Household wealth in Boston. Source: Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, 2015.
ADOS (by 2005) is short for “American Descendants of Slaves”, also known as American DOS, DOS or USDOS, etc. It means US Blacks who come from US slaves. About 90% of Black people in the US are ADOS. The term goes back to at least “America’s Little Black Book” (2005) by Norris Shelton. The term is being pushed on the Internet by Antonio Moore and Yvette Carnell.
Not ADOS:
- Nigerian Americans because few if any came from slaves.
- West Indian Americans because they came from non-US slaves.
- Non-Black people of colour, also not from US slaves. Note that many Native Americans were made into slaves, but their descendants no longer form a separate class in US society.
- White Americans, many of whom have the blood of Black slaves in them – just ask James Watson – but have since crossed over and now enjoy White privilege.
Examples of non-ADOS: Barack Obama, Kamala Harris, Marcus Garvey, Louis Farrakhan, Harry Belafonte, Stokely Carmichael, Colin Powell, Issa Rae, and:
Joy Reid of MSNBC is also non-ADOS. She would have you believe that the #ADOS pushback against Kamala Harris on Twitter was largely carried out by Russian bots.
Reparations: All of this matters because of reparations. For hundreds of years in the US, Black people have worked for free or almost free (slavery, peonage, prison labour). The wealth they created went to White people. So did almost all the wealth created by the Homestead Act, G.I. Bill, and FHA loans, thanks in part to White Southern senators, racist bankers, etc. These and other US government policies helped to create a wealth gap between Blacks and Whites of at least ten to one.
Affirmative action was supposed to right some of these wrongs, but many of the Black people who have benefited came from an African and Caribbean brain drain. The fear is that reparations will wind up the same way.
Counter-frames: Many ADOS, Native Americans, Chicanos, and some Asian Americans seem to share roughly the same view of the US, one based on a history of dispossession under US rule. Most immigrants, on the other hand, whatever their colour, lack that history and seem far more likely to kiss up to White people and look down on ADOS.
Kamala Harris: Some of the Black pushback against Kamala Harris comes from those who see her as non-ADOS. That is not a Russian plot or even mere nativism: like Obama, her record shows little regard for Black people beyond symbolism and pandering. She might like Cardi B, for example, but as attorney general her office defended mass incarceration on the grounds that California needed the prison labour. Like Obama, she has not come out in favour of reparations.
Black nativism: Unfortunately, all this plays to Black nativism, which is real. “Get back on your banana boat!” At some Black churches West Indians sit on one side and ADOS on the other – and that was long before there were Russian bots on Twitter.
– Abagond, 2019.
See also:
- Kamala Harris
- counter-frames
- dispossession
- reparations
- US slavery
- The Incomplete List of US Companies & Universities That Benefited From Black Slavery
- Slavery by Another Name – peonage, prison labour, etc
- Homestead Act
- Jim Crow
- The Third Enlargement of American Whiteness
- GI Bill
- FHA loans
- affirmative action
- Asian brain drain – the most racially conspicuous part of a more general brain drain.
- The mass incarceration of Black men
- MSNBC
- Joy Reid
593
Who set the standard for blacks?
All blacks from the US, Central and South America and the Caribbean islands are descendants from former slaves. We are not talking about those Africans that have come to this nation after slavery has long since been declared illegal.
A black who has an ancestor who was black, (a black woman who had a white man’s baby). The children are black.
First thing to do is to change the definition of race by the government. You can then try to define the small number of black people, who do not have white DNA, in the conversation and say they are the only victims of slavery.
Remember the old discredited saying “a drop of black blood”!
Those who created ADOS have a poor knowledge of the history of slavery in the Americas!
Many non ADOS were slaves and died (worked to death) in the fields. This is just another way that someone wants to separate the blacks into different groups to weaken their movement.
All Blacks should wake up! There will be no reparation where tons of money will go to some select group of individuals. What will happen is education programs, better medical care and an increase in job opportunities. Individuals will be on their own to utilize the opportunities.
Many blacks went to college on the GI bill. Many blacks bought homes on the GI bill. Many Blacks that served during World War II came from the farms of the south and did not have the basic background to prepare them for college. They returned to a south that was poison to blacks.
Many blacks had white fathers and were never identified as anything but black.
The period 1914 to 1952 was a rural social system where education was more of how to manage a farm then academics. Formal reading and writing were not high on the list of requirements in many states of this union.
Finally, for anyone to attempt to separate the slavery of the US from the balance of the Americas, it is a sad reality almost as bad as the Chiefs of Africa selling their people to the slave traders after years of slavery and knowledge of the treatment and the slave system were known throughout the world.
Today if you are black you are black! 1% to 99.99% or 100%!
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“Black nativism: Unfortunately, all this plays to Black nativism, which is real. “Get back on your banana boat!” At some Black churches West Indians sit on one side and ADOS on the other – and that was long before there were Russian bots on Twitter.”
Much “ADOS” about nothing. ADOS is the black equivalent of MAGA. Good Lord, I fully endorse Allen Shaw’s take on this issue! What is the world coming to? To the ADOS fans, next time you teach black history you will have to exclude Jean Baptiste Point Du Sable, Estevanico and others. African Americans were welcomed to Haiti and settled on Samaná Peninsula, presently part of the Dominican Republic, by the Haitian government nearly 200 years ago, their descendants qualify as ADOS, the same is true of the Americo-Liberians. Helene Cooper, Pentagon correspondent, for The New York Times was born and raised in Liberia, her name indicates that she is an Americo-Liberian therefore, an ADOS, but Harry Belafonte, born in Harlem NYC isn’t! If this isn’t nonsense I don’t know what is. By the way, Belafonte and Harris are as much ADOS as the 90% who claim a US slave as an ancestor. Why? Because Jamaica or Haiti are just as “American” as Florida or California. If you are confused by that line of argument think of Britain and Europe. The Brits are as European as the French and German.
“Kamala Harris: Some of the Black pushback against Kamala Harris comes from those who see her as non-ADOS. That is not a Russian plot or even mere nativism: like Obama, her record shows little regard for Black people beyond symbolism and pandering. She might like Cardi B, for example, but as attorney general her office defended mass incarceration on the grounds that California needed the prison labour. Like Obama, she has not come out in favour of reparations.”
I don’t like Harris anymore than I liked Obama but I’ll bet they are better or no worse than real ADOSs such as ‘uncle’ Clarence Thomas or the egregious pastor James David Manning. Instead of evaluating the political programs these people advocate a good deal of time is wasted on nonsense like ADOS non-ADOS.
“Affirmative action was supposed to right some of these wrongs, but many of the Black people who have benefited came from an African and Caribbean brain drain. The fear is that reparations will wind up the same way.”
People like Ifeoma Thorpe-White, Augusta Uwamanzu-Nna, Harold Ekeh, Kwasi Enin, Elizabeth Olatunji and Munira Khalif, recent African immigrants got into Ivy colleges the same way ADOS such as Mekhi Johnson, Michael Brown, Ronald Nelson,Jadal Williams, Taimor Williams and Samantha O’Sullivan did, by working smart, not because of Affirmative action. Reparations, really!? that ship sailed a long time ago with 40 acres and a mule.
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If I remember correctly, our gracious host himself is non-ADOS.
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Despite all the side issues, the point was does Sen. Harris best represent the values and aspirations of ADOS…
These are also the same qualifications that would apply to any other candidate seeking the ADOS vote.
With regard to the larger community who identify as part of the diaspora, we will not be ruled by those who seek a measure beyond their current investment in our unique political struggle.
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“If I remember correctly, our gracious host himself is non-ADOS.”
The following quote from this post says that Abagond is a non-ADOS raised in a country where “favor” is spelled as “FAVOUR”.
“Like Obama, she has not come out in favour of reparations.”
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While it’s true that Abagond uses Oxford spelling, I’ve always gotten the impression that he either was born in the U.S. or came over at a young age. I could be wrong, of course. Perhaps he will enlighten us!
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See YouTuber Yvette Carnell and her Breaking Brown videos. That’s where I heard this term. What i got from watching some of her videos is this movement has biases towards immigrant black people. They don’t buy into Pan African movement.
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I can always tell where a writer is from by the Oxford English spellings. I thought Abagond might be West Indian from one of the British, Caribbean Islands. From being a reader of this blog he as expressed his affinity for all things Anglophile.
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Having worked in the work place for a number of years is where i have been on the receiving end of getting the cold shoulder from immigrant blacks, this is how i learned of the chasm between black Americans and immigrant blacks. Being on sites that try to have a conversation about why this chasm exist can go sideways and turn ugly immediately.
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I am a Joy Reid fan. Joy Ann’s mother was from Guyana and her father was from Democratic Republic of Congo. I never thought i would live to see the day where Russians would be able to infiltrate our American government and spread propaganda.
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I used to be a fan of blogger Luvvie Ajay who is Nigerian-American and she made the drastic mistake of referring to black Americans as “akata” That’s when she lost me as a fan. And her ignorance of black American history.
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@ Mary Burrell
Did you know that Nnedi Okorafor has a YA fantasy series with Akata in the titles? I didn’t know it was a pejorative word. I haven’t read the books yet so I don’t know exactly how Okorafor uses it or whether she discusses the fact that the word can be offensive.
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@Mary
“I thought Abagond might be West Indian…”
He has said as much: https://abagond.wordpress.com/2007/02/25/me/
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Many of the transcontinental railroad workers were often not even paid for their work and buried in their own separate “coolie” cemeteries while held against their will until the project completed.
Like Allen Shaw mentioned just about all West Indian Blacks are a result of the slave trade.
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This blog post may spark a heated discussion, and I don’t want to get involved in lengthy arguments. I’m going to share my thoughts that are relevant to the original post, but I’m not going to come back and address any replies. In other words, please don’t be insulted if I seem to ignore you, because in reality I won’t even know that you were talking to me.
Looking at that graph reminded me of how certain White people in Boston (especially WASPs) own multi million dollar historic houses that their ancestors paid for many generations ago. In some cases, these families haven’t had to worry about rent or a mortgage for centuries, and they can make a fortune any time they feel like selling the house. Other racial and ethnic groups are much more likely to rent or buy homes themselves, which brings down their net worth considerably.
I would like to see reparations in the form of free college/university courses at any educational level: bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral. I notice that many Black immigrants and their descendants are gradually improving their situation through education, often despite serious issues like poverty, language barriers, and discrimination from both White and ADOS people. I think the same strategy could work for most ADOS people. Some have already enjoyed success through education, such as Deval Patrick and Ayanna Pressley.
I had a Haitian-American friend tell me that she would never marry an ADOS guy, because they’re not trustworthy. I thought that was a melodramatic and prejudiced statement, since of course there are some trustworthy ADOS guys. I wonder now if she was trying to kiss up to me when she said that. This friend has two degrees and speaks five languages, so for the record I don’t think she has to put anyone else down in order to look good! I would think she was awesome regardless of her partner’s background.
I want to say to the world that success is not a pie that will be eaten up by others if you don’t steal your slice first. Rather, success is like a community vegetable garden that will produce more food when everyone works in it together. It’s fine to criticize those who have given up on working in the garden, but why get upset if someone’s peppers are a different color than yours or the seeds came from another country? Just be glad that they’re growing!
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@gro jo
I feel like I’m missing something with your ADOS/MAGA parallel. Perhaps that’s because I don’t really understand the subtleties of ADOS, but I took it to be a way of “othering” people. i.e “You’re not genuine, you’re not one of us.” or something. Whereas I take MAGA to be a philosophy of greed, “I want the riches and power of White people in history books.”
The net effect may be the same, people who are drawn to MAGA are also racist and ADOS could have an impact like other forms of “divide and subjugate” racism. But, at the same time, Black people are not a monolith and ADOS is also a reflection of that.
In the end, I can see why MAGAts would love ADOS but I’m not getting how they’re alike.
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<Like Allen Shaw mentioned just about all West Indian Blacks are a result of the slave trade.
I thought that West Indians origins are from South America where there direct descendants are from. I know that when invasions began from Europeans that slavery started and that there is also a clear strong link to the slave trade. So a mixture of both and no doubt other races too. There are some Islands in the Caribbean who still have indigenous populations though they are only very small groups left.
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People that feel the the trickle down treatment aren’t going to feel the difference of being Ados or non-ados. In the colonized you are almost treated based on how you look…..
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Sorry about my less than rational rant. I feel better now somewhat.
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“I’m going to share my thoughts that are relevant to the original post, but I’m not going to come back and address any replies. In other words, please don’t be insulted if I seem to ignore you, because in reality I won’t even know that you were talking to me.”
Chicken.
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@Abagond
“Most immigrants, on the other hand, whatever their colour, lack that history and seem far more likely to kiss up to White people and look down on ADOS.”
This reminded me of the discussion about assimilation from the “Cesaria Evora: Sodade” post. The scary thing to me is how effective the concepts of division can be at obscuring the reality shown in the chart. One group may look down on the other, but at the end of the day, neither enjoys anywhere near the success of the oppressors.
Assimilate and “bootstrap ” you’re way from a net worth of $8 to $12k but when compared to $247,500, you can plainly see it’s all smoke & mirrors.
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@ Omnipresent
There was overlap, although I don’t recall how much offhand. But I know that there were African slaves from the West Indies who were transported and resold here, and I believe that sometimes the trade went in the opposite direction as well. I think the majority of West Indian slaves came from the same area of Africa as the majority of U.S. slaves.
Just to complicate things a little more, as early as 1637, white colonists in New England traded a group of Pequot Indians to the West Indies in exchange for African slaves. Later on, people from the Southeastern tribes were also transported to the West Indies and sold into slavery. So it’s possible that some West Indians may also have a trace of North American indigenous ancestry.
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Woah. Every now and again your 500 words hit just seen the article gets even more interesting than it already was. If really like to know more about this separation in the same church thing.
ADOS can also be called “The Right Kind of Black.” There’s a fascinating story on This American Life about a young man who experienced this first hand.
“Uganda Be Kidding Me”
https://www.thisamericanlife.org/598/my-undesirable-talent/act-two
Depending on where I am, I’m often the right kind of black because light skinned but that can change awfully fast the minute I say something white people don’t like.
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When I was reading about this I learned that Notorious B.I.G, the rapper, would not be ADOS because both of his parents were Jamaican immigrants. Also, Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture) was born in Trinidad and Tobago.
On one hand, I think there is zero problem with recognizing the black cultures that developed in the context of the continental U.S.A and the people who created them. On the other hand, I think bridges can and should be built. How different groups of black people relate to the prevailing system is a huge reason for the divisions that exist. This dynamic is as ancient as the “house negro” and “field negro” concept.
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“On one hand, I think there is zero problem with recognizing the black cultures that developed in the context of the continental U.S.A and the people who created them.”
False. Jazz, that most African American art form was created in New Orleans by ADOS and non-ADOS whose ancestors came to the USA from St-Domingue (colonial Haiti) because they didn’t want the freedom the Haitian Revolution offered.
Writing “favor” as “favour” is a dead giveaway that our genial host isn’t being entirely ‘honest’ about where he grew up.
“@gro jo
I feel like I’m missing something with your ADOS/MAGA parallel. Perhaps that’s because I don’t really understand the subtleties of ADOS, but I took it to be a way of “othering” people. i.e “You’re not genuine, you’re not one of us.” or something. Whereas I take MAGA to be a philosophy of greed, “I want the riches and power of White people in history books.””
You aren’t missing a thing. ““You’re not genuine, you’re not one of us.” and therefore you shouldn’t be getting Affirmative action or Reparation, etc. ADOS is the ghetto version of MAGA, since it’s a struggle over crumbs. Maybe Mr. Tidjane Thiam, the non-ADOS ceo of Credit Suisse Group AG, a bank with assets worth $796.3 billion, should dump his ADOS wife since marrying her ends up enriching an ADOS at the expense of non-ADOS? Like MAGA, it assumes the ‘superiority’ of USAers over the rest of humanity. US exceptionalism in action.
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@ gro jo
“Writing “favor” as “favour” is a dead giveaway that our genial host isn’t being entirely ‘honest’ about where he grew up.”
I don’t know that he’s ever said one way or the other where he grew up. The reason I think the way I do, is that I’ve noticed how many cultural commonalities we have when discussing elementary age through college (I think Abagond and I are very close to the same age). I realize with the U.S. having the huge global influence it does, I may be wrong.
I don’t write “favour” but I do write “dreamt” instead of “dreamed” and “travelled” instead of “traveled” and a number of other spellings that are more British than American.
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Interesting
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Non ados people please be honest. You know your family says things that would be considered racist if they were white.
the term akata should speak volumes, by itself, to the anti ados sentiment held. Couple that with the fact that ados people paved the way for the american life you now live.
This is not to take away from folks like Marcus Garvey and the like. Who, it should be noted, mostly held pan African views which are not held by non ados folks in general.
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“I want to say to the world that success is not a pie that will be eaten up by others if you don’t steal your slice first.”
Unfortunately, this is exactly how the world is, and whites have been the biggest transgressors in hoarding all the pie.
“Rather, success is like a community vegetable garden that will produce more food when everyone works in it together.”
That’s a goal to work for, not reality on the ground.
“It’s fine to criticize those who have given up on working in the garden”
How about asking them why they stopped working in the garden? Were they given the worst soil and polluted water and rusty broken tools and seeds that don’t thrive in this climate?
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“Non ados people please be honest. You know your family says things that would be considered racist if they were white.” ADOS don’t? If you’re white you’re all right, if you’re brown stick around, if you’re black get back should be attributed to non-ADOS?
“Couple that with the fact that ados people paved the way for the american life you now live.”
Hello, history, give me rewrite. Your claim is nonsense and a shameless attempt to write non-ADOS out of the history of the USA.
Does the name Homère Patrice Adolphe Plessy jog your memory? Maybe you know him better as Homer Adolph Plessy of the eponymous ” landmark U.S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896),which sanctioned the controversial “separate but equal” doctrine for assessing the constitutionality of racial segregation laws.”?
“Homer Plessy’s paternal grandfather was Germain Plessy, a white Frenchman born in Bordeaux c. 1777.[5] Germain Plessy arrived in New Orleans with thousands of other French expatriates who fled Saint-Domingue in the wake of the slave rebellion led by Toussaint L’Ouverture that wrested Haiti from Napoleon in the 1790s.[5] Germain Plessy married Catherine Mathieu, a free woman of color, and they had eight children, including Homer Plessy’s father, Joseph Adolphe Plessy.[5]”
Non-ADOS were in The USA before it was the USA (Jean Baptiste Point Du Sable, Estevanico and others), during its creation (Chasseurs-Volontaires de Saint-Domingue was a French regiment of colored troops (gens de couleur) that was founded on 12 March 1779…The regiment accompanied the Comte d’Estaing as part of the expeditionary force for service in the American Revolutionary War…Twelve-year old slave-boy Henri Christophe, who served as a drummer, would later become the King of Haiti. ) and after its creation (Plessy, Carmichael, Belafonte, etc.)
Let’s not mention the fact that 22% of the USA was a ‘gift’ of the Haitian Revolution to Jefferson, who opposed it. Please, spare me your abysmal display of ignorance. Go learn some real history and quit writing bs based on your feelings.
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To grow jo, I already addressed the contributions of non ados people in my last sentences. No denial of that at all.
The main point of the post however is the anti ados attitudes held by non ados folk. Which is not anything unique. It seems people of all nations have drunk the kool aid of American propaganda aka racism. Heck, even ados people themselves have issues here.
Grow jo are you non ados? You’re condescension was palpable in that post. This is a touchy issue but no need for hostility. Just be honest, ados and non ados people are divided and conquered.
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“American Descendants of Slaves” The term itself implies a sense of inferiority, and is a rupture from the history and culture of our ancestors who were part of the largest forced migration in history. These people are basically saying that their history starts in 1619. That they started as conquered people. When in fact the essence of Afrikan culture is the reason why those of us who are descendants of that forced migration are here. It was the essence of Afrikan culture that gave our ancestors the fortitude to survive forced marches to the Afrikan coast; months in slave prisons; the horrific Middle Passage, and the daily terror of chattel slavery. We understand the our history in America has its idiosyncrasies. We understand the impact of three cycles of white supremacy and the double-consciousness Du Bois discussed. But that’s only part of our history over several millennia. I think something deeper than group reparations is driving this identity movement. They want to additional demarcations to the Afrikan world, updating the Berlin Conference geography and subsequent national identities, to include the United States, the Americas, and the Caribbean as separate entities, just like Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, et al. What more could the global White Supremacy Dynamic hope for.
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“The main point of the post however is the anti ados attitudes held by non ados folk.”
Nonsense, the main point was to show that such divisions are real. ADOS are full of vitriol for their fellow ADOS as the “if you’re white you’re alright” chant indicates.
“It seems people of all nations have drunk the kool aid of American propaganda aka racism. Heck, even ados people themselves have issues here.”
I found your ADOS as ‘victims’ of the whole world irritating and dishonest, ADOS have harassed non-ADOS but that fact disappears in your comment, non-ADOS are reduced to mere parasites who feed off the struggle of righteous ADOS. As my history lesson indicates, such claim is nonsense. Non-ADOS have experienced the same racism as ADOS.
“Just be honest, ados and non ados people are divided and conquered.” Nobody is playing ‘victim’ here but you. Show me what non-ADOS have taken from ADOS or how they blocked them from getting what they fought for. ADOS and non-ADOS hold their share of prejudices toward each other, if you want to discuss that fact, start by dealing with your own prejudices against non-ADOS.
“Grow(sic) jo are you non ados? You’re condescension was palpable in that post.” What you call my condescension was an attempt to set the record straight.
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I’m a CADOS, Canadian descendant of American Slaves. I can heartily attest to ‘Grow Jo’s’ assertions of prejudices between the ADOS, and non-ADOS.
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As a ‘HADOS’, I’d like to thank Herwneith for her comment.
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I am non ados myself on my father’s side but what I am seeing here is kind of vicious actually. I never said ados are holier than thou ados and non ados are the same people, geopolitically speaking.
What I am saying is that, in recent decades, there is Ia shift in attitudes where non ados separate themselves from ados. Do ados have a similar term to akata?
It seems like non ados take the problems of internalized racism they have experienced either to themselves ( I got it too) or through vicarious experience like the media and placed themselves in opposition to ados.
Also there us economic incentive in the U.S. it seems like. Do you think the recent influx of non ados celebrities in media is a function of talent?
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“American Descendants of Slaves” The term itself implies a sense of inferiority, and is a rupture from the history and culture of our ancestors who were part of the largest forced migration in history.” – makheruspeaks
WHAT? ADOS or American Descendants of Slaves, “implies a sense of inferiority” Personally, I do not believe ADOS implies a sense of being inferior. To me, it’s simply a distinction in accordance with the geographical locale of his/her enslaved forefathers and foremothers. It has nothing to do with being lesser than another people.
It would be the same if Haitians, who were colonized by the French, to say that they are “inferior” due to being enslaved by the French. It would be the same if the Dominican Republic citizens were to say that they were “inferior” due to being enslaved by the Spaniards (Spain). It would be the same thing if those living on one of the Caribbean islands, who were enslaved by the British, to say that they were “inferior” due to being enslaved by the Brits.
“These people are basically saying that their history starts in 1619.” – makheruspeaks
Who or what group of so-called ADOS or in the alternative, African American made such a statement? In my honest opinion, only an individual fraught with ignorance would believe such nonsense. I’ll wait for you to provide me with a name of who actually said what you posted……
“That they started as conquered people. It was the essence of Afrikan culture that gave our ancestors the fortitude to survive forced marches to the Afrikan coast; months in slave prisons; the horrific Middle Passage, and the daily terror of chattel slavery.“ – makheruspeaks
WHEW! Lawdy, lawdy have mercy. To me, no one is in a position to give another person fortitude or strength. You may be in a position to give words of encouragement, but that’s about it. Inner strength or fortitude is something that’s spiritually drawn upon due to your personal beliefs in a higher power.
“That they started as a conquered people?” – makheruspeaks
What in the world are you talking about?? Do you really believe that we as a people were spawned out of thin air??
PS: Imagine this for a moment. African Chiefs (Hamites), giving words of encouragement to ANOTHER people (Hebrews) that were captured, simply to be loaded into the hull of a slave ship. Such rubbish! (SMDH)
I suggest that you brush up on your history and while you’re at, …. read the darn Bible!
Proverbs 17:28 Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.
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@makheruspeaks
Right.
It’s certain that cultural details will be different depending on the background and location of a particular people. Even within America, Southern and Northern culture is not exactly the same and then Louisiana is different from Georgia. So from that perspective, I don’t have an issue with the mere recognition of ethnic differences.
However, the chattel slavery experience is not unique to North America and it might have been almost random whether your ancestors ended up in the Caribbean or the Carolinas. Furthermore, there is a long history of all kinds of interaction. There were non-ADOS like T&T-born Carmichael involved in the civil rights movement in the USA. There was a Jamaica-born slave, “Dutty Boukman”, associated with the Haitian Revolution on the neighboring island. There were free black ADOS who were welcomed to settle in Haiti after the revolution when America still had slavery.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haitian_emigration
Gro Jo’s erm – incendiary – way of putting things aside, he’s right that any notion of non-ADOS as leeches holding back ADOS is not historically informed but a manifestation of prejudice. It’s quite possible that Trump’s nativist rhetoric has brought this to the forefront now. However it would also be wrong to suggest that prejudices are unidirectional. Ultimately, I consider it all self-defeating as you do.
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@Son said: “It seems like non ados take the problems of internalized racism they have experienced either to themselves ( I got it too) or through vicarious experience like the media and placed themselves in opposition to ados.”
EXACTLY!
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blakksage, why don’t you regale us with your anti non-ADOS “internalized racism”?
Let me help you get started: “And for those who dream that there will be some type of alliance between so-called African-Americans and native Africans, that is not only wishful thinking, but sheer nonsense. The depiction of the gentleman wearing a green suit in the movie with a green lip-plate lodged in his lower lip was done for a strategic purpose, that is, to indicate the difference between us, not similarities.
By the way, how many so-called African Americans have you ever seen wear a green painted lip-plate in public??
Wake up Black folks, Selah!
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on Tue Feb 27th 2018 at 04:58:39
abagond
@ blakksage
I hated seeing that lip-plate man in the film. In my experience people like him are used to exoticize Africa.”
This exchange between you and Abagond is revealing. The only “Black folks” that matter are the ones you feel are totally westernized. My friend, African Americans are a minority of “Black folks”, even in the Americas.
“Tribes that are known for their traditional lip plates include:
The Mursi and Surma (Suri) women of Ethiopia
The Sara women of Chad (ceased wearing plates in the 1920s)
The Makonde of Tanzania and Mozambique (ceased wearing plates several decades ago)
The Suyá men of Brazil (most no longer wear plates)
The Botocudo of coastal Brazil (in previous centuries, both sexes wore plates)
Aleut, Inuit and other indigenous peoples of Northern Canada, Alaska and surrounding regions also wore large labrets and lip plates; these practices had mostly ceased by the twentieth century.
Some tribes (Zo’e in Brazil, Nuba in Sudan, Lobi in West Africa) wear stretched-lip ornaments that are plug- or rod-shaped rather than plate-shaped.”
Why did you fail to notice that this ‘exotic” custom is practiced by non-Africans?
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“This exchange between you and Abagond is revealing. The only “Black folks” that matter are the ones you feel are totally westernized. My friend, African Americans are a minority of “Black folks”, even in the Americas.” – gro jo
First and foremost, you are off topic!
Look at Gro a What; I meant to say gro jo. My friend, it would be self-beneficial for you if you’d cease advertising your abundance of ignorance for free. You should at least charge a pittance of an entertainment fee so that you may begin taking classes at the local community college. That may prove to be personally helpful for individuals such as yourself.
Moreover, your comment above was obviously fashioned within the small confines of your beautiful mind. I never said what you posted. You should at least properly quote me with quotations marks.
Furthermore, it appears to me that you also have an affinity for conversations regarding lip plates. Well, …not yours truly. You are referring to a comment that was posted under Abagond’s “Black Panther” blog post. And as a friendly reminder, the current blog post is “ADOS” (American Descendants of Slaves), not ADOSLP (American Descendants of Slaves that adorn Lip Plates).
You still never answered my question: How many so-called African Americans have you seen with a lip plate lodged within their lower lip? More than likely zero, because we are not the same people. I don’t know why are you experiencing such difficulty with this fact.
I am quite certain, that if you’d attempt to perform such an act on a so-called African American, you are going to walk away with a busted lip, my friend! In fact, I challenge you to do so.
Carry on with your bad self, …Mr. gro jo!
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“I never said what you posted. You should at least properly quote me with quotations marks.”
Carry on with your bad, and accurately quoted, self, …Mr. blakksage!
If you are going to take non-ADOS to task for their bigotry against ADOS, you must start with your on bigoted views about them.
You make a number of absurd assertions such as: “You still never answered my question: How many so-called African Americans have you seen with a lip plate lodged within their lower lip? More than likely zero, because we are not the same people. I don’t know why are you experiencing such difficulty with this fact.
I am quite certain, that if you’d attempt to perform such an act on a so-called African American, you are going to walk away with a busted lip, my friend! In fact, I challenge you to do so.”
I never claimed that African Americans and non-African American Blacks were the same people, I did claim that African Americans are not even the majority of Blacks in the Americas and I pleaded with you for understanding of the differences between yourself and other Blacks. In the process, I pointed out the hypocrisy of a certain ADOS mentality that claims that only you guys did the heavy lifting in the battle against racism. At no point did I try to minimize the bigotry of non-ADOS toward ADOS.
As a gentleman and a scholar, I needn’t remind you of the contributions of non-ADOS to African American culture. “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing”, a/k/a “the “Black National Anthem”” was penned by the brothers Johnson, James Weldon and John Rosamond. They were descendants of people from Nassau Bahamas and St-Domingue (present day Haiti). As a Bible thumper, I don’t see why you need me, a godless atheist, to remind you of a basic tenet of your creed: ” Let He Who Is Without Sin Cast The First Stone!”
Be well my friend.
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Nothing like money to get everybody in the family fighting.
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@gro jo
OK!
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https://www.definitions.net/definition/ADOS
https://www.thefreedictionary.com/ADOS
https://www.acronymfinder.com/Military-and-Government/ADOS.html
https://www.acronymfinder.com/ADOS.html
https://www.appliedbehavioranalysisedu.org/ (ADOS)
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@Solitaire: You asked about Nnedi Okorafor and her book Akata Witch. I asked my Nigerian coworker about this word and this is how he explained it to me. It is a Yoruba word that is used for African Americans that means wild animal. He then went on to say it’s not a term of endearment. There is a lot of patriarchy in African culture so when they immigrate here to America and see how black American women are independent and they are not subjected to men that is frowned upon. There is just a huge chasm among immigrant black people and American black people. There are various theories about the origin and meaning of the word. In Nnedi Okorafor’s Akata Witch the protagonist Sunny is Nigerian-American. She is an Nigerian and also an albino. She is like a Harry Potter character she has magical powers. Like Harry Potter who was called “Mud Blood.” I remember the term “mud blood “ being used as a type of slur. His parents didn’t have magical abilities. So Harry Potter was called Mudblood. But because the girl Sunny in Okorafor’s Akata Witch is American she has been labeled “Akata.” I have been listening to a sample of Akata Witch on Audible and it is in my wishlist. When African people are using this word and speaking among themselves about black Americans it’s not a term of endearment.
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@ Mary Burrell
Thank you for the explanation. I did more or less understand that it was a slur. I didn’t know whether Nnedi Okorafor had committed an offense against ADOS by using “akata” in her books. Your comparison with Harry Potter and “mud blood” is really helpful. It seems like she’s using “akata” in a similar way. I do admire Okorafor as an author and you know how it is, you don’t want authors you like to do something horrible.
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@ Mary Burrell
Let me clarify: I wasn’t very familiar with the term “akata” but I knew it was in the title of her books that I wanted to read someday. Then in your first comment about “akata” on this thread, I found out the term was a pejorative. After your first comment, I did more or less understand that “akata” was a slur, which I hadn’t known before. And in your most recent comment you explained it in much fuller detail, which helps me understand what “akata” means and how it reflects on differences in the cultures, especially regarding women and patriarchal attitudes. Thank you again for the explanation!
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It’s not so much that non-ADOSes do better than ADOS, especially since I don’t believe degrees and wealth are the only measure of success, but whether ADOS people should be considered inferior or the lower blacks because other groups do better. And the answer to that is no.
Also, I’m not familiar with the Boston area but isn’t the Northeast pretty heavily Caribbean & African? I honestly never met a Black American from Boston so I’m not surprised the wealth of non-adoses would be higher out that way since there seems to be more of them on average.
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Reblogged this on A Black Writer in Berlin and commented:
Reposted from Abagond. Off the top of my head, I can’t say much about it right now because I’m up to my neck in other things at the moment (debts, possible eviction, etc.). But I might add that this squabble between native-born Afro-Americans and foreign-born blacks is nothing new. It was happening when I was a kid; it was happening when my father was a kid. In fact Harold Cruse devoted an entire chapter in his book “Crisis of the Negro Intellectual” to the on-going beef between Afro-Americans (Negroes at the time) and Caribbean blacks (West Indians at the time). For example:
“An anti-West Indian bias was implicit in some of the relentless editorial assaults in (A. Phillip) Randolph’s ‘Messenger’ against the Garvey movement, as part of the “Garvey Must Go!” campaign carried out by the American leadership. This campaign reached a high pitch in 1923…Randolph and his group were enraged by Garvey’s words and answered him in the ‘Messenger’ under the editorial heading, ‘A Supreme Negro Jamaican Jackass'”….
And on the flip side of the coin, from Caribbean blacks, Cruse noted that “once a West Indian gets to the United States he becomes critical of Negroes being exploited because they ‘don’t understand business'”….
All in all, it’s just another sad case of American history repeating itself in terms of the Afro-American vis-a-vis other ethnic groups.
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Ah no Allen Shaw, the reason for ADOS separation is because the United States offer reparations to slaves in the United States. Uh, ADOS know there were other slaves. We just also know about the settlement made specifically to US slaves. That is like two different people being involved in two separate car accidents and are asked to split the Sam settlement. That’s dumb.
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As far as I know, the Caribbean has already assembled a case for reparations:
http://caricomreparations.org/
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TBH, it’s questionable whether it was separate car accidents; more like one car accident in which someone flew out the front window and into a ditch, another flew out the back window and into the road and another was trapped in the car. Perhaps it’s the injuries that are different not the accident. The Transatlantic slave trade was essentially one event, even more so when we’re talking about a particular colonial power.
Up until after 1776 the British Caribbean and the North American colonies were both under the English crown and were politically connected on that level. It’s ironic that American independence resulted in slavery persisting here until after the civil war (1865) while the British Empire ended it in 1833. Had America not become “free” and adopted a constitution that affirmed the rights of man, slavery would have ended earlier. (smh)
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Did I miss the news, who is offering reparations? Last time slavery was mentioned in official circles was when Clinton offered an apology for the enslavement of Blacks, no reparations was even hinted at.
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@ gro jo
Three Democratic candidates for president in 2020 have lately talked about reparations: Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and Marrianne Williamson. Even Tucker Carlson on Fox News had a discussion on it.
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@ gro jo
Oh, and Julian Castro too is calling for reparations for Black people. It has become all the rage.
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@ abagond
I would not include Black candidates in a list of this kind. A possible implementation of a successful reparation’s program can only happen under a White politician in the USA as it is. A Black politician that tries something of the sort will be branded a thief or socialist of the worst kind.
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@origin when you put it like that…
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Well, that settles it if Julian Castro (Who??) is calling for it its as good as done! Pandering to the electorate is the fashion until 2020. Trump will be reelected by a landslide opposing this.
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Is there a good definition of ADOS anywhere? Who among ADOS should be eligible for reparations? Should non-ADOS be eligible for anything?
I found another one in this article:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/11/18246741/reparations-democrats-2020-inequality-warren-harris-castro
I still find this definition problematic in some ways. For example,
– Ex-President Barack Obama is reported to have some slave ancestor in the US on his mother’s side and he has identified as black / African-American on official documents. Does that mean that he should be eligible for reparations given these criteria?
– A similar argument could be presented for Kenzo Lee Hounsou, the son of Kimora Lee Simmons and Djimon Hounsou. Kimora Lee Simmons has slave ancestors in the US, but was not primarily raised by her African-American father. Yet, her son undoubtedly will mark himself as “African-American”.
– How about Jovan Adepo, whose mother was from Nigeria and who was born in the UK, but who had an African-American father from Tennessee? When he was brought to the US, he was mainly raised by his mother’s family in Maryland. He technically has US slave ancestors, but was born overseas to a non-US mother.
– If European adults who were born as “brown babies” after WWII, or any overseas born and raised person with a parent who was African-American (including those in Asia) later migrate to the USA as an adult, are they eligible for reparations?
– Does marking oneself as “multi-racial” qualify as “black”? More and more people in my own family and in my godmother’s family are now tri-racial or quadriracial. Are they eligible?
– Many people have ancestors with African ancestry in the US predating the civil war, yet who were not slaves during the civil war or for some time before then. That would include people who were “Free People of Color” or who lived as Negroes in non-slave states and who were not slaves. Are their descendants, who may identify as black, still eligible for reparations?
– How do we classify “Black Cherokees” (whose ancestors may have been enslaved by the Cherokee)?
I am also glad that this article does examine the problem of simply making cash payments. While they may be needed to some extent after making a formal apology, it will not correct the underlying problems. Instead, it should focus on asset building (both financial assets and land/property), health and education, and a trust fund targeting ADOS (however it may be defined) for specific purposes, etc.
This is a program that I also strongly support:
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Are there multiple corroborating sources for this statistic? If someone had told me this in the early 80s, I may have believed it. But I find it very hard to believe now. Growing up in Anacostia, SE DC, and PG county, MD and spending a lot of time in Alabama and having the majority of my cousins growing up in Mississippi, I would easily believe that at least 90% of black Americans were ADOS in 1980.
But since the mid 80s, I found myself in many situations where a large portion of the black people around me (sometimes even the majority) would definitely not be ADOS (at least in DC and metro NY). Even in the 90s, I worked in several places that employed large numbers of blacks, but they were mostly not ADOS. I suspect that it may have dropped below 80% by 2019 (although of course, it depends on how you define it).
In fact, I even found it problematic that so many what I would label as non-ADOS would challenge my entrenchment in US society compared to THEM.
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First and formost, this is our country and our history and grievance between America and the ADOS is our business similar to civil war.
Second, the list of people listed as not ADOS, a majority of their parents came from the Caribbean, which was thw slave hub, my point our ancestors pick cotton and yours picked sugar cane, and as we lived under jim crow you lived under European colonial rule and your economy was enslaved to you master European country until our civil right and black power movement.
My point is bondage is bondage no matter if u call it slavery, or colonialism.
Africans you were totally dominated by the Europeans, that’s how the decendants of the middle passage got to America, a place where these ADOS contributed too, so you can run too when Africans are doing their ethnic cleansing to each other, ideas put in your head by Europeans. I guess Rwanda taught yall nothing. Aftet you were conquered and colonized, many African peoples become independant to fall for slavery as a recipient of the World bank and IMF and controlling your currency keeping you a slave, not by term but by enslaving your mind thinking you are free but not, mental bondage. After debt relief and America farm aid, you are falling into infrastructure slavery to rhe Chinese, and if you dont path that money back all those assest will be taken into control by the massive Chineese military complex. Lastly, Africa was also a victim of the cold war being control and manipulated by 2 White nations, which enslaved you politically and instilled dictators to control you for the man.
My point bondage is bondage no matter Africa, Brazil, Caribbean, and AMERICA and Europe.
As for that list such as Louis Farrakhan, Garvey, Bellephonte, and General Powell, there parents may not have been born in the United States, but the tentacles of common bondage male them my hero’s and brothers and sisters. These people call themselves proud BLACK Americans, not Caribbean negro.
Back to the African, i wish yall just do something good for Africa and stop corruption, ethnic strife and build and clean the place up so my ADOS butt can go somewhere so i can spend my money which my ansestors paid to price for me to do.
I disagree with Black Americans looking for acceptance from others, we arw the freedom fighter, most progressive people in the shortest period of time in history. Black America needs to be more assertive in defending their nation and ansestors honor, cause at the end of tne day when the white people start shooting at each other as in 1864, you Africans who look down on ADOS will fill the airports or concentration camps but i can bet money your offspring just like many in the list still will weather out the storm with their ADOS kinsman.
Beware talking about people one day may have to hide you in the basement like a jew and stop running to Europe.
Sincerely,
Proud American of African descendants by the middle passage.
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African immigrants in any form shall not be granted any form of reparation for descendants of american slaves. That should be their grievance with their country and Europe. ADOS IS A POLITICAL GRIEVANCE BETWEEN THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND CITIZENS born during a certain time span. In my opinion, reparation will never happen, but if is does the funds will come out of the general federal budget in the form of a tax cresit which means even ADOS will being paying for their own reparation. By the way even Adfirmative Action has a time limited as explained in the law determined by the supreme court at a later date.
As for Africans, who have been ebslaves the most, first bu when theu land took and colonized bu the European, then bu the World bank, IMF debt trap, and the cold war used as a pawn by 2 superpowers determining leadership, also bu themselves with ethnic strife, now the Chinese with infrastructure debt that the revert back to China ownership if payments not made. But at the end of the day what goes on between Americans descendant os slaves and the diaspora who may parents may not have been born here but lived through jim crow such as Farrakhan Powell,Bellephonte, and all those foreign exchange students who were imposed by racial segregation by jim crow or redlining who identify as BLACK Americans. Alwaya remember it should not be based on where the ship landed and if you picked cotten, sugar cane or blood diamonds, but in this case African American should be more assertive in our country and not take crap from foriegns AFRICAN OR ASIAN OR EUROPEAN. Just like Africans need to help Africa by stopping the brain drain running to Europe and America. America of slave descendants need to keep our struggle in check so our progression benefits our descendants, not foreigners. On the simple bases of the movement and grievance is between The United States and the citizens they deprived of economic development for so long. In closing, dont have no issue with other black immigrants but no African or Carribean immigrant should be afforded an affirmative action reward, which are intended for descendants of American slavery, not AFRICAN or Carribean slavery and colonialism. That is an issue they must take up with their governments and former and present masters.
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How are we to understand your grievances when you are barely literate and have no idea of history or geopolitics?
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LOLZ!!!
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Seriously though, I have been perusing this #ADOS agenda for some time now, and if it is not an op, then it is just as dangerous.
Strike 1: https://medium.com/@TalibKweli/why-ados-is-trash-receipts-attached-5a337f46f10
According to the above link, #ADOS is a divide and conquer CONservative op that seeks to draw a hard line on Democrat candidates that will inevitably alienate their non-black (aka majority) base. There will also be the secondary effect of dividing the 4.2 million black immigrants from the 38.9 million native black Americans. Thus, a reverse melting-pot effect is created where blacks are divided by ethnicity, but whites are united by race. That is how they keep us weak and divided.
Strike 2: https://ados101.com/black-agenda
Much of the claims in the above can be resolved with a general Sanders style social-Democratic agenda. Why should the above benefits benefit black people only, when most Americans are affected by updates of the same policies used to affect black people. Black people are just canaries in the coal mines for future policies and techniques. A breakdown:
In place since 2010.
Then why are they going after black immigrants instead of Indians?
EPA has been gutted. Fix that first.
Like Single payer health care?
Goddamn Isis papers mumbo-jumbo B.S.
Strike 3 :
https://ados101.com/roadmap-to-reparations
Ooooh Boy…….
Congratulations, you just lost the party nomination.
MMT does not work that way. The basic flaws in the above statement will be left as an exercise for the reader.
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From – https://ados101.com/roadmap-to-reparations
You know how poor people think that if they win the lottery their problems will be fixed, yet they end up just as broke 5 years later? The above quote is that, except for a whole ethnicity. getting money in a busted system doesn’t change the fact that the system is busted. That’s how you have the children of Baby Boomers sliding into a social position lower than their parents. Fix the system first, then go from there.
But then again, this may just be an op to separate highly educated immigrants from meeting up with a large black American cohort to create Pan-Africanism 2.0. Such as black African and Caribbean financial institutions lending to black American businesses.
But I could just be paranoid.
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Here is Adolph Reed :
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYLx6eroTdE)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tbe4hGp-8s)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EE4unn3bPFQ)
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Russian backed trolls.
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Thanks for addressing this matter. So far I’ve only heard it from a handful of youtubers such as Tone and Yvette themselves, New Possibilities, and a few members of the black manosphere.
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Woke up this morning and got online to one of the social media sites I frequent. One of the posters posted a firestorm that is brewing on Twitter about the Netflix show She’s Gotta Have It 2. The opening scene is a conversation between the two characters. The protagonist character Nola Darling and one of her many lovers, an handsome black British man. They are having a discussion about history of black British actors being used instead of black American actors in films and television here in America. The conversation between the two characters are having is black American history of slavery versus blacks in Great Britain and colonialism. The commentators on Twitter who are watching the Netflix show are very angry about Black Americans ignorance of their history. The dialogue between the two characters was like they were playing the oppression olympics. Long story short, black Brits have a very low opinion of black Americans. I have read about black American actors being resentful when black actors from other countries get cast in roles for black characters here in America. It is my personal opinion that all black people around the globe need to learn each other’s history. There is a chasm between black people from other countries, and black Americans. The truth is all black people have suffered oppression from white supremacy.
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Mary Burrell wrote:
“I have read about black American actors being resentful when black actors from other countries get cast in roles for black characters here in America.”
I certainly can understand why, but this is yet another example where the real problem is the white people running the studios. It would be noble of a non-ADOS actor to not pursue those roles or to turn them down, but in reality they probably want all the work they can get to further their career. The real issue is why do white American directors and producers and showrunners seem to have a bias against ADOS actors?
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@ Solitaire: I have noticed it’s the same for white actors as well. Take a show like The Walking Dead, there are many actors from the UK that work on that show as well as Fear The Walking Dead. There are a lot of white actors from the UK that work in many American television and film. Black actors from other countries working in American television and film don’t bother me. But I noticed when Jordan Peel’s Get Out was excelling at the box office. I remember reading a statement by Samuel L. Jackson saying an American black actor should have been cast. I don’t agree with that. I enjoy a lot of the talented black actors that are from abroad.
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@ Mary Burrell
Ah, I didn’t realize that about the white British actors (I don’t follow TV shows very much). That’s a good point.
Generally I just enjoy good actors no matter where they’re from, like you said. But at the same time, I do think that maybe certain historical roles, like the ones in “Twelve Years a Slave,” really should be reserved for American black actors.
The bigger problem in Hollywood, though, is unquestionably whitewashing. That bothers me a lot more than where a black actor hails from.
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Oh please. Did anyone complain when Denzel Washington played Steve Biko, Don Cheadle played Paul Rusesabagina or when Will Smith played Bennet Omalu. Does anyone complain about these corny fake “African” accents they always put out? God bless Angela Bassett, but the whole of Black Panther left me traumatized. And don’t get me started on that abomination called Cool Runnings – no Jamaican stars and oh boy does it show! But it’s not like we lacked talented actors from the Edna Manley School of Arts.
We live in the age of globalization. If you can do the work cheaper, you will get work. What is funny is I don’t hear that tonetalks fellow bawling about Hugh Laurie as House, Christian Bale as Batman, or Henry Caville as Superman. Hollyweird does not care about black people, and they don’t care about white actors either, so any complaints are just tilting at windmills.
Here’s SamJack:
And The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/aug/29/black-british-actors-directors-hollywood
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2015/jul/05/us-rallies-to-stop-uk-taking-hollywood-by-storm
Maybe the real question should be why don’t these big name American actors go to China and the U.K.?
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@Satanforce: Great points made.👍🏿
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Has anyone heard of auditions and the bottom line? Unless the actor/actress has box office clout, they will take the cheapest one. As Sate Sate weites, noone complains when American actors play foreigners, black or white.
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@ Satanforce
Good points.
“Maybe the real question should be why don’t these big name American actors go to China and the U.K.?”
With the U.K., I wonder how much of it has to do with accents? Not many of the big-name U.S. actors seem to be able to do British accents that pass muster over there.
I remember in the movie Closer from several years back, when Natalie Portman and Julia Roberts were cast, their characters were rewritten to be Americans. The original play had those two characters as being from two different social classes in Britain and made those class differences an integral part of the drama, so it really changed the meaning a lot when that element was dropped from the movie version.
Peter Dinklage has taken a lot of flak for his bad British accent in Game of Thrones even though technically Westeros is a fantasy world.
Matt Damon did go to China in an absolutely atrocious example of whitewashing, but that’s a different can of worms.
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I was eating Balderson’s 2year old cheddar cheese. Hence the spelling errors.
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“Maybe the real question should be why don’t these big name American actors go to China and the U.K.?”
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is box office gold in China.
“How Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson rules the Chinese box office
“He’s the biggest star at a time when there aren’t as many who can carry a movie globally.”
Image: Dwayne Johnson
Dwayne Johnson takes a selfie with fans during a red carpet event promoting his film “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” in Beijing on Jan. 4, 2018.Jason Lee / Reuters files
July 13, 2018, 2:58 PM EDT / Updated July 13, 2018, 3:14 PM EDT
By Daniel Arkin
Hollywood plays by new rules. If a studio wants to score a big hit in China, home to the fastest-growing box office on the planet, it needs a globally known brand like Marvel. A-list stars, once the anchors of the industry, don’t necessarily draw overseas audiences by their names alone.
But there is at least one big exception — Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.
In the last decade, the former professional wrestler has become one of the most popular and consistently bankable American stars in China, a brawny and exuberant leading man who powers hits like “San Andreas,” “Rampage,” and the “Fast and Furious” sequels.
Johnson’s rise comes as the American film industry — confronted with tepid domestic theater attendance and rising ticket prices — increasingly places its bets on China, with its 1.3 billion people and more than 40,000 big screens.
“The overseas numbers show that he’s become such a dominant force — even just having his name above the poster,” said Jeff Bock, a senior analyst at Exhibitor Relations, an entertainment research firm.
“He’s the biggest star at a time when there aren’t as many who can carry a movie globally,” Bock said, adding that some of Johnson’s projects — like the last two installments in the “Fast and Furious” saga — exceeded their domestic grosses by tens of millions of dollars in China.
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“Rampage,” the recent sci-fi monster film in which Johnson plays a primatologist who teams up with a mutant albino gorilla to protect Chicago, is just one example.
It grossed a respectable $99 million in the U.S. in April, but it soared to more than $156 million in China, earning a spot on the top 10 highest-grossing movies of the year there to date.
Johnson’s new action extravaganza, “Skyscraper,” represents Hollywood’s clearest attempt yet to capitalize on his massive appeal in the Middle Kingdom. (The film will be distributed domestically by NBCUniversal, the parent company of NBC News.)
The film, a $125 million riff on “Die Hard” that was partly shot in China, stars Johnson as a former FBI agent and amputee who must defend Hong Kong’s tallest skyscraper against a band of terrorists.
“Skyscraper” will be released in China on July 20, a notable release date as it comes amid the government’s so-called blackout period, when Hollywood imports are barred from theaters and Chinese productions are given a chance to flourish.
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One reason for the prime spot on the calendar: “Skyscraper” is co-produced by Legendary, a California-based production company that was acquired by the Chinese conglomerate Wanda Group in 2016 and boasts major marketing muscle.
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“It’s pretty significant that ‘Skyscraper’ is the lone Western film showing in China during a six-week period, spanning July and early August, when [middle-class consumers] go out in droves,” said Richard Gelfond, the chief executive of IMAX.
Johnson, for his part, owns up to the raw commercial calculation behind “Skyscraper,” which debuts on Friday in the United States.
“The studio immediately saw the business end of it. China will probably overtake the U.S. as the biggest market in the world in the next 24 months,” Johnson recently told The Los Angeles Times.
Image: “Skyscraper”Chinese-language poster for “Skyscraper.”Legendary
Johnson said that as the writer/director Rawson Thurber was writing the script, “you had the sense that he wasn’t constructing it in Hong Kong just for the sake of that. It was a real love letter to that city.”
Hong Kong is just one of the Chinese cities Johnson has evidently come to know well. He has repeatedly toured the country for public-relations blitzes, posing for selfies with legions of adoring fans and gamely taking to the stage for family-friendly press junkets.
“He’s worked hard at building a profile in China, as some but not all American stars have, and he’s made himself extremely accessible,” said Stanley Rosen, a professor at the University of Southern California who studies Chinese cinema.
Johnson’s all-smiles social media footprint — 110 million followers on Instagram, 13.1 million followers on Twitter — doubles as a colorful Chinese travelogue, brimming with photos of the beaming, unabashedly giddy star mixing it up with locals on the streets or at jam-packed red carpet premieres.
Of course, Johnson still has celebrity status in the United States, where he commands the sort of media attention and loyal following that inspired feverish chatter about his long-term political ambitions.
And yet Johnson dispelled those rumors, telling Vanity Fair this week that he had ruled out a 2020 presidential run.
“I have so much respect for the position. It’s something that I seriously considered,” Johnson said. “What I need is to time to go out and learn.””
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Use the Grammarly extension. No more cirkajerk for me!
The question is rhetorical. The main idea is that American’s are having to learn to function as ex-pats and work in a globalized world. This has nothing to do with non-ADOS snatching the crumbs from ADOS, but with larger shifts in the global economy.
Then it shows the problem of American’s being unable to function in the larger global market. For example, actors who can’t get African accents right.
But back to the original topic. What the ADOS want is akin to Jews in 1939 demanding to be put as equals with the rest of the German population, and be given a large cash subsidy. We all know how that would work out. Asking your oppressor to elevate you to the status of the oppressor is not a good idea.
What I believe ADOS is really about is resentment towards a group of non-ADOS who are perceived to be taking benefits that should be allocated to ADOS. This resentment is mainly against second-generation black immigrants who are perceived to be showing the proper deference to the natives. Thus their focus on the word “Akata”, African actors and other such trivialities that have no impact on the greater black populace. But then again, maybe the backer behind this project are as concerned about black people as Hollyweird is. It would certainly explain a lot.
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@Solitaire
How about Renée Zellweger in “Bridget Jones Diary” (a UK produced film) and its sequels? Zellweger was born, raised, educated and worked after university graduation in Texas.
Yeah, non-ADOS playing ADOS (or actual slaves) does not upset me too much, not nearly as much as what happens to Asian-Americans. I would accept non-American Asians playing an Asian-American role. What is more difficult to accept is
– whitewashing the characters, replacing nonwhite characters with white characters.
– Yellowface: have a non-Asian playing an Asian character.
– Having Asian-Americans portraying foreigners all the time (reinforces the stereotype that Asian Americans are foreigners).
What happens a lot more among Asian-American communities is the flack that mixed race Asian Americans get when they play Asian American roles. Some monoracial Asian Americans are very vociferous about their objection to this. It may be partially because Asian roles are so few and far between that monoracials feel that “monoracial” roles should go to monoracial actors. I rarely see severe objections to mixed race black Americans playing a black role. what I see more is “colorism”, ie, occasional objection over a light-skinned black actor playing a dark-skinned role, or vice-versa.
Re: Satanforce
Actually, many Asian Americans (and even some Eurasian / Hapa Americans), due to the limited opportunity in the US and especially Hollywood, go overseas to Asia to develop their careers. Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Philippines, etc. are replete with American artists who could not develop their careers in the US.
How many Americans know NY-born Wang Lee Hom? Everyone in Taiwan, HK, SE Asia knows him. .
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How come Issa Rae counts as a non-ADO when her mother is an ADO from Louisiana? Just shows how stupid the whole ADO, non-ADO thing is. I guess her Senegalese father ‘ruined’ her bloodline or the ADO morons don’t understand how reproduction works.
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*At his command centre in the Ministry of State Security he sits and plots, Fu Manchu-like. His saturnine countenance matches his Asiatic demeanour perfectly, as he twirls his moustache, plotting to divide and conquer the black race so that he may import cheap manufactures, export invaluable natural resources, enslave their men, and do unspeakable Orientalisms to their women.
But to move his plan forward, he summons his best agent, a deep cover genius who has infiltrated various black spaces on behalf of the Third Technical Division of the Chinese Liberation Army. A hard man dedicated to Sinic success ad Chicom domination of the earth, utterly devoid of morals, values or compassion, more robot than man….*
Oh hi, Jefe!!! Didn’t see you there! How’s Kiwi! Ummm… Anyway
See my previous response.
We are now in an age akin to basketball after the Dream Team, where America no longer dominates even it’s own internal market and must compete internationally to succeed and find work. Yao Ming can come to play basketball in the States, just like American imports can, and do succeed in the CBA. But back to the original discussion, let’s look at another topic – college admissions and courses.
Take two legendary courses – Harvard’s MATH 55 and MIT’s 6.001 (SICP). These are both, very hard introductory courses, that, even with multiple recitals a week, TAs helping and access to some of the best resources on earth, still result in massive dropout rates from those courses. How are affirmative action and massive cash payouts going to make ADOS succeed in these and other extremely difficult introductory courses at top American schools? I’d venture to say that smaller class sizes, dedicated teachers who know the material, a way to escape from improper home environments, summer training for competitions and Olympiads and an understanding of what the state of the art is would help more than any amount of reparations would.
But the ADOS-baiters are not interested in that sort of solution because…
One wonders if a multi-millionaire black woman who summers at Martha’s Vineyard but can trace her descent to a 17th century Carolinas slave is more deserving of reparations than a half-ADOS, half-Nigerian/Senegalese/Barbadian nursing assistant at an old age home.
This ADOS crap is just a political power play that some black people want to use to gain an advantage in society by appealing to the System’s guilt complex. I don’t know, they probably watched Get Out too many times or something.
What they don’t realize is that the System uses self-flagellation instead of guilt. Sure, they will allow mulattoes to become president and make “woke” movies to guilt trip progressive rich coastal whites, but they will never change society in any meaningful way. Deep down, the ADOS-baiters know this – they don’t expect the government to massively increase the federal debt to massively empower a small portion of society. What they are doing is pandering to the System’s guilt – which will not work because the System doesn’t feel guilty about anything.
That’s why I say this “ADOS” thing is either an op, a scam or a fraud. It is either an attempt to keep black people divided ethnically instead of racially integrated, a scam by a few hucksters to gain money and standing as “Black Leaders” or are really dumb enough to believe their own propaganda.
Or maybe all of the above.
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@Jefe:
That Wang guy is cute!
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Russian sponsored trolls. I’m a descendant of enslaved people who escaped from slavery. Am I entitled to reparations?
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@ Jefe
While nothing you said was wrong, when I brought up whitewashing in Hollywood, I wasn’t just talking about Asian Americans. It happens to all POC.
So to tie what I was saying back into the topic of the thread: while I do have some questions about the appropriateness of non-ADOS playing important historical U.S. blacks, or U.S. blacks playing important historical African figures for that matter, it is not anywhere as important an issue as the tendency of Hollywood to either leave out black characters (fictional or historical) or rewrite them as being white.
I would love to see more casting like “Hamilton” which turns whitewashing on its head.
@ Satanforce
“I’d venture to say that smaller class sizes, dedicated teachers who know the material, a way to escape from improper home environments, summer training for competitions and Olympiads and an understanding of what the state of the art is would help more than any amount of reparations would.”
Well, there have been proposals to structure reparations in such a way that instead of individual payments, the money would go into programs targeted towards underserved black communities. The state of public education is so bad in the U.S., so unfair in the distribution of funding and other resources, that it desperately needs restructuring one way or the other.
I also think the reparations debate needs to be broadened; it shouldn’t just be a U.S. issue. There are several European nations that got filthy rich off the slave trade who should be paying reparations to the descendents of slaves all over the world and to the African nations they impoverished.
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@Solitaire
Reverse the main ideas in that above passage to see the problems with it. First would be – The state of public education is so bad in the U.S., followed by *the money would go into programs targeted towards underserved black communities. *
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Ah, crap baskets. Useless goddamn WordPress. I’m doing this in my IDE.
@Solitaire
Reverse the main ideas in that above passage to see the problems with it. First would be – The state of public education is so bad in the U.S., followed by the money would go into programs targeted towards underserved black communities. If the public education system is busted, shouldn’t the entire public be given assistance and mot jut black people? You think that the majority is going to vote something for black people without getting the same help themselves?
Rasta: England needs to give reparations to Jamaica, and to sponsor repatriation to the Motherland!
Satan: Yeah, I agree that you have a moral case. But how do you intend to get a country with massive wealth inequality, not to mention a whole bunch of Trident nuclear missiles, to give up a massive portion of their G.D.P to us? And how would we deal with such rapid inflow of cash into a relatively underdeveloped, import-heavy economy like ours?
Rasta: Welll…. the people of Europe will just have to find it in their conscience to do the right thing…
Satan: You mean the same people you say originally lived in caves, and are thus cold-hearted rapists and murderers of black people and are fundamentally without conscience?
Rasta: I’ll just go smoke my weed over here.
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Rastaman vibrations, bamba clat!
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@ Satanforce
“If the public education system is busted, shouldn’t the entire public be given assistance and mot jut black people?”
There are certain overserved public school districts that are doing just fine, so no, the entire public doesn’t need assistance. The problem is inequity in the system, not a total breakdown across the board.
Now, are other populations besides black Americans negatively impacted by underfunded public schools? Yes, of course, and I come from one of those. But in general we still had more resources and better teachers than most of the underserved black communities.
“You think that the majority is going to vote something for black people without getting the same help themselves?”
Why would it need to go to a majority vote? This is something that could be decided in the legislature or the courts. Under the current political climate, it isn’t going to happen any time soon, but that could change in the future, and there is precedent for other legislation and court decisions that primarily benefited black people. We are currently in a conservative backlash that is chipping away at those gains, but the tide will eventually turn.
“You mean the same people you say originally lived in caves, and are thus cold-hearted rapists and murderers of black people and are fundamentally without conscience?”
Did I say that? I don’t believe I did. 😉
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“Why would it need to go to a majority vote? This is something that could be decided in the legislature or the courts. Under the current political climate, it isn’t going to happen any time soon, but that could change in the future, and there is precedent for other legislation and court decisions that primarily benefited black people. We are currently in a conservative backlash that is chipping away at those gains, but the tide will eventually turn.”
Good old Solitaire, always ready with the jokes. The 14th Amendment? It did more for corporations than Blacks. Affirmative Action? It’s been very very good for white women. School desegregation? Please.
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@ Gro Jo
“Good old Solitaire, always ready with the jokes.”
Puh-lease, you’ve already accused me numerous times of being humorless and too serious.
“The 14th Amendment? It did more for corporations than Blacks. Affirmative Action? It’s been very very good for white women. School desegregation? Please.”
Valid points, but on the other hand: the 13th Amendment, the Enforcement Acts, the 15th Amendment, the Civil Rights Acts of 1866, 1871, 1875, 1960, 1968.
The 15th Amendment specifically excluded women, white or black, from voting (some suffragists were already making the argument that the 14th Amendment implicitly gave women the right to vote).
Granted the 15th Amendment and other Reconstruction-era measures were not enforced as they should have been, granted black men throughout the south and in many other regions of the U.S. were effectively disenfranchised. But arguably these measures did provide a legal and legislative foundation for the later civil rights movement to build on.
Women were a late addition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. There is debate among historians about whether the addition of women was sincere or an attempt to wreck the legislation. But consider that feminists had been fighting a losing battle to get the Equal Rights Amendment passed since the 1920s.
School desegregation I’ll give you, but the Civil Rights Act of 1964 also outlawed segregation and discrimination in public accommodations, public facilities, and all programs and activities that receive federal funds. Granted not all of these are enforced as they should be, but there has been progress and improvement. And arguably the existence of such legislation is better than not having it at all, because as with the 15th Amendment it provides a foundation and a precedent for future improvement and advancement.
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In other words, you basically agree with me. All the rights you claimed protected Blacks did more for others than for Blacks. Some laws meant to protect everyone were written to exclude Blacks without explicitly singling them out:
“When Affirmative Action Was White elaborates on this core theme in four stages. First, the author looks at how African Americans were denied access to economic relief during the New Deal. Although many federal officials understood that black sharecroppers were the hardest hit group during the Great Depression, a full 65 percent of African Americans were denied access to social security benefits, government grants, elderly poor assistance, and unemployment insurance. Administered by local politicians throughout the South, New Deal relief programs were simply not given to the vast majority of African Americans. The result was the deepening of black rural poverty.
Similarly, southern segregationists skewed the natural direction of worker reform. Positioning the National Labor Relations Act (1935) and the Fair Labor Standards Act (1938) as key moments in America’s modern labor movement, Katznelson shows how southern congressmen incorporated provisions into legislation that exempted agricultural and domestic labor. Consequently, while white workers throughout the United States gained the means to organize and improve their standard of living, the sectors dominated by African American workers were left to languish in further poverty. When blacks finally gained access to some industrial jobs during World War II, southern congressmen conveniently abandoned labor reform and helped pass the Republican Party’s Taft-Hartley Act (1947). According to Katznelson, Taft-Hartley not only placated the labor movement in the South, but it also decoupled the burgeoning connections between civil rights agitation and demands for economic equality.”
Your “conservative backlash” is just a return to the ‘good old days’.
Robert Moses, the great builder, of highways and so much else, built a swimming pool in a mixed neighborhood in Harlem and managed to keep Blacks and Hispanics out by keeping the water temperature below what they felt comfortable with! No single approach will make the problem go away. Eternal vigilance is called for.
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@ Gro Jo
“All the rights you claimed protected Blacks did more for others than for Blacks.”
All? No, I disagree. Some, yes, but I didn’t say all. I said the laws weren’t always given teeth; that’s different. Who else did the 15th Amendment or the Enforcement Acts help or protect?
And at any rate, my point was about the possible passage of reparations, that there have in fact been previous measures passed that were intended to primarily help African Americans. But I know that quite possibly if reparations does ever pass it will end up doing more for others even if the original intention was otherwise. And thusly I do agree 100 percent with you here:
“No single approach will make the problem go away. Eternal vigilance is called for.”
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The anti-Black American sentiment on here is disgusting. If someone said what you guys are saying about black people as a whole, you would call it racist. But of course the irony is lost on you guys. It always is.
I will no longer read your blog.
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Jane, How much is Trump paying you to be so publicly offended?
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You see how these people think? To them, only black Americans count as black people. Everyone else is just an oppressor in dark skin, stealing their affirmative action and college slots while calling them Akatas behind their backs.
@Solitaire
My understanding is that bills would have to pass both houses.
My above dialogue with a Rasta is based on a conversation I had a few months ago at church. It is intended to show the issues regarding obtaining reparations from a first-world foreign power. Never mind the racial component that is a necessary feature of all international relations, and the desire of white nations to maintain white world supremacy/hegemony.
It is rather ironic that the ADOS Reparations movement is using protest techniques usually associated with left-wing politics to achieve what is essentially a conservative result – the (long-discredited) American Dream.
To see my point, let us look at the whole 40 acres and a mule solution post-1865. What would have had been put in place to prevent:
the decline in farm prices resulting from price volatility and the first era of globalization?
price gouging as a result of monopolistic prices by the railroads and other trusts?
the hard currency system that forced farmers into an increasing cycle of debt (like today’s urban worker)?
low commodity prices (like today’s low wages) that put at the mercy of the crop lien system?
And this is before we look at stuff like the Freedman’s Bank and the War on Reconstruction. And do you also notice that much of what was in place in the 1870s still applies, in some form, today? That is because the American system is based on siphoning wealth and political power from the Middle Class (aka those suckered into believing in the American Dream) to the ruling oligarchy. It has been that way since the formation of the country as a modern state post-1865.
That is the big joke about the ADOSite – he wants to live like white people -when even white people don’t live like white people.
Take, for example, their claim about the wealth race gap. It fails to explain the lack of emergency savings and massive indebtedness among the majority demography. It would not surprise me if the much of that white wealth is concentrated in the top quintile.
If the ADOSite wants and gets his reparations – fine. But it will not solve the problem of a nation being enslaved and being servants to an entrenched oligarchy.
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0.0000000001 BTC
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Anyone not convinced that ADOS is a counter-op is encouraged to read the following from Black Agenda Report.
https://www.blackagendareport.com/ados-shrinks-reparations-politics-fit-narrow-horizon-tribalism
https://www.blackagendareport.com/why-ados-reparationists-oppose-free-tuition-and-student-debt-forgiveness
From the above link:
https://www.blackagendareport.com/ados-shrinks-reparations-politics-fit-narrow-horizon-tribalism
On getting actual results:
https://www.blackagendareport.com/reparations-now-maybe-order-get-job-done-its-time-call-it-something-else
https://www.blackagendareport.com/we-must-have-demand-towards-transformative-black-led-reparations-movement
https://www.blackagendareport.com/reparations-means-global-social-transformation
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@ Satanforce
“My understanding is that bills would have to pass both houses.”
I thought that by “You think that the majority is going to vote something for black people without getting the same help themselves” you were talking about opening it up to a nationwide vote, like what’s required for the passage of a federal amendment.
“It is rather ironic that the ADOS Reparations movement is using protest techniques usually associated with left-wing politics to achieve what is essentially a conservative result – the (long-discredited) American Dream.”
Interesting point. It could be seen that way. On the other hand, couldn’t it also be seen as a redistribution of wealth, which is more of a left-wing ideal?
As for the rest, you make some very good points and I don’t disagree with your general assessment of the financial state of much of white/nonblack America.
I still believe reparations for slavery would be the fair, moral, and just thing to do, but I think it will take a massive change in attitudes and political powerholders to get there. I don’t foresee it happening any time soon. Also, you are absolutely correct to be wary and suspicious about counter-ops.
One thing I have noticed is that just discussing reparations with other white people allows a natural opening to start talking about the econimic history that many of them don’t know, like the destruction of Black Wall Street and Leopold’s violent theft of resources in the Belgian Congo. I may not change their minds about reparations, but in these discussions I can educate them about the negative financial impact of colonialism, the systemic theft of wealth from black Americans, the economic effects of red-lining, etc. I hope that is helping to rectify some mistaken beliefs and false stereotypes, even if in a small way.
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@ Satanforce
About this:
“I thought that by “You think that the majority is going to vote something for black people without getting the same help themselves” you were talking about opening it up to a nationwide vote, like what’s required for the passage of a federal amendment.”
I don’t know what I was thinking. Federal amendments are ratified in each state by the legislature, not a general election. Just scratch all that, my mistake. I’ll just sit here in the corner rewatching Schoolhouse Rock…
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Well Turtle Man Mitch McConnell has already said “No Reparations Bill will be passed as long as he is head of the Senate.” Things are getting pretty heated in that Congressional Hearing today. On Juneteenth of all days. But McConnell and his crooked wife Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao are too busy lining their pockets and hurting marginalized communities. They both need to be run out on a rail.
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I just did a post on McConnell and reparations:
https://abagond.wordpress.com/2019/06/19/mitch-mcconnell-on-reparations/
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