Posted on 06/19/2002 3:26:43 AM PDT by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - Promising that it will be one of the "most historic gatherings of African people in America," organizers of the Millions for Reparations Rally are demanding monetary compensation from the United States government and its citizens. The theme of the rally is: "They owe us!"
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, founder and president of the Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny (BOND), and a critic of the rally, said, "If that many people have enough money to go to D.C. to march, then they don't need reparations."
The Aug. 17 event will take place in Washington, D.C. on the 115th birthday of the late civil rights leader Marcus Garvey. But Peterson said Garvey was an outspoken advocate of post-slavery self-repair for black people in America and would not support the idea of modern day reparations.
The Durban 400 and National Black United Front (NBUF), the lead organizers of the rally, claim their event is "simply an attempt to repair, to make whole, the descendants of the victims of the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade."
At the urging of the Durban 400 and other groups, the United Nations' 2001 World Conference Against Racism declared the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade and the pre-Civil War slavery in the United States crimes against humanity.
NBUF National Chairman Dr. Conrad W. Worrill recently urged concerned "African people in America" to review and add to a list of nearly twenty atrocities that, according to Worrill, "they owe us for."
Among the atrocities on the list are the "Raping of African Women," "KKK Night Riders and Lynchings," "Mental Atrocities," the "Crack Epidemic," and "the 13th and 14th Constitutional Amendments."
According to Worrill, "The abolishment of slavery was really a constitutional scam and the 14th Amendment that allegedly made African people citizens of America was imposed on us. We were never asked if we wanted to be citizens."
But David Almasi, spokesman for the black conservative group Project 21, said those seeking reparations forget the benefits of living in America.
"What about the fact that now you're in America, the land of opportunity as opposed to being in Africa with malaria, dictators and things like that," Almasi said.
According to Peterson, "These organizations that are supporting this so-called Millions for Reparations are anti-American organizations anyway. They're communist/socialist organizations."
Peterson added that "so-called civil rights leaders" like Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), the NAACP, the Congressional Black Caucus and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan have encouraged a culture of dependency among African Americans instead of self-reliance.
Peterson said he especially wants to encourage white Americans to protest those calling for reparations and "not have the fear of being called a racist" for doing so. However, he said, "As long as you give into these people, there is no stopping them. There is no end to their destruction if we don't stand up to them with truth."
The "truth," Peterson said, is that reparations are "a bad idea in that it is divisive, it is racist, and it's another form of using black Americans to gain power and wealth."
E-mail a news tip to Michael L. Betsch.
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BUMP
Oooh! You play hardball, don't you? ;-)
You're correct. No doubt about it.
Amen!I appreciate your feeling that the semantics of the conservative argument needed to be corrected. It definitely helps to have a clear and seamless statement to promote ones view. But aside from my attempt to break the tension with a little levity I really think there's some practical merit in my idea. As a nation we should be ready to bear the costs of assisting those trapped here by circumstance to a better life. Somewhere else. And I think it would behoove us equally to require of immigrants that they have the means and plans to become productive American citizens. Bush's plan to assist immigrants is folly. If they're not ready to work for the level of existence they want to live at here then they don't want to be here badly enough.
The philosophy of "tax the rich to assist the poor" is antithetical to liberty. Reparations and immigrant assistance are part and parcel of that socialist philosophy. It ought to be "assistance to leave, fortitude to enter".
Gestapo tactics notwithstanding, your point here flies in the face of the Constitution. If you are born here, you are a citizen here.
I can't stand the America-haters either. But I won't act like I am applying for work in the SS.
Well, thank you! I'll take that as a compliment. :-)
Yepper, it is time we settled up once and for all to see who owes who here.
Of course whites get welfare and commit crimes. Of course whites should pay their own way too. Of course whites should repay their victims and the families of the victims of their crimes. But millions of whites aren't rallying to extort yet even more money from the taxpayer...blacks are. I say we settle up and bring an end the welfare state.
Oooh, great "theme". Nothing like p*****g everyone off just before you start asking them for cash.
I have a question about this, though: Exactly how long does reparations go on? I mean, does every black child that is ever born in this country get a very large check? Does this go on forever?
LL: I have a question about this, though: Exactly how long does reparations go on? I mean, does every black child that is ever born in this country get a very large check? Does this go on forever?
Meet the New Palestinians!
Decisions, Decisions......
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