A Concise History of Black-White Relations In The USA

A lot of people have already responded to this comment but I just wanted to add my 2 cents.

I've heard this sentiment expressed before and every time I hear it I have to ask. What if some aliens came here and said that they wanted to enslave you and take you away to their planet. The passage and life there will be difficult and you will have no rights and will be the property of alien masters for them to do with as they will. In exchange though you descendents in 10 generations will be granted full rights, have far greater opportunities to materially better themselves, have longer life and better health than they could have here on Earth would you take that deal?

 

aaahhh the great OBAMA . . .

I don;t know where Obama grew up but it was no more prevalent
than the YOUR NOSE IS BIG . . YOU ARE A GEEK
bull**** taunts of children everywhere
to blame that for the GREAT PROBLEMS in the community is BS

And if Obama was here I'd tell him the same thing

Rocket River

 

Don't forget absurd and ignorant.

 

It's true that in the 1800s Irish, Jews, Polish, and Italian faced heavy discrimination as much as blacks; in fact, the current rate of Hispanic immigrants flowing in is proporational to the 1800's wave by using its proportion to the nation's overall population. However, their children or grandchilren could pass as white while blacks followed the systemic pattern of generational slavery and later racism. When there were labor crisises between the workers and the factory owners, they owners played the race card between immigrants to divide them amongst each other. Black Americans usually recieved the raw end of the deal.

The two comparisons don't match. Every minorty faces discrimination to a certain extent based on how they can't pass as white.

 

It would be interesting to debate the role of sports in the academic and professional underperformance of the black race. Is the black culture and media overemphasizing the wrong goals in life? Should they place greater emphasis on education as opposed to say sports, music, etc? Debate!

 

It depends on what it is that you consider to be Black Culture.

I think the portrayal of blakcs in mainstream media is doing blacks and the all American youths a disservice. But there's a lot of money to be had in the entertainment and advertising industry. I can't blame them (or the Black endorsers) for pursuing goals that maximizes their interests, but it's sad to see a lot of people easily swayed by it.

All targeted demographics show this pattern where the ads seemingly focus on what their target thinks. Unfortunately, this also reinforces the American held stigma of blacks. The stigma I'm refering to is how other countries view our race relations through the movies, music, and news we broadcast.

It's hard to view this upon a static prospective as the dynamic reinforces itself, so a portion of blacks are also part of the blame.

 

To be honest, I knew that my post would receive some of the following backlash, and that parts of it would be ignored to make it look like I was advocating slavery. I will respond to the critics below.

I addressed this in my original post.

My post was about slavery having never existed in America, not about colonialism having never existed in Africa, so this was pretty much irrelevent on that count. On your other point, I direct you to my response to FranchiseBlade, where I pointed out that blacks should not be thankful that they/their ancestors were taken as slaves. By saying that, I would hope to cover different wording of the same idea (ie replace thankful with okay with, happy, fine, ecstatic, etc. and my point remains the same.)

Unfortunately there is no perfect solution. I am not claiming to be able to end racism with a wave of my magic wand. What my method does do is get rid of legislative racism, which can and has r****ded the evolution of values. It also has the benefit of not discriminating against someone else (someone who has had no part in the discrimination of the past) in an effort to make up for prior mistakes. For a little basketball analogy, I am against rectifying the bad calls with bad make-up calls, and would suggest just calling the game right from this point forward, even if that does leave one team with an unfair deficit to begin with. No matter how many programs we make to try to "level the playing field" it is in fact not until we have the slow evolution of values that we can truly eliminate racism.

What people went through on their way here is irrelevent to the point I was making. I also did not attempt to justify anything. From my original post:

I am quite obviously (to me anyway, perhaps not as obviously to the rest of you as I had thought) not trying to justify slavery or be an apologist for slavery. I don't know how I can make this more clear: SLAVERY WAS BAD. I was only responding to the assertion that modern whites are still reaping the benefits of the slave based economy. In fact, all Americans, including blacks are reaping any residual benefit of the slave based economy of early America. I addressed the colonialism point above.

One more time for all of you who had trouble finding this carefully hidden information in my original post:
Slavery was bad, and I am apalled that it ever happened. None of my points are in support of slavery or are praise or thanks for its existance.

 

The blacks didn't benefit from slavery. Their higher living standard in USA than those in Africa is a result of them along with compassionate whites making strides to improve their rights and lives. Without such efforts, they might still be slaves today. Slavery brought them to USA with no guarentee of later happiness, in fact, imposed permanent blocks against the black's happiness forever. The credits of making their lives better should be allocated to the ones that fought against slavery, not slavery itself.

Slavery changed the blacks destiny into the wrong direction, then freedom changed the black's destiny into the right direction.

If the whites brought to Africa not the slaughters, colonial exploitation, and slavery, but the goodies in western cultures and mutual benefits from equal trades, the Africans might have lived good lives as opposed to the decadence in Africa now. Rather than helping brothers to get up, they put them down.

 

My name's not Cliff. Where did I ever say the problem was just schools? I was making a point, and a good one. As long as Blacks live in predominately Black neighborhoods, and have poor schools, then straight away they are going to start at a disadvantage.

I remember when the first 2 Black students arrived at my high school. This was during the mid-'60's, and there was a huge difference between the high school I went to, which was an inner city one, and the inner city high schools that the overwhelming number of Blacks attended. It was de facto segregation, although students were supposed to be able to "choose" which school they went to. That we see great differences between schools today, 40 years later, is unacceptable, but there it is.

School districts have made attempts to remedy the problem, besides busing, although a student may end up taking a bus anyway, like my son does. My 14 year old goes to a "traditionally" Black high school in Austin, still with a large majority of Black students, because he goes to it's magnet program... those are an effort to make available "cutting edge" learning in poor areas of the city, with college level courses, advanced placement courses, and an emphasis on a particular curriculum, like science and math, (which can include courses on robotics, computer graphics, and a host of other related subjects), or the arts and humanities, which have special emphasis in those areas. My son goes across town, from his largely white neighborhood, with it's largely white, highly ranked grade school, and usually on a bus, so he can take these advanced courses in the fields he's interested in. We like the fact that he's in a school with a lot of diversity, which you don't particularly see in the suburbs, certainly not where we live.

My personal preference would be to have everyone living all over the damn place, with everyone looking at each other as neighbors who happen to have different backgrounds and ethnicities. That's not the case, yet. At any rate, I think you need to direct your post towards someone else. I'm more than a little familiar with racism, going back to the 1950's, when I was growing up, in the '60's and '70's, when I was politically more active than I am now, and in my everyday life. And I disagree with you. I think the fundamental problem is education... poor education in poor schools still being a reality for minorities, and desperately needed education for those who don't consider themselves minorities, and have a rather whacked idea of the everyday discrimination faced by too many in this country.

Things have changed to an amazing degree, I disagree with you there as well, but America still has a very long way to go.



Keep D&D Civil.

 

The debate about history and race relations is ultimately a useless endeavor. To bring up slavery and "white guilt" is to propagate a cycle of hate and backlash. It's especially restrictive when history comes into play. White people cannot change what has happened. All they can change is what is currently occuring. A White American born in the USA today has not owned any slaves. To blame him for the sins of his father and his father's father is to condemn an innocent person. Imagine if everyone held onto the negative emotions associated throughout history. Blacks will hate Whites. Chinese will hate Japanese. The Koreans will hate the Japanese. Native Americans hate Whites. The Asians will hate the Mongolians. Europeans will hate the Romans. etc. It's ultimately self-defeating. Just look at the conflict in the Middle East. Unending and full of hatred.

Who here decided to be born white? to be born black? to be born asian? to be born latino? Who here decided to be born rich? to be born poor? Why is Paris Hilton so rich? Why is Einstein so smart? Life deals out different cards to different people. It's often unfair. But to dwell in the past is counter-productive. We must remember the past, but live in the present, and plan for the future.

All we can do currently is change what is in the present. If inner city schools are not as good as schools in the suburbs, we must fix that problem. If African-American culture is influencing the African-American community in a negative manner, let us address it. If unjustice has occurred, then let us fight to make it right.

 

I understand your point isn't to excuse slavery but the basic thrust of your argument is that there shouldn't be white guilt and by extension legal remedies regarding past discrimination because Black Americans have done better in America than Black Africans in Africa. I understand you're trying to walk a fine line here but that sort of statement does say essentially say that slavery wasn't all that bad since after all now Blacks in America are better off than if their ancestors had remained in Africa.

In material terms statistics would show that yes Black Americans are better off than Black Africans but that still shouldn't absolve societal guilt over the fact of slavery or that the descendents of slaves have been legally discriminated against and the legacy of that needs to be addressed.

Yes to your basketball analogy the make up call is bad but this isn't a basketball game and the argument here is that while other Americans disproportionately benefitted from slavery and discrimination Black Americans were held down by it and so even if the game is called fair now Black Americans have been severely handicapped. A basketball game or season ends and the next game or season is a fresh start but it doesn't work that way when one group has historically benefitted while the other has been historically oppressed. You can't just call a new game and have everyone start the same.

 

I just thought I'd throw this in here, based on the comment above.

Carry on.

 

No one denies that groups other than blacks faced discrimination. Are you saying that the discrimination that the irish encountered in the U.S. was equal to that of blacks?

 

Tough subject revisited.


I find the cartoon offensive and unhelpful. I do not feel that I benefit in any way from what injustices blacks may experience today, and I do not like it being protrayed that way to anyone else, including blacks. Does it in any way help the black community to perpetuate this view?

As for those who feel this should not be personalized, nonsense. It is very personal, and it is very personal for the many blacks who would look at this and feel anger and frustration towards whites.

And I don't feel that way just because my ancestors didn't get here until the late 1800's and early 1900's. The issue is what has happened to people ...how have they been treated... who are alive now. I do not revisit how my ancestors were mistreated by Russians or Germans or just about any other population. What is relevant is how I have been treated.

So the relevant issue...how blacks, some other minorities, on average, still do not have opportunities available to other groups. Until you have visited minority schools in poor areas, you cannot argue otherwise. When I lived in Los Angeles, many black and hispanic schools did not even have enough books for the children. Teachers were staying past 11 pm to copy chapters for the kids. (I got a committment from my company to fund the shortfall, until the VP in charge of our charity found out that the school board {who would have been embarrassed by this} had friends on our board so they pulled the money out).

I'm not saying that the situation has not improved, it probably has. But it is still a major inequity.



The cartoon is unhelpful and inaccurate but a more accurate, relevant portrayal could be just as or more inflammatory.

 

no matter how you qualify StupidMoniker, its still an unbelievably offensive and ignorant view.


a lot of you guys don't factor in the psychological impact that slavery continues to have on the black community. and that's why I really don't think the subject can be debated because talking about economic opportunities isn't the point really. Obviously blacks have a lot economic opportunities in today's world.

 

Barack O was raised by his grandparents (who were white) in Kansas and Hawaii as his father (kenyan) was out of the picture. Anyway, he has lived on the south side of Chicago and been more or less a public servant there, both officially and unofficially, for the last 20 years - despite the fact that with his resume he could easily be a multi-ten-millionaire by now working for a law firm in any city in the US or living a cushy academic live with tenure in New Haven or Cambridge.

Regardless, the great Obama's ideas on race relations and many other topics are pretty well thought out and presented (and dare I say, presented better than your fragmentary stream of consciousness posts in general). You should read, or better yet, listen to him/them at some point.

 

Your opinion is contradicted by history. What evidence do you have that "legislative racism" has r****ded values? The way you break down racial stereotypes is exposing how flawed those myths are, and that's done by putting people who are targets of those stereotypes in a position to disprove them. Put disadvantged students at Yale and studies find they often do as well as privileged students. What exactly has affirmative action done to hurt race relations? In fact, many critical race theorists, e.g. Richard Delgado have found that racism is really motivated by power relations. Historically, the law has been a driving force in counteracting racist attitudes. The passage of the Civil Rights Act did more to reverse racial attitudes than anything else. Why? Because the law is the most powerful normative force in American society. People treat the Constitution's values as important because they are the highest law of the land. A slow evolution of values won't happen when there's no catlyst to start it. So, in actuality, if you believe in an evolution of values you should be for a legislative approach to racism.

As for your bad call analogy, that is a glib and counterintuitive approach to the situation. If you have a race and one group has been given an unfair head start, do you not take some action to rectify that inequality? Other than having the word "racism" in it, what is wrong with legislative racism? Why is it better for generations to labor under an unfair and oppressive system?

 

How about the very fact that it is discussed. People are not going to be happy to be discriminated against, white, black or green. Do you think someone who loses their spot because of a law made to "level the playing field" is going to be happy about it. That kind of reverse racism only builds resentment. What we need is for the law to be colorblind. I am not personally in a position to hire people. If I were, I would pick a candidate based on their qualifications, not the color of their skin.

You say the Civil Rights Act has done the most to reverse racial attitudes. I disagree. The only way the Civil Rights Act was able to pass was through the evolution of values. Peoples attitudes became more enlightened. There was a time in history where slavery and the subjugation of people was the norm. Once there were enough people whose values had evolved enough to realize racism was bad, they were able to pass the Civil Rights Act. (While we are discussing the Civil Rights Act, I feel compelled to point out that it follows what I said, pretty much to the letter. In my quick review of the Act, at every point it seems to say that all persons should be treated equally under the law, regardless of color or any other consideration.) There were still racists opposed to its passing, but they were a minority. Do you really think that the evolution of values that led to the passing of the Civil Rights Act had less to do with changing the racial attitudes in the country than the Act itself? That is prepostorous. At that point, most peoples attitude was already in line, that is how the Act passed. Many of the people opposed to equal right remained opposed after the Act passed (or do we not remember that discrimination continues well after the law has been changed). Passing laws does not change people's attitudes, or I would not be anti-abortion considering the fact that Roe v. Wade was settled before I was even born and Planned Parenthood v Casey has been law for 16 years.

Public discourse and the pressure of one's peers change attitudes. If you own a store and refuse to hire black people, then you will be called to account. Your face will be on TV. You will be called a racist. There will be boycotts of your store and you will lose money. You will be told by the people that your attitude is wrong, and that wil make you adjust your perspective. It is imperitave to show people not that discrimination is illegal, but that it is WRONG. I don't know about you, but I break laws on a fairly regular basis. It is illegal to drive faster than the posted speed limit. What percentage of drivers have changed their attitude to reflect that? On the other hand, it is wrong to ram slower traffic to get them out of your way. How many people do you know that ram the cars in front of them?

It is hard to take your assertion that people take the constitution's values seriously. The constitution says that no one shall be deprived of life without due process, yet millions are killed each year through abortion with no reprecussions. There is a constant assault on our right to bear arms. If anything, the people of the United States are caring less and less about the constitution, they are certainly not shaping their attitudes based on it.

The catalyst in the evolution of values happened long ago. It happened the first time someone in America said that slavery was wrong. That began the slow evolution of values that continues even now. Two generations before mine, it was okay to discriminate against black people in basically any situation. In my grandparents time, it would be normal to have white's only facilities of all types. In my parents time, you could do no such thing, but it was certainly a social norm to consider minorities as different, and even as lesser. I couldn't tell you how many times I have heard my uncle use racial epithets. In my generation, most people (myself included) think that all races are equal, and that discrimination based on race is wrong (unless you are discriminating against the majority, as this thread shows.)

Action has been taken. The law has been changed and discrimination is no longer allowed. In time there will be no one left who has lived under discriminatory laws in America. That is the way it should have been all along. The problem is not when you make everything equal, it is when you tip the balance in the other direction. No one should have a problem with a system where the most qualified candidate is chosen, regardless of race, creed, color, or religion. The problem arises when you say that someone's race should be used to give preferential treatment. It was not okay to give preferential treatment to whites, and it is not okay to give preferential treatment to any other race. It is not better for generations to labor under an unfair system, which is why it is important to not put such a system in place, even with the goal of correcting the sins of the past. What is counterintuitive is to correct a mistake by making the same mistake all over again. Haven't we learned that it is bad to select for race?

What view specifically is offensive? What view specifically is ignorant?

 

That all sounds logical.

But laws aren't the whole picture are they? And they can take generations for their full effect to be felt.

The reality is, from grade school up it's not yet remotely equivalent. Fix that and your argument has more traction.

 

wow. . that almost hurt . . .
They are well thought out because they coincide with yours?
amazing how often that happens

well I have over 30 yrs of experience as a black person
in a black neighborhood raised by American Africans
Obama's experience is as foreign to the African American experience
as someone who came over From Africa
he was not raised in the community . .. as you pointed out
and even as he works in the community he is as open to misinterpretation
of the folkways of the community as yourself

it is easy to make judgements and interpretations as an outsider
easier still for them to be wrong

Rocket River