The House yesterday apologized to black Americans, more than 140 years after slavery was abolished, for the "fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow" segregation.
Question: why is this controversial?
Thursday, July 31, 2008
House apologizes for slavery
A recent Washington Post article describes the House's recent decision to apologize for the U.S. government's involvement in slavery.
Question: why is this controversial?
Question: why is this controversial?
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10 comments:
Well I would wonder why they've decided to make this apology now and not long ago. Did they one day decide "As a side note to the pressing War in Iraq, the recent recession, and issues to finding renewable sources of energy, it seems like the perfect time to say how sorry we are that the U.S. was involved with slavery"? I don't think so. There seems to be some kind of motive behind this apology. They have made this kind of public announcement before when they apologized after WWII for interning the Japanese and Japanese-Americans, but that was right after the occurance. I would like to know more about why they are doing this and why now of all times.
When I first heard of this story I had the same reaction Melissa did. It is somewhat absurd to apologize after such a long period of time. At the same time, I have trouble believing the reason stated in the article for the uneasiness concerning the apology- that it may make it easier to implement reparations - is the real reason it is controversial. I don't think most Americans consider themselves as representing the U.S. government throughout history. I can see how some would feel that we are apologizing for another generation's sins, not our own.
Matt, you write:
"I don't think most Americans consider themselves as representing the U.S. government throughout history."
It's supposed to go the other way around -- the government representing U.S. citizens. Does this make a difference?
I agree with Matt that some could feel that we are apologizing for sins committed by another generation. What makes the whole thing even more nonsensical is that the people who the sin was committed against aren't even here to hear the apology.
Since the government is our representative, whether we agree with them or not, it amounts to us apologizing for slavery we didn't commit to people who were never themselves enslaved. It just doesn't really make any sense to me. (Although I think there are far more important issues in government than this to worry about.)
This story reminds me of a few years ago when people like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton were calling for Congress to give money as reparation to slave descendants. I thought it was bogus for them to ask Congress to do such a thing. That would set the precedent for Japanese to ask for money after spending time at the labor camps or some other group to ask for money because their ancestors were wronged at one time in history. I agree that slavery was wrong and everything, but let bygones be bygones.
The idea of reparations is even more crazy than a government apology. Reparations would amount to actually punishing the innocent through taxation.
Actually, according to Wikipedia, most interned Japanese Americans received monetary reparations in 1988.
This is such an interesting topic!
I was completely amazed that this happened. I really don't see the point in the apology other than it being a distraction and a piece of "feel good" legislation. I have a number of problems with the government apologizing for slavery, far too many to list here. However, the point Natalia brings up about the government representing its citizens puts an interesting twist on the apology.
Our government represents its citizens, so when the government issues an apology it is apologizing on behalf of all of its citizens. Since many of the citizens are descendants of former slaves does that mean they are apologizing to themselves?
The whole idea is silly. Lets focus on solving our problems, not on how to apologize for causing them.
I have the same reaction to this apology as a lot of you do. I think the House apologizes NOW makes no difference to what has happened in the history.
But I do have a thought on why the house apologizes now.
Perhaps because the rising power of African Americans in the United States?
If I were a descendant of former slaves, I would take the apology, because (perhaps) this apology was what I have been waiting for.
For me, if Japan apologized to Chinia for the Nanjing Massacre (which killed 300,000 civilians in China)that happened in 1937, I would be happy to accept its apology, because that is what I have been waiting for.
I know these two events are different, but I still want to give this example to show my point -- I could somehow feel the motivation of the House apologizing to black Amerians,though black Americans today seldom demand this apology.
Adam writes:
"However, the point Natalia brings up about the government representing its citizens puts an interesting twist on the apology."
So we have a couple of ways of thinking about government floating around here. Matt suggested that the people represent the government. I observed that it's usually thought of the other way -- the government represents the people.
There are many more ways to think of the government. For instance, it could be seen as a kind of corporate entity, acting with relative independence from the governed (especially if a majority of the governed have historically had no representation in government, e.g. the poor, women, and black men).
Consider bumper stickers proclaiming, "Don't blame me, I voted for _____!" -- naming an electoral candidate who lost (I have seen this formula in different incarnations after different elections). Such a declaration denies that the government represents the speaker personally. You may have done this yourself when traveling in another country, when questioned about U.S. policies by people living there. Certainly there are few people who can get behind every federal policy.
To what extent is such a denial necessary, possible, practicable?
If you were a descendant of American slaves, how would you feel about being represented by a government that refused to apologize for slavery, a purely symbolic gesture that costs little or nothing?
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