[deleted]
The Fourth of July
111–120 of 324 posts
Re: The Fourth of July
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
The main stream media and the elites are supporting the cancel culture. In fact, they fuel it -- both WaPo and NYT published articles about why 7/4 should be canceled. That's okay, as a country needs different voice and people have different political spectrum by nature. What's disappointing, though, is that the conservatives do not have a big enough platform to publish well-argued counter points, even though "conser…
Please consider that you are in an extreme social media and/or real life filter bubble. "The elites" aren't some secret Soros/Clinton/HerEmails force out to destroy America. I've found that taking a long-ish break (2-3 weeks) from reading the news and social media can be extremely eye opening.
True, but on the other hand the components of this filter bubble are mostly people that have benifited from the current state of affairs
Re: The Fourth of July
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
What me and my family talked about today is that, as immigrants, we are so sad how much the "native born" people of the US hate their own country. They seem to never waste an opportunity to remind others of their disdain and it is more and more visible these days e.g. in big news media or on Twitter. Makes me sad and I hope this can change.
Yeah, and so many people of color came to the US with a suite case and less than $1000 dollars, and then became a successful person in a few years. I certainly did. My wife certainly did. My team, my gardener, and my contractor certainly did. Some people who are from the same school as I went to have even become CEOs of big companies, and some have become famous professors or head of prestigious universities. If anyt…
Focusing on the "cancel culture" is, IMHO, putting the cart in front of the horse. It is a by-product of a society where a cop can murder an African American in broad daylight and (in most cases) suffer no consequences. If you can't trust the society to not murder you, why would you refrain from tearing down anything you don't like?
When the society doesn't serve justice, people will implement "justice" with their own hands, with often bloody consequences. Thousands lost their heads during the French revolution: I'm sure many of them didn't deserve it. People died and lost their homes during the American Revolution, and during the Civil War: I'm sure many of them didn't deserve it, either.
I'm no big fan of the so-called "cancel culture", but justice is the only way I see that can rein it in.
Re: The Fourth of July
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
Please consider that you are in an extreme social media and/or real life filter bubble. "The elites" aren't some secret Soros/Clinton/HerEmails force out to destroy America. I've found that taking a long-ish break (2-3 weeks) from reading the news and social media can be extremely eye opening.
True, but on the other hand the components of this filter bubble are mostly people that have benifited from the current state of affairs
What do you mean?
Re: The Fourth of July
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
When writing this, did you consider that most African Americans are descended from people who didn't get to bring a suitcase? That they were still fighting to be treated as equal citizens a century and a half after no longer being considered property? And that the fact that they're over-represented in basketball doesn't mean that inequality is solved?
Note that you said descendants. They were not slaves, nor were their parents nor their grandparents. What remove does it take to get over it and stop acting like everyone owes you? Immigrants have come to America with nothing and having suffered unimaginable trauma (such as having had their entire family incinerated) and prospered.
I think you will find that the descendants of immigrants who suffered unimaginable trauma have not "gotten over it," either - they just know America is not responsible for that trauma, so they don't have anything to demand of America. (In many cases, the political entity that enacted that trauma is effectively no longer existent, so they have no one to make demands from and they have gotten as close to justice as they ever will; in many cases, America was directly responsible for that happening, so they certainly have no reason to feel like America owes them anything.)
Re: The Fourth of July
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
Grant also sent Custer to South Dakota to wage war and steal land. Once gold had been discovered it was a foregone conclusion that white settlers would therefore get the land, no matter what treaties had been signed. Which lead to a white supremacist eventually carving four presidents visages into Mount Rushmore, in violation of treaties made between the Lakota and the US, and today's arrest of Lakota who were protes…
All the things you said about Grant are correct. But it can be argued that the good things he did outweighed the bad. In that case, is it ok to tear down a statue?
Why not? It's not like statues are some sacred principle.
And in the Fourth of July, as the US celebrates declaring independence from its past status as a colony, of rebelling against an imperial monarch that no doubt did lots of good, but also taxed them without representation, let's also celebrate our current revolutions against injustice.
We should not idolize people, not even if they did good things. And if in the revolutionary throes of fighting for justice, the wrong statue gets taken down, that is so unbelievably tame and minor compared to what we celebrate on Independence Day.
Re: The Fourth of July
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just because there exist immigrants who have fled their home country to find a better life in US doesn't invalidate the plight of other groups in the US right now: just look at the police brutality protests. If your bare minimum is "at least your family didn't get incinerated so get over it", that's extremely heartless and cruel: the US can and should do better than such a low baseline.
Which policies or lack thereof specifically target the black people? We should definite fight to abolish them. Otherwise, wouldn’t it fair to say that the US legal system has flaws that every group may suffer, and therefore it’s really about law and order?
Just so I understand your framing: Do you consider the poll taxes and literacy requirements for voting of the Jim Crow era to have been policies that specifically targeted black people or not? They were written in a racially neutral way (and the 14th and 15th Amendments were in effect then, and they were ruled constitutional).
Re: The Fourth of July
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yup. My mom and dad came to this country with nothing. My mom had $30 and a husband, who, she didn't even know, was 'employed' by her brother-in-law but not paid wages. They managed to escape virtual slavery at age 30, have two kids, and achieve the American dream. Mom even went to school again while putting both her kids in private school (didn't live in a great school district). America's been pretty great to us. B…
We cancelled the melting pot: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201...
Yeah I'm familiar. Was told i was white by my history professor because I believed in american ideals. Academia is the source of the worst ideas
Re: The Fourth of July
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just because there exist immigrants who have fled their home country to find a better life in US doesn't invalidate the plight of other groups in the US right now: just look at the police brutality protests. If your bare minimum is "at least your family didn't get incinerated so get over it", that's extremely heartless and cruel: the US can and should do better than such a low baseline.
You're distorting what I said. As regards these protests I believe that they will probably only make things worse. Black areas are where the most crime occurs so there is going to be more police activity in those areas. The protests encourage a feeling amount black people that the police are the enemy and that if you're stopped it's always only because you're black. On the police side this means that the typical inte…
I think lots of white collar crime occurs in “white neighborhoods”; it’s just not a priority for law enforcement.
Re: The Fourth of July
#120tl;dr “America good, me not want think about complicated stuff.”