Tag: racism
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The Expertise of Air Traffic Controllers
In the wake of the collision between an American Airlines jet and an Army helicopter at Washington National, and Trump’s blaming the accident on diversity hiring, I’m reminded of Spielberg’s “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” The movie left me with two impressions. First, that governments are competent to organize meeting and communicating with visitors…
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The Doctrine of Discovery
Christopher Columbus’s first landing in America on October 12, 1492 by Dióscoro Puebla, 1862 (Wikimedia Commons) and White Christian Nationalism Doctrine of Discovery It all began with the Doctrine of Discovery. Before the Spanish started the oldest permanent settlement in North America, St. Augustine in 1565. Before the English arrived in Jamestown in 1607. Before…
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Prager University on Slavery
Slave Owners Were Democrats PragerU The Prager University Foundation, or PragerU, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that promotes conservative views. Despite its name it is not an academic institution and does not offer degrees. PragerU has been accused of publishing misleading or false content on climate change, slavery, racism, immigration, and fascism, and promoting anti-LGBT politics. With this reputation to uphold, Candace…
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Read a Slave Code
Because History Makes Ron DeSantis Feel Bad Slave Codes The transcript of the South Carolina Negro Act of 1740 that used to be online at South Carolina Educational Television is now on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. It’s a sign of the times. Slavery in the United States was governed by laws that developed from…
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Lost Generational Wealth
The growing gap between worker productivity and pay has been a new source of wealth since the early 1970’s. A much older but similar source of wealth was pocketed by slave owners. A Citigroup historical review of ties to slavery shows at least indirect profits. The company acknowledged that slavery and slave labor “most likely”…
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Adjusting the Race Lottery
Affirmative Action and Legacy Admissions Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life. ― Cecil Rhodes, 1853-1902 While reading Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates in 2016 I thought about the advantages of being born in America and not a third world country, and being born white.…
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Lincoln and Slavery
It sounds ridiculous and unnecessary, researching Lincoln and slavery. But I’m vetting American heroes with an emphasis on racism, and finding surprises and a slow evolution in Lincoln’s words and actions. Lincoln served in the Illinois Assembly and U.S. House of Representatives as a member of the Whig Party from 1834 to 1849. He opposed both…
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A History of U.S. Immigration Laws
A History of Racism, Jobs, and Resistance to Change Recent debate over immigration and closed versus open borders raises questions about the American history of immigration. It seems that every native-born citizen is descended from immigrants; even the first Native Americans were new arrivals at some point.2 This article looks at tightening restrictions on immigration after…
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Second Class Citizens
Legal Discrimination against Palestinian Israelis Americans are too willing to assume that the only democracy in the Middle East has a written Constitution and Bill of Rights like theirs. The examples below are legal discrimination by the Israeli government. This unequal treatment under the law applies to over 1.7 million Israeli citizens in Israel, more than…
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Madison’s Confederate Memorials
This 1981 memorial at Forest Hill Cemetery was removed August 16, 2017. (Patrick Mack/Wisconsin State Journal) A Timeline of Civil War Memorials United States 1857 In Dred Scott v. Sanford the Supreme Court rules that a slave, or a descendant of slaves, is not an American citizen and has no standing to sue in federal court for…