Replies

Well they can screw the mule, too!

Does EVERY black alive today, feel they are entitled to 40 acres and a mule?

Or simply 40 acres and a mule to be shared by ALL the descendants from any verifiable former slave?

Where is the "adjustment" for all the taxpayer funds expended in welfare payments, food stamps, housing benefits, free health care, set asides, affirmative action in jobs and schools, Civil War deaths, etc, etc.....?

American blacks can't point to a single nation on the face of the Earth -- where blacks enjoy the standard of living or the opportunities as they do here in America -- and they insult Americans by this insane demand for "reparations"...

I find it deeply offensive...
My family didn't even arrive in American until 1930, why do I owe American blacks ANYTHING?
We never held a slave, we didn't sell anyone into slavery.

It may come as a shock, but blacks were not the only folks ever held in slavery -- and many folks, including blacks are still held in virtual slavery... American blacks need to "get over it"....and make the most of the opportunity they have here in America

My own "people" were held as slaves at multiple times in history, by multiple conquerors -- I've never heard even one relative ever claim they should be paid "reparations"...

It my deeply held belief that any black who currently believes they are entitled to ANY reparation -- should be given a check and tossed out of the country...

. Semper Fi

"Well they can screw the mule, too!

Does EVERY black alive today, feel they are entitled to 40 acres and a mule?

Or simply 40 acres and a mule to be shared by ALL the descendants from any verifiable former slave?"

Well now, I've seen it referenced a bit more diplomatically, but yes, that's the issue.

Anyway, I asked because, with the possible exception of people here on FR, the average white person has never even heard of it.

And while white America has never even heard of the issue, most blacks are very familiar with it. And for black America, it's a symbol of how they, as a group, have been cheated out of their fair share from the first days of their status as free people.

Like you say, it's not even possible to dole out compensation for such a claim today. But that's unfortunate, cause that issue will be considered by blacks to be proof that they can't get fair treatment under this system, and that they never could.

And while you can list lots of government programs that were devised and run for their benefit. The truth is that blacks have also been, individually and as a group, cheated and screwed by a variety of government agencies.

Forty acres and a mule would have been a smart and just thing to do in 1865. If it had been, it would be proof, to this day, that blacks can and do get fair treatment under our law. As it stands, demagogues like Conyers will be able use the issue very effectively, and there's no easy counter for it that is convincing to blacks.

To have basically made the promise, and to have then reneged on it, was really, really, stupid. And will forever haunt relations between the races.