Let me ask a question...

doogie said:

Individuals from every race and background have persevered and succeeded throughout some of the most harrowing personal backgrounds and experiences.

Some, in every race and background, have chosen been taught to be mired victimhood and seek no escape.

I think this is more accurate.

YellowSnow said:

When I approach this debate, I tend to start from Jared Diamond “Guns, Germs, and Steel” sort of perspective, which is to say that history has favored some tribes and dealt a shitty hand to others. And that most of this was due to random accidents of history, geography, etc.- e.g., the Land of China, Europe, Fertile Crescent, etc., were all more suitable to civilization building than say Sub Saharan Africa or the Americas (pre Columbus). Hell, it’s relatively recent construct in human history that it is immoral for one tribe to fuck over another and take their land. I’m not saying we? should all have “white privilege” guilt or what have you so don’t twist, but we do have to acknowledge that fact the black tribes along the West Coast of Africa got fucked pretty bad by history in the past 500 years or so and we’re still living with the repercussions to this day.

In my view, the time to start rectifying the wrongs of history done to black Americans was in 1865, but this never really happened (politically it was probably impossible given the attitudes at the time). Slavery ended but was followed by another 100 years of 2nd class citizenship. On this subject: I think Daniel Patrick Monynihan’s controversial paper from 1965 “The Negro Family: The Case For National Action” is still relevant to this day, some 50 plus years after it was released. Here’s a link if you haven’t read it before and it’s annotated for this of you that struggle with TL;DR: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/the-moynihan-report-an-annotated-edition/404632/#Chapter III .

Consider that by the time that we? as a country started trying to undo the injustices of the previous 300 years or so with the Civil Rights Legislation of the mid 1960’s the breakdown of family structure in black America had already reached a critical juncture. The out of wedlock birth rate in 1965 amongst African Americans in 1965 was 26% (for Whites it was 3% in that year); today the number is 73% and for non-Hispanic Whites it’s grown to 29%. Keep in mind that there isn’t an example in human history of a culture suffering this level of breakdown in family structures and still having good results.

As it relates to Swaye’s OP, I don’t know the answer other than to say we as a country didn’t rectify wrongs of the past soon enough. And Race Bannon is right that a lot of that is on the Democratic Party of 1865 to 1965, and it can certainly be argued that Great Society Programs starting in the 1960’s haven’t yielded the hoped for results. What is clear it that a different approach is needed and I don’t think it’s just throwing money around- e.g., reparations.

Causation POTY!

@dnc wrote: "Just yesterday another honkey frren posted on FB "Racism was almost dead in this country until Obama resurrected it".

People actually believe this shit."

Obama didn't resurrect racism. But I had black, women & other minority clients and associates saying things like "Wait until 'our guy' gets in there, shit's gonna change, big time." True story. So a lot of people projected their hopes and dreams onto Obama, and expected him to be their sugar-daddy or their President that would finally do for them what they imagined prior Presidents had done for white society. Those folks very much felt that when Obama got elected, the entire tables had turned, their points of view were now mainstream, and for the first time ever, they would have things their way, for a change.

I voted for him twice and his initial victory was orgasmic. The country felt very unified. Then, just like with Clinton and other Presidents, reality set in and Obama started backing off on the Medicare Public Option, told black kids to "pull their pants up" and started talking like Reagan, which shocked a lot of people. What they failed to grasp was that a President has to govern from the middle, so the sugar-daddy role lead to things like changes in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division to help blacks and minorities, and other indirect, structural changes versus direct benefits or money in people's pockets. Yet, many people, particularly minorities still maintained a delirious hope that Obama was going to fix every problem they had and make everything right in their lives. And when he failed to deliver on things, they just blamed Republicans, accused all of Obama's detractors of racism and created a lot of blow-back in the country.

I believe Obama had more Socialist tendencies, believed in the power of Government to do more in peoples lives, and assumed too much guilt for the U.S. and Western society than he should have, such as in that awful Cairo speech or his "remember the Crusades" bullshit. He was way off base on that shit, but maybe he was desperate to have something big on his legacy and resume than fucking up in Libya and Syria.

I still like Obama, but IMO the "problem" with Obama reflected in that quote from dnc's friend doesn't come from Obama himself, but from the expectations, hopes and dreams people projected onto him and saw in him, which were never really there.

Edit: I also think that we saw a ramping up of rhetoric and racial animosity toward the end of Obama's tenure as people began to realize it would be a long time before we elected another minority president, so people really needed to be heard and push for change before Obama left office. A little like Black Friday - no pun intended - at Walmart.

On the opposite side were Obama's critics and opponents who saw a lame duck, socialist-leaning President whose legacy they could neuter by being obstructionist, and they pulled out all the stops to do just that. But, the opposition party does that to every President, so it's not much of an excuse.

TurdBuffer said:

@dnc wrote: "Just yesterday another honkey frren posted on FB "Racism was almost dead in this country until Obama resurrected it".

People actually believe this shit."

Obama didn't resurrect racism. But I had black, women & other minority clients and associates saying things like "Wait until 'our guy' gets in there, shit's gonna change, big time." True story. So a lot of people projected their hopes and dreams onto Obama, and expected him to be their sugar-daddy or their President that would finally do for them what they imagined prior Presidents had done for white society. Those folks very much felt that when Obama got elected, the entire tables had turned, their points of view were now mainstream, and for the first time ever, they would have things their way, for a change.

I voted for him twice and his initial victory was orgasmic. The country felt very unified. Then, just like with Clinton and other Presidents, reality set in and Obama started backing off on the Medicare Public Option, told black kids to "pull their pants up" and started talking like Reagan, which shocked a lot of people. What they failed to grasp was that a President has to govern from the middle, so the sugar-daddy role lead to things like changes in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division to help blacks and minorities, and other indirect, structural changes versus direct benefits or money in people's pockets. Yet, many people, particularly minorities still maintained a delirious hope that Obama was going to fix every problem they had and make everything right in their lives. And when he failed to deliver on things, they just blamed Republicans, accused all of Obama's detractors of racism and created a lot of blow-back in the country.

I believe Obama had more Socialist tendencies, believed in the power of Government to do more in peoples lives, and assumed too much guilt for the U.S. and Western society than he should have, such as in that awful Cairo speech or his "remember the Crusades" bullshit. He was way off base on that shit, but maybe he was desperate to have something big on his legacy and resume than fucking up in Libya and Syria.

I still like Obama, but IMO the "problem" with Obama reflected in that quote from dnc's friend doesn't come from Obama himself, but from the expectations, hopes and dreams people projected onto him and saw in him, which were never really there.

The problem is there are idiots that actually thought racism was almost dead before Obama came around.

Easy answer. As long as the media chooses to keep fueling a guilt ridden, blame the distant past, culture of minions.