Robert Johnson, the founder of Black Entertainment Television, called for the U.S. government to give $14 trillion in reparations for slavery.
Johnson, America’s first black billionaire when he sold BET to Viacom in 2001, told CNBC the government should pay trillions in reparations to help reduce racial inequality. He said, “Now is the time to go big,” to keep the country from splitting into separate and unequal societies, Johnson told CNBC.
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Doesn’t he know that the societies would be unequal if this were implemented? Nobody today was alive when racism was enacted or emancipated. Slavery is a stain on our American history, and if you want to see this country get to a better place, change has to begin from the bottom up.
Since last week, this country has been facing a national reckoning over racism, as cities across the country erupted in protests over the weekend following the murder of George Floyd. The idea of paying reparations to the descendants of slaves to close America’s racial wealth gap has been around since the Civil War. Still, it only has the support of approximately 25% of Americans.
Johnson said, “White America cannot embrace the notion that the original sin of slavery deserves some recompense. My argument is there is no problem in trying to implement a cash payment to 40 million African-Americans to let them achieve equality of opportunity that has been denied to them for over 200 years.”
[Fox News] Johnson told host Bret Baier that Americans must look at the passing of time in “total context.”
“Part of that context is people have a right to protest when they see injustice. That goes all the way back to Dr. Martin Luther King,” he said. “But on the other hand, we have to go to the root cause of people’s protesting that leads to violence, whether it is agitated violence or just violence because people feel frustrated and bitter.”
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“The taxpayers will pay for this because for two reasons, particularly,” Johnson responded. “One, it is an atonement for 200-plus years of slavery, segregation, Jim Crowism, and the denial of people opportunity rights. But, the result of that payment would be to bring African-Americans equal to White Americans in terms of opportunity, wealth and income.
“Instead of looking at it as a payment, look at it as an investment in 40 million African-Americans who deserve equal treatment and equal opportunity.”
Johnson added that the return on that investment would include more African-Americans “taking responsibility to build their communities [and] families [and] to become successful businesspeople and entrpreneurs who pay taxes and contribute to society.”
If they give reparations, I won’t be standing in line. It’s not that I am stupid and or an idiot, but I wouldn’t have worked for it. As I said before, I was not part of slavery, not have I spoken to anyone who was a slave—taking money for something that I didn’t have active participation would be like stealing.
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Should black Americans want reparations? To each its own. When that money is spent, would they want more? How much for each person and who gets it since not every black person has heritage from Africa. Some come from the islands, South America, etc.
Johnson, who was praised for calling out Joe Biden and is a mouthpiece against the Democrat Party by Republicans, is now finding himself on the hot seat for choosing a topic that many Republicans do not support.
This piece was written by Wayne Dupree on June 1, 2020. It originally appeared in WayneDupree.com [4] and is used by permission.