Category: Politics Politics by Richard R. Tryon and others
This chapter is an update on the CC and Racism chapter that reflects current events of April-May 2001 when campus PC supporters were challenged by David Horowitz. He drafted a reasoned ten point one page letter listing reasons to oppose the simplistic PC concept that blacks as a defined minority deserve to collect reparations for the sins of those who tolerated slavery. It was to be run as a paid advertisement in some 54 college newspapers. Predictably the liberal leaders of the PC movement tried hard to suppress this so-called 'inflamatory' letter, without trying to rebut the merits of the arguments. Read here what happened next.

Compassionate Conservatism and Minority Politics
or How to deal with the lingering hunger for divisiveness via racism

Including the fascinating issue of Black Reparations

By Richard R. Tryon

Under the guise of its worn out claim to being the party that cares for the poor, etc., the liberal wing of the Democrat party has encouraged an endless stream of minority advocacy groups. The oldest of them must be the original so-called feminist group, the Suffragettes, deserves the claimed linkage to the first major change to the U.S. Constitution- the right for women to vote!

In the past 40 years this group, reinvigorated, has experienced a considerable power trip while agitating for several ideas that seem to be, at least superficially, driven by the power of simple logic. Thus, the quest for the ERA Amendment was the first major direction taken by the emerging of such organizations as NOW. It took some significant effort by some very clear thinking women to stop this amendment from becoming a reality to replace all of the body of law in place that has protected women from much abuse for a long time! Ratification failed only after the chance had been extended by a questionable legal decision which could have sparked a rather fascinating Court battle. Had ratification happened, albeit after the conventional period for acceptance, Court challenges would have put the Supreme Court to the test of deciding if the process was flawed.

Fortunately, women like Phyllis Schafly got many others to encourage men as well to let this flawed special interest demand lapse. Few women spend time now agitating for a revival of ERA. Instead new fragments have come forth to petition for the rights of females who prefer to be lesbians and want their preferred sexual orientation to be given a set of perceived ‘equal rights’.

Another special group agitates for “Equal pay for equal work”, but can’t quite find a way to measure what is equal? Or another wants to break through a perceived ‘Glass ceiling” in corporate career development. It is hard to imagine how we can get some to understand that the rules for success in business are common to both men and women. They are not men’s rules- just the rules that work!

The Civil War, which was initially fought over the right of the agriculturally dominated Southern states to have jurisdiction over their economic affairs to balance the industrial Northern states. In time it became the battle to free the slaves and indeed more Americans on both sides died in this war than in any other in our nation’s history.

It is not surprising that the push for civil rights took another hundred years to emerge in a way that did not reignite the fighting. When it came, the Democratic liberals were ready to ride with it and so many groups flourished that it is tough to name them without leaving out one or more major ones.
From the NCAAP to the various coalitions the movement has agitated for more laws than perhaps any other cause in American history. Compassionate Conservatives do not find fault with the fact that enormous changes were needed, and they can even thank the liberals for sparking them!

However, they can also reach out and ask when is it time to assimilate, integrate and put aside the need to have endless accounting of bodies in one pigeon hole or another? When is it time to recognize that far more minority folks have achieved assimilation than have not.

With successful Chinese now being discriminated against in college entrance exams because they outperform all others, when do we stop and let merit determine scholarship without regard to special quotas or racial or sex preferences? It won’t happen until the majority comes to accept that compassionate conservatism is not trying to outperform the liberal notions of redistribution of intellectual ability is no different than their notions of redistribution of wealth. Somehow they are determined to achieve the Marxist ideal without each contributing according to his ability and taking according to his need, by simply making everyone the same! Without cloning of one standard model - bisexual to avoid invidious comparisons- the liberals will be always confronted with genetic differences, even if they can achieve equality of housing, income and education.

It is time for the CC to put forth that it recognizes that the majority of all identified minorities are not inferior and are performing quite well. It is the lower 20% of all individuals that are proving that the Bell curve is hard to avoid. These folks are not just victims of injustice by others. They must take charge of their own lives at an early age or face consignment to the group that the Lord said would always be with us. Perhaps the poor have to be around to show each generation that a better life awaits those that are willing to start early to work for it.

It is time to recognize that successful people play the game of life by a set of rules that lead to success. They are not the rules decreed by any group. They are the rules that common sense shows and has shown millions of Americans to be the rules that work! We can achieve harmony with all so-called minorities when we stop trying to count and catalog people, not as individuals, but as government defined groups that are to be treated in one way or another solely on the basis of the group identifiers that they create. We can rid ourselves of racism when we stop trying to measure who is in which group; and how does the group perform, as contrasted to a government defined standard.

One of the most ill-conceived but easy to understand aspects of concepts for making an issue in minority politics is the one that easily ‘connects’ with many people who do not want to study beyond the superficial level. It is fairly easy to get many people to agree that some people are able to be put into a system of racial classifications. It is not hard to carry that to the simplistic conclusion that in America, all people who are today living among us, who are apparently easy to catalog as ‘blacks’ ( the current PC correct term unless the more limited group of Afro-Americans is to be described) have one ‘political’ characteristic in common. They are all descendants of slaves!

Although such can not be so. Some current Afro-Americans came to the U.S. under their own power, or of that of their ancestors, and sought to be made citizens as foreigners rather than as descendants of slaves made free by the Lincoln inspired Emancipation Proclamation.

But, those thinking about the horrors of slavery in terms of wanting to do something to make amends for the national disgrace of having tolerated same, can brush such an observation aside as being a minor irrelevancy.

Such persons can also look at the recent history of Jewish Reparations of family asset recovery as another evidence of the validity of the idea that circulated thirty years ago in some American churches, that so-called ‘Blacks’ deserve “Reparations” or special money to absolve white Americans from their collective guilt of being descendants, in some cases, of those who not only condoned slavery, but participated in it. These people draw a parallel between Hitler’s genocide of Jews and Americans acceptance of slavery, and profoundly feel a need to make restitution.

The Episcopal Church, for one, passed at its National Convention, many years ago a resolution to cause the allocation of its funds for the administration of such a program. To the best of my knowledge, little money, if any, changed hands because of this resolution beyond that needed to further study the problem. My guess is that when the practical considerations were examined, it did not take long to determine that the resolution that may have sounded good to those that voted for it, was not one that could be easily put into practice. In fact, the problems for administration alone would have been sufficient to have eliminated the effort. But, the outcry among so many members of the faith who were opposed to such a program added a far stronger reason for the leadership to find ways to quietly ‘bury’ the concept. Why continue and find that vital fiscal support for all other programs would ‘dry-up’ if the leadership tried to further and implement some kind of actual payments to some or all who could be ‘qualified’.


The greatest rival to the National Council of Churches, when it comes to inventing new ways to implement policies aimed at helping people in the name of social justice or social reform or just socialism, has been found in the nation’s universities. Liberals love to teach and students are often full of youthful enthusiasm for idealistic concepts. It is easy to have professors, teachers, or graduate assistants spout off with simple statements like: The so-called ‘white man’s’ ideas of civilization, industry and social order have often worked to the disadvantage of all others, who are called minorities. The best example is generally regarded to be the slavery that brought several million people from Africa to be sold to early Americans mostly in the Southern States.

Nobody wants to find an argument for slavery and indeed no good one exists. But, it is somehow easy to assert that ALL descendants of slaves are unfairly handicapped and deserving of some special assistance. It is an easy step to assert that all who happen to show some skin pigmentation that some can label as ‘black’ or some shade of brown are needing and deserving to receive money as ‘reparations’ for the sins of those who contributed to the slave status.

A cursory look at pictures or reports of those caught in pockets of poverty, who happen to qualify by color, helps affluent folks jump to the conclusion that reparations are long overdue! In the world of university campuses where PC means politically correct as well as personal computer, it then becomes an axiom that needs no defense. It is an article of faith in the PC corners of power that somehow reparations are in order.

Into this environment, a rather courageous former Communist intellectual ‘guru’ or writer for the cause, one David Horowitz, recently found a way to insert his presence in a way aimed at ‘shaking up’ the liberal leaders of the PC tenant that calls for ‘Black Reparations’. In an effort to try to counter this call for so-called for an action being put forth as one that is long past due, Horowitz wrote and tried to place a full page ad in some 52 college campus papers! Horowitz reasoned that it is PC for every campus to insist upon freedom of the press and the right of free speech to proclaim the need for Black Reparations. But, is it also equally true that those who choose to be opposed must also have the right to be heard? Even when they pay for the space that is otherwise denied?

Horowitz listed ten reasons why we should all think clearly and conclude that such an idea as black reparations is not a good one. Of those that reacted negatively to his attempt to place the ad, most made no effort to read his ad or to consider his thinking. All that was required was that those in control of publishing needed to refuse the ad on the grounds that PC policy requires the suppression of all material that self-appointed paragons of virtue could declare to be inflammatory to any minority group. Opposition to the idea of black reparations should not be tolerated simply because some of this defined group, if not all, are assumed to be opposed to seeing any such negatives ideas about something that will bring money to them.

Horowitz found a “catch-22’ situation for the liberal theologians! But, if you take time to read his ad, you will find that it presents a set of honest reasons to consider, not a list of insults aimed at causing dissension. Here is the Ad:

Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Blacks is a
Bad Idea for Blacks - and Racist Too


One

There Is No Single Group Clearly Responsible For The Crime Of Slavery

Black Africans and Arabs were responsible for enslaving the ancestors of
African-Americans. There were 3,000 black slave-owners in the
ante-bellum United States. Are reparations to be paid by their
descendants too?

Two

There Is No One Group That Benefited Exclusively From Its Fruits

The claim for reparations is premised on
the false assumption that only whites
have benefited from slavery. If slave labor
created wealth for Americans, then
obviously it has created wealth for black
Americans as well, including the
descendants of slaves. The GNP of black America is so large that it makes
the African-American community the 10th most prosperous "nation" in the
world. American blacks on average enjoy per capita incomes in the range
of twenty to fifty times that of blacks living in any of the African nations
from which they were kidnapped.

Three

Only A Tiny Minority Of White Americans Ever Owned Slaves, And
Others Gave Their Lives To Free Them

Only a tiny minority of Americans ever owned slaves. This is true even for
those who lived in the ante-bellum South where only one white in five was a
slaveholder. Why should their descendants owe a debt? What about the
descendants of the 350,000 Union soldiers who died to free the slaves?
They gave their lives. What possible moral principle would ask them to pay
(through their descendants) again?

Four

America Today Is A Multi-Ethnic Nation and Most Americans Have
No Connection (Direct Or Indirect) To Slavery

The two great waves of American immigration occurred after 1880 and then
after 1960. What rationale would require Vietnamese boat people, Russian
refuseniks, Iranian refugees, and Armenian victims of the Turkish
persecution, Jews, Mexicans Greeks, or Polish, Hungarian, Cambodian
and Korean victims of Communism, to pay reparations to American blacks?

Five

The Historical Precedents Used To Justify The Reparations Claim
Do Not Apply, And The Claim Itself Is Based On Race Not Injury

The historical precedents generally invoked to justify the reparations claim
are payments to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, Japanese-Americans
and African- American victims of racial experiments in Tuskegee, or racial
outrages in Rosewood and Oklahoma City. But in each case, the recipients
of reparations were the direct victims of the injustice or their immediate
families. This would be the only case of reparations to people who were not
immediately affected and whose sole qualification to receive reparations
would be racial. As has already been pointed out, during the slavery era,
many blacks were free men or slave-owners themselves, yet the
reparations claimants make no distinction between the roles blacks actually
played in the injustice itself. Randall Robinson's book on reparations, The
Debt, which is the manifesto of the reparations movement is pointedly
sub-titled "What America Owes To Blacks." If this is not racism, what is?

Six

The Reparations Argument Is Based On The Unfounded Claim
That All African-American Descendants of Slaves Suffer From The
Economic Consequences Of Slavery And Discrimination

No evidence-based attempt has been made to prove that living individuals
have been adversely affected by a slave system that was ended over 150
years ago. But there is plenty of evidence the hardships that occurred were
hardships that individuals could and did overcome. The black middle-class
in America is a prosperous community that is now larger in absolute terms
than the black underclass. Does its existence not suggest that economic
adversity is the result of failures of individual character rather than the
lingering after-effects of racial discrimination and a slave system that
ceased to exist well over a century ago? West Indian blacks in America are
also descended from slaves but their average incomes are equivalent to
the average incomes of whites (and nearly 25% higher than the average
incomes of American born blacks). How is it that slavery adversely affected
one large group of descendants but not the other? How can government be
expected to decide an issue that is so subjective - and yet so critical - to the
case?

Seven

The Reparations Claim Is One More Attempt To Turn
African-Americans Into Victims. It Sends A Damaging Message To
The African-American Community.

The renewed sense of grievance -- which is what the claim for reparations
will inevitably create -- is neither a constructive nor a helpful message for
black leaders to be sending to their communities and to others. To focus
the social passions of African-Americans on what some Americans may
have done to their ancestors fifty or a hundred and fifty years ago is to
burden them with a crippling sense of victim-hood. How are the millions of
refugees from tyranny and genocide who are now living in America going to
receive these claims, moreover, except as demands for special treatment,
an extravagant new handout that is only necessary because some blacks
can't seem to locate the ladder of opportunity within reach of others -- many
less privileged than themselves?

Eight

Reparations To African Americans Have Already Been Paid

Since the passage of the Civil Rights Acts and the advent of the Great
Society in 1965, trillions of dollars in transfer payments have been made to
African-Americans in the form of welfare benefits and racial preferences (in
contracts, job placements and educational admissions) - all under the
rationale of redressing historic racial grievances. It is said that reparations
are necessary to achieve a healing between African-Americans and other
Americans. If trillion dollar restitutions and a wholesale rewriting of
American law (in order to accommodate racial preferences) for
African-Americans is not enough to achieve a "healing," what will?

Nine

What About The Debt Blacks Owe To America?

Slavery existed for thousands of years before the Atlantic slave trade was
born, and in all societies. But in the thousand years of its existence, there
never was an anti-slavery movement until white Christians - Englishmen
and Americans -- created one. If not for the anti-slavery attitudes and
military power of white Englishmen and Americans, the slave trade would
not have been brought to an end. If not for the sacrifices of white soldiers
and a white American president who gave his life to sign the Emancipation
Proclamation, blacks in America would still be slaves. If not for the
dedication of Americans of all ethnicities and colors to a society based on
the principle that all men are created equal, blacks in America would not
enjoy the highest standard of living of blacks anywhere in the world, and
indeed one of the highest standards of living of any people in the world.
They would not enjoy the greatest freedoms and the most thoroughly
protected individual rights anywhere. Where is the gratitude of black
America and its leaders for those gifts?

Ten

The Reparations Claim Is A Separatist Idea That Sets
African-Americans Against The Nation That Gave Them Freedom

Blacks were here before the Mayflower. Who is more American than the
descendants of African slaves? For the African-American community to
isolate itself even further from America is to embark on a course whose
implications are troubling. Yet the African-American community has had a
long-running flirtation with separatists, nationalists and the political left, who
want African-Americans to be no part of America's social contract. African
Americans should reject this temptation.

For all America's faults, African-Americans have an enormous stake in their
country and its heritage. It is this heritage that is really under attack by the
reparations movement. The reparations claim is one more assault on
America, conducted by racial separatists and the political left. It is an attack
not only on white Americans, but on all Americans -- especially
African-Americans.

America's African-American citizens are the richest and most privileged
black people alive -- a bounty that is a direct result of the heritage that is
under assault. The American idea needs the support of its
African-American citizens. But African-Americans also need the support of
the American idea. For it is this idea that led to the principles and
institutions that have set African-Americans - and all of us -- free.



When I first read of the liberal reaction to this advertising effort, it was in Newsweek and the author wrote a specious article that failed to list the ten points or to debate any of them. I wrote to him the following letter:

“Dear Mr. Alter:
Your P-31 story this week on black reparations and the role of David Horowitz in trying to place an ad in campus papers and perhaps in newsmagazines fails to answer some key questions:

1. Why did you fail to note the Ten reasons why black reparations are an illusion that fails to help anyone as listed by Horowitz?

2. How can you define Horowitz as an intellectual that you claim is advancing arguments only to keep conflict with the extreme left alive for some personal business gain? Are you claiming that his quest now for individualism is equally as bad as his former push for communism?

3. Why can't you see and accept that America's greatness requires a blind eye toward those who want to put individuals into various 'pigeon-holes' for purposes of fomenting ways to create evidence of class differences. Horowitz was a master at using his leftist skills to promote the ideas that to help Americans, we must unite to socialize and elimimate by killing those who can be charged with evil according to communist rhetoric.

When he was like Saul of Tarsus, converted into St. Paul, Horowitz became a loud voice to show that those who adopted his posture of the past can only foment a continuation of group think ideas that do not relate to individuals. He is asking you, Mr. Alter, as I am, how can America be made better by listening to ideas aimed at capturing funds from all Americans (except those who are to receive them) to be given to all those in the special class?

Can you outline ten ways to fairly determine who is responsible for what? Or even several to determine who is entitled to what? Should Opra get more than others, who also happen to have some skin pigmentation that is not yellow, brown, or pink? Is she entitled to more because she could have been far more successful if she did not carry the stigma and harm of the terrible ravages of slavery that may have happened to some or all of her ancestors, or at least those who lived in America? Can you prove or measure such?

Your old teacher may be dead, Mr. Alter, but his assignment to you is alive! Now, how about telling us how to critique Mr. Horowitz? Which of his ten points is right? Which are wrong? Why?

By the way, I am 68 and unfortunately a minority of one. My Hugenot ancestors suffered as have Jews, and many other ethnic, religious or racial groups. Are you proposing reparations for me too? I am not looking for any, nor should anyone else!

Regards,
Richard Tryon, Humacao, P.R.”

If you go to the Horowitz web site you will find that he has publicized the ad in question and also many letters from readers, both for and against his line of thinking. Interestingly, many of the letters are from people who might be targeted as potential recipients of such aid as reparations. Here are a collection of those letters and anyone who reads them will discover that this issue is not a simple one!

Here are the letters:


Liberal education betrayed.

I just read Mr. Horowitz's ad on reparations. The content is interesting
and provocative, just the material that should be part of a liberal
education. There could be no clearer illustration of the transformation of
elite universities than their rejection of this ad.

A truly liberal education fosters the transcending of the current
"weltanshauung" or world view of a society. When the Nazis eliminated
"Jewish Science"; when fundimentalist sects refuse to respect empirical
process of discovery; when the soviets interpreted history through a
single lens; then there is only high level indoctrination- and the a great
ideal is lost.

This ad is in the best tradition of historical and sociological analysis.
There is no unstated evocation of latent animus, rather each idea is
clearly expressed and argued, inviting further dialogue that ideally
expands understanding.

The institutions that have refused to run this ad and falsely label it as
racist have lost their way. The students of these universities will never
know the soaring of spirit that comes with an open mind. The concept of
academic freedom, while acting to protect each tenured professor, is
meant to insure freedom of expression. When the tenured faculty
perversely uses their academic freedom to stifle open discussion of
unpopular ideas it is the most insidious betrayal of the underlying ideal,
one that many have sacrificed for over the ages. I only hope the rejection
of this advertisement will mark the low point of the current perversion of
the liberal academic ideal.

Al Rodbell (arodb@aol.com)




NB: David Horowitz welcomes and reads all comments. Due to the
volume, however, he is unable to respond to each message personally.


Reader comments on David Horowitz's
"Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Blacks is a Bad Idea for Blacks – and Racist Too".


The Jeffersons

I was wondering if the decendents of Thomas Jefferson and Sally
Hemmings would be on the receiving or the paying side of reparations.
What percentage of which race will qualify persons to receive
reparations. It gets complicated, doesn't it?

Phil
Souderton, PA
3/30/01



Some Truth Finally Revealed

Thank you Mr. Horowitz for getting some honest reasons out there to the
public as to why reparations for Blacks is absurd and totally unjustified.
Seeing the constant pursuit of acquiring a myriad of advantages in
America without working for or deserving them creates much resentment
towards their extortion and exploitation attempts; many of which are
sucessfully executed. I will refuse to pay them reparations for all ten
reasons that you have so bravely outlined. Keep it up. There are many of
us who are waiting for leaders, writers, and public people to say that
America is chocking on the extreme left diet. People like you show us we
have a healthier choice. Keep it up. We need your voice now more than
ever before! C

Ms. Page
Littleton, Co 80123
3/30/01



Personally Speaking

I read your artile after watching a newscast the other nite regarding
reparations. Personally, I do not believe the reparations I have been
hearing about are the answer. It just seems to be another quick fix to a
very complicaed issue. I agree with certain point in your article, and
disagree with others. I also agree/disagree with various point made in
the comments.

I find it disturbing that large-scale cash payments (expected to be made
largely by people who were NEVER responsible or the atrocities
committed) are expected to make a people 'whole' for what none of them
ever experienced in the past. Can money buy freedom from prejudice?
of course not! I think all sides are looking for quick fixes - and both sides
in this fray also seem to be making cheap shots. I have personally
witnessed black kids working hard in school being brutally teased and
called 'white' by the angry kids who turn to drug dealing and crime to
make their way in the world. I have also seen some of these you 'punk'
drug dealers grow up with crack-addicted mommas and no papas - and
no one else stepping in to teach them better and to LOVE them!

I have seen white folks loving and helping black folks - only to get beat up
cos they are white. I have seen black folks helping and loving white folks,
only to have the cops stop them on the street cos they 'look like a
suspec' - read that as 'you don't look like you belong in this white
neighborhood'. DO you think cash is going to fix this? I don't. What
disgusted me the most about all of this is the black 'kleaders' who are
charing money from their OWN (and mostly poor!!) to 'file' for these
so-called payments! I think that is the lowest type of behavior around!!!
scam artists feeding off their own - i don't see white folks saying 'pay me
$50 and i'll get ya $$$ from the govt someday! i see black men doing it! is
makes me sick to see them preying on hardworking people who are
trying to get ahead.

i'm sorry if this rambles on a bit - but i think this whole issue is important.
whites and blacks are HUMAN under the skin! we are more alike than
different! we all bleed is you cut us - and we all cry and love and hate. we
all have failings, but we all have it within us to be great. my experience is
that the racism is on both sides - and that is what has to stop. when i walk
down the street, you don't know my past or what i have done good or
what i have suffered - so don't judge me until you KNOW me.

love to all ;)

not sure how to fix this
NJ
3/30/01



Another Big Money Grab By The Left

Black people fail to realize that by not taking responsibilty and of course
blaming "whitey", for everything that ails them, they become "enslaved".
This is exactly what the black leaders have done while they themselves,
(Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson) have gotten rich.

THE TRUTH: Black people, if you want to be free and to have financial
power ,you have to develope marketable skills and be competive (Tiger
Woods, Sabrina Williams, etc.) and this takes hard work and discipline.
Golf did not come naturally to Tiger Woods; he had to practice for 1000's
of hours. Sabrina Williams practiced 14 hours a day for years. They
could never have done this if they had a "welfare, whitey owes me
mentality" which is what the black leaders and white liberals are
pedaling.

We live in a competive capitalistic environment, not a
socialist/communist one. If you want to live in a socialist/communist
country (were the government gives you everything),then perhaps you
need to go live in Cuba. Any takers, I doubt it? The truth is black people
will NEVER be free until they learn to take full responsibility for their
plight and stop succombing to the notion that "whitey" is the reason for
their problems as black leaders would have them subscribe.

Black people, you must realize what is happening....black leaders and
white liberals get rich by stirring up black resentment toward the "white
establishment. This is what is happening with the call for reparations.
What black america needs to say to these race baitors is "no thanks, we
don't want your assistance anymore, we don't need reparations, we are
going to start taking responsibility for our failures and start doing for
ourselves from here on out, we see what you have been doing to us for
decades and we're not going to take it anymore". When this happens,
these self-serving evil black leaders and white liberals will flee like the
devils they are and furthermore this will cause white america to notice
and see black people in a more positive light. Then we will have REAL
and LASTING change in race relations.

Jim Crow
Georgia
3/30/01



I think you miss the point.

You must understand something Mr. Horowitz's. The reparation are not
the burden of white people. It is the burden of the goverment of the
United States. For it is a goverments responsibility to provide freedom,
justice, and equality to the people. (especially if you say that's what your
going do) This goverment allowed slavery, murder, roberry, slaughter,
oppression, humiliation, families to be torn apart, child labor to elderly
labor, etc.

Yes, There may have been a few slave owners so you say, but please do
not think that it was do to a majority of good white folks who thoght it was
wrong. They just could not afford it.

You can have slaves and rape them, maim them, abuse them mentally
and physically, rape thier children, murder them, and do all sorts of ill
manner one could speak of in which is unpresedented in Euro slavery
(which was primarilty for debt or captured soldiers, not race related). And
Guess what.....IT WAS ALL PERFECTLY LEGAL!!!!!!! There was NO
intervention from the goverment to even discourage that type of thinking.
The same goverment that was set up for "ALL MEN".

The civil war began when NC nullified federal law. and lincoln freed the
slaves to weekend the south. After all you have plenty weapons,
materials, food, clothing and save a boat load of money when you have
free labor.

The white folks who died for our so-called freedom, died for injustice and
immorality.....not because our skin was black. The are the same people
who probably would do the same for any ethnic group being oppressed.
Actually, that is ones humane obligation to stand up against
mistreatment of his fellow man. Certainly we would hope our fellow man
come to do the same for all of us. This was not some sort of FAVOR. I
thank for them for having the courage to stand up against injustice just as
we did in World War 1, World War 2, and Korean War.

Yes, we volunteered to help PRESERVE DEMOCRACY. Did I mention it
was ILEGAL for us to VOTE during those wars?!!

This is not a Black or White issue. It is a goverment allowing a entire race
to be subjected to this treatment for 400 years and the people were black
and the slave owners were mostly white. Yes the goverment should be
held accountable for that. After all, IT IS FOR THE PEOPLE BY THE
PEOPLE>

Intelligent Black Man
Philadelphia, PA
3/30/01



Reparations

First of all I would like to say that the so-called calsified pineal logic you
are using is typical of the askinaz caucasian mountain mind set!
Reparation is beyond the comprehension of the insane caucasian
mutant mind set. Afrikans that benevolently ask the mutant caucasian to
voluntarily pay reparations might as well ask white mutant people to stop
having white mutant skin. Afrikans must develope a new standard but yet
an old one of reparations to meet the requirements demanded by
Afrikans of TODAY who know their history, as the calcified white
standards are for "WHITES ONLY"

Reparations will be another tool of distruction used against Afrikans just
as nutrition is a tool for destroying Afrikans. Reparations obtained from
mentally ill caucasians is in itself a crazy concept. Sane people can pay
reparations to sane people. However, any demands of reparations made
against the MENTALLY ILL (caucasian) is questionable. In other words,
Afrikan people would have to decide how much the thief (caucasian,
etc.) should keep of what they have stolen. This is what Afrikans call
reparations. No thief has any rights to claim any part of what they have
stolen. The caucasian will NEVER accept themselves as being insane
thieves that warrant punishment or habilitation.

Reparations mean that all of the caucasians, country's and religions
must pay so-called money for kiling over 600 million + Afrikans during
colonialism and slavery. Added to this, they must pay for Afrikans
lynched via drugs, by police, (street god crooks)in jails, as a result of
drug experiments, medical treatments, eating junk foods, mis-educated
mental deaths, alchohol, cigarettes lead poisoned, syphilis, killed fighting
in mutant caucasian wars and abortion victims. They (the
caucasian)must pay for the direct death of potential off-spring of those
murdered. Aside from this, the mutant must give back the economic
profits they got from 450 + years of FREE slave LABOR, the so-called
money and profits of the over 10 million dollars in gold and jewels given
to the U.S.A. for distribution to ex-slaves by emperor Menelik in 1865.
Pay for the patents stolen from George Washington Carver and many
other inventors. Pay for the stolen music copyrights of Fats Waller and
other musicians. Pay for the stolen resources of Afrika such as gold,
diamonds, boks, tin, wood, land, uranium, plutonium, trees, ivory, oil and
treasures looted from ancient cities and Egyptian tombs. Again NO
THIEF HAS ANY RIGHTS TO CLAIM WHAT THEY HAVE STOLEN.
Therefore, the caucasians must give back what they have stolen, AND
THEN REPARATIONS CAN BEGIN. Anything else would be an insult to
our ancestors. ONLY A SANE PEOPLE CAN BE PUNISHED OR PAY
REPARATIONS. Caucasians would have to be habilitated. Habilitation
means you must learn to live in holistic harmony with yourselves, nature,
and then other races. After habilitation the caucasianshould be
holistically balanced (reparations) and then rehabilitated. Reparations in
caucasian linear logic means punishment while with Afrikans it means
healing and harmony with God.

Asante (Keyoflife1@AOL.com)
N/A
3/30/01



About time...

It's about time someone had the guts and courage to tell it like it is. My
ancestors came over from Poland. None of us ever owned slaves or
were in any way involved with that issue. I've already been screwed by
quotas, preferences, "added" values to scores for other people, etc. It's
about time the blacks quit whining, pissing and moaning about how bad it
is/was/can be/may be and just get out and show some character,
gumption and hard work. Quit trying to blame everyone else for your
social/character deficiencies and lack. Quit pissing and moaning. It's
starting to sound like all the blacks can do is keep asking everyone else
for handouts...

Captain Bob
3/30/01



Forgive your parents

Dave,

The biggest issue in your life is that you have never forgiven your
parents. The article is not even the issue. You really don't believe it all
the way yourself - it's the attention your father never gave to you, and
how your mother overlooked your talent. Forgive them Dave. Pure and
simple. The longer you hang on to that anger and frustration, the more
your true talents will be misconscrued by America - just like your parents
overlooked your talent.

Love, Kram Thims

Kram Thims
3/30/01



America The Home Of The PC Handout

My family fought on both sides of the Civil War; we fought not to end
slavery, but to defend our lands, and to preserve the Union. If you want
to pay reparations to anyone for that period; how about the hundred of
thousands of displaced southerners after the war. What about the rape
of the south due by the carpetbaggers. Both black and white suffered
after the war. My family lost what little land we owned, and lost what
means to make a living. Nothing is owned to Afican-Americans that
hasn't already given. People in this country need to get over it, wake the
#&$* up and start to worry about bigger problems like that worhtless
puppet in the White House. The Carter name has fought in every major
conflict America ever been to the French & Indain Wars to family serving
abroad in the Balkans. America the greatest empire to ever be shall.
Should we destroy it over petty arguments from a uncivil era. Brothers
and sisters arcoss the land we need to raise up and come together as
one ethinc group; THE HUMAN RACE.

Nick Carter (SirDonk@juno.com)
Novato, California
3/30/01



Curious

The injustice I see is when I, a 26 year old black male, walk down the
street and feel the cautious, watching eyes of whites that feel that there
is a need to be afraid of me. The injustice I see is when I am around inner
city blacks and hear a noticeable difference in our language. The
difference is as distinct as American English is to European English. The
injustice I see is that African Americans as a society begins at the end of
slavery. European Americans never addressed the language barrier
when they so graciously invited us to this country. When were able to
organize schools initially where was the support from the government to
see that we were given a proper and equal education to the European
Americans? Even when we were bussed into attend classes with the
European Americans, how could you expect any of those children to
concentrate and be successful. The first obstacle is the language barrier.
The second is the inferiority complex that each of those students had to
live with. How can you get a proper equal education under those types of
stresses? You wonder why we are violent? You wonder why we seem to
stay involved in the legal system. We just became a civilized society
when slavery ended. Unlike the European Americans who enslaved and
oppressed us.

John Doe
3/30/01