Reply to It's (finally) time for reparations. It's time for the US to pay its debt.

Forum Index » Political Discussion

Reply to "It's (finally) time for reparations. It's time for the US to pay its debt. "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm half Irish and half Slav (both were oppressed and made slaves of England and the Roman empire). Where is my reparations?[/quote]

Take it up with Parliment and the Vatican, otherwise you are barking up the wrong tree [/quote]

Really? My grandfather used to tell us about the time when he would go looking for work in the city and businesses had signs sayng, "Help wanted. Irish need not apply." So again, where are reparations for Irish Americans? [/quote]
For refusing to give you grandfather a job? How old are you? Welcome to reality of unemployment. Was your ancestor held in chains when he went looking for a job? Was he refused a seat on a train? Even if you are 60, your grandfather was likely born in early 1900, so truly by then Slav, Italian immigration replaced the Irish as victims of the slums and no jobs. As for the English treating Irish like subhuman, yep true. That is who Americans got it from.[/quote]

Yeah, no. It's not the same thing. The US system was really not against your family for very long and it certainly isn't now.

I wouldn't say my family is owed reparations from the USA and I'm part Japanese and part Jewish (among other things, but those are the two relevant here). The slightly stronger argument is for the Japanese side due to the internment camps, though I still don't think it rises to nearly the level of oppression against black people or Native Americans. As for the Jewish side, that's much more complicated, but still -- at this point, the system itself is not built to push us down, despite anti-semitism that is rising to sort of scary levels right now.

This whole thing is tough. My family all came here through Ellis Island in the 1910s/1920s. Every single last name my family now has is fake because the Ellis Island officials told them "you won't get a job with that name." Was that tough? Absolutely. My mom and uncle were called Japs on the streets of NYC in the 50s.

But black people and Native Americans are still ahead of us in line for reparations, IMO. [/quote]

So, you say the US certainly isn't against my family now. You know why? My grandfather eventually put together multiple low paying jobs and busted is butt to eventually come up with enough money to get his children some sort of training. Those children did the same with their children and so on. Not complicated.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics