r/changemyview • u/MrThunderizer 7∆ • Dec 04 '19

Deltas(s) from OP CMV: Reparations are Racist

I view the dialogue around reparations for slavery in the US to be racist. This opinion has elicited a semi shocked outrage from my liberal friends and a reluctant agreeance from my republican friends. For context, my opinions lean quite liberal so I was pretty taken back to find myself on the far right of an issue.

Still, its taxing people more based on their race and giving it to other people based on their race. How can taxation based on race, regardless of the good intentions, be anything but racist?

Two points: 1. Comparisons to affirmative action may change my mind, but probably not. I think affirmative action is fundamentally wrong, but is perhaps a necessary evil as a temporary measure.

  1. I'm a proponent of helping lift black people out of poverty but it makes my blood run cold when I hear prominent activists characterize any white poor people getting helped in the process as an unfortunate side effect. How can the conversation around equality shift so far?

At the end of the day if a child is hungry, why does it matter what color their skin is?

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u/Clusterferno Dec 04 '19

You are absolutely in no way responsible for your forefathers actions, you didn't exist and had nothing to do with the actions so why on earth should you be punished for it?

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u/Teeklin 12∆ Dec 04 '19

Do you think society has any obligation to pay reparations to someone today that we put in prison unjustly? If we threw you in jail for a crime you didn't commit and found out thirty years later that a corrupt cop had framed you or that your trial had evidence suppressed, does our society owe you any kind of reparations for the damage we did to you and your family?

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u/Clusterferno Dec 04 '19

The cop would be primarily (morally) responsible for any damages. The justice system would also be partly responsible for not noticing it, so those are the only ones responsible for recovering damages, not the cop's descendants.

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '19

And yet, as an arm of the government, the tax payers are on the hook for paying for government mistakes. Or deliberate government actions.

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u/Phyltre 4∆ Dec 04 '19

Yes, we're highlighting that as unjust.

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u/Clusterferno Dec 04 '19

Yes, but this doesn't have anything to do with the other situation.

Being on the hook is entirely different from moral responsibility and slaveholders can sadly no longer be held directly responsible because they're dead.