uk ( for example)

"British anti-slavery was one of the most important reform movements of the 19th century. But its history is not without ironies. During the course of the 18th century the British perfected the Atlantic slave system. Indeed, it has been estimated that between 1700 and 1810 British merchants transported almost three million Africans across the Atlantic. That the British benefited from the Atlantic slave system is indisputable. Yet, paradoxically, it was also the British who led the struggle to bring this system to an end."

( source BBC website:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/society_cu ... y_01.shtml )

But despite the fact that the UK was no longer trafficing in slaves UK companies i.e LLoyds of London still insured the Duch, Belgina, French, Spanish etc ships that were travelling the Atlantic - they were doing it because that was their business (and back in the 1800's no one had heard of 'ethical business' ) but would they also be considered for reparations?

---------------------

Caveat:
I'm not against the idea of reparations (before anyone says otherwise) but I do think it may need more thaught and preparation than it currently has now.

[willihen]

No one on this forum was a slave, what do you deserve?

I have Cherokee in me so do I get reparations for that?

[willihen]

How in the world does one assess who gets how much?
Even if reparations were made, there is no way to decide who gets what.
Then what about someone who is 1/2 black. someone is 1/4. What if a person is 1/32 black.

I shouldn't worry. It's not gonna happen anyway.

[Common Sense]

How in the world does one assess who gets how much?
Even if reparations were made, there is no way to decide who gets what.
Then what about someone who is 1/2 black. someone is 1/4. What if a person is 1/32 black.

I shouldn't worry. It's not gonna happen anyway.

That's a good question. I feel that as long as black people are at each other's throat and not working as a collective.......Reparations is a universe away.

[Anonymous20]

I AM COMPLETELY AGAINST REPARATIONS.........NO MAN NEEDS IT.....ITS A COP OUT. STOP CRYING AND MOVE ON. BESIDES HOW MANY OF YOU WERE PHYSICALLY THERE NE WAY? ITS A BIG JOKE.

[Anonymous20]

THE OLD LADY FALLING ON PURPOSE IN A SUPERMARKET IN ORDER TO SUE........SHE WAITS FOR 10 YEARS TO GET 10,000 DOLLARS..........


WORK, GET A JOB, SELL DRUGS, HUSTLE, DO WHATEVER YOU GOT TO DO.........................AND STOP CRYINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG

[MICK]

not a damn thing.

[MICK]

I AM COMPLETELY AGAINST REPARATIONS.........NO MAN NEEDS IT.....ITS A COP OUT. STOP CRYING AND MOVE ON. BESIDES HOW MANY OF YOU WERE PHYSICALLY THERE NE WAY? ITS A BIG JOKE.

Thank You.

[Lonewolf]

I say fock reparations, you can't turn back the clock for generations already passed away and into the history books, reparations is to the living whom suffered or their survivors, not to their future decendants.
How in the fock are you going to be equal on that reparations sh*t with "all" those that were at one time enslaved, disposessed, stripped, an so on, and we are not just speaking about the Black Man, because the Natives, The French Colonials, The Mexicans, The China Men were all cheated by the policies of past U.S. Goverments in its contemporary world of Imperialism.
I'm not supporting by no means what was done to our peoples, but I'm not going to pay 1 cent out of my taxes for the sins of past generations.

[MICK]

a kid beat me up in 2nd grade. Id like his family to write me a check.

see how stupis that sounds?

[J-DUB]

HELL YEA KROO, THAT SHIT SOUNDS REAL DUMB

[MICK]

thank you^^^

there is no differnce.

[Anonymous20]

check this out, i just found some stuff about white slavery in America which u never really hear about


http://free.freespeech.org/americanstat ... avery.html


heres a few worth the read

The Forgotten Slaves:
Whites in Servitude in Early America and Industrial Britain
http://www.hoffman-info.com/forgottenslaves.html

“Up to one-half of all the arrivals in the American colonies were White slaves and they were America’s first slaves. These Whites were slaves for life, long before Blacks ever were. This slavery was even hereditary. White children born to White slaves were enslaved too.”

“Whites were auctioned on the block with children sold and separated from their parents and wives sold and separated from their husbands.”




White Slavery, what the Scots already know
http://www.electricscotland.com/history ... lavery.htm

“There were hundreds of thousands of Scots sold into slavery during Colonial America. White slavery to the American Colonies occurred as early as 1630 in Scotland.”




White Slavery — What Really Happened
http://www.youngbnp.com/White%20Slavery.htm

“...according to historian John Van Der Zee: ‘Between one half and two thirds of all Whites who came to the New World between 1609 and the early 19th century were slaves.’

“These White slaves came in the millions from the shores of the British Isles, in the form of deported convicts, political prisoners, and kidnapped children. ‘Transportation’ to the New World or Australia was a common punishment up until the late 1800s, and orphans have been sent to Australia as late as the 1950s.

“In 1618 the Council of London passed a bill legalizing the capture of vagrant children, aged eight or older. These homeless children were to be sent to Virginia, where they would be indentured as slaves for fourteen to sixteen years. After this, the slaves were to be released and given land. Promises like these were common. ‘Indentured servants’, or White slaves, as they should be called, rarely saw their benefits. The term of service was often extended, and many of the boys and girls who were captured died in slavery.”

[ChAoS]

ummm itz almost 2005.....ain't nobody gettin' money for bein' a slave. Move in get a job QUIT BLAMIN' PROBLEMS ON WHITE FOLKS=P_)

[se11]

you people do realize that the white europeans bought black slaves from black african slave traders right? so technically the africans that sold slaves to the whites should be the ones giving you reparations.