The Race Paradigm

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Just wanted to say that as a very white man who grew up in a very white area[...]

You surprise me.

 

[Vortigern99]

Of course, I'm enjoying our dialogue here. It's refreshing to actually come across someone who disagrees with you but is willing to have a mature conversation.

I understand where you are coming from in many ways but I think that there is an unconscious drive to it to basically "make everyone white, so no race" I know for sure that is not what you intend, but what would the "non race" "human" be?

A world of NO. I don't consider myself "white" for a number of reasons, including the inaccuracy of the term vis-a-vis actual skin pigmentation in individuals of European ancestry, the prevalence of Native American traits in my phenotype, and the fact that current scientific consensus rejects race itself as an accurate and evidential system of human classification.

So, whereas I am not white, on what grounds will I wish to "make everyone white, so no race"? There's no race because there's no race. I propose to celebrate and embrace our differences, not ignore them or pretend they're not there or blend them all together into one uber-race or whatever silly thing you think I want.

I thought of another way to explain what you're up against. Consider the difference between the concept of the "melting pot" and the "mosaic"

Many people pushed the idea of the "melting pot" in the era of American history where you had the biggest boom of immigrants (BTW I'm aware I tend to discuss these things from an American perspective, I apologize for that narrow view but it's what I know) so in this era the idea of "assimilation" was promoted. This is why you'll see pictures of people from different countries around the world wearing "white man suit and ties" back in old black and white photos from the time.

The eventual conclusion was the the "melting pot" and "assimilation" was ultimately racist because the dominant culture basically took over and forced everyone to be like them.

Mosiac is something that allows each cultural group to maintain identity while being part of a bigger cohesive picture.

Sign me up for the mosaic! I like the imagery and purpose of that, and ascribe to it wholeheartedly. You seem to be under the impression that I'm pretending we don't have physically observable differences, or that I want our geographic polymorphisms (as one paper, quoted upthread, phrased the idea of distinct traits derived from environmental selection) to be hidden away or ignored. I don't want that at all.

Rather, I'm proposing that we (society at large) accept our polymorphisms as part of the human experience -- without ascribing all of the cultural, linguistic, behavioral, intelligence-related, religious, interpersonal and other affiliations that we attach to our false ideas on race.

Race doesn't exist; individuals do. Each person is comprised of a multitude of factors and influences, only part of which is the genotype they inherited from their parents.

So on the one hand it's interesting to say "Get rid of race" but that's like saying that since you look "more white" that you should just ignore your Native American culture.

I don't follow this analogy at all. Rather than saying "get rid of race" (which I know I wrote upthread, but it was a rhetorical modification of a sentence you had written, not my original wording), let me expand and clarify that to: Extract all of the automatic affiliations attached to race, because race does not objectively exist. I am not in any way suggesting that "since you look 'more white' that you should just ignore your Native American culture". I don't think that and I have never said or written anything approximating it.

I am aware that culture and race are two different things, but really for the practical reality of how people interact with one another you will find that they are often closely tied.

Preaching to the choir here. Culture (including language, behavior, religion) is tied up in our ideas on race, which is part of what makes race a subjective and inaccurate social construct. One cannot deduce culture from an individual's observable phenotype with anything approaching accuracy or objectivity. Hence this thread and the proposals inherent in it.

 

[Vortigern99]

Based on that and other stories, plus additional compelling observations I've made in my 40+ years on this planet, I will agree without hesitation that racialism is intrinsic to humanity: that is, the affiliation of individuals with similar physical traits. "Birds of a feather" and all that.

I'm surprised to read this, as it contradicts what I thought your message was. It also seems to contradict your assertion that there are no measurable differences.
Do you perhaps mean that we tend to think of people with similar physical traits of belonging together?

I have never thought, conceived, believed, said or written the phrase "there are no measurable differences" among human beings. If you got that from my posts then either I haven't been clear or you haven't been reading closely! What I'm saying is that those measurable differences do not constitute race.

Race is not purely a system of separating populations based on genotype or phenotype. As you touch on below, we attach to race (unconsciously or purposefully) any number of affiliations concerning language, behaviors, personal relationships, upbringing, religion, aesthetic preferences (IE music and art), modes of dress, ethics, morals, adherence to laws, sexuality, etc. These racialist affiliations are a subjective mental exercise that cannot possibly be accurate or complete, and leads to divisiveness and oppression.

Do you perhaps mean that we tend to think of people with similar physical traits of belonging together?

I'm sure we do. We do use visual cues to distinguish social groups but these differences are overwhelmingly artificial: Uniforms, traditional costumes, religious attire, etc...

These [cultural] differences are regarded as far more important than biological differences. People do group themselves and others according to size, hair color, etc... but they rarely assign much importance to that.
Skin color being important for social identity is an exception among physical trait.

I disagree with the hilited paragraph. Phenotype -- our observable physicality -- is a major and immediate method of classification among human beings of all nations and cultures. It's the point Kim Hunter was making, and I after her, with the story of the Planet of the Apes shoot in which "chimp" actors affiliated with other "chimps" to the general exclusion of "orangs" and "gorillas", and so forth. It's inherent in human nature to associate with those that resemble us physically.

This "birds of a feather" impulse towards association of like-with-like does not mean, perforce, that we must always give in to the impulse. Part of being a mature adult is dealing with natural impulses that are not appropriate or correct or kind in a given context. However, recognizing the existence of those impulses is important, I think, before moving on to the next step of addressing and overcoming them.

I think it may be good to remind ourselves of the most notorious racists of the last century: The nazis. The pprimary victims of nazi racism were jews, roma and slavs.
You'd be hard pressed to find visible differences between these groups and germans.

Jews and Gypsies look(ed) the same as indigenous Germans? You'll forgive me if I don't accept this bare assertion.

Mumbles reminds of one important fact. It is possible for only a few people to force an identity on someone, regardless of their choice.
And if it's based on skin color, it's virtually impossible to escape. That's one thing that makes skin color based identity harmful in itself, IMHO. You can change your clothes, religion, name. As an adult you may not be able to change your accent but it's a choice you could make for your kids.

On this we can agree. Hence this thread and the proposal inherent in it.

 

[Delvo]

That's why the deniers keep trying to insist that it actually has some mysterious unspoken alternative definition that would better suit their sermons about it, even though they can't state exactly what that definition is because they know perfectly well that no such alternative definition is really there.

I have never thought, conceived, believed, said or written the phrase "there are no measurable differences" among human beings... What I'm saying is that those measurable differences do not constitute race.

 

[Vortigern99]

I'm not offering any special personal definition of race. I'm proceeding from the mainstream scientific viewpoint on the matter, which rejects essentialist race classification on grounds of inaccuracy and subjectivity.

You never responded to an earlier request for clarification of your own viewpoint. Do you think you can do so now?

ETA: Also, in what way am I, in your opinion, "insist[ing] that [race] actually has some mysterious unspoken alternative definition that would better suit their sermons about it, even though they can't state exactly what that definition is because they know perfectly well that no such alternative definition is really there"? I defined race according to the mainstream definition on page 1 of this thread. What are talking about, Delvo?

 

[Vortigern99]

From the OP:

The concept of race depends on a multiplicity of affiliated factors, such as anatomy, culture, ethnicity, genetics, geography, history, language, religion, and social relationships.

This is the mainstream, widely accepted definition of the word. Nowhere have I "insist[ed] that [race] actually has some mysterious unspoken alternative definition that would better suit [my] sermons about it", nor have I avoided "stat[ing] exactly what that definition is", nor have I tried to place an "alternative definition" into the discussion.

You are demonstrably mistaken, Delvo.

 

[iangoeswest]

From the OP: “ I submit that we try to eradicate the [race] paradigm, to move forward where not only ‘racism’ but the very idea of race is abolished from our enculturation process.”

Longtime lurker, infrequent poster, but this topic is near and dear. I have read the thread with interest. I think both Mumbles and truethat have covered most of the field regarding my thoughts on the above, but here are a couple that have maybe not bubbled to the surface yet. My comments are directed particularly to the issue of race in America. I am insufficiently well-traveled to speak to conditions in other places, and my criticisms and points are related directly to the local historical perspective.

Race, as the book says, Matters. It matters because it forms a considerable piece of the legal, cultural, and economic backdrop against which our society has grown and developed. It is irrelevant to that question whether race is “real” in a biological sense; it has always been real in a cultural sense. Many people of good faith with different perspectives on this issue would like to live in some sort of ‘post-racial’ world either in the sense that we interbreed to the point of assimilation of appearance, or simply that the appearances and attitudes that make up “race” stop mattering. The OP suggests something like the latter. I am reminded of a quote from Chief Justice John Roberts – “the way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” In one sense it is a pleasing and concise syllogism. In another, more accurate sense, it’s totally, totally wrong.

Racism is built in. The issue is not so much whether you or I as individuals have ‘racist’ attitudes, the issue is that race is the backdrop. Gender and class too, and they’re all related; while I personally feel that race is the “bigger” of the backdrops, reasonable minds may disagree and it’s less important that one ranks the backdrops in my preferred order and more important that one recognizes the fact that race is right there, all the time, suffusing our lives in ways extraordinary and mundane.

While the goal of the OP is perhaps a noble one (although I have sensed some pushback on the thread, perhaps because those who speak of getting beyond race sometimes – though I’m not suggesting in this case – give off an air of being insufficiently concerned with issues of racial equity), I believe we cannot (and should not) get beyond the paradigm of race until we, in fact, FIX the problems caused by the paradigm of race. Or at least start to. Acknowledging them, even (in this regard, a tip of the hat to truethat’s comments).

Much of this nation was built by uncompensated workers. While there exists consensus that “slavery is bad,” the idea that the descendants of those uncompensated workers are, perhaps, owed their back pay is so controversial as to be a political third rail – it is politically suicidal even to suggest. This strikes me as odd, as it seems a modest proposal.

Beyond the above, there is a direct connection between the slaves and the condition of their descendants. Do some rise above it? Of course. Does this mean that the connection is therefore so attenuated as to not be worthy of our consideration? No.

I have taught, on and of for the past decade, the required class of “Constitutional Law” in several law schools here in the Bay Area. I have a pitch I give at the beginning, acknowledging that the U.S. Constitution must seem a very different thing to the descendants of slaves than to others. Indeed, the Constitution itself effortlessly deconstructs in an unsavory fashion – it’s crueler provisions were not, as is commonly said, a distasteful but necessary compromise that “we” (the heroes, the abolitionists) made with “them” (the wicked slavers). Quite the opposite – Madison, the main architect of the Constitutional plan, was an unrepentant slaver and a nasty one. “They” are the ones who drafted the document itself.

All of which is to say, racism is our roots. It’s our past and our present, and the “dead hand of history” (as Walter Mosley calls it) sits heavy on our shoulder. If we wish to eradicate the “race paradigm,” I submit that we must seek to right racism’s wrongs where we can, mitigate its damages where they can be identified, and frankly and honestly acknowledge that for hundreds of years it has been “better” to be white than to be black in America.

I am not holding my breath!

 

[Pup]

While there exists consensus that “slavery is bad,” the idea that the descendants of those uncompensated workers are, perhaps, owed their back pay is so controversial as to be a political third rail – it is politically suicidal even to suggest. This strikes me as odd, as it seems a modest proposal.

How does one define descendants of slaves? What percentage of bloodline does it require?

If, say, a former slave was freed and passed as white before 1865 and his or her descendants continue to live as white, are they descendants of slaves? If a family today self-identifies as black, looks black, and is a descendant of free blacks so far back into the antebellum period that they cannot identify any slave ancestry, are they descendants of slaves?

 

[truethat]

I always thought reparations are a bad idea. But I thought a good fair solution that wouldn't just be a "handout" would be a blanket gift of free education to any black student that can get into a college. IOW you get into Harvard, it's free. Where ever you get it in, it's free.

 

[Frozenwolf150]

I just have this to say.

Race may be an artificial construct, but that doesn't stop racism from having very real social, economic, and legal consequences. It's like how the gods of various world religions may not exist, but that doesn't stop people fighting, discriminating against, and killing each other over religious differences.

 

[Delvo]

From the OP:

The concept of race depends on a multiplicity of affiliated factors, such as anatomy, culture, ethnicity, genetics, geography, history, language, religion, and social relationships.

This is the mainstream, widely accepted definition of the word.

No. It is not. This is easily demonstrated by common cultural references to white people "acting black" or black people "acting white". That does correlate behavior to race, but still treats them separately; it says the people still are what their bodies physically, biologically are, and anything else is just an act. That's how you used the idea yourself in some other cases like this one:

I'm proposing that we (society at large) accept our polymorphisms as part of the human experience -- without ascribing all of the cultural, linguistic, behavioral, intelligence-related, religious, interpersonal and other affiliations that we attach

Anything that's merely ascribed to or affiliated with or attached to something is not a part of its definition. For example, people also, often inaccurately, ascribe or attach stereotypes of behavior/thought/personality to people of different ages, religions, sexes, and occupations. That stereotyping doesn't define what age, religion, sex, or occupation is, and doesn't make age, religion, sex, or occupation not exist.

In order to get us all to quit defining race by affiliated/attached things other than race, you'd first have to get us to start.

 

[Delvo]

You never responded to an earlier request for clarification of your own viewpoint. Do you think you can do so now?

I had to look back again to see the original question & context...

Can you divide humanity in to well-defined groups based on physical characteristic?

Do those divisions match the traditionally used ones?

Yes.

Am I one of these "deniers" because I'm attempting to show that race is an artificial invention with an untenable biological foundation? And if so, to which specific "piles of lies" are you referring?

Things like this looked just like threads I've seen before where people claim there are no biological/physical differences between the human races. You also said you don't deny that, but it's right here in the same thread where you said stuff like this here, and the self-contradiction on this subject is also very familiar. Usually, though, the way a thread develops after a start like that is that they cling to the original absurd claim much longer and more desperately, lobbing every silly trick they can come up with to try to save it, and don't retreat to saying they never said what they said until pages later. So when this thread went differently, leaning away from the biophysical reality of races toward sociological issues about them, and it appeared that that was the original intent anyway, I dropped the argument as off-topic. I guess I have less interest in sociological opinions than in setting the facts straight when scientific reality is denied, or in letting threads stay on track. (I just came back because the subject I was dropping came up a few more times anyway.)

You never responded to an earlier request for clarification of your own viewpoint. Do you think you can do so now?

My viewpoint: "Working on how society handles issues about human races does not require, and is even harmed by, absurdly pretending races don't exist."

 

[iangoeswest]

How does one define descendants of slaves? What percentage of bloodline does it require?

If, say, a former slave was freed and passed as white before 1865 and his or her descendants continue to live as white, are they descendants of slaves? If a family today self-identifies as black, looks black, and is a descendant of free blacks so far back into the antebellum period that they cannot identify any slave ancestry, are they descendants of slaves?

Yep. All that and more; the problems you've identified barely scratch the surface of the logistical boondoggle that would be an attempt at reparations, particularly in some sort of direct, person by person form (I am not trying to handwave away the issues you raise; I acknowledge both that they are completely valid and that I have no principled answer to any of your four questions).

I am not persuaded that the opposition to reparations as even a proper topic of political discussion lies, however, in its logistical complexities, considerable though they may be. Your questions - and the other hundred that logically follow - would admit to principled answers, if our collective mind were set to it. Before we talk about how to structure the paying off of a debt, however, we have to agree that there is a debt to be paid. That is what I feel to be the "modest" part of the proposal. And yet there are a great many people in America who not only believe that there is no debt to be repaid, but that in fact we have done far too much in favor of black America, that it occupies too much of both the public coffers and the conversational bandwidth, and that we just need to get "past" it. I believe this to represent a sort of cognitive dissonance; a failure to grasp the magnitude of what happened over the last 400 or so years, and the way it very naturally ripples still.

 

[iangoeswest]

I always thought reparations are a bad idea. But I thought a good fair solution that wouldn't just be a "handout" would be a blanket gift of free education to any black student that can get into a college. IOW you get into Harvard, it's free. Where ever you get it in, it's free.

Sounds good, and a zillion other such - one could envision all manner of investment in communities, development grants in traditionally black locales (to say nothing of more basic needs like environmental remediation; as I imagine in many cities, there are two areas nearby - Hunter's Point in San Francisco, and Point Richmond further up the Bay - where there is an overlap of environmentally degraded land and subsequently located black communities), and a variety of other non-"direct" approaches to reparations.

I am agnostic as to the approach (although in the spirit of your urged self-examination I would gently challenge you on your sense that such payback is a "handout" in the way the term is usually used). I'm as blue as blue gets, but am informed by the last 50 years that you cannot end poverty simply by giving money to poor people. Your proposal is subject to the same logistical problems which Pup began to develop in his post - obviously, such problems are exacerbated by more "direct" forms of reparations, and are attenuated by more indirect forms, but the problems do not go away in any event.

And as hard as those problems would be, I think that solutions would present themselves readily if, in fact, America had anything approaching a collective sense that there is a historic imbalance which it is our obligation to seek to balance. I think the mere sense of obligation would, itself, serve to begin to right the scales.

But that is not where we're at. The books remain deeply imbalanced, and thus I remain of the view that it is not proper to "close the book" on race in the spirit of the OP until such time as said books are more balanced. (I do not believe us to disagree on this point).

 

[GnaGnaMan]

I have never thought, conceived, believed, said or written the phrase "there are no measurable differences" among human beings. If you got that from my posts then either I haven't been clear or you haven't been reading closely! What I'm saying is that those measurable differences do not constitute race.

You said that race itself does not exist in any definite or definable or quantifiable or measurable or significant sense [...]
And that seems to clash with eg the below paragraph.

I disagree with the hilited paragraph. Phenotype -- our observable physicality -- is a major and immediate method of classification among human beings of all nations and cultures. It's the point Kim Hunter was making, and I after her, with the story of the Planet of the Apes shoot in which "chimp" actors affiliated with other "chimps" to the general exclusion of "orangs" and "gorillas", and so forth. It's inherent in human nature to associate with those that resemble us physically.

As to those actors, there was more than just visual differences dividing them. In fact, I remember hearing almost the same anecdote from actors that were involved in a movie on the Stanford Prison Experiment.

Jews and Gypsies look(ed) the same as indigenous Germans? You'll forgive me if I don't accept this bare assertion.

I'm not quite sure how do provide evidence for this. How about this: If the difference was obvious, then why was it necessary to make those of jewish descent wear yellow stars?

How about this guy? What's his background?

Solution

 

[GnaGnaMan]

Much of this nation was built by uncompensated workers. While there exists consensus that “slavery is bad,” the idea that the descendants of those uncompensated workers are, perhaps, owed their back pay is so controversial as to be a political third rail – it is politically suicidal even to suggest. This strikes me as odd, as it seems a modest proposal.

Please don't use the term "modest proposal". I searched hard for some hidden meaning before realizing there was none.

Anyways, the idea is not at all modest. The last 150 years have seen torrents of blood spilled all over the world. Saying that there should be reparations for the descendants of the victims is like opening a can of worms, except that the worms are venomous snakes. It's a financial incentive for re-fighting past conflicts.

If we wish to eradicate the “race paradigm,” I submit that we must seek to right racism’s wrongs where we can, mitigate its damages where they can be identified, and frankly and honestly acknowledge that for hundreds of years it has been “better” to be white than to be black in America.

I agree but I think that the talk about slavery plays a part in obscuring racism's wrong. The fact is that blacks suffered government prosecution until the 1950/60ies. You don't need to trace the current conditions of blacks all the way back to slavery.
Many of those who suffered under that are still alive. Reparations for them would be quite appropriate.

I agree with truethat that free education would be the best to address the damage done by past american apartheid because I think that denying education and opportunities is the most lasting damage. It shouldn't be for blacks (as in dark skinned people), though, but for those who actually bear the burden of past injustice.

 

[Pup]

And yet there are a great many people in America who not only believe that there is no debt to be repaid, but that in fact we have done far too much in favor of black America, that it occupies too much of both the public coffers and the conversational bandwidth, and that we just need to get "past" it. I believe this to represent a sort of cognitive dissonance; a failure to grasp the magnitude of what happened over the last 400 or so years, and the way it very naturally ripples still.

That's a fair assessment.

But it gets even more complicated, talking about debts. One can say that white Americans were guilty of enslaving blacks, but how many lives were enough to sacrifice, to cancel out that debt? Should descendants of Elijah Lovejoy's family still be paying reparations? Descendants of Union soldiers? Descendants of recent immigrants who had no hand in slavery? How much do Massachusetts taxpayers still owe, after ending slavery within their state early in their history and raising the 54th Mass? What about states like Ohio which never allowed slavery and had an active underground railroad?

And, further complicating things, there's the problem that if "the government" pays reparations, the implication is that the government is still white people doing things for black ones. In other words, it would make no sense for well-to-do taxpaying descendants of slaves to be paying reparations to themselves. Therefore, all taxpayers would give money to the government, and the money would be magically changed so the reparations would instead be officially coming from the federal (or state) government which formerly allowed the enslaving. One could certainly consider the government to have been a white entity enslaving black people at the time, but it seems strangely racist to think of it as a white entity paid for by white people today, when that's no longer the case.

I've always felt that the best solution is the one we're doing now: offering assistance to poor people, regardless of race or background. That way, those who are disadvantaged for whatever reason are helped, and those who have done well and therefore don't need compensation don't receive it.

 

[Ts4EVER]

I think these days the debate about racism is masking different problems. Take the old example for casual racism:
A black guy and a white guy are walking towards each other, the white guy changes sides of the street.
I'd claim that these days, if the black guy was wearing a suit and tie and carrying a briefcase, the white would not change sides of the street, he would however, if the black guy was wearing some kind of sports jersey, a baseball cap and low hanging jeans.
The problem these day is classism, not racism.

 

[iangoeswest]

Please don't use the term "modest proposal". I searched hard for some hidden meaning before realizing there was none.

Ach! Sorry about that. The allusion was, as you now realize, unintended, although undoubtedly the phrase was lodged in some crevice of my mind from its original use. Anyway, this stuff is heady enough without giving you more to have to cut through, so, point taken.

Anyways, the idea is not at all modest. The last 150 years have seen torrents of blood spilled all over the world. Saying that there should be reparations for the descendants of the victims is like opening a can of worms, except that the worms are venomous snakes. It's a financial incentive for re-fighting past conflicts.

The "modest" point of the idea is the recognition that there is a debt, remaining and unpaid. This does not to me seem a controversial point. It may be that the word "reparations" itself carries some loaded meaning, because I view your observations about the last 150 years as supporting, rather than drawing from, my point. Yes, torrents of blood, leaving many victims. As to all of it, there should be reparation. We should be trying to fix it.

The alternative is, to my mind, to tell the victims and descendants of victims (and here I would argue that modern descendants of slaves are themselves victims in a different way than, say, I as the mere "descendant of" a holocaust sufferer am a victim) to simply get over it. I do not ascribe this sentiment to your point, but as to victims and their descendants, it seems binary to me - we either say "we're gonna try to make this right" or we say "get over it."

I think that the talk about slavery plays a part in obscuring racism's wrong. The fact is that blacks suffered government prosecution until the 1950/60ies. You don't need to trace the current conditions of blacks all the way back to slavery.
Many of those who suffered under that are still alive. Reparations for them would be quite appropriate.

Fair point, they are not mutually exclusive views. I would be delighted if the tenor of the national conversation was "how can we honestly address and right the wrongs of our own lifetime?" rather than "haven't we done enough for you people already?"

Minor quibble: the "need to trace the current conditions of blacks all the way back to slavery" is directed to those who ascribe the shortcomings of American black communities exclusively to failure of will or, perhaps, genetic predisposition. Whatever role either of those may play, if we're going to talk "why," it is an incomplete discussion without the recognition that American black communities are comprised mainly of the descendants of people who were robbed of all language, culture, and identity and were systematically treated in fact and law as subhuman for hundreds of years. The product of that history is incompletely evaluated without reference to that history.

But quibble aside, I hear ya'; there's plenty of racism's wrong within recent memory with which people of good faith might make common cause, and I'm happy to start there.

 

[iangoeswest]

It gets even more complicated, talking about debts. One can say that white Americans were guilty of enslaving blacks, but how many lives were enough to sacrifice, to cancel out that debt? Should descendants of Elijah Lovejoy's family still be paying reparations? Descendants of Union soldiers? Descendants of recent immigrants who had no hand in slavery? How much do Massachusetts taxpayers still owe, after ending slavery within their state early in their history and raising the 54th Mass? What about states like Ohio which never allowed slavery and had an active underground railroad?

And, further complicating things, there's the problem that if "the government" pays reparations, the implication is that the government is still white people doing things for black ones. In other words, it would make no sense for well-to-do taxpaying descendants of slaves to be paying reparations to themselves. Therefore, all taxpayers would give money to the government, and the money would be magically changed so the reparations would instead be officially coming from the federal (or state) government which formerly allowed the enslaving. One could certainly consider the government to have been a white entity enslaving black people at the time, but it seems strangely racist to think of it as a white entity paid for by white people today, when that's no longer the case.

I've always felt that the best solution is the one we're doing now: offering assistance to poor people, regardless of race or background. That way, those who are disadvantaged for whatever reason are helped, and those who have done well and therefore don't need compensation don't receive it.

My thinking on the debt issue tracks my thinking on the racism issue in general - the problems are institutional more than personal, and the solutions should be as well.

For instance, I do not see it as "white" America doing the enslaving, for reasons of historical nuance that you point out in your first paragraph. It is at once simpler and more accurate to say that "America" did the enslaving. All of America - free states and slave states - benefited from the practice. The free black man living in Massachusetts wore a cotton shirt made possible by the slaves who tamed Georgia at a cost measured in human lives. I am a white Jew Constitutional attorney living in Berkeley, California. I've pretty much ticked all the blue boxes and lack any sense of white guilt - indeed, my people came here long after slavery and didn't have a great time of it when they did. I'm a lot more Ohio than Georgia in our (now) shared example. Nonetheless, I benefit from the social order of our society as surely as does a dyed-in-the-wool confederate flag flying racist - we're both wearing those same cotton shirts.

I do not have immediate answers to the problems raised by your questions other than the above observations that the problem is more properly addressed institutionally rather than trying to match the descendants of slave owners with the descendants of slaves in the world's most awkward round of speed dating.

I share the sentiment of your last paragraph, and there's a somewhat interesting thread in "USA Politics" about "welfare" which raises other difficult questions. The discussion of debts is messy and imperfect - my interest in it runs largely for its historical and Constitutional implications (Justice Thomas, who does not speak from the bench, cites among the reasons his embarrassment at his "Gullah" accent, having been raised by descendants of those same people who tamed Georgia. The dead hand of history weighs heavy on the shoulder).

But I can't think that what we're doing now is the very best solution - we're just whistling past the graveyard. All the money for the social safety net, and while I'm happy that few people are starving in the streets, I don't have the sense that what we're doing is sustainable. "I'm sorry" is not really in the American character, I think; if not "reparation," is there something we could do that tilts towards "reconciliation?"

All towards the OP - what can we do to close the books on race? I accept that it is possible to do, but think a more raw, direct discussion - at a minimum - needs to happen.

Candidate Obama got me with his speech "A More Perfect Union." It was, I feel, the most direct and important speech in American politics in my lifetime. Boy, it's sure been downhill from there! But at that moment I had the hint that there was some actual way to shake off the dead hand of history and be the nation that we could be, free of the sins of our youth. That hint will continue to sustain me, although your wise questions, and many more like them, persuade me that the way forward is not simple.

I appreciate your thoughts on the matter.