- You guys have any questions before we move on?
Anything you want to chat about?
We're good, yes sir?
That's an interesting question.
What do you mean by that?
Recently is the key.
Recently is the key
So to your question, to your question,
I think you have to understand what the word
reparations means first.
So reparations you are repairing something
that you have broken, you are paying for something
that you were supposed to pay for.
I'm not saying that there aren't people
living in America today who are suffering
and are going through pain and strife
because of what's happening when it comes
to, you know, machines taking jobs,
factories becoming industrialized, et cetera.
But reparations is a specific conversation
about a specific time in America and that is Black people
were slaves, you know what I mean?
I have even heard people say like,
"Oh but there were some of the Irish
"who were indentured."
Yeah, slavery look at the numbers,
look at the time, look at the level of work.
You could not work toward your freedom
for most Black people in America this was a time
when you were, you lived and died as a slave.
And so that's what reparations is about.
And so I hear what you're saying
but I think that's a completely separate conversation
that needs to be had about the now.
Because if you are not careful
what you then do is you combine everybody's suffering
into the same bowl and you make it seem
like all injustices have the same weighting
and they don't.
Just like crimes, you know, theft isn't the same as murder.
We don't try them the same way.
And as much as there is a White person
who is suffering today, I feel for anybody
who is suffering because I know what it's like
to be poor, I know what it's like to suffer.
I didn't come from a wealthy family.
We struggled when I was growing up.
But I also understand that there are levels
of that suffering, you know?
And so sometimes White people, it does
block a White person because you go,
"White privilege," and a person goes, "I'm poor
"and I'm White, where's the privilege?"
White people are like, "I wish I could activate
"my White privilege. I wish I could do it right now.
"White privilege! Give me something."
(audience laughing)
I get that, I get that, trust me I get it.
It is hard to accept that you have benefits
because of the color of your skin
if you cannot see the benefits that you have.
But the thing I tried to explain to a person
is think of it more like golf.
Don't think of it as privilege then,
think of it like a handicap.
Right?
In golf they acknowledge that you are in a position
where you need so many advantages
to be competitive in the game, right?
So what they say is, "You have a handicap of 15."
So that means you're going to be hitting
from this tee and you get more chances
to get the ball in because we understand
the position you're in.
And if you're a Black person in America,
from slavery, from day one the number of injustices
that have held Black people back in America
amounts to an insurmountable,
like you look at Black people's freedom,
you look at Black people's land,
just land alone.
The amount of wealth you can acquire over time
if you own land is exponential.
Because you have the land, you have the fact
that you can borrow based on the land.
You have the fact that you can use the money
that you have borrowed to grow more wealth.
You can use it to grow your family's wealth.
Just taking that away from Black people alone
is crippling them and so you combine that
with slavery and then you look at Jim Crow Laws.
You didn't let Black people in America
live in the areas that they wanted to live in.
They couldn't get loans from the banks
that they wanted to get loans from.
And then on top of that when they started
getting the loans from American banks,
American banks were found to be giving them
higher interest rates when in fact they were
the same risk as many of the other races
that they were giving loans to.
So, when you combine all of those things,
I think it's safe to say that Black Americans
have a conversation that they need to be having
with the United States.
Doesn't involve me, doesn't involve White people.
It's like, "Yo, American government,
"meet the Black people."
That's it.
(clapping, cheering)
Have that conversation.
(upbeat music)