If I can manage Arabic, I’ll be sure to do just that.
You ok for copying and pasting?
Reparations discussion
- Thread starter VorZakone
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
You ok for copying and pasting?
Good to hear. My advice on languages would be to work with those you already have a base in. Arabic is a tough language to begin learning in your mid-late 20s (that's when I started), especially when you've a dissertation to research and write.
I'd have to look at the facts and figures and read some authoritative research before doing that.
People don't exist in the abstract so I'd like to know which groups make up the Other grouping, and whether the results include immigrants or not.
Your gig innit?
Yeah I learned a little of it before I did my study abroad stuff in Israel and Egypt and it was tough.
The only way I can think of to get around it is to make it a military focused people’s history of the WOT (read: war through the eyes of the common soldier) from the perspective of the international coalition troops. That way I’ll only have to worry about French and German, which I’ve started working on already.
Possibly. It's a slippery slope though; plagiarism carries penalties.
Yeah, that’s why I write my own shit.
Well yeah but plenty of things have previously been legal that are now considered abhorrent. Abolitionism wasn't some fringe movement going against the standards of the time back in the 1800s: plenty of people knew slavery was bad, and plenty of slavers knew it was best but actively continued to profit off slaves anyway because they liked making money from owning people.
Individuals alive now aren't wrongdoers but they have indirectly benefited from not being discriminated against and from their ancestors not being owned or viewed as subhuman by law. That quite clearly has given them significant advantages: greater wealth, more access to capital and more access to political power, things that were denied people who were not only unable to, say, own property or obtain wealth but who instead themselves were the property of others, used for labour instead of being able to profit from it. Anyone who wasn't subjected to such a situation should be able to recognise the clear advantages which come with that.
Yeah I did try to cut the size of the articles/essays down but couldn't really, sorry about that.
Just to start off with what do you mean by reparations ? If its anywhere similar to this
then it will all be eaten up by capital.
- Infrastructure - Who is providing the infrastructure ? Government or private companies ? We still live under a neoliberal economic model, the government unless a radical different one to the last 40 odd years will simply out source to the private sector which = shite infrastructure.
- Cash - Cash will be useless as anyone who receives reparations will find their rent, mortgage, healthcare cost etc sky rocket up.
Sanders actually does (or at least last time I checked) very well with black voters especially with black women. The reality of the ''Bernie Bro'' wasn't some white dude into marxism(E.g. Me)but young african american women who are mostly likely socialists. I would say there's a argument to be made that Sanders isn't radical enough, polling shows the american demographic most in favour of socialism over capitalism is black america.
There's no guarantee of anything but applying benefits across is
- Politically possible right now.
- The only way so far to get massive economic changes in american is labour movement all races this is possible with applying benefits across the board approach, yet I've to see how reparations could reach a mass base to change politics.
- It won't of course level the playing field(I've yet to see how reparations would) but the improvements would be massive. A policies set like Sanders is just the start not the finish.
- Reparations doesn't challenge the fundamental problem - capitalism.
Also these white led and biased organizations and governments are still here, right ? They will importantly have a giant role on any future outcome of reparations. And who from the african american community will be at future discussion of reparations ? Because these inequalities within the African American community will have their own class interest in how reparations are put forward. Which is one the arguments put forward in the essay.
I think you've miss read the last essay.
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Cheers for your valuable input.
No offence, but it's a silly point.
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Honestly i think I would be against the idea of directly giving funds to the descendants. I could potentially see benefit in providing it to people who were kept under slavery themselves if they are still alive.
In the end, I never feel like people should be punished (ie taking their taxes to use for it) for the wrongs of their ancestors. Just like I'm not a fan of someone who never suffered the wrongs getting the benefit because their ancestors were wronged. You have to accept that some truly terrible things happened to different people throughout history, but it is far better to learn from them and improve things going forwards, than continually digging up the old wrong doings.
What I think would be far better use, and unlikely to causes as much political backlash and fighting/resentment, is directing funds into improving the lower class areas where these people are living. Focus should be on improving the lives of all the people in those areas, and bridging the gaps between the classes.
In the end, I never feel like people should be punished (ie taking their taxes to use for it) for the wrongs of their ancestors. Just like I'm not a fan of someone who never suffered the wrongs getting the benefit because their ancestors were wronged. You have to accept that some truly terrible things happened to different people throughout history, but it is far better to learn from them and improve things going forwards, than continually digging up the old wrong doings.
What I think would be far better use, and unlikely to causes as much political backlash and fighting/resentment, is directing funds into improving the lower class areas where these people are living. Focus should be on improving the lives of all the people in those areas, and bridging the gaps between the classes.
Again cheers for your valuable input.
But really you could at least try, maybe ?
Although I'm guessing you won't.
I will. There was an interesting discussion earlier in the Westminster Politics thread regarding terminology and language, and following from that I've long been of the view that Karl Marx's real lasting legacy is the popularisation of the term 'capitalism'. Ever since, many people have subscribed to the notion that what we live under is an 'ism', which contains the belief that there is another 'ism' under which we could live. Whereas in actual fact capitalism is just a term which describes the economic system as it would invariably function in one form or another. In other words it's natural.
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Reparations are not only necessary, they are the morally correct thing to do. There continues to exist a systematically rigged class system in the US which manifests in massive racial imbalances. Past historic injustices have not yet been corrected and in fact continue to permeate society.
Is correct, though the other side of the argument is equally as compelling. Lots of grey area with this one.
@Sweet Square
He does ok with black voters, mostly in line with his numbers among whites, but he does very very badly with southern blacks (and quite badly with southern whites). At least this time, his strongest racial support has been Hispanics.
There is no way he does better with black women. He does worse with women overall this time, much worse compared to 2016 when it wasn't too big a gap. There's no polling separating by both race and gender but it won't make sense in light of the separate race and gender trends.
Unfortunately a lot of primary polling just lumps all non-whites into one group, so it is hard to tell. In this poll, his strongest recent showing, he has 14% among whites and 25% among non-whites. In this one, his weakest, he has 13% among whites and 15% non-whites.
However, in this poll for South Carolina only, which does a better racial breakdown, he has 13% among blacks, 16% among whites, and 20% among hispanics.
The main thing with Bernie's polling is always that age is the strongest determinant, and race/gender/income are usually secondary to it.
@adexkola
What I don't agree with is the notion that a stronger stance on reparations is what is holding back those numbers. The person leading the black vote in all 3 polls is Biden (with a massive margin), and I don't need to say much about his policies or his history. In the 3 polls which I linked above, Biden's non-white/black numbers are 33, 25, and 50 respectively.
He does ok with black voters, mostly in line with his numbers among whites, but he does very very badly with southern blacks (and quite badly with southern whites). At least this time, his strongest racial support has been Hispanics.
There is no way he does better with black women. He does worse with women overall this time, much worse compared to 2016 when it wasn't too big a gap. There's no polling separating by both race and gender but it won't make sense in light of the separate race and gender trends.
Unfortunately a lot of primary polling just lumps all non-whites into one group, so it is hard to tell. In this poll, his strongest recent showing, he has 14% among whites and 25% among non-whites. In this one, his weakest, he has 13% among whites and 15% non-whites.
However, in this poll for South Carolina only, which does a better racial breakdown, he has 13% among blacks, 16% among whites, and 20% among hispanics.
The main thing with Bernie's polling is always that age is the strongest determinant, and race/gender/income are usually secondary to it.
@adexkola
What I don't agree with is the notion that a stronger stance on reparations is what is holding back those numbers. The person leading the black vote in all 3 polls is Biden (with a massive margin), and I don't need to say much about his policies or his history. In the 3 polls which I linked above, Biden's non-white/black numbers are 33, 25, and 50 respectively.
It's just my point that at this time it's best to target those people who are not playing on a level playing field and improve their situation. This is the best we can do to help those who are in this situation due to actions of the past.
Because blacks were slaves they suffer from it now in socioeconomic terms so just target these poor neighborhoods because everyone deserves a chance.
Same goes for trailer homes and similar neighborhoods.
I just don't accept that we should judge the people of yesterday by the standards of today. To say that the US government was in the wrong for permitting slavery somewhat glazes over the fact that almost every other government also permitted it. The standards of the time were very different to our own. The abolition of human slavery took time, and I'm not sure the US was particularly slow in moving towards it (after all, it was one of the causes of the American Civil War, an event that occurred prior to the abolition of slavery in many European countries).
History is complex, things we now consider to be wrong were carried out by many people from many nations, and slavery is just one example (and the enslavement of Africans by Europeans and their descendants just one example of slavery). We cannot right what we now consider to be the wrongs of history - those committing the 'crimes' are not around to be punished, and those who suffered from the 'crimes' are not around to be compensated. Why is it that the descendants of those affected by African slavery are deemed to be such a worthy cause rather than, say, the descendants of people enslaved by the Roman Empire (after all, there are far more of them alive today)?
The answer to that question is that slavery is not really the cause of the collective guilt that America feels concerning its black population, it's the fact that the maltreatment of that population lasted well into the latter half of the 20th century (a form of apartheid remained legal in some states even in the 1960s). The motivation for the whole idea is to salve the national conscience concerning racism, and has nothing much to do with slavery.
How you gonna get reparations off the Roman empire? The US government still exists and can still be held to account.
Closet bigots always show in these types of threads.Like clockwork. I knew page three would produce a gem like this
Always. I expected the usual suspects from the racism, blackface and ‘should this person have lost their job because they were caught on video being racist’ threads to show up. I’m surprised more haven’t yet.
Albeit one person saying that slavery wasn’t wrong because it was legal at the time is quite special. I’ve not seen that kicking around anywhere before.
I think giving descendants of slaves (blacks in general) free access to health care, cheap/free and quality education and access to capital to start businesses are better ways to use the money.
What about blacks who we can argue are impoverished largely cause they are black but arent descendants of slaves? I am not against the idea. I just think focusing more on giving blacks social and econiomic equality is a better way to spend political capital.
could the US government not in turn counter sue the people who actually rounded up slaves, packed them onto boats and sold them for profit
the government still exists and could be held to account
Huh?
I think it's a great idea and about time. People forget that slavery wasn't even abolished too long ago - 150 years ago - and the black Americans were given 0 financial reward for centuries of unpaid work. That correlates directly today - a lot of black Americans struggle because unlike their white counterparts, their parents and their parents before them were born into low income households and areas, with few assets of their own - meaning poorer education, worse jobs, more crime, lower capital from family to draw from and worse financial advice to learn from. The fact that in 1865 slaves were freed - but not given any land for all those years work - probably meant most had to take low paid jobs on farms afterwards anyway - whereas if they were given land they could have built farms and commerce of their own and families could've built their asset base which would've trickled down into all areas of black communities.
And that's before getting into the emotional suffering caused to slaves and their descendants. But anyone who thinks the descendants of slaves don't suffer really need to think about the economic consequences at least of slavery today.
And that's before getting into the emotional suffering caused to slaves and their descendants. But anyone who thinks the descendants of slaves don't suffer really need to think about the economic consequences at least of slavery today.
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could the US government not in turn counter sue the people who actually rounded up slaves, packed them onto boats and sold them for profit
the government still exists and could be held to account
I'm not sure what the US government would itself be suing us for but if there's a case for it then sure, that should happen.
Aren't there blacks in Amerixa who's ancestors weren't slaves? Slavery is a huge part of the racial disparity. But these areas remain poor because they're not invested in, no jobs, their children don't have a hope of going to university etc. The two aren't mutually exclusive but I feel it's better to focus on the other areas.
Slavery did start here under the British government.could the US government not in turn counter sue the people who actually rounded up slaves, packed them onto boats and sold them for profit
the government still exists and could be held to account
Which, as I said before, brings up the point of reparations paid to descendants of slaves from the colonial era. Should the British foot that bill instead of the US?
If the British start paying reparations, the treasury will be empty before they even cover a tenth of India.
dont worry - there is always the option of sending gunboats back to china and forcing them to sell opium again... that should keep some money rolling in
This may be true but again the issue here is that non-capitalistic models do not - and sometimes have not - always resulted in increased equality for African Americans depending on how said models are implemented. Socialism does not automatically preclude a government or its people from discriminating against certain groups of people - plenty of Americans are receptive to more socialistic ideals like a universal health service but a lot will begin to balk at it if they find out African Americans are going to receive the same benefits as them. FDR when he was in power pursued a lot of socialistic policies (even if it was still under capitalism) but it didn't result in an end to civil discrimination against African Americans - that ended up coming much later. As Coates himself argues class unity for African Americans can sometimes seem like a bit of a sham when working class people were also responsible for the exploitation and abuse directed to African Americans.
True but the UK does already give about £3bn or so a year in aid to Africa and Asia. In reality before the discussion of reparations is ever bought on board, the British people can't ever complain about foreign aid.
Most countries had abolished slavery before the US. The fact it was such a consistent discussion and had already been outlawed in a lot of northern states demonstrates it wasn't that it was seen as okay at the time - even plenty in the south knew it was bad but continually partook in it anyway because of the immense economic benefits it afforded them personally. They ultimately just really liked owning African Americans because it afforded them increased power and prosperity and offered them at certain stability that they could never be at the bottom rung of society.
Additionally, the discrimination against African Americans which you refer to which took place after abolition wasn't a separate event - it was a direct consequence of slave owners trying to solidify their power and dominance over the African American population who had been newly freed, with African Americans in many cases often forced into servitude one way or another, effectively still slaves due to their geographical and social circumstances. You say it's to solve the country's "national conscience concerning racism" as if this is, again, somehow separate from slavery. Racism itself was central to slavery, the idea you could own people if they were of a race that wasn't your own.
I don't think you can link foreign aid to reparations, Denmark and Sweden pay some of the highest foreign aid money as a portion of GDP and Denmark owned a minuscule of colonial land that Britain ever did.
It wasn't a direct link, more a comment that foreign aid shouldn't be a complaint made by British people. Different countries have differing reasons for foreign aid and not all of it is selfless. The UK has a duty more than anyone else to participate in foreign aid.