Shoult the black man celebrate the fourth of July when they were not free until much later?

Answer 1

To quote Frederick Douglass:

"I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity, and independence bequeathed by your fathers is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me by asking me to speak today? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn that it is dangerous to copy the example of nation whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrevocable ruin! I can today take up the plaintive lament of a peeled and woe-smitten people."

"What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy-a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States at this very hour."

Answer 2

The 4 of July symbolizes independence. The United States had to fight a war first before they were "really" free. The date signifies when the USA announced it's independence from Britain. Even though slavery was still in practice around the world at that time, the USA created an environment for the future release of slaves. So in that case I would hope all Americans would celebrate the 4th of July.

Answer 3

I'm glad hypersensitivity to PC is going out of vogue. Look, it's wrong to frame this in terms of black vs. white. Though important, the race relation debate has no place here.

If you look at everything through the lens of race, you become a racist. A racist! A man with a chip on his shoulder, a man who suspects everyone, a man who sees only hate and ugliness in the world (even when it isn't there) - and returns it in kind. A very, very unhappy man.

At some point that black man needs to quit looking at everything from the point of view of a black man and start seeing things as an American - and a part of our society - and an equal. He isn't JUST a black man, he's many other things at the same time. Sometimes different aspects of his being should come to the fore, and by God, on the 4th of July, he's an American first!

So the answer is, yes, the black man should celebrate the fourth of July, because he is an American! Black vs. white gets a holiday.

If that black man sees himself as a thing separate - even on this day - he his hopelessly, even ridiculously, racist.

Answer 4

The Fourth of July ( Independence Day) celebrates the freedom of the Country from England. It has nothing to do with slavery.
As a black, you can celebrate whatever you care to, but you're living in a country where you have the best chance in the entire world to live a healthy prosperous life. Especially including whichever African country your ancestors came from. Be real thankful to be an American. Those who stayed in Africa are a million miles behind you in every way.

Answer 5

Yes Black people should celebrate the 4th! They are americans and america was built off the backs of black people. That is why slavery was hard to abolish because of the rich taking advantage or a race of people. I am disappointed in your question that u would think that at all!

Answer 6

Black people are just as American as anyone else! Much of America was built on the backs of Black men and women. The Fourth is their day just like it is the day of everyone descended from people who immigrated after 1776 and everyone here before that too.

Answer 7

Considering that the American black man was freed from the horrors of a brutal life in the various barbaric countries of Africa by being transported to these shores in chains, perhaps he should celebrate " Slavery " instead.

Answer 8

That's like asking if the white man should celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Answer 9

If the black man loves America and wants to celebrate the fact that it finally became an independant country, than he can do whatever he wants.

Answer 10

Of course a black man should celebrate the 4th of July!!! Why not?!?!?

Answer 11

If the black man (or woman) is glad that America exists as a country separate from England, then yes. I can see the freeing of the slaves being more significant to him/her, though.