KIRA DAVIS: The left’s half-a-trillion-dollar slavery reparations fantasy is a woke joke – and an insult to every black American whose ancestors sought freedom from government, NOT more bondage to it
By KIRA DAVIS FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 10:42 EST, 5 December 2022 | UPDATED: 10:42 EST, 5 December 2022
Kira Davis is host of the podcast ‘Just Listen to Yourself with Kira Davis’
Black America’s ancestors are turning over in their graves.
A California task force to ‘study and develop reparations’ is nothing short of a boondoggle.
A 500-page mess of social engineering, vague definitions, and impossible spending, not designed to address the important issue of racial wealth disparity, but to use handouts to hide the progressive left’s true cynical objective – power and control.
At its core, this proposal views black people as infantilized, uneducated victims, who most certainly can’t be trusted with the tools to improve their own lives.
It is an insult. A mirage. A distraction.
First, the black community cannot even agree on the fundamental question of who should receive reparations.
I’m a California resident and tuned into the task force’s last meeting, which was marred by accusations of bias, discrimination and corruption.
Some advocated for anyone of black racial heritage — including immigrants and their descendants — to receive compensation, while others argued that only black American descendants of slaves should be eligible.
In the end, the committee determined that black residents who are descendants of either black slaves or ‘free Black person[s] living in the United States prior to the end of the 19th century’ would qualify.
This superficial progress was hailed as a victory, but scratch below the surface and it’s clear that they’ve done little to advance the impossible dream of true racial reparations.
I’m a California resident and tuned into the task force’s last meeting, which was marred by accusations of bias, discrimination and corruption. (Above) Kamilah Moore is chair of the California Reparations Task Force (left) and Dr. Amos C. Brown (right), vice-chair
A California task force to ‘study and develop reparations’ is nothing short of a boondoggle. (Above) California Reparations Task Force meeting at the California Science Center in Los Angeles on Sept. 22, 2022
In fact, they may have set it back further.
Once upon a time, freed American slaves were promised 40 acres and a mule as compensation for their pain.
Freed slaves, for the most part, found the offer acceptable. The reason for this is simple – the only way to escape poverty is to accumulate wealth. Not cash. Wealth. And wealth requires ownership.
Understanding this, our ancestors from the era of slavery were content with the opportunity to work for their own families in pursuit of their own future, rather than continued forced servitude for the benefit of whites.
40 acres and a mule is what they were promised, but not what they received. The rest is history.
But now we see that the original promise of black American ownership has also been lost, replaced by the reparations task force’s horrifying labyrinth of Black Lives Matters-inspired government committees, oversight, and social justice programs.
This committee is supposed to be the model for reparations across the country?
What a joke.
Their report focused on comparatively irrelevant issues like climate racism, discrimination in entertainment, and domestic violence caused by alleged white supremacy.
Rather than focusing on the legacy of slavery and segregation, the committee dedicated absurd amounts of attention to the health of black LGTBQ Americans.
More than 400 pages into the document, we’re told black transgender ‘women’ are ‘less likely to access healthcare’ because of the ‘legacy of enslavement.’ Or that black LGBTQ Americans have also been found to have higher rates of diabetes, asthma, heart attacks, and cancer
I have not interviewed every single black person in America, but I can confidently say – as a black person – that if you asked a random person of color on the street what the purpose of reparations is, no one would say it is about compensating men, who believe they are women for their health battles.
But this report is more than just ridiculous – it’s dangerous.
The committee pushes for the redistribution of businesses and property in California, allegedly stolen through ‘racial terror’—a ridiculously vague and perniciou
The original promise of black American ownership has also been lost, replaced by the reparations task force’s horrifying labyrinth of Black Lives Matters-inspired government committees, oversight, and social justice programs.
It evokes the disastrous redistribution of farmland in Zimbabwe in the early 2000s. The Zimbabwe government seized farms from white landowners, who had owned their properties for generations and redistributed them to black farmers.
But farming was the backbone of the nation and is a precise and labor-intensive industry. The random redistribution put inexperienced farmers in charge of highly fertile lands. The economy crashed, and eventually the government had to admit the entire scheme was a failure.
Would this type of redistribution mean seizing land and businesses from their current owners in California, granted those people are not black?
Such a thought is deeply concerning, as an American and as a decent human being.
There is also a recommendation to create more mandatory anti-bias curricula, which is already happening in California public schools. So-called ‘anti-racism’ training has already ignited fury among parents of all races for its embedded discrimination against white students.
The committee pushes for the redistribution of businesses and property in California, allegedly stolen through ‘racial terror’—a ridiculously vague and pernicious idea.
In fairness, not all the recommendations are an intellectual stretch.
The call for reparations due to housing discrimination and Jim Crow segregation are legitimate, but alas, not taken seriously.
The committee designed a whopping $223,000 per person for housing issues alone. That amounts to over half a trillion dollars, not to mention what will inevitably be required in order to rectify bizarre complaints over transgender diabetes and climate change.
California can’t afford this. The current state budget is $308 billion and facing a $25 billion deficit.
It’s clear that the committee is far more concerned with social engineering and woke virtue-signaling than building self-sustaining black communities.
It’s not what black America’s ancestors wanted. All they ever asked for was what they were owed: their land and compensation for their servitude in order to build wealth.
Instead, the Californian vision of reparations is an unrealistic fantasy based on punishing ‘white offenders’ by stripping them of their privilege — be it their property, wealth or status.
Kira Davis is host of the podcast ‘Just Listen to Yourself with Kira Davis’ and Deputy Managing Editor of RedState.com
The reality is that if the fate of black Americans is reliant on the decisions of committees, they will never be free to solve their own problems – and that’s just how the left wants it to be.
Go ahead, give the task force trillions – the head of the Department of African American/Freedman Affairs will become the most powerful political force in California. Another unelected bureaucrat, accountable to no one. And all the while, the scheme remains entirely unaffordable.
The real course to correct the injustices black Americans have suffered would be to work to bring wealth and prosperity to all Americans.
Loosen the reins of burdensome laws and policies that discourage entrepreneurs, set up business incubators in low-income areas, lower the cost and raise the quality of education, and support policies that encourage the growth and perpetuation of the nuclear family.
But they won’t do that.
That puts the power in the hands of the people, and We, the People are the last thing on the minds of the powerful elite who have become far too accustomed to using the plight of black America as a political football.
Black America should not trade one master for another.