Art McGee:
> Usually described by WHOM?
The people I happen to read, of course. There are two general classes of proposal: (1) pay up; (2) pretend to pay up through "programs". Do we need to go through this?
> Of course Bourgeois liberals are
> going to try and hijack the concept and water it down. Those
> of us who are radicals already understand that the
> Reparations demand is part of an overall liberation
> strategy, not an end in and of itself. Part of the strategy
> is the simple act of making the demand. Even if we never get
> Reparations, the very act of demanding it and staying in the
> ruling classes face with the demand is powerful all by
> itself.
This leads to the problem of sincerity. We of the Left (at least, of my kind of Left) are powerless, but we possess truth. Our opponents are powerful, but do not possess truth. Truth is our only weapon; if we throw it away by using pretense and insincerity, we have nothing. Therefore, if I seriously intend anarchy and communism I can't sincerely say more about reparations than that if people insist on following the liberal model, they should pay up according to the liberal rules of property, but that I don't believe in the liberal model. I think a society in which reparations -- adjustments of net worth -- were meaningful would simply recreate the problems which they were supposed to address. In fact, "recreate" may be the wrong word -- the system wouldn't miss a beat.
At the same time, I'm not going to oppose liberals who want to pursue reparations -- I assume they believe in them, and they are the only just action under liberalism. But I don't want to repair liberalism and capitalism, I want to get beyond them.
> Also, Reparations will be meaningful even after a Socialist
> revolution. More than anyone, Black/African people need
> serious healing, beyond just the monetary, which will
> actually require more than simple equitable distribution. It
> won't be enough to simply seize the means of production and
> eliminate wage labor, a whole bunch of other shit is going
> to need to be done above and beyond that to heal Black
> people. If it's a serious revolution, and not more bullshit,
> then some serious Reparations will STILL be due. This shit
> is about much much more than mere "wage slavery."
I think you're wrong -- that Black people could manage their affairs perfectly well without "help", provided they could get out from under the race (and class) system. In fact, if the White-suburb thing crashes, I can see them sending out missionaries and aid teams to the stunned survivors, getting them out of their stalled SUVs and darkened malls and giving them blankets and soup. You all laugh, but stranger things have happened -- and will happen.