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Thread: Juneteenth Holiday

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    Default Juneteenth Holiday

    It's been in the past five years that I learned about Juneteenth. I am white. I told my African American nurse about the history of emancipated Texan slaves in 1865. She was unaware.

    In the city where I grew up, African Americans were allowed to go to a city park on Juneteenth where they enjoyed the pools and grounds for picnicing and swimming. The next day the pools were drained and refilled. The park was scrubbed.

    Also in the same city the history of taking homes and land away from black people is becoming known. These properties were then used to build city buildings.

    I encounter white people who think these events are much to do about nothing, but for me, it is a time of reckoning and an opportunity to learn and make personal changes in how I think. If you take away someone's home and land without proper compensation, and they loose that generational wealth, and then you tell them to pull themselves up be their boot straps, it reminds me a what Dr. King said, "you don't tell a bootless man to pull himself up by his bootstraps".

    Folks don't change as long as they ignore or dis the truth. Hopefully enough will reconsider and lend our minds to the effort to overcome, as Norman Rockwell said, "a problem we all live with.

    "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice". MLK

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    Default Re: Juneteenth Holiday

    As much as I am into history never really paid attention to, my bad-- a day that should be celebrated no doubt
    The secret of getting ahead is getting started-- Mark Twain

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    Default Re: Juneteenth Holiday

    Long overdue. Like so much about real equity.

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    Default Re: Juneteenth Holiday

    Quote Originally Posted by TSherbs View Post
    Long overdue. Like so much about real equity.
    I would imagine equity more as not making a difference between us and them; they have their own group, you call them by their ethnicity ("african american") and / or skin color (I've read black, brown, colored people, etc.), you celebrate "their" history, "their" culture, "their" ... instead of "ours".

    This is a difference in European and American way of viewing things. We don't really separate people like that, only by citizenship. I've never in my life, in real life, heard anyone consider himself "white" before. Just Slovenian. Or Austrian. Or Serbian. Or Croatian.

    I understand that might also be due to relatively homogenous populace in comparison to the US, however, so I'm not trying to throw shade, just an observation in cultural differences.

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    Default Re: Juneteenth Holiday

    Quote Originally Posted by adhoc View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by TSherbs View Post
    Long overdue. Like so much about real equity.
    I would imagine equity more as not making a difference between us and them; they have their own group, you call them by their ethnicity ("african american") and / or skin color (I've read black, brown, colored people, etc.), you celebrate "their" history, "their" culture, "their" ... instead of "ours".

    This is a difference in European and American way of viewing things. We don't really separate people like that, only by citizenship. I've never in my life, in real life, heard anyone consider himself "white" before. Just Slovenian. Or Austrian. Or Serbian. Or Croatian.

    I understand that might also be due to relatively homogenous populace in comparison to the US, however, so I'm not trying to throw shade, just an observation in cultural differences.
    Yes, Juneteenth is a uniquely American date of significance.

    And I can't imagine that Europe is free from prejudice and racism (albeit parsed through different terms and languages).

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    Default Re: Juneteenth Holiday

    Quote Originally Posted by adhoc View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by TSherbs View Post
    Long overdue. Like so much about real equity.
    I would imagine equity more as not making a difference between us and them; they have their own group, you call them by their ethnicity ("african american") and / or skin color (I've read black, brown, colored people, etc.), you celebrate "their" history, "their" culture, "their" ... instead of "ours".

    This is a difference in European and American way of viewing things. We don't really separate people like that, only by citizenship. I've never in my life, in real life, heard anyone consider himself "white" before. Just Slovenian. Or Austrian. Or Serbian. Or Croatian.

    I understand that might also be due to relatively homogenous populace in comparison to the US, however, so I'm not trying to throw shade, just an observation in cultural differences.
    It is "our" history, but "their" experience is not "our" experience.

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