Zimmerman Martin Case

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joshuapowell26

New member
Barack Obama's parents were of mixed ethnic background. Barack Obama mother, Stanley Ann Dunham was an American of English descent from Wichita, Kansas, while Barack Obama father, Barack Obama Sr., was from Nyang'oma Kogelo, Nyanza Province of Kenya.

if you want to be technical then he is Kenyan-American, even if Kenya is in Africa, Obama is not African American, he was born (supposedly) here and like Zimmerman, is "half" white, but I guess you're only half when it suits your argument right?
 
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JM3245

New member
what i find amazing is the complete lack of empathy into the african american experience. and that maybe, just maybe, the context of the last couple hundred years has informed many african americans' opinions on the matter. the charges of reverse-racism and hypocrisy are particularly galling.

god (and i use "god" as a figure of speech only), you must really hate barack obama, because you've mentioned him like 10 times in a thread about a totally different subject. your head must've exploded the other day when he had his press conference.
 
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niupt2k

Member
There's no "even if" about it. Kenya IS in Africa. This is not something in dispute. And Kenyan-Americans ARE African-Americans, just like Chinese-Americans ARE Asian-Americans, because China is in Asia.





Supposedly? Oh boy, is the birth certificate conspiracy theory still in circulation?

And the fact that someone is born in America doesn't mean they're not Irish-American, Italian-American, Asian-American, or African-American. Go to South Boston and ask how many people are Irish-American. Most will raise their hands. Ask how many people were born in Boston. Most will raise their hands.



If someone cannot have ANY white ancestry to self-label as African-American, then essentially nobody is. Most African-Americans have at least some caucasian blood in them. But that doesn't mean they don't identify with the African-American community and they aren't treated as "black" by racists. I don't have any problem with someone with one white parent identifying as African-American. Consider, when someone looks like this:



Every racist he's ever met has considered him to be a "black man," so why can't he self-identify as one? Are you instead suggesting we dust off the word "mulatto" from the dust of history and bring it back into circulation?
 
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birdiechick6543

New member
A good number (probably most) Americans of Irish descent disagree with you. I've actually never met someone who argues you have to have been born in Ireland to be "Irish-American."

Wikipedia article on "Irish Americans"



Hmmmmm...John F. Kennedy wasn't born in Ireland, was he?

Wikipedia article on "Irish American Heritage Month"
 
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DarioCe

New member
Out of interest why should the last couple hundred years be relevant? Leaving aside segregation, black people alive today didn't live through the oppression of a couple centuries past and white americans weren't the perpetrators. It seems weird for people to hang on it like that. Like how some old slave families seek reperations from the family of the then land owner even though neither party had any involvement at all.

There also seems to be some idea of exceptionalism in it. Like black americans have some sort of special history because of slavery ignoring that every race, including whites if you look at serfdom in the same light, have suffered oppression also. I just find it weird people always bring up that black people suffered for the last few hundred years like the people alive today actually lived through it when they didn't. I feel like that sort of clibging to the past just adds to feeligs of division and works counter to tearing dowb the race boundart
 
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slm4jesus

New member
re: role models. The Peter Westbrook Foundation serves underprivileged youth of New York City. Two members of the US Fencing team, Daryl Homer and Ibtihad Muhaofftopicd, came from the Peter Westbrook Foundation. The Peter Westbrook Foundation is arguably the most competitive fencing organization in the United States, particularly in saber.

Peter Westbrook Foundation promo - YouTube

60 Minutes interview with Peter Westbrook:

Peter Westbrook Interview - 60 Minutes - YouTube
 
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MikieLikesItt

Member
i think you raise many good points. and i get where you're coming from.

but slavery was not that long ago. and the "south" attacked the "north" to keep it going. after slavery, there's roughly a hundred years of attempted suppression by the same southern states (and some northern ones too, let's be honest), to keep african americans down. and we're not only talking about the very real threat of lynching, we're talking about state and municipal governments passing laws to keep african americans suppressed. we are talking about current history when we're talking about the suppression of african americans voting, for instance. or redlining. or the very real violence african americans encountered that led up to the civil rights movement.

by your logic, should someone of the jewish persuasion not talk about or "cling" to the holocaust?
 
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ThierryM

New member
Slavery was several generations ago but Jim Crow segregation wasn't. Kids today? Their parents or grandparents were part of those events. That's not ancient history. Like the Holocaust, it's recent history that still affects the current generation because their parents and grandparents lived through it. I had a college professor whose wife, despite having a PhD, was denied the right to vote because she "failed" a literacy test (a subjective test where all whites seemed to pass and all blacks seemed to fail). Middle-aged African-Americans today remember seeing the federal government have to send the 101st Airborne Division to a high school so that black kids to go to class without being beaten by other students or expelled by the school administration.



My mom was eleven years old when this happened. It's not ancient history.
 
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jessieyC

Member
also, ask a greek about turks. then tell me that the collective conscious of a people can't be linked to events hundred of years in the past.
 
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KayaD

New member
good points, you too mitlov, and I do understand the issue with things like the jim crow laws. But to answer a couple of your questions:

RE jews clinging to the holocaust: Obviously its an important part of jewish history (that being said, they haven't ever really had the best time of it) but if they used it to say have a problem with midern Germans then I would have the same issue with it. I don't object to black people remembering slavery and the fight for equal rights, I obkect to how it seems to be used in some cases to justify attitudes today. Obviously it takes more than a generation fpr these things to not have some personal effect but I wouldn't be jumping to help it linger either.

For instance my great aunt's family except her were killed in the holocaust. My mum is still effected by that idea and its another reason she hates anyrhing nazi related. I persoanlly don't really care about it as harsh as that may be. I don't really see thw value of her approach over mine and feel like it just helps keep up divisions and barriers.
 
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blonddie

New member
Zimmerman helps rescue a family in an over-turned car.


http://www.theweek.co.uk/us/54253/george-zimmerman-rescues-family-overturned-car
 
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thedeadphishphan

New member
The way REAL, ACTUAL African's were treated was horrible... beyond horrible. The slaves that were here, some direct from Africa, some born here was all terrible.. there is no excuse for that treatment in any sense.

The Jewish people were almost completely wiped out however, so I don't know if I would put that quite on the same scale. Both were atrocities and should never have happened.

There is nothing wrong with no forgetting what happened for history sake... but really, LET IT GO. There is nothing you can do to get back what happened no matter your color/ethnic background.

Basically, every ethnic group has some sort of reason they could complain and throw a fit when something happens and then use their father's father's father's etc history as an excuse for it. Call it what you want... I call it whining.
 
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Z4R4THU5TR4

New member
I think that might be a little harsh, considering there is still a great deal of mistrust and racism in society today. However it's worthy to note that slavery is not the reason for the current problems. Until we can focus on fixing the plight of African American youth, and reduce the number of children born into poverty, then we can start mending fences.
 
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lecoq742

New member
let it go? john lewis, member of congress, was beaten while marching across a bridge in 1965. he and others were peacefully marching across a bridge, and white cops in selma, alabama beat him and others. why? for voting rights.

you really have no idea what you're talking about.
 
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