Where's the Reparations for Blacks?

Question

Not that I necessarily want them. I could care less. But in light of all the other reparations payments, why haven't the blacks been given theirs? Before you say it, why haven't the decendents of slaves been given reparations. FYI, Below are the years, amounts and names of people paid:

1952 - $822 million - Holocaust Survivors
1971 US - $1 billion + 44 million acres of land - Alaska Natives Land Settlement

1980 - $81 million - Klamaths of Oregon

1985 - $105 million Lakota of South Dakota

1985 US - $12.3 million - Seminoles of Florida

1986 - US - $31 million - Chippewas of Wisconsin

1986 - $32 million - Ottawas of Michigan

1988 - Canada - $230 million Japanese Canadians

1988 - Canada - 250,000 square miles of land - Eskimos and Indigenous people

1990 - Austria - $25 million - Jewis Claims on Austria

1990 - US - $1.2 billion - Japanese Americans

What's up with this. How can you guys get soooo pissed when black people bring it up, but not here?

I'm glad some see what i'm saying. I don't even care if we ever get reparations. I just want someone to tell me why past payments are justified but not for blacks...

Jessica - C'mon, hon. Welfare?

Angela W - Well, well, well...someone's angry, aren't we.. You proved my point. Thanks.

Deerwoman - these numbers aren't incorrect. I've studied this topic and have several books on the matter.

ejumburke-seems your common sense is a little one-sided, but that's cool. I'm not expecting to get paid any time soon.

Answer 1

Because Blacks had no rights back then. Many people mainly white will tell you their for reparations, but only if you can find one single slave today.

See the only problem with that is blacks did try to get reparations but fail, why? Because they wasn't free and had no such rights. They were only freed to a new form of bondage call Jim Crow, Segregation etc.

How could ANY black person ask for reparation when these thing happen?

Between 1824 and 1943 there were over 300 events classified as “Race Riots” in which entire white communities turn on and murdered, maimed and destroyed entire Black communities.

The Red Summer Riots of 1919, The Rosewood Massacre of 1923,Colored People & The N.Y. Draft Riot of 1863, The Church & The N.Y. Draft Riots, Labor Competition & The N.Y. Draft Riot, New Orleans Race Riot of 1866, Washington Race Riot of 1919, The Colfax Massacre 1873, Chicago Race Riot of 1919

Omaha Race Riot 1919

Kirven Texas 1922

If We Must Die
Mississippi Black Codes

A Blood Red Record - 1900

They would kill blacks just 50 years ago for looking at a white woman. 40 years ago blacks could just vote how could they get reparation when in fact they were still being oppress 100 years after slavery?

Answer 2

first of all I dont advocate reparations. saying that let me say that the ideal that blacks dont deserve reparations when it was given to the japanese and others is an indication of the small mindness of the people who are posting here. To say that blacks should be happy because they were sold into slavery is sick. affirmative action has helped because without it many blacks would still be working in the fields. yet, we have those who think it should now be done away with..the field is no where near equal but I shudder to think how bad it would truly be without affirmative action. For those who think that all blacks should return to africa..with reparations. There is also caucus in the mountains of russia where you may return too if you have found that there are too many blacks in america for you. The only originals in the usa is the american indians and I have no doubt that they would love to see you leave as well. We will not reach a point of almost equality in this great nation as long as posters continue the racist based questions to incite racism from the responders.

Answer 3

I'm not pissed off for you having brought this up. I think you have a valid point. I have heard some discussions about Blacks deserving to be paid reparations for being forced into slavery and being discriminated against. I don't know the answer to this but I do think we've come a very long way in the past forty to fifty years.

I think we're pretty close to closing the gap between the disparity of educational and career opportunities when it comes to White vs. Black. Maybe we haven't outrightly given any specific settlement to Blacks, but I do think we have made up for it in other ways.

As I've already stated, I think we've reached the point of achieving a pretty fair balance when it comes to diversity and offering Blacks equal opportunities and a level "playing-field" in so far as education and employment go.

Even though Dr. King didn't get to cross over into the "promised land," he did have a "mountain-top" vision in which he foresaw the day coming when a man (or woman) would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I think we're there.

Think about this, the only reason General Powell is probably not the President of the United States today is because he respected and honored the wishes of his wife, Alma, to not pursue it. Condoleezza Rice is not only qualified to be President of the United Stateds but may infact, not only be the first Black-American elected to our nation's top office, but our first woman as well. I'm White, and I'd vote for either one; and I think quite a few other White-Americans feel the same way as I do.

Answer 4

If a plantation owner has twenty black slaves and worked them so many hours per day without pay, I believe the decendants of those slaves should figure how many hours their relative worked. Figure in the going hourly wage at the time, subtract the value of room and board at the time.
When this is all well documented, present a bill to the decendents of the plantation owners.
The vast majority of people living here today are decended from people who came over from Europe years after slavery was history. They had nothing to do with slavery.

Answer 5

That's a good darn question! Isn't it amazing how the US government conveniently "forgot" the promise it made to newly freed slaves after the Civil War? They promised "5 acres of land and a mule" to every freed slave. So why aren't the descendants of those slaves getting the modern day value of five acres of land and a mule, plus 142 years worth of interest? (I have no idea how much that would add up to, but it's A LOT!) It is totally wrong.

I am not black and, to my knowledge, have no African ancestry. But I don't get mad when black people bring it up reparations. They're right to bring it up. What's fair is fair and that they haven't been given reparations is not fair!

Answer 6

Most of the reparations you mentioned were given to those people who were wronged. They were living and experienced the injustice.

Tony Evan, a very good Black pastor once said about reparations that none of the people alive today had slaves. No one even had your mother or father as slaves...it happened over 150 years ago. but if we are going to talk about reparations to those whose ancestors were slaves, how about compensating those whose ancestors were killed to bring freedom to them? Why is it that we do not hear about the tens of thousands of White men that died to give freedom to all? Maybe for those who want reparations to go to Gettysburg or Anderson and see the results of so many that died to do this.

I do regret that this ever happened. I am deeply disturbed anytime any injustice is done to anyone, man woman, boy or girl....Black, Yellow Red or White. If there is not justice for all, then there is not justice at all.

This being said, let us let go of the past and get on with making sure there is justice for all.

Answer 7

If everything you have listed above is true then I think you have a very compelling argument. I am a white man and I never thought about things from that perspective before. In fact I had no idea there had been all these reparations paid to other groups. Thank you very much for a new perspective, I am astonished. Good posting.

Answer 8

They were either directly effected by the act, or had their land taken.

Slavery was wrong, but you would have to go after the European slave traders and get money from them.

Most of my Black friends abhor the idea of Slavery as do I, but are thankful for the freedom they now have here and respect the price their ancestors paid for them to live here now.

Peace!

Answer 9

I never new so many groups were paid reparations , It probably would be the biggest settlement, they think we don't deserve it because we were sold by blacks.

Answer 10

Give me a break. I've never owned a slave. Neither have my parents, grandparents or great-grandparents. Why in the world would your people expect reparations for something that happened 142 years ago? How does it affect you in the least? Also, what would you expect "each" black person in America to get?