Saturday, April 12, 2008

The Debts of our Forefathers

Anonymous said...

LET IT GO...it is 2008 and neither myself, my parents nor my grandparents were slave owners. At some point, we all have to move forward and stop dwelling on the past.

I work as a medical professional and I can tell you that I have many black, white, filipino, hispanic and asian colleagues. They all got there the same way I did - hard work, determination, and sacrifice. Say what you want, but the only thing holding people of ALL colors back is their own poor choices and lack of motivation.

I am SICK to death of hearing this bull. I don't care if you are purple polka dot, you can still make a life for yourself in America if you have the drive. Enough of the racial mumbo jumbo. And, as for Obama - I think a lot less of him since he has defended just last week Rev. Wright.

There is no good exucse that anyone should accept about such behavior no matter what color you are and what your beliefs are. Preaching hate and negativity only produce more. Positive words go a lot further with all of us.

My point exactly. How many generations must suffer for the sins of our forefathers? Three, five, ten, fifty, or do we just keep harping on slavery ad infinitum? Basically, all descendants of the pilgrims can be traced back to traitors and heretics who thumbed their noses at England and the Queen as they defected to the "new world". Should we hang our heads and offer monetary reparations to England for their loss of taxpayer revenue?

My great, great, great grandfather shot and killed two chicken thieves he caught in his back yard. Does that make me a murderer? Should I bare a sense of guilt for an action that happened 100 years before I was born? No, slavery happened and it was a bad thing, but there is absolutely nothing anyone can do to change that fact today. No amount of money, racial quotas or public assistance will erase the memory of slavery, nor should it.

We need to heed the lessons that slavery taught us as a nation and focus on the future to ensure that such an atrocity never happens again. Our children are taught the history of the Civil War, not as a morality lesson, but as a lesson of how ignorance, apathy and greed can become a drug which numbs the minds of a democratic and free society.

My parents and grandparents instilled in me the belief and skills needed to overcome the obstacles that I would face in my generation. They spoke to me of the past to remind me not to make the same mistakes and to learn from others foibles.

As a human being I deeply regret slavery; I also regret Auschwitz, Hiroshima and 911. The only thing we can do as a society is learn from these tragic events in our past and work together to ensure that they never happen again. To dwell on the sins of our past only distracts us from the enemies whom we currently confront.

Forthright

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

TROUBLE IS NEITHER HILLARY OR HUSEIN OBAMA WILL EVER PUBLICALY
SUPPORT WHAT BILL CROSBY SAID.

Bill is all over our TVs this week......he's wonderful !



'They're standing on the corner and they can't speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk:
Why you ain't,
Where you is,
What he drive,
Where he sta y,
Where he work,
Who you be..

And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk.
And then I heard the father talk.
Everybody knows it's important to speak English
except these knuckleheads. You can't be a doctor
with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth.

In fact you will never get any kind of job making a decent living. People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking around

The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal.
These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids. $500 sneakers for what??
And they won't spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics.
I am talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit.
Where were you when he was 2 ? ?

Where were you when he was 12 ? ?
Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn't know that he had a pistol ? ?
And wh ere is the father ? ? Or who is his father ?
Isn't that a sign of something gone wrong?
People with their hats on backward, pants down around the crack, isn't that a sign of something ?
Or are you waiting for Jesus to pull his pants up ?
Isn't it a sign of something when she has her dress all the way up and got all type of needles [piercing] going through her body?
What part of Africa did this come from??
We are not Africans. Those people are not Africans; they don't know a thing about Africa . < I>
With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap, and all of them are in jail.
Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person's problem.
We have got to take the neighborhood back.

People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different 'husbands' -- or men or whatever you call them now.
We have millionaire football players who cannot read.

We have million-dollar basketball players who can't write two paragraphs. We, as black folks have to do a better job. Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us.
We have to start holding each other to a higher standard.

We cannot blame the white people any longer.'



Dr. William Henry 'Bill' Cosby, Jr., Ed.D.

Unknown said...

First of all, I think reparations are a silly idea -- they would accomplish nothing, and they would be completely unfeasible logistically.

I also think Forthright is right: white people alive today should not be made to feel guilty over things that happened 50 or 100 years ago.

BUT, at the same time, that doesn't mean you can simply blame 100% of the black community's problems on them. A child who has grown up in poverty arrives to the first day of kindergarten having heard 30-40 million less words than her peers -- who grew up hearing correct grammar and reading books with their parents.

Yes, this child can still succeed. But it will be much, much harder to make it when she is absolutely hamstringed from the start. She will spend the rest of her education just trying to catch up to her middle class peers. Should white people be to blame? NO. But its unfair for a white person (or Bill Cosby, for that matter) to simply say, well, they are struggling because of "their poor choices and their lack of motivation". I agree that these things are obviously key factors. But the problem is larger. That little girl is trapped in a system so much bigger than her --created as a result of past events--- that it will take not only good choices on her part and more motivation than you realize, it will also take constant faith, a good bit of luck, more than a few excellent teachers, and, perhaps, a miracle for her to "make it".

I'd be willing to bet that most of your professional colleagues (of whatever color) came from homes where their parents did make it to college (and, perhaps, their parents did as well...)

Rather than standing around trying to blame white people for this, or black people for that, it would be much more constructive to think of what PEOPLE (of any color) can do to help break this cycle. Now there is some dialogue I'd like to see on this blog...

Anonymous said...

I agree with Anna, but the cycle has to start in the home. Teachers are heros, and do a great job for the most part, but when there is no family support for them, they give up and move on to a child where the parents and family do care. Those are the ones that break free of the cycle and move on to become successful.

Anonymous said...

I think head start has been around for two to three generations of kids. I would hate to see what our educational system would look like without that! Or does the head start make that much difference? After 40 years of millions and millions of head start dollars, I think it is time for some public accountability!

Anonymous said...

You nailed it again Forthright! When are we going to quit focusing on the past and start looking toward the future? Americans should be more concerned with the dangers of our future than debating the mistakes of our past. Just get over it!

Unknown said...

Good point Anon @5:00.. Head Start has serious accountability issues. I think it should be thrown out the window, and instead MS should fund state-wide pre-kindergarten.

Anonymous said...

I believe the constant complaining and the act of being the victim inspired by the black people forefathers them selves has backfired and limited them to believe that they can not succeed. Getting over the fact that there past generation where slaves and that the white people supposedly hold them down would be to there advantage. Stop being a victim and be a succeeder! Get out and make it own your own two feet, teach your children the white people are not the enemy but there friend. And nothing can hold them back!!

Its just an excuse to blame anyone but yourself!!!

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Anonymous said...

where is forthwright??????? can we have an update?

Anonymous said...

I can see positive, and negatives on both sides of the isles. Look at the homes, and lot sizes in the black community, and compare them with the lotsizes in the white communities. Look at schools that was in the black communities, and compare the ones that was in the white communities, look at Delta State, and look at MVSU compare those schools, and this didn't during slavery. Racism is live and well today as it was 20,or 30, years ago. Just a different stratgey.