The reparations scam

The world is awash in scams, and always has been. One of the more recent ones that concerns me is the reparations scam.

Now reparations make some sense when the object is to compensate individuals for something that was taken from them improperly or illegally. But the new twist is to claim reparations for wrongs done to ones ancestors, perhaps even many generations back. To the best of my knowledge it started with African-Americans playing on liberal guilt to claim reparations from large, well-heeled companies for how they may have used or abused their slave ancestors. But since it sometimes works, I see it beginning to crop up elsewhere, such as the African nations request through the UN for reparations from their former colonial rulers.

It’s interesting that American blacks don’t seem to feel it necessary to ask for reparations from their black African brothers who originally captured them, transported them to the coast, and sold them to whites. Could it be because these tribes have almost no money? Or perhaps because these tribes aren’t infused with the liberal guilt that makes the scam work in the first place?

Of course, this might become the world’s new growth industry, since almost everyone in the world can find a few ancestors who were trampled on by somebody or other, human history being what it is. Perhaps I ought to seek reparations from the Normans who about 1000 years ago took over what is now England by force from my putative ancestor Harold Godwinson (almost certainly not an ancestor of mine, but in this sort of scam, accuracy doesn’t really matter). With a good lawyer, I might get rich this way……..