Apologize for Slavery? Why?

Senate Approves Resolution Apologizing for Slavery

Senate Backs Apology for Slavery
Resolution Specifies That It Cannot
Be Used in Reparations Cases

By Krissah Thompson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, June 19, 2009

The Senate unanimously passed a resolution yesterday apologizing for slavery, making way for a joint congressional resolution and the latest attempt by the federal government to take responsibility for 2 1/2 centuries of slavery.

"You wonder why we didn't do it 100 years ago," Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), lead sponsor of the resolution, said after the unanimous-consent vote. "It is important to have a collective response to a collective injustice."

The Senate's apology follows a similar apology passed last year by the House. One key difference is that the Senate version explicitly deals with the long-simmering issue of whether slavery descendants are entitled to reparations, saying that the resolution cannot be used in support of claims for restitution. The House is expected to revisit the issue next week to conform its resolution to the Senate version.

Harkin, who called the Senate's vote an "important and significant milestone," said he wanted the resolution passed yesterday to closely coincide with Juneteenth, a holiday first celebrated by former slaves to mark their emancipation.

This recent willingness to deal with the nation's difficult racial history has come about in part because of President Obama's election, said Rep. Stephen I. Cohen (D-Tenn.), who began pushing for an apology more than a decade ago when he was a state senator and pronounced himself "pleased" with the Senate vote.

Still, Cohen said, "there are going to be African Americans who think that [the apology] is not reparations, and it's not action, and there are going to be Caucasians who say, 'Get over it.' . . . I look at it as something that makes people think."

Even among proponents of a congressional apology, reaction to yesterday's vote was mixed. Carol M. Swain, a professor of political science and law at Vanderbilt University who had pushed for the Bush administration to issue an apology, called the Democratic-controlled Senate's resolution "meaningless" since the party and federal government are led by a black president and black voters are closely aligned with the Democratic party.

"The Republican Party needed to do it," Swain said. "It would have shed that racist scab on the party."

— Doc Velocity





[edit on 6/20/2009 by Doc Velocity]



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[edit on 20/6/09 by masqua]

Why should I appologize for something i didn't do? This appology is only going to make the White Senators happy.

This is so stupid, dont get me wrong, i'm not racist in any way,
but the only way i would stand by a apology for slavery is if they actualy found someone that was a slave still living , as for everyone else, life sucked back then, get over it... nothing we do now is going to change what happend then.
History is a great subject to learn from , but sad to dwell on.
People should move on and live in the now... the past can not change.

I think it was the right thing to do, politically motivated or not. The US gov. finally put forward a formal appology for slavery. Good for them!
Now they need to apologize for what they did to native americans as well.

It might just seem like useless words to some, but really, it is the right thing to do, and that makes it worth doing IMO.

I want reparations and an apology for the members of my family that suffered mental anguish, loss of income and injuries while fighting in the Civil War for the Union on behalf of the people whose descendants think I owe them an apology, much less reparations.

Keep making that racial divide stronger you saintly senators. It was a stain on our history's past, yes. The operative word being past.

I have just a couple of problems with apologizing for events in which we were never involved. Nobody alive today in America was ever a slave. Nobody alive today in America was ever a slave owner. Slavery was abolished over a hundred and thirty years ago.

We of the modern era had nothing to do with it. If we're going to apologize for slavery in America, then hell, let's apologize for the sacking of Rome, too.

It's utterly meaningless, regardless of which political party is in power. For example, I'm from a Southern white family, but we have black blood in the family on my father's side. Reverend Al Sharpton's Civil War era ancestor was a white slave owner, which I think is diabolically comical.

So, I ask you, who apologizes to whom? Who pays reparations to whom? The whole notion of such entitlement is absurd — but if it ever comes time for America to make reparations to the black man, then I am marching my white ass down there and filing a claim and collecting the government check, because I can prove my ancestry, and there's a black dude in there.

See, this whole notion of apologizing across the centuries is retarded.



But one thing that really irks me is the quote from political science Professor Carol M. Swain at Vanderbilt University, who said, "The Republican Party needed to [apologize]. It would have shed that racist scab on the party."

And this person is a professor?!

At a university??

Anyone who attended U.S. History class and even pretended to pay attention knows that the Democrat Party is the villain of America's racist history. It was Southern Democrats who gave us the Ku Klux Klan, it was the Democrat Party that opposed Civil Rights reform right through the 1960s, it is the Democrat Party who STILL has a former Klansman (Sen. Robert "White Nigger" Bird, D/WV) sitting in the U.S. Senate!

More importantly, it has always been the Republican Party at the forefront of Civil Rights reform in America, dating back to Abraham Lincoln.

For slavery apologists to denigrate the Republican Party is not merely an insult, it's outright historical revisionism.

— Doc Velocity






[edit on 6/20/2009 by Doc Velocity]

Please.

I'm so sick and tired of this crap.

Boo hoo.

So there was slavery.

It's over. Get over it.

None of the black people I know or have met have ever been out in a field I or any of my family owned picking cotton or sugar cane so stfu. I'm not apologizing for something that happened in the 1800s and I'll be damned if I'm paying any extra tax money or anything to give anyone "reparations."

At some point in history - every race has been enslaved. For those of you "christians" out there - go pick up your Bible and take a looksie.

It's in there.

Oh, and if it's soooo bad for the black man and woman in America and it's soooo hard - why don't you head back over to that technological marvel called Africa...... wait......

nm

On a level... my first instinct is to say the same thing, really what the hell did I ever do lol?

But then...

there is this one thing

The world we live in so screwed up... previously No One had ever apologized for slavery in the last 150 years... so it's never been done.

So ... I'll live with this, because it is screwed up and ridiculous... no one ever said sorry in an official way

so why not do it for those bone heads? I mean can it hurt?

Japanese wont apologize for ww2 either to the Chinese, I'd rather not... ummmm, live in one of these situations we see world wide where... grudges are held for thousands of years

reply to post by Doc Velocity


Exactly. If I could give you applause, I would, many times over. I'm tired of being forced to ride the guilt train. It's old.

reply to post by Darkblade71

Now they need to apologize for what they did to native americans as well.

I remember in high school learning in both my US history classes and English literature classes that, it is more or less a two way street with the Indian thing. Sure, there were white men that did horrible things to innocent Indians. Likewise, there were Indians that did horrible things to innocent white men. Perhaps they should apologize too?

It might just seem like useless words to some, but really, it is the right thing to do, and that makes it worth doing IMO

It's the right thing to do if you were somehow involved. As it's been pointed out, no one alive was a slave and no one alive owned a slave back then.

I'm not sure exactly why people want to apologize, but maybe they're thinking that something happening 150 years ago is holding black people back? I personally would think that a black man being elected president of a the country that used to have slavery in some parts would be enough of an apology--and it would show that black people don't have to stay in the slums and wallow in their misery.

seriously i get feeling that most of the people in here are some white supr.
like that nutjob killed the guard in that museum...seriously.

reply to post by ricco78


Just because you don't think it's right to apologize for slavery, something that no one alive today was involved in, doesn't make you a white supremecist. Nice try though.

reply to post by ricco78


and here we go w/ this crap.

I'm not a racist.

I have very good and close friends who are from completely different cultures than myself.

I judge people base on their individual actions - not on their skin color or their race.

People who do that are completely ignorant and are the very foundation of what is keeping the human race from achieving its potential.

So, call people like me a "white supremacist" if it makes you feel better about supporting stupid bs like "REPARATIONS." Because I frankly support intelligence, not a specific race.

Cheers.

[edit on 20-6-2009 by mf_luder]

Originally posted by ricco78
seriously i get feeling that most of the people in here are some white supr.
like that nutjob killed the guard in that museum...seriously.

And I get the feeling that a whole lot of brainwashed, spineless people out there are psychotically inclined to carry an imaginary burden of guilt. To those pathetic souls I say, First, get psychological help, get de-programmed, get a prescription for serotonin reuptake inhibitors or whatever; Second, get an education.

— Doc Velocity

[edit on 6/20/2009 by Doc Velocity]

I'd agree... it's MORE racist to make people apologize for something they didn't do because of their race... well put

It isn't racist to not want to apologize...

I personally wouldn't get up on a podium and apologize...

But

This is different it's a govt apology and the govt did it...



Maybe in 150 years we will get an apology for the missing 12 Trillion dollars?

Originally posted by octotom
reply to post by Darkblade71

 

I remember in high school learning in both my US history classes and English literature classes that, it is more or less a two way street with the Indian thing. Sure, there were white men that did horrible things to innocent Indians. Likewise, there were Indians that did horrible things to innocent white men. Perhaps they should apologize too?

The natives were defending thier land, which was taken in the name of the US Gov. You do have a point, but the way the us went about killing natives, such as small pox laced blankets etc was totally wrong, forcing them to march in winter to other areas etc. Thats my point I guess, but yeah, it was a war, and all sides are to blame for attrocities.

It's the right thing to do if you were somehow involved. As it's been pointed out, no one alive was a slave and no one alive owned a slave back then.

I'm not sure exactly why people want to apologize, but maybe they're thinking that something happening 150 years ago is holding black people back? I personally would think that a black man being elected president of a the country that used to have slavery in some parts would be enough of an apology--and it would show that black people don't have to stay in the slums and wallow in their misery.

Well it is the US gov that is apologizing, not the man on the street, the Gov was involved. Therefore, they should do just what they did, apologize.

None of us alive today had anything to do with slavery, but our gov continues on and was involved.

Sorry this all is in a quote box, not sure exactly how to fix it

[edit on 20-6-2009 by Darkblade71]

Slavery was a product of the ancient Middle Eastern world (Persia, Mesopotamia et al) - it was not a "White European thing." Then adopted by the Greeks, Romanians and throughout the Old World.

Slavery was a common occurrence in the New World too, pre-Columbus, and thus it is difficult to warrant apologies when so many civilisation engaged in the practice.

In fact, the Chinese were treated much worse by the Japanese (Rape of Nanking) and their anguish/suffering was diabolical - buried alive, human experiments, torture, et al.

An apology is meaningless.

reply to post by Darkblade71

The natives were defending thier land, which was taken in the name of the US Gov.

How could it be that we were taking "their land" when they had no concept of land ownership? Back then, they views the whole Earth as humanities. That is why the Dutch were able to buy Long Island for $.03, a button, and some lint.

You do have a point, but the way the us went about killing natives, such as small pox laced blankets etc was totally wrong, forcing them to march in winter to other areas etc.

Just as a counter: The Natives massacred whole settlements of people. Roanoke, for example, would be an example of an uncalled for massacre. Some of the time, settlements would be attacked that weren't even placed on land that Indians were on, or had been on.

But, hold on people... We installed the government, whatever the government does is a reflection on the people of America. I do not want my elected representatives apologizing for me to the world.

And if the Democrat-controlled government really wanted to apologize for racial injustice, they'd force Senator Robert "White Nigger" Bird to resign for his involvement with the Ku Klux Klan.

Oh, but I guess Senator Bird isn't a scab on his political party.


— Doc Velocity