Thread by @mrhick01

NEW 🧵! Interest Convergence & The American Democratic Republic

It's often been argued that white America has only conceded to Black American demands for justice when there has been interest convergence for the whites in power. (1/x)

Example 1: during the Civil War, emancipation of the enslaved in the South was not the endgame, but a means to strike a blow to the Confederate economy & war effort.

It was the means to preserve the Union. (2/x)

Example 2: With the American Civil Rights Movement (CRM) & the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, the Voting Rights Act in 1965, & the Fair Housing Act in 1968, the motivating drive was not to help Black Americans out of good will... (3/x)

...it was to avoid looking hypocritical to the rest of the world as the Communist Soviet Union & China pointed out that the United States *talked* freedom, but Jim Crow in the south & job & housing discrimination in the north made those words a lie. (4/x)

We have voices in America telling us that #Reparations, pure reparations, is an impossible dream.

For many reasons & centuries of history, Black Americans descended from chattel slavery are despised & stigmatized, even amongst other Black Americans! A bottom caste.

(5/x)

The main question comes down to: what's in it for the rest of the country? Why should governments of the United States: federal, state, & municipal, do this at all?

Where's the interest convergence? (6/x)

It all comes down to this: remember this day?

That day when a series of acts were committed to stop & change the results of the 2020 Presidential election? #January6thInsurrection (7/x)

You know, that political party whose main factions are white christian nationalists, people who assert that "CRT" is destroying American education & "the way of life," ... (8/x)

...& now evokes crackpot theories like "independent state legislature theory" as a means of controlling national elections for like...well, *forever,* (9/x)

And *despite all of these emerging realities* in the face of a whole American political party who has resolved that American democracy is disposable if their unpopular beliefs & ideas can't win... (10/x)

...and you have Democratic Party political hacks & "mediots" ready to lay blame at the feet of Black American male voters (!?!) when likely losses happen at the mid-terms. (11/x)

People will engage in all of these performative contortions rather than understanding that more & more Black Americans are serious about having the owed debt restored to our people, with interest & damages for suffering. (12/x)

Here's the interest convergence:

America! Do you love your American democracy? How much does it matter to you to keep it?

If it really matters that much to you, get serious about reparative justice for the group of over 40M American citizens that you've denied it to. (13/x)

Democrats! The American Democratic Party:

If you genuinely value this Republic, then do material justice for the unquestionably most loyal, durable faction of your party that you have! Commit to Black American #reparations & a national Black agenda! (14/x)

*Stop scapegoating Black American men* for the threat to American democracy.

Acknowledge your cowardice to do justice by our people. Evolve. Fix Black America to fix America! (15/.)