One of the common responses to discussions about racism and other forms of injustice is the demand for solutions. The commonplace entry into public and private discussions about racism, the efforts to take over comment sections, to silence those who work to highlight inequality with responses like "what's the solution" does not engender solutions but rather works to derail the conversation. Usually deployed alongside the descriptor of wining and complaining, this disingenuous demand (as opposed to a desire to figure out the path toward justice) for solutions illustrates the manner that white male privilege operates. In my many years of teaching and writing, the majority of those who felt entitled to have answers NOW and remedies yesterday were white men. The "shut up... stop complaining...give me solutions" reframe is the embodiment of privilege.
Recognizing our forms of denial and challenging our social and racial myopia is the solution. Refusing to accept the lies and distortions, the misinformation and stereotypes is a remedy. However, for those who are desperate for solutions, who feel disappointed with our collective failure to provide a road map toward justice you don't have to look any further, I got you.
Reparations: Given the history of racist violence, evident in slavery, Native American genocide, Jim Crow, forced sterilization, racist immigration laws, the conquest of Southwest and other crimes against humanity, I think reparations are in order. "Sorry isn't enough!" According to the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (NCBRA):
A necessary requirement of all forms of reparations is an acknowledgment by the government or corporation that it committed acts that violated the human rights of those making the claim for reparations. Some groups may want an explicit apology; however, neither the acknowledgement nor apology is sufficient - there must be material forms of reparations that accompany the acknowledgment or apology. Reparations can be in as many forms as necessary to equitably (fairly) address the many forms of injury caused by chattel slavery and its continuing vestiges. The material forms of reparations include cash payments, land, economic development, and repatriation resources particularly to those who are descendants of enslaved Africans.'
Financial restitution, especially given the amount of wealth generated through white supremacy, because of enslavement, genocide, and exploitation, is a necessary step of racial reconciliation. White financial and political success has been predicated on white racism. Malcolm X rightfully destroys the myth of meritocracy, bootstraps, and the white protestant work ethic as reasons for success:
If you are the son of a man who had a wealthy estate and you inherit your father's estate, you have to pay off the debts that your father incurred before he died. The only reason that the present generation of white Americans are in a position of economic strength...is because their fathers worked our fathers for over 400 years with no pay...We were sold from plantation to plantation like you sell a horse, or a cow, or a chicken, or a bushel of wheat...All that money...is what gives the present generation of American whites the ability to walk around the earth with their chest out...like they have some kind of economic ingenuity. Your father isn't here to pay. My father isn't here to collect. But I'm here to collect and you're here to pay. (From By Any Means Necessary, New York: Pathfinder Press, 1970, 123.)
Prison abolition: The history of America's prison systems and the criminal justice system as a whole is wrought with racism. As Angela Davis remarks,
In order to imagine a world without prisons -- or at least a social landscape no longer dominated by the prison -- a new popular vocabulary will have to replace the current language, which articulates crime and punishment in such a way that we cannot think about a society without crime except as a society in which all the criminals are imprisoned. Thus, one of the first challenges is to be able to talk about the many ways in which punishment is linked to poverty, racism, sexism, homophobia, and other modes of dominance.
America's addiction to incarceration requires dramatic intervention. No reform will suffice given the entrenched nature of the criminal (in)justice system within every institution, from the political to the educational, from the cultural to the economic. The systemic incarceration of people of color, of the poor, represents an assault on families, communities, and a betrayal of the principles of equality, fairness, and democracy. The addiction to incarcerating people of color, particularly the poor, continues a history of systematically breaking apart families and communities. It contributes to stop and frisk, racial profiling, and a culture of criminalization. As noted by Robert Gangi, one time Executive Director of the Correctional Association of New York, "Building more prisons to address crime is like building more graveyards to address a fatal disease." It is time to rectify a societal plague - mass incarceration. This would be a step in the right direction. In the next installment I will lay out some additional solutions.
Follow Dr. David J. Leonard on Twitter: www.twitter.com/drdavidjleonard
His inability to distinguish between problems of the poor and problems of blacks is my biggest complaint. Take the prison system for example. Clearly you're onto something, but your inability to discuss the issue without invoking race greatly hampers your argument
Keep putting these race-centric arguments in front of white liberals and you're going to erode the support that you do have. The country may be getting less-white, but not necessarily blacker. Do you think the hispanic community wants to hear your "woe is me" whining?
Just curious, but if white people are required to provide reparations to descendants of enslaved Africans, should black people be required to compensate the descendants of Union soldiers who died fighting to end slavery?
Tell you what. Why stop at 400 years? Why stop at America? Why not just go back to the Caribbean islands and find out what English/Spanish/French islands gained economically from slaves? Why stop there? Go back to slavery in Africa. Then you can make it thousands of years and possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars using the simple Rule of 72.
http://data.worldbank.org/topic/poverty
Ever read black authors after they visit "The Motherland". They say a quiet thank you to the ships that brought their ancestors here. It was the single greatest thing that ever happened to Africans of today.
negatives toward everything. Even one's own deficits. The solutions lie entirely with those who recognize that they live in a world that is interconnected, who recognize the illogic and malfeasance of those who make decisions that affect entire communities around the world without the health of the entire community in the consideration.
To cease and desist trafficking with the deniers is one solution.
Then Hitler kiled of many many more?
And the Jewish population seems to be doing just fine.
I can totally understand the point made by Mr. X about the 400 years of no pay, which made the white man rich.
But I doubt very seriously that in the history of man, this is the only occurance it has happened.
Being very ignorant on the subject, I am not trying to be crass. Just trying to learn. Please give references to another race/creed/religion that received some sort of reparations for a misconduct against their ancestors...
Gypsies in Italy?
Native American reservations?
It's not like the issue has been swept under the rug like free Blacks that were slave holders both small and large.
If you reverse the scenario, and put whites into slavery, free them, promise them 40 acres and a mule, and the blacks don't deliver. Use poll tax to stop you from voting. Police interdiction programs to target you because you are white; last hired and first fired actions by black employers. well, you get the picture, it would cause a malaise in the psychological makeup of whites.
Look at White Euros whom suffered generational discrimination, they have the same pyschological profile of a batter persons as do African Americans.
The lesson here, is it an human condition that crosses racial lines.
Mr Leonard is simply trying to find excuses and twisting the facts to fit his case. I understand that he hass some terrible white guilt complex but that doesn't mean his holier than thou opinions are correct.
Southerners owned slaves prior to the Civil War. However, the percentage of Americans who owned slaves was much smaller whenthe Norther states are counted. Besides, most Americans are descendants of immigrants who came to the United States after the Civil War. A slightly smaller percent of free blacks owned slaves prior to the Civil War. There were 3,775 free blacks who owned slaves in the South alone. Some of these were free blacks who purchased family members out of slavery, but the majority purchased slaves for the same reason as whites. Virtually all American Indian triobes had slaves, particularly the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickashaw, Creeks and Seminoles.