House poised to apologize for slavery

[SBrad001]

I'm not sure how I feel about this.

Anyway. . . discuss.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/29/house.slavery/index.html

[RTicUL8]

The U.S. Govt. didn't start the slavery - it was going on long before the U.S. became a nation.
However, they didn't stop it right away either.
But they did stop it - it just took a while.


What I'd really like to see would be the Egyptians apologizing for enslaving the Israelites.

.

[Darky]

BS. I could care less about slavery, as far as getting an apology from anyone today or getting reparations. Offer reparations, and I'll take em :D, but I don't see a reason for any of that stuff...No one alive today owned a slave or was a slave. Get over it.

[FordGuy]

BS. I could care less about slavery, as far as getting an apology from anyone today or getting reparations. Offer reparations, and I'll take em :D, but I don't see a reason for any of that stuff...No one alive today owned a slave or was a slave. Get over it.

Very well said. How long must this crap keep going on? Shit happened, it was bad. We need to move on as a nation of equality. Same goes for the Indian crap, enough is enough! I want my own Casino, And I don't want to pay taxes, oh wait, I am white. Should it really matter.

[Original_MudButt]

Very well said. How long must this crap keep going on? Shit happened, it was bad. We need to move on as a nation of equality. Same goes for the Indian crap, enough is enough! I want my own Casino, And I don't want to pay taxes, oh wait, I am white. Should it really matter.


Yeah, I remember a news story a while back about the gaming casinos in Mass. When people found out they could get free money all of a sudden 3/4 of the population had Indian blood.

Enslavement of a human being is wrong, wrong, wrong......

But reparations?

[IntrepidXJ]

a lot of bad shit has happened in the past....just the way the world was.....move forward and quit dwelling on the past

[BruceB83]

I know how I feel about it and it's BS. The U.S. as a country didn't cause slavery to start. If they do this, mark my words, it will be the beginning of a long list of wants from certain individuals (caugh Jesse caugh Jackson). U.S. taxpayers will end up paying for something they don't agree with nor had any control over and that is certainly NOT the type of drag on the economy and spending we need right now.

This makes my blood boil.

[old_man]

I didn't do it, I'm not appologizing for it. I don't like the fact that it happened, but at this point in time it is just an excuse for not having to take personal responsibility for ones actions and status in life.

I left home at 15 and have been on my own ever since. I worked my way through engineering school. A month before I graduated, I found out I would have qualified for "head rights" and could have had all my schooling paid for and had a stipend to live on. I think that because it was my hard earned money paying the tuition, I took extra care to get my money's worth. I also found out later that I could have qualified for food stamps. Hell I thought I was living pretty good.

[bradow]

What happened to 40 acres and a mule?:farmer:

[Darky]

Read the article and they also are apologizing for Jim Crow, but even then, I say its nothing but a political maneuver...won't change anything, and pretty much anyone affected is either dead or has made their own way already.

[XJ Stryker]

BS. I could care less about slavery, as far as getting an apology from anyone today or getting reparations. Offer reparations, and I'll take em :D, but I don't see a reason for any of that stuff...No one alive today owned a slave or was a slave. Get over it.


X3

[wolfpackjeeper]

you guys are all wrong

I think that they should pass the resolution, have it say that anyone who owned a slave be required to give reparations to anyone who was a slave. end of story.

None of this, you were rich you must have had, or my grandfather was so I deserve, direct responsibility only. No slavery no entitlements, the sad part is if they never pass a resolution saying this, the idea will never go away.

[rocknxj]

If the House apologizes for slavery, who will apologize for Snoop Dogg?

[alex22]

Very well said. How long must this crap keep going on? Shit happened, it was bad. We need to move on as a nation of equality. Same goes for the Indian crap, enough is enough! I want my own Casino, And I don't want to pay taxes, oh wait, I am white. Should it really matter.

I live in CT. We have both Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casino's. They are not required to pay taxes, but they are very generous with their money. They give out more money to causes, to the state and such than they would have been required to if they were paying taxes. Plus those New Yorkers have to drive through CT and pay for gas, food and anything else they need. The casino's are good for the state.

~Alex

[FordGuy]

I live in CT. We have both Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casino's. They are not required to pay taxes, but they are very generous with their money. They give out more money to causes, to the state and such than they would have been required to if they were paying taxes. Plus those New Yorkers have to drive through CT and pay for gas, food and anything else they need. The casino's are good for the state.

~Alex
Do you not think they give to keep the heat off? Not to say giving is not giving. My opinion is that it should be a level playing Field for all of us, and its not.

[RNMedic]

my family were slaves to the crown and English Lords almost a 1000 years ago, get over it and move on!!!

[8Mud]

I think they ought to give them restitution. We could pro rate it according to how dark their skin is. The darker your skin the more money you get. Though this method could kind of screw with the whole equality thing and maybe the "all men are created equal" philosophy.
Somebody is going to have to explain to me how constantly pointing out the differences, is going to help achieve equality?

[5-90]

I think that they should pass the resolution, have it say that anyone who owned a slave be required to give reparations to anyone who was a slave. end of story.

Hm. I like this!

Giving reparations to anyone who was not directly and personally involved sets a bad precedent. Personal responsibility is just that - personal.

The United States did not sponsor or force slavery, and slave-run plantations were around before the United States was a country.

And, these people were sold into slavery by their own people - we wouldn't have been able to buy slaves from Africa if they weren't sold by someone.

Ergo - if reparations are to come from anywhere, they should come from the collective economy of Africa. If we're going to go two places removed to pay reparations from slavery (at least two generations are as close as anyone can get to slavery as of now...) then we should go two places removed to fund them - slaves were sold in Africa, taken to England, and sold again (in most cases. I believe Spain also had a slave market - and there may have been a few more "intermediate" markets in the Caribbean as well...)

[Darky]

Not all slaves were purchased in Africa...many were just plain taken.

[TheAlmightySam]

I'll keep this short and sweet:

If African Americans truly want equality, they need to stop bringing up the inequalities of the past.

Let it go. When I talk to an African American, I don't see them as a victim of slavery, I see them as another human being. If they bring it up constantly, though, that's all America will see them for.

[Bent]

F-ing bleeding heart liberal morons are just pandering, again.

[Darky]

I'll keep this short and sweet:

If African Americans truly want equality, they need to stop bringing up the inequalities of the past.

Let it go. When I talk to an African American, I don't see them as a victim of slavery, I see them as another human being. If they bring it up constantly, though, that's all America will see them for.
I prefer black, thank you very much...;)

[TheAlmightySam]

Blah blah blah. Just a bunch of bad noise, that's all you are, Bent. Do you have anything constructive to say on these topics, or are you just the 5-year-old who busts into the room to interrupt the adults and shout his opinion?

[RichP]

Hey, I want an apology from the government too, back in the 60's thanks to those 'heroes' MLK, JFK and LBJ I was bussed to a inner city school an hour away in 6th grade, there I was stabbed twice and slashed once, won't even go into the times I was beatup. :rattle: :rattle: :rattle: :rattle:

[Darky]

Well, he's probably right...Its nothing but a case of pandering to a particular group to appease them, nice coincidence that the first black man to ever run for president is running this year...;)

[Bent]

Do you have anything constructive to say on these topics?
Nope, just accurate.

[TheAlmightySam]

Well, he's probably right...Its nothing but a case of pandering to a particular group to appease them, nice coincidence that the first black man to ever run for president is running this year...;)
It is just pandering, I agree. But it's not just the Democrats doing the pandering. From the CNN article:

"In April, the Senate passed a resolution sponsored by Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas, that apologized to Native Americans for "the many instances of violence, maltreatment and neglect."

In 1993 the Senate also passed a resolution apologizing for the "illegal overthrow" of the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1893.

In 1988, Congress passed and President Reagan signed an act apologizing to the 120,000 Japanese-Americans who were held in detention camps during World War II. The 60,000 detainees who were alive at the time each received $20,000 from the government."

Both sides are guilty of these wastes of time.

[Bent]

Both sides are guilty of these wastes of time.
True.

[TheAlmightySam]

You know, it's amazing, Bent - I'll bet when the Democrats are in power, like now, conservatives bitch that nothing gets done. When Republicans in power, progressives bitch that nothing gets done.

I'll bet you we're both right. It's not that the Democrats don't get anything done or the Republicans don't get anything done - nothing ever gets done by either side. And a lot of that is due to little bullshit things like this. It's not that I have a problem with them apologizing - what I have a problem with is that we're spending so much effort in Congress to apologize, rather come to a resolution on say the housing crisis or high fuel prices or the war or...

[Bent]

It's not that I have a problem with them apologizing...
There is no need for apologizing for something we abolished and in part went into a civil war to do so. Should an apology be issued to the descendents of the southern plantation owners for property and economic losses? Should an apology be issued to England for stealing their colonies? Should we apologize to Mexican immigrants for not keeping Mexico and making it part of the US?

[TheAlmightySam]

Simply put, Bent, I agree.

[welldone]

i'd say to the ones that want reparations. send them back to africa and give them a stick and tell them to have a good-one. don't they know that when they had their tribial wars the loosing tribe was placed in slavary. and all the slave traders did was go over and trade for them. they where already in slavery. so they should be getting that apologize for from what ever country they came from.

[JNickel101]

Thats just the thing - the US basically BOUGHT a country in Africa and offered to send any former slaves back to their homeland....

I wonder how many actually took the gov't up on that deal...

[RichP]

Thats just the thing - the US basically BOUGHT a country in Africa and offered to send any former slaves back to their homeland....

I wonder how many actually took the gov't up on that deal...

About the same number of celebrities who vowed to leave the US if GWB got relected.... none.

[JNickel101]

:roflmao:

[Bent]

About the same number of celebrities who vowed to leave the US if GWB got relected.... none.
I want my vote back!

[Tom R.]

...nice coincidence that the first black man to ever run for president is running this year...;)
Eh, just wanted to point out a minor correction… there were at least six others who ran for prez before Obama. :)

Also, Obama is multiracial (I hate that word since we are of one race, but it gets the point across). Multicultural Psychologists say Obama is actually less "black" than "white" due to miscegenation on his father’s side. So, technically, he has more European lineage (chiefly English) than he does African (Kenyan). So, in that sense of the term he's not a black man, though he remains a man of color. ;)

[Darky]

Eh, just wanted to point out a minor correction… there were at least six others who ran for prez before Obama. :)

Also, Obama is multiracial (I hate that word since we are of one race, but it gets the point across). Multicultural Psychologists say Obama is actually less "black" than "white" due to miscegenation on his father’s side. So, technically, he has more European lineage (chiefly English) than he does African (Kenyan). So, in that sense of the term he's not a black man, though he remains a man of color. ;)
Who else ran? I never heard of any...

[ECKSJAY]

Who else ran? I never heard of any...

Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton come to mind in recent years. :gee: Oh yeah, Alan Keyes too...

[Darky]

So they actually did run? I thought it was a joke! :D
Didn't know Alan Keyes was black, but I never paid much attention to him as I think I must've young enough not to care...;)