Salient Point or Godwin's Law. You Decide.

[miltan]

Today, Wachovia apologized because a couple of banks that eventually became part of the company used to own slaves. Leaving aside whether or not an apology was appropriate (I'd have to say it is: your company accepted slaves as collateral. That's some sick stuff), it actually set me to thinking, as I am wont to do, on a bit of a tangent

Comments

[ericflee]

drat. i tried to get my friend's ultra-controversial editorial about reparations off of the old rice newspaper webpage, but I failed. alas.

she's black and wants money for repayment.

it's funny; in even more clearcut cases (as in, we took property and now people are asking for it back), like when the u.s. broke umpteen million land treaties with the indians, we refuse to give anything back. really, it's a simple argument--those with the spoils refuse to give them up.

blacks deserved reparations a long time ago, but I don't know if it's time now to do this.

practical arguments are sometimes the best, even if they do clash with the neo-liberal political mantra. for example, people can rail against business all they want, but the fact is, without business, we wouldn't have an economy. and for some reason, idealists always overlook that fact.

[miltan]

Yeah. I think that I've basically come to the conclusion that in almost all cases, pragmatism trumps idealism. I think my goal is to be idealistic, but to not lose sight of reality. So just because I know that businesses are important for the economy doesn't mean that I should stop wishing they'd be better corporate citizens. But at the same time, I shouldn't let that completely cloud my judgement.

My half-way-through new year's resolution is to be a practical idealist :-).

Slavery Reparations

[anonymous]

I was always against Slavery Reparations. The mere execution of paying them out boggles contemplation. Do I think African-Americans as a class deserve them, though? Yes. Without doubt. We have continually beat that community down. They know we know this. We laugh at Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle because we know they are right. "It's funny, because it's true." But once we turn off the TV or leave the theater, we go back to the status quo, the Prozac, the lifetime of unending therapy sessions we need to help us deal with the fact our society is rotting from the inside out. It's not just our leaders; it's the people who elect them