So What Happened To Blacks After Slavery?

[Asclepias]

Sharecropping Became the Reality for Freed Slaves
Denied the opportunity to own their own small farms, most former slaves were forced to live under the system of sharecropping.

Life as a sharecropper generally meant living in poverty. And sharecropping would have been a bitter disappointment to people who once believed they could become independent farmers.


Sharecropping was a system of agriculture instituted in the American South during the period of Reconstruction after the Civil War. It essentially replaced the plantation system which had relied on slave labor and effectively created a new system of bondage.

Under the system of sharecropping, a poor farmer who did not own land would work a plot belonging to a landowner. The farmer would receive a share of the harvest as payment.

So while the former slave was technically free, he would still find himself bound to the land, which was often the very same land he had farmed while enslaved. And in practice, the newly freed slave faced a life of extremely limited economic opportunity.

Generally speaking, sharecropping doomed freed slaves to a life of poverty. And the system of sharecropping, in actual practice, doomed generations of American in the South to an impoverished existence in an economically stunted region.

Beginning of the Sharecropping System
Following the elimination of slavery, the plantation system in the South could no longer exist. Landowners, such as cotton planters who had owned vast plantations, had to face a new economic reality. They may have owned vast amounts of land, but they did not have the labor to work it, and they did not have the money to hire farm workers.

The millions of freed slaves also had to face a new way of life. Though freed from bondage, they had to cope with numerous problems in the post-slavery economy.

Many freed slaves were illiterate, and all they knew was farm work. And they were unfamiliar with the concept of working for wages.

Indeed, with freedom, many former slaves aspired to become independent farmers owning land. And such aspirations were fueled by rumors that the U.S. government would help them get a start as farmers with a promise of "forty acres and a mule."

In reality, former slaves were seldom able to establish themselves as independent farmers. And as plantation owners broke up their estates into smaller farms, many former slaves became sharecroppers on the land of their former masters.

What Was Sharecropping?

Sharecropping was the system of farming that kept formerly enslaved people in a life of poverty in the years following the Civil War.

www.thoughtco.com

You speaking facts. The inbred recessives wont like that.

 

[IM2]

Sharecropping Became the Reality for Freed Slaves
Denied the opportunity to own their own small farms, most former slaves were forced to live under the system of sharecropping.

Life as a sharecropper generally meant living in poverty. And sharecropping would have been a bitter disappointment to people who once believed they could become independent farmers.


Sharecropping was a system of agriculture instituted in the American South during the period of Reconstruction after the Civil War. It essentially replaced the plantation system which had relied on slave labor and effectively created a new system of bondage.

Under the system of sharecropping, a poor farmer who did not own land would work a plot belonging to a landowner. The farmer would receive a share of the harvest as payment.

So while the former slave was technically free, he would still find himself bound to the land, which was often the very same land he had farmed while enslaved. And in practice, the newly freed slave faced a life of extremely limited economic opportunity.

Generally speaking, sharecropping doomed freed slaves to a life of poverty. And the system of sharecropping, in actual practice, doomed generations of American in the South to an impoverished existence in an economically stunted region.

Beginning of the Sharecropping System
Following the elimination of slavery, the plantation system in the South could no longer exist. Landowners, such as cotton planters who had owned vast plantations, had to face a new economic reality. They may have owned vast amounts of land, but they did not have the labor to work it, and they did not have the money to hire farm workers.

The millions of freed slaves also had to face a new way of life. Though freed from bondage, they had to cope with numerous problems in the post-slavery economy.

Many freed slaves were illiterate, and all they knew was farm work. And they were unfamiliar with the concept of working for wages.

Indeed, with freedom, many former slaves aspired to become independent farmers owning land. And such aspirations were fueled by rumors that the U.S. government would help them get a start as farmers with a promise of "forty acres and a mule."

In reality, former slaves were seldom able to establish themselves as independent farmers. And as plantation owners broke up their estates into smaller farms, many former slaves became sharecroppers on the land of their former masters.

What Was Sharecropping?

Sharecropping was the system of farming that kept formerly enslaved people in a life of poverty in the years following the Civil War.

www.thoughtco.com

You speaking facts. The inbred recessives wont like that.

True. They have a serious problem with such things.

 

[IM2]

This thread is specifically about what the government of these united states did to blacks after the years of slavery up until right now.

The republicans here want to take credit for ending slavery while simultaneously telling us that they should not be held responsible for what their ancestors did before they were born. In standard republican fashion everybody else must take responsibility but them. However in the 150 or so years after slavery things have happened that most of these guys don't want to discuss.

And you don't. Your responses show that you don't. You want to keep talking about what you didn't do 200 years ago and what you weren't alive for, yet you are being shown what has been done since you've been alive and you still try using those excuses. Or you do the flacaltenn talking about blame and victimhood. You can't face the truth and don't want to admit the truth.

And the truth is that if whites who are racists got out of our fucking way, we would be doing just fine.

 

[Oldestyle]

This thread is specifically about what the government of these united states did to blacks after the years of slavery up until right now.

The republicans here want to take credit for ending slavery while simultaneously telling us that they should not be held responsible for what their ancestors did before they were born. In standard republican fashion everybody else must take responsibility but them. However in the 150 or so years after slavery things have happened that most of these guys don't want to discuss.

And you don't. Your responses show that you don't. You want to keep talking about what you didn't do 200 years ago and what you weren't alive for, yet you are being shown what has been done since you've been alive and you still try using those excuses. Or you do the flacaltenn talking about blame and victimhood. You can't face the truth and don't want to admit the truth.

And the truth is that if whites who are racists got out of our fucking way, we would be doing just fine.

It's not the Republicans that put blacks on the figurative plantation for the last sixty years, IM2...that was your Democratic Party! It's isn't the racists that have turned blacks into victims dependent on handouts...that's the liberals that treat you like children! It's not white leaders who have sold you out for the almighty dollar...it's your OWN leaders that have gotten rich while urban blacks are not much better off now than they were before the War on Poverty was launched!
You know who's "doing just fine"? Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Barack Obama, Corrine Brown, Maxine Waters, Charlie Rangel, and a whole lot of other black leaders!

 

[Oldestyle]

Your politicians talk about "racism" as the problem while they're raking in the cash with both hands!
To them "racism" isn't a problem...it's a cottage industry to line their pockets!

 

[IM2]

Your politicians talk about "racism" as the problem while they're raking in the cash with both hands!
To them "racism" isn't a problem...it's a cottage industry to line their pockets!

That's not how it's going but whites like you love to believe that tale.

 

[IM2]

This thread is specifically about what the government of these united states did to blacks after the years of slavery up until right now.

The republicans here want to take credit for ending slavery while simultaneously telling us that they should not be held responsible for what their ancestors did before they were born. In standard republican fashion everybody else must take responsibility but them. However in the 150 or so years after slavery things have happened that most of these guys don't want to discuss.

And you don't. Your responses show that you don't. You want to keep talking about what you didn't do 200 years ago and what you weren't alive for, yet you are being shown what has been done since you've been alive and you still try using those excuses. Or you do the flacaltenn talking about blame and victimhood. You can't face the truth and don't want to admit the truth.

And the truth is that if whites who are racists got out of our fucking way, we would be doing just fine.

It's not the Republicans that put blacks on the figurative plantation for the last sixty years, IM2...that was your Democratic Party! It's isn't the racists that have turned blacks into victims dependent on handouts...that's the liberals that treat you like children! It's not white leaders who have sold you out for the almighty dollar...it's your OWN leaders that have gotten rich while urban blacks are not much better off now than they were before the War on Poverty was launched!
You know who's "doing just fine"? Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Barack Obama, Corrine Brown, Maxine Waters, Charlie Rangel, and a whole lot of other black leaders!

Wrong. And I think I can say that with expertise as I am black and have personally seen the last 50 years. Whites like you can't face the truth. Luckily not every white person is like you, but far too many are.

 

[Oldestyle]

Your politicians talk about "racism" as the problem while they're raking in the cash with both hands!
To them "racism" isn't a problem...it's a cottage industry to line their pockets!

That's not how it's going but whites like you love to believe that tale.

Those blacks leaders HAVEN'T become fabulously wealthy while their constituents continue to wallow in poverty?

 

[Oldestyle]

This thread is specifically about what the government of these united states did to blacks after the years of slavery up until right now.

The republicans here want to take credit for ending slavery while simultaneously telling us that they should not be held responsible for what their ancestors did before they were born. In standard republican fashion everybody else must take responsibility but them. However in the 150 or so years after slavery things have happened that most of these guys don't want to discuss.

And you don't. Your responses show that you don't. You want to keep talking about what you didn't do 200 years ago and what you weren't alive for, yet you are being shown what has been done since you've been alive and you still try using those excuses. Or you do the flacaltenn talking about blame and victimhood. You can't face the truth and don't want to admit the truth.

And the truth is that if whites who are racists got out of our fucking way, we would be doing just fine.

It's not the Republicans that put blacks on the figurative plantation for the last sixty years, IM2...that was your Democratic Party! It's isn't the racists that have turned blacks into victims dependent on handouts...that's the liberals that treat you like children! It's not white leaders who have sold you out for the almighty dollar...it's your OWN leaders that have gotten rich while urban blacks are not much better off now than they were before the War on Poverty was launched!
You know who's "doing just fine"? Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Barack Obama, Corrine Brown, Maxine Waters, Charlie Rangel, and a whole lot of other black leaders!

Wrong. And I think I can say that with expertise as I am black and have personally seen the last 50 years. Whites like you can't face the truth. Luckily not every white person is like you, but far too many are.

LOL...you know what, IM2? At some point you actually need to say something intelligent to prove that you have "expertise"! When you post the nonsense you provide here it simply shows a low IQ individual who seldom has an original thought and only passes for intelligent when they're stealing someone's ideas!

 

[Sunsettommy]

"Under a true system of justice, if you do the crime, you do the time. Law and order deter bad guys. Period. However, once we start social engineering and going soft on crime in order to avoid rightfully incarcerating individuals of particular races, everyone is harmed, including those the limousine liberals purport to help. The most dangerous example is our current rush to push jailbreak legislation under the false premise that black people are incarcerated unfairly and to ignore the appalling levels of crime committed by young black males. It hurts everyone, including law-abiding African-Americans.
If one were to be dropped here from Mars with no preconceived notions about violence in America, one would come away with the impression that white supremacy is the biggest threat to public safety. DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan announced last month that the Department of Homeland Security would be using increased resources to confront “racially based violent extremism, particularly white supremacist extremism.” Yet the reality in the everyday stories from New York, where Jews are being attacked by violent black youths every day, or the knockout game continuing in places like Maryland, paints a very different picture. And it’s backed up by the data.
Cory Booker claims that there is “systemic racism” in our criminal justice system leading to unjust mass incarceration of black people. The facts simply say the opposite. According to the new National Crime Victimization Survey published by the Bureau of Justice Statics, out of the 593,598 interracial violent victimization crimes between blacks and whites reported in 2018, 90 percent were black against white, and 9.5 percent were white against black. That is simply astounding given that black people compose just 12 percent of the general population and white people comprise 62 percent. And the trend is getting worse. As Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute observes, “That ratio is becoming more skewed, despite the Democratic claim of Trump-inspired white violence. In 2012-13, blacks committed 85 percent of all interracial victimizations between blacks and whites; whites committed 15 percent.”

The lopsided share of crime committed by black people is a problem across the board, but particularly for violent crimes. According to the FBI’s 2018 Uniform Crime reporting, of the 11,514 homicide offenders whose race is known, a whopping 55 percent were black, 42 percent white, and three percent other. Though black people make up only 12 percent of the population, they composed 53 percent of all murder victims in cases where the identity of the victim was known and reported. In cases where the race of both the victim and offender was known, a staggering 88.9 percent of black homicide victims were murdered by black offenders.
To drill down even further, in 2017, black males accounted for 45 percent of homicides, even though they make up just seven percent of the population. That means they commit murders at a rate eight times higher than whites.
In 2018, African-Americans accounted for 54 percent of those arrested for robbery, 34 percent of those arrested for aggravated assault, and 43 percent of weapons violations. In total, they composed 37.4 percent of all violent crime arrests. Yet, despite the complaint about black imprisonment, only 33 percent of state and federal inmates in 2017 were black. And their numbers are dropping quicker than any other group."

As we all know, providing facts to IM2 (our resident white guy whose sock is a black racist)is no different than spitting in the wind.

His goal is to be the most prolific racist poster on US Message Board. As far as I'm concerned, he's won. He's a bored ol' white guy looking for a thrill.

Naww Markle, no white bored guy would put THAT MUCH effort into becoming a "Grievance Scholar" just to sit here and troll USMB.. This is YEARS and YEARS of studying stuff that makes ya crotchedly angry and resentful... It's the real deal.. Might even have a degree in it for all I know..

That has been my very impression of IM2, he spends so much time crying about the past systemic injustice perpetrated against blacks, which have mostly vanished since the 1960's, allowing a lot of blacks to be very wealthy and famous, but he doesn't want to talk about black success, he wants to feel bad about injustice that he HIMSELF never suffered, after all he was never a slave, 3/5 of a person, is a citizen, a legal voter, and more.

If White America is so bad how did Winfrey Ophrah be a BILLIONAIRE? Have many Blacks who have over $500 MILLION, all in White America, There are a few former black basket ball players who can afford to BUY pro basketball teams, all happening in White America.

How did The 99% black Cosby Show be NUMBER ONE on TV for 5 straight years?

How did a black man be voted into the White House?

All done in a Country with over 60% Whites to only 14% blacks.....

There are many successful blacks in White America, but he is too busy crying about the past injustice (which can't be taken back) to notice them. He is trying to get others to feel bad about the past (which has already happened) so he can continue to cry and cry and cry, it is boring and a waste of time, NOBODY is getting any younger, why waste so much time to crying about a past you can not alter?

I say go into the future, press for freedom, truth and long life!

Past injustice my black ass. I am talking about right now and have shown it.

I notice you ignored most of my post, could it because there are happy successful blacks in it?

Your relentless attacks on people of the past gets boring after a while, in the meantime, once again, Slavery was abolished 152 years ago. Check

Blacks can vote and be a full citizen, 152 years ago. Check
Blacks can be President, Millionaire, Billionaires. Check
Blacks own large corporations. Check
Blacks own their own TV network, develop their own TV shows and movies. Check
Blacks no longer face the insult of Segregation. Check
Blacks can go to well funded "White" schools and Colleges. Check
Blacks can sit any open seat anywhere in buses, theatres, cars, trains, boats, ships. Check
Blacks win various acting awards, including the most prestigious three, Emmys, Oscar and Golden Globe. Check
I can go on and on, showing the freedom Black people now enjoy that wasn't prevalent up to the 1960's.

You doing to dispute all this?

 

[flacaltenn]

The root cause of the problems blacks face is white racism. Whites like you are the biggest impediment we face. Until whites like you are taught that your racism must not be accepted and excused by other whites, then our problems will reduce and many of them will end.

I guess you're including ME into the problem -- so I'm gonna defend myself. Even THO -- I have no racism to defend.. I have NO denial of all the injustices in our history, but I see that that the MOST EGREGIOUS ones like slavery and public discrimination have been largely repaired.. Whites did NOT "redefine racism" away from the VISIBLE REAL RACISTS, no matter what the author claims. The REAL racists MARGINALIZED themselves into oblivion once the morals and values of the "white public" change away from ignorant simplistic generalizations and stereotypes..

What I see modern racism as is a failure of government -- which WAS the biggest purveyor of INSTITUTIONALIZED racism in this country for 150 years -- to provide EQUAL justice under the law.. And the tendency of government education to "lower expectations" on the INTELLECTUAL abilities of the poorer children of this country.. In fact, as he does often, Biden blurted this last one out with his "Poor kids are just as smart as WHITE kids" brain fart... So he "kinda" agrees with me on that.

But the diff between Biden's statement and MINE is that many of these inequalities are EDUCATION and ECONOMICS driven.. Not SOLELY RACIAL -- but because of the math facts on both essential criteria for success for fixing poverty -- blacks suffer UNEVENLY on BOTH education and economic fronts.. Contact with the JUSTICE system and systemic problems THERE --- are driven largely by those same two factors..

NOTHING changes on inequality or perceived racism UNTIL BOTH the primary factors of education and economic disparity are addressed... And secondarily -- FIX the corruption of prosecutorial abuse, the BURDEN of the poor interacting with the law and justice system..

You would do MORE for bias and inequality by SELLING academics as one of the HIGHEST values in the Black "culture"... Stop pushing stinky canards about "math and science" is RACIST and academic achievement is "too white".. Stop WASTING money sending your kids to college to get "Grievance Degrees" and get them interested in CAREERS that serve more people and give them economic security..

You're literally KILLING them by NOT elevating academics as a core cultural value..

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

... You would do MORE for bias and inequality by SELLING academics as one of the HIGHEST values in the Black "culture"... Stop pushing stinky canards about "math and science" is RACIST and academic achievement is "too white".. Stop WASTING money sending your kids to college to get "Grievance Degrees" and get them interested in CAREERS that serve more people and give them economic security..

You're literally KILLING them by NOT elevating academics as a core cultural value..

Whoa!

Did IM2 say anything like the above? He quoted many academic studies, and most of them were well worth reading. When he defends Obama — a genuinely well educated man; when he uses W.E.B. Dubois as his avatar — a man who could outthink any one of us in several languages, he doesn’t show disrespect for academic achievement. Yet he gets insulted by many here just for supporting his party and the party of Obama and most African-Americans!

I don’t include you, flacaltenn, among those who badger and insult just for partisan purposes. Doesn’t seem like you would do such a thing. I hope not.

I may even agree with some of the points you raise, but in other contexts. I don’t usually agree with IM2’s (in my opinion) often over-aggressive tone, or in all aspects of his analysis. But when he’s right he’s right. We haven’t many African-American voices here and they should be listened to and not ganged up on. He should be defended against racist attacks, not hounded over every different perspective or supposed error he makes, like our “history major” Oldstyle does. He should not be falsely charged.

The historical reality, the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow hangs heavy upon ALL Americans. Otherwise we wouldn’t even be having this discussion, let alone getting all worked up about it. IM2’s point about the different and more subtle forms that white racism takes is valid. The felt experience of African Americans, their own historical experience, should not be made light of, just as when speaking directly to other Americans from different backgrounds, be they Jews or Catholics or Poles or Southern whites, a little forebearance and a careful use of language is important.

 

[Indeependent]

... You would do MORE for bias and inequality by SELLING academics as one of the HIGHEST values in the Black "culture"... Stop pushing stinky canards about "math and science" is RACIST and academic achievement is "too white".. Stop WASTING money sending your kids to college to get "Grievance Degrees" and get them interested in CAREERS that serve more people and give them economic security..

You're literally KILLING them by NOT elevating academics as a core cultural value..

Whoa!

Did IM2 say anything like the above? He quoted many academic studies, and most of them were well worth reading. When he defends Obama — a genuinely well educated man; when he uses W.E.B. Dubois as his avatar — a man who could outthink any one of us in several languages, he doesn’t show disrespect for academic achievement. Yet he gets insulted by many here just for supporting his party and the party of Obama and most African-Americans!

I don’t include you, flacaltenn, among those who badger and insult just for partisan purposes. Doesn’t seem like you would do such a thing. I hope not.

I may even agree with some of the points you raise, but in other contexts. I don’t usually agree with IM2’s (in my opinion) often over-aggressive tone, or in all aspects of his analysis. But when he’s right he’s right. We haven’t many African-American voices here and they should be listened to and not ganged up on. He should be defended against racist attacks, not hounded over every different perspective or error he makes. He should not be falsely charged.

The historical reality, the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow hangs heavy upon ALL Americans. Otherwise we wouldn’t even be having this discussion, let alone getting all worked up about it. IM2’s point about the different and more subtle forms that white racism takes is valid. The felt experience of African Americans, their own historical experience, should not be made light of, just as when speaking directly to other Americans from different backgrounds, be they Jews or Catholics or Poles or Southern whites, a little forebearance and a careful use of language is important.

You joined Mar 15, 2020...
In a month you will...
[1] Insult IM2 for the racist piece of shit he is
[2] Not put IM2 on Ignore but will no longer respond to his Threads
[3] Put IM2 on Ignore

It''s a learning experience.

 

[irosie91]

I am showing you guys what has been done to blacks after slavery to include during your lifetimes. You guys see this and continue on with your ignorance. There are whites in your generations who have continued doing the same things as your parents and grandparents but in a different way. You guys are part of them. You think that because its not obvious that you can claim you aren't responsible but then we see the supreme court ruling in 2017 that basically states that systemic racism is real and present in modern society. So you don't have any other choice but to agree with the things I present or deny them and try gaslighting. You here in opposition have taken the second option which means you are doing exactly what your parents and grandparents did and that makes you responsible for the racism that continues today.

“The second key maneuver, which flowed naturally from the first, was to redefine racism itself. Confronted with civil rights headlines depicting unflattering portrayals of KKK rallies and jackbooted sheriffs, white authority transformed those damning images of white supremacy into the sole definition of racism. This simple but wickedly brilliant conceptual and linguistic shift served multiple purposes. First and foremost, it was conscience soothing. The whittling down of racism to sheet-wearing goons allowed a cloud of racial innocence to cover many whites who, although 'resentful of black progress' and determined to ensure that racial inequality remained untouched, could see and project themselves as the 'kind of upstanding white citizen(s)' who were 'positively outraged at the tactics of the Ku Klux Klan". The focus on the Klan also helped to designate racism as an individual aberration rather than something systemic, institutional and pervasive.”

― Carol Anderson, White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide​

The root cause of the problems blacks face is white racism. Whites like you are the biggest impediment we face. Until whites like you are taught that your racism must not be accepted and excused by other whites, then our problems will reduce and many of them will end. That is the solution and don't give me that crap about blacks not taking responsibility because I worked in the black community and still do. I see blacks who have spent a lifetime taking the responsibility you guys talk about but never take. Whites like the ones in opposition here don't want to change things because that means they lose their advantage and preference. That's all your arguments are about.

WEB Du Bois said LOTS ----about what was he
"right" ? try to focus. As to the situations of
the many, many aggrieved individuals and communities and sectors of USA society, ALL
can come up with DA REASONS that include
blame. In fact, if you talk to people from ANY-
WHERE in the world, you will hear of the slings and
arrows that have DRIVEN their own into the ground.
Du Bois so engaged too. I grew up in an area that
was old in the USA---it was already a town in pre-revolutionary days-----SHEEEESH George
Washington was there (so attests a sign in the ruin of an old water run mill at the local river) He may,
indeed, have pissed there on the way to the Delaware
River. Locally the descendants of Italian
immigrants complained BITTERLY about the
characterization of their fellow POOR SUFFERING
ITALIAN forebears and themselves as "MAFIA"
just because a bit up river-------was used as a
watery graveyard for------well---I'll let you guess.
The descendants of the scottish immigrants---that
never seem to have lost their rolling R's and
"wee" and "bonny" and "lassie" over the centuries
still held a grudge against the limeys and their own
miserable lots in life. The Irish cops had their thing
too------get out from under your rock
.

 

[Oldestyle]

... You would do MORE for bias and inequality by SELLING academics as one of the HIGHEST values in the Black "culture"... Stop pushing stinky canards about "math and science" is RACIST and academic achievement is "too white".. Stop WASTING money sending your kids to college to get "Grievance Degrees" and get them interested in CAREERS that serve more people and give them economic security..

You're literally KILLING them by NOT elevating academics as a core cultural value..

Whoa!

Did IM2 say anything like the above? He quoted many academic studies, and most of them were well worth reading. When he defends Obama — a genuinely well educated man; when he uses W.E.B. Dubois as his avatar — a man who could outthink any one of us in several languages, he doesn’t show disrespect for academic achievement. Yet he gets insulted by many here just for supporting his party and the party of Obama and most African-Americans!

I don’t include you, flacaltenn, among those who badger and insult just for partisan purposes. Doesn’t seem like you would do such a thing. I hope not.

I may even agree with some of the points you raise, but in other contexts. I don’t usually agree with IM2’s (in my opinion) often over-aggressive tone, or in all aspects of his analysis. But when he’s right he’s right. We haven’t many African-American voices here and they should be listened to and not ganged up on. He should be defended against racist attacks, not hounded over every different perspective or supposed error he makes, like our “history major” Oldstyle does. He should not be falsely charged.

The historical reality, the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow hangs heavy upon ALL Americans. Otherwise we wouldn’t even be having this discussion, let alone getting all worked up about it. IM2’s point about the different and more subtle forms that white racism takes is valid. The felt experience of African Americans, their own historical experience, should not be made light of, just as when speaking directly to other Americans from different backgrounds, be they Jews or Catholics or Poles or Southern whites, a little forebearance and a careful use of language is important.

You feel a need to defend IM2 from being "hounded" over the errors he makes? Why is that exactly? I'm not some red neck racist hurling invective. I simply pointed out why I think some of his claims don't stand up to even casual scrutiny! IM2 claims what he says about black people can't be questioned because he's black and therefore the ultimate authority...a stance I find to be laughable! You're right when you say that when he's right he's right...but when he's wrong...and when it comes to history (which I'd like to think I'm a bit of an authority on!) when he's wrong he's wrong!
To be quite blunt...I find it disrespectful to IM2 that you feel you have to protect him from me. Is he that pitiful? That unable to defend himself?

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

I read your historical comments carefully, Oldstyle . I was inclined at first to agree with you when you first mentioned the economic pull of better paying jobs in the north, about WWI creating job opportunities for southern African Americans, about decreased family farm ownership among all groups. Obviously for many blacks WWI opened up a possible escape from poverty and oppression. Many were long economically and politically forced into de facto slavery in the south. They were a despised race-color caste of sharecroppers, prisoners searching for any escape.

But then you started this narrow game about why they didn’t leave earlier, challenging IM2 to “explain that!,” and I concluded you were not trying to educate but just win a point, a point you were fundamentally ignorant about. As I tried to explain earlier, NOTHING about the African-American experience in that period, not life in the south, not life in the north, not buying a tiny farm or losing that farm, not staying in the south, not moving to the north .... can be explained adequately without reference to the overwhelming reality of American racism. This was a period of increasing national racism, north and south. Black scholars understand this. Most whites have no idea.

 

[IM2]

An modern example of white racism in public policy.

Your politicians talk about "racism" as the problem while they're raking in the cash with both hands!
To them "racism" isn't a problem...it's a cottage industry to line their pockets!

That's not how it's going but whites like you love to believe that tale.

Those blacks leaders HAVEN'T become fabulously wealthy while their constituents continue to wallow in poverty?

No.

 

[IM2]

I read your historical comments carefully. I was inclined at first to agree with you when you first mentioned the economic pull of better paying jobs in the north, about WWI creating job opportunities for southern African Americans, about decreased family farm ownership among all groups. Obviously for many blacks WWI opened up a possible escape from poverty and oppression. Many were long economically and politically forced into de facto slavery in the south. They were a despised race-color caste of sharecroppers, prisoners searching for any escape.

But then you started this narrow game about why they didn’t leave earlier, challenging IM2 to “explain that!,” and I concluded you were not trying to educate but just win a point, a point you were fundamentally ignorant about. As I tried to explain earlier, NOTHING about the African-American experience in that period, not life in the south, not life in the north, not buying a tiny farm or losing that farm, not staying in the south, not moving to the north .... can be explained adequately without reference to the overwhelming reality of American racism. This was a period of increasing national racism, north and south. Black scholars understand this. Most whites have no idea.

Thank you Mr. Paine. Well said.

 

[IM2]

On February 26, 2018, 50 years after the Kerner Commission findings, the Economic Policy Institute published a report evaluating the progress of the black community since the Kerner Report was released. It was based on a study done by the Economic Policy Institute that compared the progress of the black community with the condition of the black community at the time of the Kerner Commission. The Kerner Commission met in 1968 and made recommendation on how to move toward racial progress. Titled “50 years after the Kerner Commission,” the study’s central premise was that there had been some improvements in the situation blacks faced but still face disadvantages that were based on race.

Here are some of the findings.

African Americans today are much better educated than they were in 1968 but still lag behind whites in overall educational attainment. More than 90 percent of younger African Americans (ages 25 to 29) have graduated from high school, compared with just over half in 1968—which means they’ve nearly closed the gap with white high school graduation rates. They are also more than twice as likely to have a college degree as in 1968 but are still half as likely as young whites to have a college degree.

The substantial progress in educational attainment of African Americans has been accompanied by significant absolute improvements in wages, incomes, wealth, and health since 1968. But black workers still make only 82.5 cents on every dollar earned by white workers, African Americans are 2.5 times as likely to be in poverty as whites, and the median white family has almost 10 times as much wealth as the median black family.

With respect to homeownership, unemployment, and incarceration, America has failed to deliver any progress for African Americans over the last five decades. In these areas, their situation has either failed to improve relative to whites or has worsened. In 2017 the black unemployment rate was 7.5 percent, up from 6.7 percent in 1968, and is still roughly twice the white unemployment rate. In 2015, the black homeownership rate was just over 40 percent, virtually unchanged since 1968, and trailing a full 30 points behind the white homeownership rate, which saw modest gains over the same period. And the share of African Americans in prison or jail almost tripled between 1968 and 2016 and is currently more than six times the white incarceration rate.

Following up on this, Richard Rothstein of the Economic Policy Institute, wrote an op ed published in the February 28th edition of the New York Daily News entitled, “50 years after the Kerner Commission, minimal racial progress.” It had been 50 years since the commission made those recommendations at that point, yet Rothstein makes this statement: “So little has changed since 1968 that the report remains worth reading as a near-contemporary description of racial inequality.” People knowing nothing about responsibility want to lecture us on being accountable for our own situation. Since our situation is caused by white racism, we are held accountable and responsible to point it out and then demand that it stop.

The blacks get rich off racism is a meme created in modern times by that fat slob Limbaugh. Of course some of you here will try repeating the idiotic comments made during Jim Crow by Booker T. Washington. For him to say that while looking at the carnage done by whites right in his face is a historical example of foolishness that is unprecedented. You can't get rich off racism if there is none and when you look at those leaders you are not looking at overly wealthy people.

Al Sharpton has been estimated net worth of around $1 Million as of April 2020.

As of April 2020, Jesse Jackson’s estimated net worth is $15 million.

As of April 2020, Farrakhan’s estimated net worth is $5 million

As of April 2020, Rush Limbaugh has an estimated net worth of more than $700 million. He is one of the highest-paid people in the United States.

As of April 2020, the estimated net worth of Sean Hannity is approximately $300 million.
And here we see just exactly who has gotten famously rich from using race.

 

[Oldestyle]

I read your historical comments carefully, Oldstyle . I was inclined at first to agree with you when you first mentioned the economic pull of better paying jobs in the north, about WWI creating job opportunities for southern African Americans, about decreased family farm ownership among all groups. Obviously for many blacks WWI opened up a possible escape from poverty and oppression. Many were long economically and politically forced into de facto slavery in the south. They were a despised race-color caste of sharecroppers, prisoners searching for any escape.

But then you started this narrow game about why they didn’t leave earlier, challenging IM2 to “explain that!,” and I concluded you were not trying to educate but just win a point, a point you were fundamentally ignorant about. As I tried to explain earlier, NOTHING about the African-American experience in that period, not life in the south, not life in the north, not buying a tiny farm or losing that farm, not staying in the south, not moving to the north .... can be explained adequately without reference to the overwhelming reality of American racism. This was a period of increasing national racism, north and south. Black scholars understand this. Most whites have no idea.

So let me see if I follow your rationale here, Tom! You think that it took two generations of blacks living in the south before they were suddenly overwhelmed by the "reality of American racism" and THAT caused millions of them to uproot and move to the north? That's what you're going with to explain why The Great Exodus started in 1920 and not in 1870? With all due respect...that's absurd!

A more reasonable explanation is that a massive shortage of labor in the north brought on by the First World War prompted northern industrialists to recruit southern black labor to work in their factories. It isn't that the southern blacks were reacting to southern racism because let's be honest here...racism was alive and well from the close of the Civil War until the start of WWI...it's that they were reacting to the promise of a better life in the north. A better life because of better jobs!