My only reply, Jeremy, is that my ancestors came from Poland and Bohemia.
Do a bit of digging and you'll find that during the first wave of migration from those countries my people found a great deal of discrimination in mostly large cities such as New York, Cleveland and Chicago.
The second wave was admittedly faced with less discriminati…
My only reply, Jeremy, is that my ancestors came from Poland and Bohemia.
Do a bit of digging and you'll find that during the first wave of migration from those countries my people found a great deal of discrimination in mostly large cities such as New York, Cleveland and Chicago.
The second wave was admittedly faced with less discrimination.
My ancestors had absolutely nothing to do in terms of the history of slavery in our nation or in other nations.
Now, how can you convince me to carry your self admitted burden of historical racism, when during my entire adulthood I have worked side by side with black, brown and Asian people.
During my retirement I have continued my work as a literacy volunteer. I prefer to address historic wrongs one person or family at a time, rather than stuffing people into government apartment towers were the problems of poverty, skin color and education are conveniently hidden from view.
You solve the problem of skin color your way, Jeremy. You may achieve better results than mine, if only because you are just beginning your adulthood and the odds are in your favor of outliving me by a large margin.
I'll continue to plod along one person or one family at a time. I figure I can help five or ten families learn to read and write American English, before I die.
I'm not suggesting that you or your family had any part in the evils of racism. It doesn't change the fact that the consequences of institutional slavery have inflicted tremendous harm and injustice upon a people only because of the color of their skin. Every successive wave of immigrants to this country has been discriminated to some degree or another, but let's not kid ourselves, the level of injustice and discrimination against blacks exceeds it by many orders of magnitude. You and I belong to the country that did this. I think we dishonor our American ideals by not reckoning with this shameful past.
Jeremy, I think you've been Kendied and diAngeloed! I feel like deprogramming you! But please, before you take as gospel their ideas, do check out one or two of these: https://www.ereads.com/best-thomas-sowell-books/
I appreciate all you've said and applaud your efforts to make life better for disadvantaged people, whatever made for their disadvantage. I do ask in addition that you learn about and see that white privilege, whether you dug that well or not, Deut. 6:11, made a positive difference for your ancestors when they got to this country.
To be clear, I don't think you are part of the problem Dennis. You sound like you are part of the solution. I of course don't have the answers, but I think it begins by having difficult conversations free of contempt and accusations. I think we need to be much more transparent about our history. It should be taught more comprehensively in our schools. Also, our schools and neighborhoods are still far too segregated. If we are going to end racial division we need to be more proximate in our daily lives and associations. I also appreciate the civil dialogue. It's pretty rare these days.
As a side note, I know age is relative, but I have raised 6 teenagers so I don't consider my self a young man anymore :).
“Not reckoning with this shameful past.” How about accepting racism as your personal savior and moving on into the 21st century where every TV commercial features a black person (and they were on TV and in catalogs etc in the 60s too...) Every TV therapist is black and if you want to go to Harvard you can get in on lower test scores than the rest of us who weren’t here during that shameful past that puffs your chest with moral certitude....
“It is July 19, 1935. They are all standing at the base of a tree in the pine woods of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Above them hangs the limp body of Rubin Stacy, his overalls torn and bloodied, riddled with bullets, his hands cuffed in front of him, head snapped from the lynching rope, killed for frightening a white woman. The girl in the front is looking up at the dead black man with wonderment rather than horror, a smile of excitement on her face as if show ponies had just galloped past her at the circus. The fascination on her young face set against the gruesome nature of the gathering was captured by a photographer and is among the most widely circulated of all lynching photographs of twentieth-century America. Lynchings were part carnival, part torture chamber, and attracted thousands of onlookers who collectively became accomplices to public sadism. Photographers were tipped off in advance and installed portable printing presses at the lynching sites to sell to lynchers and onlookers like photographers at a prom. They made postcards out of the gelatin prints for people to send to their loved ones. People mailed postcards of the severed, half-burned head of Will James atop a pole in Cairo, Illinois, in 1907. They sent postcards of burned torsos that looked like the petrified victims of Vesuvius, only these horrors had come at the hands of human beings in modern times. Some people framed the lynching photographs with locks of the victim’s hair under glass if they had been able to secure any. One spectator wrote on the back of his postcard from Waco, Texas, in 1916: “This is the Barbecue we had last night my picture is to the left with the cross over it your son Joe.” This was singularly American. “Even the Nazis did not stoop to selling souvenirs of Auschwitz,” wrote Time magazine many years later. Lynching postcards were so common a form of communication in turn-of-the-twentieth-century America that lynching scenes “became a burgeoning subdepartment of the postcard industry. By 1908, the trade had grown so large, and the practice of sending postcards featuring the victims of mob murderers had become so repugnant, that the U.S. postmaster general banned the cards from the mails.” But the new edict did not stop Americans from sharing their lynching exploits. From then on, they merely put the postcards in an envelope” (Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent).
Do you think you are morally superior to these white people caught up in this sadistic culture? I recommend a book to you called Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning. It is chilling and should motivate ALL of us to learn from the past so we don’t become the monsters of the future.
Since Polish and Bohemian genes are some of the masters of my aged body, I must say Melissa that you are the only person to notice my use of allegory.
I've looked but cannot find a star icon to paste on your report card so I'll do the next best thing by becoming the first person to subscribe to your forthcoming missives 🤔
My only reply, Jeremy, is that my ancestors came from Poland and Bohemia.
Do a bit of digging and you'll find that during the first wave of migration from those countries my people found a great deal of discrimination in mostly large cities such as New York, Cleveland and Chicago.
The second wave was admittedly faced with less discrimination.
My ancestors had absolutely nothing to do in terms of the history of slavery in our nation or in other nations.
Now, how can you convince me to carry your self admitted burden of historical racism, when during my entire adulthood I have worked side by side with black, brown and Asian people.
During my retirement I have continued my work as a literacy volunteer. I prefer to address historic wrongs one person or family at a time, rather than stuffing people into government apartment towers were the problems of poverty, skin color and education are conveniently hidden from view.
You solve the problem of skin color your way, Jeremy. You may achieve better results than mine, if only because you are just beginning your adulthood and the odds are in your favor of outliving me by a large margin.
I'll continue to plod along one person or one family at a time. I figure I can help five or ten families learn to read and write American English, before I die.
I'm not suggesting that you or your family had any part in the evils of racism. It doesn't change the fact that the consequences of institutional slavery have inflicted tremendous harm and injustice upon a people only because of the color of their skin. Every successive wave of immigrants to this country has been discriminated to some degree or another, but let's not kid ourselves, the level of injustice and discrimination against blacks exceeds it by many orders of magnitude. You and I belong to the country that did this. I think we dishonor our American ideals by not reckoning with this shameful past.
Jeremy, I think you've been Kendied and diAngeloed! I feel like deprogramming you! But please, before you take as gospel their ideas, do check out one or two of these: https://www.ereads.com/best-thomas-sowell-books/
and check this out! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pls-Z0KOOgw
How will you solve your dilemma, Jeremy?
I've told you what I do to help disadvantaged people and families.
What thoughts do you have, other than creating a national movement that aligns with your ideas?
Yes, Jeremy, I was once a young man. Took me a while to control my mouth and actively engage my ears.
I wish you well on what I believe will be a most productive life.
Your civil reply to my comment was most appreciated.
I appreciate all you've said and applaud your efforts to make life better for disadvantaged people, whatever made for their disadvantage. I do ask in addition that you learn about and see that white privilege, whether you dug that well or not, Deut. 6:11, made a positive difference for your ancestors when they got to this country.
To be clear, I don't think you are part of the problem Dennis. You sound like you are part of the solution. I of course don't have the answers, but I think it begins by having difficult conversations free of contempt and accusations. I think we need to be much more transparent about our history. It should be taught more comprehensively in our schools. Also, our schools and neighborhoods are still far too segregated. If we are going to end racial division we need to be more proximate in our daily lives and associations. I also appreciate the civil dialogue. It's pretty rare these days.
As a side note, I know age is relative, but I have raised 6 teenagers so I don't consider my self a young man anymore :).
Six teenagers? You have my condolences. I've only been able to raise 4 teenagers while retaining a portion of my sanity.
I jumped to the concept of you as a young man still in college when I peeked at your bio here on substack.
The conclusion fence is a dangerous barrier to jump over 🥴
“Not reckoning with this shameful past.” How about accepting racism as your personal savior and moving on into the 21st century where every TV commercial features a black person (and they were on TV and in catalogs etc in the 60s too...) Every TV therapist is black and if you want to go to Harvard you can get in on lower test scores than the rest of us who weren’t here during that shameful past that puffs your chest with moral certitude....
“It is July 19, 1935. They are all standing at the base of a tree in the pine woods of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Above them hangs the limp body of Rubin Stacy, his overalls torn and bloodied, riddled with bullets, his hands cuffed in front of him, head snapped from the lynching rope, killed for frightening a white woman. The girl in the front is looking up at the dead black man with wonderment rather than horror, a smile of excitement on her face as if show ponies had just galloped past her at the circus. The fascination on her young face set against the gruesome nature of the gathering was captured by a photographer and is among the most widely circulated of all lynching photographs of twentieth-century America. Lynchings were part carnival, part torture chamber, and attracted thousands of onlookers who collectively became accomplices to public sadism. Photographers were tipped off in advance and installed portable printing presses at the lynching sites to sell to lynchers and onlookers like photographers at a prom. They made postcards out of the gelatin prints for people to send to their loved ones. People mailed postcards of the severed, half-burned head of Will James atop a pole in Cairo, Illinois, in 1907. They sent postcards of burned torsos that looked like the petrified victims of Vesuvius, only these horrors had come at the hands of human beings in modern times. Some people framed the lynching photographs with locks of the victim’s hair under glass if they had been able to secure any. One spectator wrote on the back of his postcard from Waco, Texas, in 1916: “This is the Barbecue we had last night my picture is to the left with the cross over it your son Joe.” This was singularly American. “Even the Nazis did not stoop to selling souvenirs of Auschwitz,” wrote Time magazine many years later. Lynching postcards were so common a form of communication in turn-of-the-twentieth-century America that lynching scenes “became a burgeoning subdepartment of the postcard industry. By 1908, the trade had grown so large, and the practice of sending postcards featuring the victims of mob murderers had become so repugnant, that the U.S. postmaster general banned the cards from the mails.” But the new edict did not stop Americans from sharing their lynching exploits. From then on, they merely put the postcards in an envelope” (Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent).
Do you think you are morally superior to these white people caught up in this sadistic culture? I recommend a book to you called Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning. It is chilling and should motivate ALL of us to learn from the past so we don’t become the monsters of the future.
I think no need for sarcasm, especially as we wish (I wish) to persuade Jeremy to consider a different perspective
and by the way, as many have pointed out, the word "slaves" comes from "slavs." For historic reasons . . .
Why is this relevant to the conversation?
Since Polish and Bohemian genes are some of the masters of my aged body, I must say Melissa that you are the only person to notice my use of allegory.
I've looked but cannot find a star icon to paste on your report card so I'll do the next best thing by becoming the first person to subscribe to your forthcoming missives 🤔
Thanks. At the moment just writing a blog, The Critical Mom, plus what's on my Melissa Knox site.