Rarely has there been a more unqualified person for the position he holds than Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson. A bitter racist to the core, his latest attempt to improve his 23% approval rating is to demand reparations. In a recent interview, he criticized President Donald Trump for ignoring the “demands” of the “descendants of the formerly enslaved.”
The “descendants of the formerly enslaved.” That’s a new one. Another way to say it would be the “descendants of the formerly emancipated.” As a former history teacher, Johnson should presumably know that the freedom of black slaves was paid for with the blood of over 360,000 Union soldiers, mostly white, and that the lands of the slaveowners themselves were utterly destroyed.
The debt has been paid.
Two other historical tidbits our humble teacher-mayor should be familiar with are: 1) nowhere else in the history of the world did one race of people wage war and die to free another race of people from slavery, and 2) at one time or another, every race of people has both enslaved and been enslaved.
So, Brandon, from one “descendant of the formerly enslaved” to another, allow me to offer you some advice as to how others have managed to climb out of their hole without demanding reparations from innocent people centuries after the fact.
CULTURE
The term “ghetto” has come to symbolize downtrodden inner city neighborhoods in which minorities, by their own choice, self-segregate. But the original ghettos were sections of European cities in which Jews were forcibly placed. The practice began in 1555 in Venice and spread across Europe and Russia and ended in 1870; the Nazis reestablished it after their rise to power.
Despite being forced to live in ghettos, and despite the discriminatory laws against them, and despite their limited opportunities for education and employment, do you know what the Jews did? They thrived anyway.
Do you know what the Jews didn’t do? They didn’t use their music, art, and culture to glorify violence or drug use or domestic violence. They didn’t lionize their own thugs and criminals. They didn’t harbor animosity towards fellow Jews who managed to do better in life as “sellouts.” They didn’t deify ignorance.
FATHERS
Approximately 63% of black children in America are raised without a father. In Brandon’s Chicago, over 80% of black children are born to unmarried mothers. These numbers aren’t just devastating. They represent a crossed Rubicon that no amount of reparations or handouts can undo.
Black fatherlessness in America is the direct result of the welfare state, which Democrats established with the goal of turning the black community into a helpless, dependent, and permanent voting bloc. With the welfare state, Democrats managed to do what they tried but couldn’t do through slavery, segregation, or the KKK. They managed to destroy the black family.
TRIBALISM
If you want to succeed in a multiracial democracy, you need to learn how to play nice with others. If you treat other races as an eternal enemy, they’re going to return the favor. There is no “reverse” racism, there is just racism. Pure, ugly, and inexcusable.
If you believe in God, I hope you have a good reason for judging hundreds of millions of people based solely on the color of their skin.
If you believe in money, you should know that capitalism is colorblind, and its inherent laws systemically punish racism. Racist bosses, managers, owners, and workers, regardless of their skin color, always fall behind in a system that rewards merit over tribe.
If you believe in socialism, don’t complain when the chains of slavery fetter your limbs, because this is exactly what you’re asking for. The intersectional hierarchy upon which systems of resentment are built only allows for one “victim” at the top. The odds that you’ll have a chair when the music stops are slim to none.
MOVING FORWARD
All due respect to the “descendants of the formerly enslaved,” but there have been collective punishments against entire races of people that have been much more brutal than agricultural slavery, and have occurred much more recently.
The Japanese armies invaded and colonized Korea, China, and large swathes of southeast Asia. Under their governorship, millions of people were enslaved, to include women used for sex slaves for Japanese soldiers. In the city of Nanking alone, over 300,000 people were murdered in a six-week pogrom. Babies were used for bayonet practice.
After the war, some of these nations descended into the hell of communism. Others didn’t, and places such as South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong emerged as economic powerhouses.
The Soviet armies and their puppets brutally occupied eastern Europe for half a century. When the Soviets packed up and skedaddled, they offered neither a single ruble nor a word of apology. And yet these nations bounced back on their own. And whatever trials and tribulations these people do go through, they don’t lay the blame on Russia’s doorstep.
And of all the slaves shipped to the New World (whom Africans or Muslim Arabs sold), only 4% came to the land now known as the United States. Over 40% of them went to Brazil. Over 55% went to Latin American countries on the whole. And over 30% went to Caribbean Islands. Those slaves worked in much harsher conditions than their northern brethren, and their mortality rate was astronomically higher.
Yet there has not been a peep of reparation demands made to any Latin American country, nor to the nations or empires that originally enslaved the victims in Africa. It should also be added that no European country has demanded anything from the North African and Muslim nations that enslaved white Europeans by the millions until the early 20th Century. Nor do we want anything from them.
The reason that demands for reparations are not made elsewhere is because the allegedly aggrieved would be told to go pound sand. The reason they are made here is because our elected leaders are largely RINO wimps and Manchurian Democrats acting out of weakness or Machiavellian calculation.
But reparations won’t fix the problems of the “descendants of the formerly enslaved.” They’ll exacerbate them. If everyone in the inner city ghettos were to trade places with everyone in the middle and upper class suburbs, to include land, wealth, homes, assets, and even careers, do you know what would happen? The once-thriving suburbs would fall into ruin, and the once-impoverished inner city ghetto would thrive.
That’s because it’s not about race, it’s not about money, and it’s not about alleged “privilege.” It is about culture and values. And until you change yours, no amount of reparations is going to change anything.
Mayor Johnson, I offer this advice on the generous assumption that your reparations push is being driven from an honest attempt to better the lives of black Chicagoans, rather than a cynical ploy to weaponize their bitterness and resentment. But if your own comical sense of eternal victimhood is an obstacle too great, then I don’t know what to tell you. Full speed ahead, I guess.
I’m confident your efforts will drastically improve the lives of your voters, and that your 23% approval rating will skyrocket.