Essay 2 SP

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Justice for What is Owed
Mitchell A. Tarrio
Social Problems
Professor Prior
September 29, 2021

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Wealth is the measurement of savings and assets minus debts. In America, the median
white household’s wealth is 171,000 dollars, while the median black household’s wealth is
17,600 dollars. (Explained 1:33) Why is this? During the great depression, Franklin Delano
Roosevelt put The New Deal into place, which released mortgage credit to the people of the
United States. (Explained 6:22) This sounds like a good thing, but the Federal Housing
Administration did not ensure mortgages to areas that were “high risk”. This led to many white
people moving out of areas that had black families living there since race was a large decider in
whether a community was high risk or not. (Explained 6:50) It became known as redlining
because maps would show areas colored in red which represented high-risk areas. (Explained
7:12) This is systematic racism, and the only justification for this is racism itself. (Explained 6:44)
It became harder for members of the black communities to move into white families’
neighborhoods since they were viewed as a threat to white homeowners. U.S. Senator Cory
Booker dealt with this problem face to face in 1969. Real-estate agents that dealt with black
clients only showed houses that were in African American communities. Houses in white
neighborhoods were said to have already been sold. Booker’s family had to set up a plan that
involved a white family making an offer on the house on their behalf after being turned down
previously. When the day of the closing came around, Cory Booker’s father and a lawyer
showed up. The agent, out of anger, punched Mr. Booker’s lawyer in the face and set a dog on
Mr. Booker himself. The agent was so worried that the black family moving in would drive down
real-estate prices that he begged and pleaded that they do not move in after it was all over.
(Explained 8:06) Homeownership is so important that it accounts for two-thirds of America's
middle classes wealth. (Explained 5:36) Having these disadvantages is a clear breach of equality
and justice and makes the black and white wealth gap grow larger to this day.
To combat this, members of the #Black Lives Matter movement have spoken out and
began protesting. However, this has not been an entirely peaceful protest. Kimberly Jones breaks
the movement into three categories of protesters, rioters, and looters. The protesters are the ones
speaking out on the behalf of African Americans, Rioters are the people causing chaos to bring
attention to the inequalities that Africans Americans are going through that protesting has not
been able to do for 450 years, and looters are taking what they need to survive since the wealth
gap has set them behind so far. (How can we win) In Kimberly Jones’ eyes, all forms of
protesting seem to be understandable and justifiable. She wants the outside to stop looking in at
the whats and a smaller picture and start focusing on the whys in the bigger picture. She says in
the video “How Can We Win”, “I think that as long as we are focusing on the what, we’re not
focusing on the why.” (Kimberly Jones How can we win 1:23) You can sense the emotion and
the passion in her voice about this topic. In the video, the anger, hurt, and sadness that can be
seen throughout all protests for the #Black Lives Matter movement is shown. This is a great
example of the pain that African Americans have been going through for years. The pain from
seeing family members and friends killed, mistreated, and taken advantage of.
The main goal of the #Black Lives Matter movement is to show everyone the harm that
has been caused to the black communities. This includes, but is not limited to police brutality,
economic inequality, and food insecurity, clothing insecurity, and traumatic emotional damage.
In “The Spirit of Rebellion Grows During America’s Summer of Protest”
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by Tyler Tynes, a local organizer of a food drive at Baltimore Community College named
Kwame said, “By the end of the summer, I hope white people see the harm they’ve caused in our
communities. By the end of the summer, we want to see change that tangibly meets the needs of
Black people that dismantles white supremacy, which has lived in this country for 400 years.”
(Tynes, T. paragraph 44) The message is to show what has been done to these communities to
evaluate what is owed.
Fittingly, expert and journalist Nicole Hannah-Jones has shown us in her article “What is
Owed” published in the New York Times Magazine. To start, slavery has caused a major setback
in the ability to create wealth for African Americans. Nothing had been “owned or owed” for the
work of slaves before and after the Civil War. The world around African Americans had a huge
advantage, and nothing was done to catch them back up. As for police violence, not much has
changed about the system and the treatment law enforcement gives to African Americans. This is
a huge problem. However, where Nicole Hannah-Jones makes the most points is in terms of
economics. Since the years of slavery cannot be taken back, and police brutality cannot be repaid
for, monetary accommodations seem to be a must at the very least. Her expertise brings many
facts to the table that are eye-opening and crucial for everyone to be aware of. Out of the
countless examples, three raised my eyebrow. The first is that black Americans had only gotten
40 acres of land upon their freedom from slavery and nothing else. (Hannah-jones, N paragraph
30) The second is about the damage of Tulsa Oklahoma, where armed white men gunned African
American communities and burned down 1,200 homes and businesses. (Hannah-jones, N
paragraph 40) Nothing was reimbursed to these communities by the State Legislature and the
bodies were buried at mass. Lastly, the typical black household is poorer than 80 percent of
white households, with no progress over the past 70 years. (Hannah-jones, N paragraph 56)
These losses must be repaid, and for the betterment and justice of the African American
community, monetary reimbursement is a start of that, so that these members of society may
begin to accumulate the wealth that has been stripped from their very fingertips by a higher
power.
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References
Explained | racial wealth gap | full episode - youtube. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2021,
from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mqrhn8khGLM.
Hannah-jones, N. (2020, June 24). From the Magazine: 'it is time for Reparations'. The New
York Times. Retrieved September 29, 2021, from
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/24/magazine/reparations-slavery.html.
How can we win - youtube. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2021, from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb9_qGOa9Go.
Tynes, T. (2020, June 29). The spirit of Rebellion grows During America's summer of protest.
The Ringer. Retrieved September 29, 2021, from
https://www.theringer.com/2020/6/29/21304911/summer-of-protest-america-2020.

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Justice for What is Owed

September 29, 2021

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