2016 Postmortem

Last edited Wed Jun 25, 2014, 02:53 PM - Edit history (1)

compare that to MY family history.

My mother's people were land owners in Alabama. They had their land "repossessed" by the court and "encouraged" to leave Alabama, despite owning the land free and clear and not owing a soul.

My father's people were land-owners in Mississippi. They had to abandon their free and clear property when they fled Mississippi, after killing the klansman sheriff caught in the act of raping and killing my Great Grandmother.

When they moved North only to be unable to purchase a house being the governmental program that backed mortgages, didn't back mortgages for Black folks. They both found it difficult to compete for jobs, as the factories posted societal and court sanctioned "No Coloreds Need Apply" signs. They both ultimately opened small businesses (a Butcher Shop and a Shoe-maker) that catered to the segregated Black community, only to see the businesses fail with desegregation, as Black folks could shop at white owned businesses (while entering and leaving through the back door, and being unable to try on their purchases), where whites never shopped in Black owned business (except bars and whore houses, both of which paid high tributes to the white police).

However, my Father's Father and my Mother's Mother valued education and made sure my parents completed high-school; and my parents made sure my sister and I went to college and beyond.

So despite your families' struggles, their American experience was wholly different from my family's and that difference was due to their race. The matter/issue of reparations starts with slavery, but doesn't stop there.