Date Posted:12:11:47 09/10/02 Tue Author: Jay Subject: Re: Reparations?? In reply to:
Pot
's message, "Reparations??" on 08:40:09 09/09/02 Mon
>The following is an essay regarding the failings of a
>system and a culture. Please note that he elegantly
>describes the mood of many white Americans and does so
>without prejudice.
>Slavery Reparations ........by Fred Reed
>On the Web I find that Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the
>chairman of Afro-American Studies at Harvard, is
>demanding that whites pay reparations to blacks. It's
>because of slavery, see. He is joined in this endeavor
>by a gaggle of other professional blacks.
>I guess he'll send me a bill, huh? I feel like saying,
>Let me get this straight, Hank. I'm slow. Be patient.
>You want free money because of slavery, right?
>I don't blame you. I'd like free money too. Tell you
>what. I believe in justice. I'll give you a million
>dollars for every slave I own, and another million for
>every year you were a slave. Fair enough?
>But tell me, how many slaves do you suppose I have? In
>round numbers, I mean. Say to the nearest dozen. And
>how long were you a slave?
>Oh.
>In other words, I owe you reparations for something
>that I didn't do and didn't happen to you. That makes
>sense. Like lug nuts on a birthday cake.
>Personally, I think you owe me reparations for things
>you didn't do and never happened to me. I've never
>been coated in Dutch chocolate and thrown from the
>Eiffel Tower. I'll bet you've never done it to anyone.
>I want reparations.
>Kinda silly, isn't it?
>But if we're going to talk about reparations, that's a
>street that runs in two directions. You want money
>from me for what some other whites did to some other
>blacks in another century. How about you guys paying
>whites reparations for current expenses caused by
>blacks? Not long ago blacks burned down half of Los
>Angeles, a city in my country. Cities are expensive,
>Hank. Build one sometime and you'll see what I mean.
>Whites had to pay taxes to repair Los Angeles for you.
>You can send me a check.
>Now, yes, I know you burned LA because you didn't like
>the verdict in the trial of those police officers.
>Well, I didn't like the verdict in the Simpson trial.
>But I didn't burn my house and loot Korean grocers.
>Over the years blacks have burned a lot of American
>cities: Newark, Detroit, Watts, on and on. Now add in
>the fantastic cost over the years of welfare in all
>its forms, of large police forces and jails and
>security systems in department stores. I can't live in
>the capital city of my own country because of crime
>committed by blacks. Toss in the cultural cost of
>lowering standards in everything for the benefit of
>blacks.
>See what I mean?
>Now, I'd view things differently if you said, "Fred,
>blacks can't get anywhere in a modern country without
>education.
>We know that. We need better schools, smarter
>teachers, harder courses, books with smaller pictures
>and bigger words. Can you help us?"
>I'd say, "Hallelujah! Hoo-ahh! Not just yes, but hell
>yes. Let's sell an aircraft carrier and get these
>folks some real
>schools and get them into the economic mainstream."
>I'd say it partly because it would be the right thing
>to do, and partly, because I'd like to add you guys to
>the tax base. The current custodial state is
>expensive. I'd just love for blacks to study and learn
>to compete and stop burning places.
>But is it going to happen?
>You may not believe it, but I, and most whites, don't
>like seeing blacks as miserable and screwed up as they
>are. I spend a fair amount of time in the projects.
>Those places are ugly. It's no fun watching perfectly
>good kids turn into semiliterate dope dealers who
>barely speak English. It just plain ain't right. But,
>Hank, what am I supposed to do about it? I can't do
>your children's homework. At some point, people have
>to do things for themselves, or they don't get done.
>Maybe it's time.
>I'll tell you what I see out in the world, Hank. I
>think blacks are too accustomed to getting anything
>they want by just demanding it. True, it has worked
>for over half a century. Get a few hundred people in
>the street, implicitly threaten to loot and burn,
>holler about slavery, and the Great White Cash Spigot
>turns on.
>Thing is, whites don't much buy it any longer. Most
>recognize that what once was a civil-rights movement
>has become a shake-down game. Few people still feel
>responsible for the failings and inadequacies of
>blacks. Political correctness keeps the lid on -- but
>everyone knows the score. Which scares me, Hank. On
>one hand, blacks hate whites and incline toward
>looting and burning. (The whites you hate are the ones
>who marched in the civil-rights movement. Ever think
>about that?)
>On the other hand, whites quietly grow wearier and
>wearier of it.
>Not good.
>On the third hand (allow me three hands, for
>rhetorical convenience), blacks keep demanding things.
>As I write, you demand reparations for slavery. Blacks
>in Oklahoma want money for some ancient race riot.
>Other blacks reject the Declaration of Independence,
>blacks in New York hint broadly at burning and looting
>over a trial, yet more demand the elimination of the
>Confederate flag, and the federal equal opportunity
>apparatus, which means blacks, wants to sue Silicon
>Valley for not hiring nonexistent black engineers.
>That's a lot of demanding for one month, Hank. What
>happens if whites ever say, "No"?
>Now, how about you? You've got a cushy job up there at
>Harvard, and you can hoot and holler about what swine
>and bandits whites are. I guess it's lots of fun, and
>you get a salary for it. But don't you think you might
>do blacks more good if you told them to complain less
>and study more?
>For example, if you want blacks to work in Silicon
>Gulch, the best approach might be to find some really
>smart black guys, and get them to study digital
>design, not Black Studies.
>That's how everybody else does it. It works. Then
>blacks wouldn't feel left out, and racial tension
>would decline.
>Sound like a plan?
>Just out of curiosity, how many hours a week do
>professors of Afro-American
>Studies spend in the projects, encouraging poor black
>kids to study real subjects, Hank?
Thanks Pot. All my lineage straight up the tree were cornbread molasses poor. I don't own crap and my ancestors didn't either. I think if I have to pay reparations the gubmint orta give me a coupla colored field hands.Quid pro quo. Right. They could teach my grandyounguns how to mug, break and enter, smoke crack, screw crack, and not fall in the crack. After a few years I could emancipate dey black asses and I would be a hero like Abnerham Linkin. I'd just stay out of the movie houses.
