Day: July 6, 2009

It’s long past time for the United States to create a program of reparations for Black Americans, not just for slavery but the second, third, and fourth iterations of systemic racism in the United States–the segregation in North and South after the Civil War, the terrorism against Black people perpetuated by the lynchings and chain gangs of Jim Crow, the  attack on Black communities through urban renewal and red-lining, and the mass incarceration carried out as a result of the  war on drugs. Each of these policies were created by the white supremacy and systemic racism that was created in the 17th century by  rich white people who sought to use create and heighten racial division to undermine opposition to them. Each of these policies have had  not only an immediate and devastating impact on the Black people in one generation but have had been repeated in different ways in… Continue reading