Whats Fair

[Spidey]

You correct the wrongs of the past by eliminating then, and trying your best not to repeat them.

The problem begins the minute you try to make up for them.

[Will Robinson]

...
So then, how do you right a past wrong, say slavery and oppression of a particular race, when bitterness competes with empathy and entitlement competes with sharing?

You would have to accept that you CAN NOT right a past wrong of that kind. It can not be done. Period.
You can only work toward stopping the residual effects. A good synopsis is: Affirmative action=Good. Quotas=Bad.

You also must have role model on the "bitter/oppressed" side lead by gracious and magnanimous example to foster hope and confidence instead of using every discussion to assign blame and keep those 'bitter fires' fueled.

A good example: Michelle Obama, in an interview after viewing the Jackie Robinson movie said it reminds her of how far we still have to go in race relations. = Bad.

Jackie Robinson was making his struggle during the height of Jim Crow, late1940's when black men and women had to use the back door....the 'colored' drinking fountain, the back of the bus if any bus at all!!
She is watching the movie in 2013...from the White House...where her husband, a black man, is the President of the United States!! A job he couldnt have if not for mostly white people voting for him to have it!!

The proper response, assuming she wanted to move things toward resolution instead of polarizing and preserving the division would be to point out just how far we have come and telling those young black children that now it is up to them to cash in on the blood sweat and tears of those that came before them and made it possible for her and Barrack to be living in the WhiteHouse, Leaders of the free world!! She could have opened the door to 'post racial' america instead of using the opportunity to imply those children were still facing what Jackie Robinson faced. Yes of course there is still some bigotry...there always will be. But that was not the time to direct the focus on the negative if you wanted to move toward a positive outcome! Those kind of potentially great moments are constantly thrown away or poisoned by minority 'leaders' because they follow the role of community agitator instead of societal healer.

The concept that 'fairness' is something that would be there if not for a political group being in the way is a terrible lie being told for strictly selfish reasons. Be they revenge or party solidarity or any mix of those kind of reasons they are ultimately selfish and counterproductive. Fairness is a luxury we afford ourselves when all concerned operate under the agreed premise that we are all equal. You play a board game or a game of cards or a game of football, etc. etc. You even up the teams and you play by the rules and know that things are "fair" if no one breaks the rules. If you teach the kids things are not even from the outset then they can't have a fair game. They become bitter and anti-social because they are taught to be militant by militants instead of being taught they are in the promised land, they deserve to be there and now they must make the most of it....etc. etc.

Walking around with your pants on the ground because you are emulating prisoners, celebrating misogyny in your poetry and music and being 20 times more likely to murder each other than the white kids is not a result of current racial prejudice that you face. Racial prejudice used to be much, much, worse and yet those symptoms were much much less prevalent in the minority community back then. The problem is more of a self inflicted wound by virtue of how the situation has been reacted to and pimped by power hungry selfish bastards than any one has the guts to admit and the process of making excuses for it is killing people and driving us farther from resolution.

[Sergeant Thorne]

Good post.

[CUDA]

True dat

[Tunnelcat]

I can't improve on your observations, nor disagree with them Will. Remember too, that anything a politician says in some speech, even the wife of a politician, is spoken to further an agenda.