They did not enslave an entire race. That makes it sound like they cleared out Africa.
it's difficult to respond to this statement as it makes no sense. the notion that every single African had to have been captured and forced into slavery in order for them to have been targeted by Europeans to be slaves in the "new world" just boggles the mind. the confederates in their declaration deemed Africans as inferior beings destined for servitude by God. the dread scott decision deemed "a negroe has no rights that a white man is to respect".
I didn't realize they were slaves until 1917.
slavery actually didn't end until around this time. the emancipation proclamation merely outlawed slaves being owned by private citizens and this was only in the rebel confederate states. debt slavery and prison slavery continued on into the 1900s and the treatment of these slaves didn't improve.
Lots of people have been oppressed and marginalized in this country. See Irish, Native American, Italian, Japanese, German, and so on. The only two groups I don't think we've oppressed at some point are the British and the French.
so much for "land of the free" eh? jim crowe laws weren't against any of the other people groups you mentioned. just blacks. none of the other social enclaves of these other people groups were burned down by the people and the government. just the black wallstreets.
good job pointing out the fact that the two people groups that weren't oppressed were the ones doing the oppressing. as far as the irish, Italians, and germans, being marginalized and demeaned, this was all done by their fellow Europeans(they did the same to the others as well BTW). round my way we call that 'white on white crime'(which, BTW, is greater than that of black on black crime according to FBI crime data).
Were any of these people oppressed? No. In fact, many are probably richer than a lot of the people they claim are oppressing them.
yes, they were oppressed as they would've ended up like colin kaepernick if they took the same stance on the issue of police injustice against blacks. they knew this, which is why they softened it with "we're just praying for the country". colin didn't hurt anybody or advocate for hurting anybody. he wanted to bring to the attention of the public an issue on injustice based on race and saw it as absurd for anyone to honor a country that oppresses them. the fact that he has money is irrelevant. I would even say it only makes it more of his duty to use his resources and platform to speak out against injustice in this country. saying that he should hush up about injustice being done to his people just because he's paid is basically telling him that he should be selfish and a sellout.
as far as my "shucking and jiving coon" comment. I stand by it and see no reason not to. when a black person is dancing with a bunch of chains on his neck and shaking hands with people who think he and his kind should be exterminated and would blow his brains out if he came anywhere near their daughters(GW Griffith "the birth of a nation" style), that is absolutely a buck-dancing coon. that guy has been buck broken and thinks if he makes friends with the people who hate his existence, maybe they'll pass over him or won't hurt him as much, instead of fighting against those who would want to do harm to you. it's an egregious form of cowardice and a sign of Stockholm syndrome where you sympathize with your abuser.
