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wTl;DR: Reparations have justifications in the ongoing and active harms done to marginalized communities.
Reparations have also become associated with historical injustices such as slavery (in the case of African Americans and Africans) or genocides (in the case of Native Americans). While opponents saw these atrocities as past events, many see contemporary implications for these incidents. The argument goes that incidents like slavery gave many marginalized groups an inherent disadvantage in American society. Such a disadvantage has hindered the development of these groups until today. While persuasive, this argument misses the point due to its passive characterization of harms to minority groups.
Slavery did not create racism. It merely represents the most famous and atrocious example of it. As W.E.B Du Bois argues, the very concept of race serves as a tool to reinforce inequality and segregation. Even as he and many other African Americans defeated arguments after arguments for racism, more simply emerged. Hence, one should not consider every discriminatory policy as an extension of slavery, but as a new and active attempt to inflict harm to marginalized groups through racism. For example, the U.S. government made the active decision to enact Jim Crow, to enact redlining, and to ignore police brutality.
The government and many people did not simply fail to resolve the legacy of racism through inaction. They promoted racism through active decisions and policy. Hence, the moral case for reparations should not revolve around the potential presence of historical injustice and present inaction. Instead, the present, clear, and active enforcement of racism in various forms should suggest a need for reparations.
For this reason, the world should pay slavery reparations.
Reparations, therefore, not as apology or acknowledgment of past misdeeds, so much as a mechanism for righting the effects of those past misdeeds.
I'd not thought about this - it's about the present, not the past.
THE WHOLE SCENIRO REGARDING SLAVES BEING SO MISTREATED IS FALSE! Most slave owners treated them fairly, but you never HEAR THAT! EXAMPLE: IF YOU PAD HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS SOR A NEW TRACTOR, WOULD YOU TAKE A SLEDGHAMMER AND BEAT IT??? THE SOUTH HAD TO FEED THE NORTH!! SOUTHERN OWNERS BELIEVED THEY WERE TAKING BLACKS OUT OF HORRIBLE JUNGLE LIFE IN AFRICA AND GIVING THEM A HNOME, ET AL.
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It's always best to write in lower case, since upper case gives the impression of shouting, and raises the emotional tenor of the conversation, when we're trying to lower it.
Please, when appropriate, also bring facts, argument and examples to bear when you make a difficult point (like the notion that slave-ownership might be 'fair').
Makes no sense. Slavery has been an issue around the world. Every culture, nation, race has had slaves. You can't begin to even figure out who should get what
I think there is a difference between "should" and "can". I share your concern about the specific mechanics of reparations. It seems fairly difficult, if not impossible, to give reparations to all the right people.
However, a moral case differs from a practical case. One can acknowledge the moral righteousness of reparations as well as the practical difficulty of doing so.
Additionally, reparations have not entered mainstream political discourses for a significant amount of time. It seem fair to say everyone, me included, still has a rather rudimentary understanding of it. Hence, perhaps more studies can reveal a practical and fair way of doing so, and one can keep an open mind about that.
tracing who should get the reparations would show several odd things that modern society might find very distasteful, there would be a lot cultures that would have to face the past properly and very eye opening for most
There would need to be limitations, the past is the past and societies change also it would be almost impossible to track the right people to the right people
Slavery has been worldwide and it still exists in several places
Make the case or invite a friend to comment!