CSI, I understand (as well as I can) your points about how painful slavery was for your ancestors. I'm afraid where I don't (or perhaps can't?)
understand is why you carry pain and shame for something you didn't experience yourself. But I will take your word for it that you feel these things.
I'm sorry you feel so bad.
But take hope. Being a child molestation, rape and cancer survivor myself, and no longer carrying the pain and shame of
any of that, please
know that you don't have to carry pain and shame around with you.
Originally posted by CSIfan
At 5 yrs old, in NYC, I was getting ready to visit Southern relatives...my Mother warned me not to say anything that would make a White Person angry,
what could happen to me down south!
My mother told me that black people were dirty. She told me not to trust them and not to touch them or I'd get dirty. I guess the difference is that
at some point, I decided she was wrong. And I cast aside the lies she told me and learned to make judgments about people, not for the color of their
skin, but by who they are.
It sounds like your formative ideas about white people came, not from white people, but from your mother.
Try to see how a woman could love a man who was set up by a master to be her mate?
Arranged marriages are still practiced in many cultures.
Lynchings, mental and physical, continue...
Physical lynchings continue? Where?
The "other children", the children of the Master...this is scary...The generations who were descended from "The Master", they were raised by him,
and all his hatred, torture, rapes...the sickness of the Master...a man who could buy and sell human beings...kill at will…
Who are you talking about here?
Who are these "children of the Master"? Who specifically?
Originally posted by CSIfan
So, this is why I think we are owed reparations, which will certainly be mostly spent on much needed therapy (at least in my case).
I hope you can get some therapy if you feel you need it. Do you have insurance? Because many insuurance plans pay for therapy.
Can a Country like America allow policies that drive people insane?
Absolutely! America still allows policies that drive people insane. I'm sure if you 'travel' around ATS a while, you'll come across many American
policies that drive all sorts of people nutso.
Originally posted by CSIfan
Anything that happened in Africa or Rome, for that matter, is not relevant here.
One thing that I notice in race discussions is that we aren't "permitted" to bring up other instances of the subject matter to add
perspective to the discussion.
Whatever we're talking about, it helps to see the big picture and add perspective to bring in other comparative and
relevant points of view.
But in these race threads, I notice a stringent lack of willingness to expand the discussion to see the larger picture. It is desired that we focus on
a specific subject as if it's closed off from the rest of the world and doesn't have its place in a larger picture.
We're told not to bring class into race discussions, even though it's relevant. We're told not to bring minority privilege into discussions about
white privilege and not to talk about how Africans enslaved their own people when we're talking about how Americans enslaved people. Why not? It
gives a discussion
perspective.
I don't think a subject can be accurately explored without looking at the "other side" or the "bigger picture".
Think of it this way. If you're standing in a small circle with some other people and all of a sudden, an elephant is popped right into the center,
filling up the space, and all you can see is it's butt crack and its tail. Now, someone is going to ask you to accurately describe what you see...
Your description is going to be very different than the person's who was standing right in front of the eye.
However, if you all took a step back to get perspective, and walked around the beast and explored the thing from all angles, you'd have a much better
and more accurate description of the thing. Then you'd all be on the same page and could talk more interactively about it.
But if one person insists that an elephant looks like a big vertical crack with a tail swishing back and forth across it, and that's ALL an elephant
is... then we can't discuss the whole thing or what the other people saw.
Very very well said and for it you have my way above vote. 
Real talk, an APOLOGY from the US govt to black America is what I would really like. But I'd have better luck
getting reparation money.
) 
Hell, slavery was
enforced by and large by force, so why not?
