NationStates Jolt Archive


Dr. John Hope Franklin on apologizing for slavery

Dishonorable Scum
24-04-2007, 14:09
An excellent interview with a noted African-American historian on the subject of apologizing for slavery:
Franklin, who knows what it is to grow up in a world where one's rights and equalities are constantly being questioned, refuses to let go. He thinks it's not just time for somebody to apologize, but to do something about it.

"No one knows the price that I've paid for what I've gotten out of this world and this life," he says. "My efforts represented sacrifices untold, indescribable. They don't know what my mother went through to see that I had opportunities, and even the fundamentals such as food and clothing and so forth. They don't know what my grandfather, on my father's side, paid in terms of taxes so that white young men could go to the University of Oklahoma, where my own father could not go.

"And I don't see any reason why I should get over that kind of exploitation of my immediate family—my father, my grandfather, my mother, and so forth. I see no reason I should get over it. I see every reason why there should be compensation, apologies, particularly in the hypocrisy it's represented, in their saying on the one hand that all men are created equal, and on the other hand, them saying if they're created equal, some are more equal than others."
...
"People are running around apologizing for slavery. What about that awful period since slavery—Reconstruction, Jim Crow and all the rest? And what about the enormous wealth that was built up by black labor? If I was sitting on a billion dollars that someone had made when I sat on them, I probably would not be slow to apologize, if that's all it takes. I think that's little to pay for the gazillions that black people built up—the wealth of this country—with their labor, and now you're going to say I'm sorry I beat the hell out of you for all these years? That's not enough. They ought to develop some kind of modus operandi that they can do something else—something to absolve themselves of three centuries of guilt from which they are the direct beneficiaries."
Full story: http://www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A88747

It's a funny thing: So many people are opposed to the idea of even apologizing for slavery, and yet it costs them nothing, as Franklin rightly points out. When there's that large a gap between the maximum that one side is willing to offer and the minimum that the other side is willing to accept, the issue is not going to be easily resolved.

I'm just disappointed that, more than a hundred and forty years later, we haven't fully dealt with the legacy of slavery yet. Maybe in another century or so...
The_pantless_hero
24-04-2007, 14:14
The problem with him, and the majority of the rest of the black populace, is that they are living in the past. Reconstruction? Jim Crow? What are those? 50 years old? Black people are still the subjects of racism today but the institutionalized and officially supported bullshit? No. The only thing holding them down is themselves and their ability to move forward and fight things happening today. You arn't going to get anywhere demanding recompense for things in the past while refusing to focus on anything in the modern day.

And even then, those that point out things in the modern day blame them on the past. Until the modern black political movement stops living in the 1950s and 60s, it is going to stay in the 50s and 60s and we here 40-50 years later arn't going to give two shits.

Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person's problem. We have got to take the neighborhood back. People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different 'husbands' — or men or whatever you call them now. We have millionaire football players who cannot read. We have million-dollar basketball players who can't write two paragraphs. We as black folks have to do a better job. Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us. We have to start holding each other to a higher standard.

We cannot blame the white people any longer.

What's more.
The idea that "I think that's little to pay for the gazillions that black people built up—the wealth of this country—with their labor," is part of the shit American education system. Did people stop working to build this country after the end of slavery? What about the oppression of men, women, and children in mills? I guess no one gives a fuck about them because they wern't black slaves and therefore they don't matter.
Pepe Dominguez
24-04-2007, 14:27
...

Ouch.. that's like -50 PC points. :eek:

Also, Bill Cosby is considered by many blacks a "race traitor.." His words are sound enough, but don't represent a majority opinion by a long shot.

The call for reparations will be defeated not because politicians are strong enough to move on rather than pander to race-baiting lobbyists (they aren't), but because we're a dynamic and ever-changing demographic group. The "we" who enslaved blacks 150 years ago is not the "we" of today, and that would become apparent very quickly if a reparation tax were ever proposed.
The_pantless_hero
24-04-2007, 14:29
Ouch.. that's like -50 PC points. :eek:
PC is worthless bullshit when it blocks facts and reality and keeps us in the dark.

Also, Bill Cosby is considered by many blacks a "race traitor.."
By the very people who can't move on and look objectively at what is happening now.

His words are sound enough, but don't represent a majority opinion by a long shot.
Which was the sad point.

The "we" who enslaved blacks 150 years ago is not the "we" of today, and that would become apparent very quickly if a reparation tax were ever proposed.
That fact has escaped those who consider Cosby a "race traitor."
Tarlag
24-04-2007, 14:32
We all have to move forward and lift each other up. Dr. Martin Luther King had a dream and it was a dream for everyone. Where we are no longer judged by the color of our skin but by our deeds. We all have to look past what has happened before and forge new relations with each other.
When someone says to me I should apologize for slavery my response is simple I ask what that person has done in memory of all those people black and white who made their freedom possible.
The response I have gotten both times is a blank stare.
Zilam
24-04-2007, 14:34
The problem with him, and the majority of the rest of the black populace, is that they are living in the past. Reconstruction? Jim Crow? What are those? 50 years old? Black people are still the subjects of racism today but the institutionalized and officially supported bullshit? No. The only thing holding them down is themselves and their ability to move forward and fight things happening today. You arn't going to get anywhere demanding recompense for things in the past while refusing to focus on anything in the modern day.

And even then, those that point out things in the modern day blame them on the past. Until the modern black political movement stops living in the 1950s and 60s, it is going to stay in the 50s and 60s and we here 40-50 years later arn't going to give two shits.



What's more.
The idea that "I think that's little to pay for the gazillions that black people built up—the wealth of this country—with their labor," is part of the shit American education system. Did people stop working to build this country after the end of slavery? What about the oppression of men, women, and children in mills? I guess no one gives a fuck about them because they wern't black slaves and therefore they don't matter.

I agree with most of that, but prepared to be flamed to hell.
The_pantless_hero
24-04-2007, 14:35
I agree with most of that, but prepared to be flamed to hell.
They can take potshots and I will return the favor.
Skibereen
24-04-2007, 14:38
An excellent interview with a noted African-American historian on the subject of apologizing for slavery:

Full story: http://www.indyweek.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A88747

It's a funny thing: So many people are opposed to the idea of even apologizing for slavery, and yet it costs them nothing, as Franklin rightly points out. When there's that large a gap between the maximum that one side is willing to offer and the minimum that the other side is willing to accept, the issue is not going to be easily resolved.

I'm just disappointed that, more than a hundred and forty years later, we haven't fully dealt with the legacy of slavery yet. Maybe in another century or so...

If you brought me a man with whip marks on his back, I would say i am sorry he was treated that way...but my apology means nothing because I didnt do it.

I will not accept culpability for events that are, were and never could have been in my control.

I dont think anyone else should either.

Get over it.

Everyone else has had to get over their oppression, and one is hard pressed to find a group of people in annuls of history who have not been oppressed at one time or another...yet you get men like this. I would laugh in his face.
His suffering, indeed. He seems to be doing just fine now.

So to the good Doctor...piss off.
Master of Poop
24-04-2007, 17:04
Over here we recently had all this stuff about the bicentennary of the abolition of the slave trade and the assumption that whitey should be apologising for it. I really don't care about the whole thing. If some white people want to beg for forgiveness then they're more than welcome to, but I won't.