If the government were to pay for blacks to travel to Africa, would you go?
I’m not talking about paying you to “go back” and stay. And I’m definitely not talking about the government kicking you out of the country and revoking your citizenship. But what if, out of the kindness of its heart, your government decided to fund travel for blacks wanting to visit or relocate to a country in Africa… would you go?
In America, when we have conversations about reparations, should we add this to our list of requests?
Going even further, it would only be right that the government provide money for us to buy land in Africa, too. You know, since they sort of reneged on that whole 40 acres and a mule thing, right?
I say yes to all of it!
Where There’s a Will…
Where would the money come from? I can hear non-blacks having a fit over the possibility of being taxed for such a thing. They have no problem paying taxes for militarized police departments or paying the salaries of bad cops (or for their leave of absence whenever they’re investigated after a killing. Heck, they even contribute to GoFundMe campaigns to make sure they’re taken care of!) or even paying for prisons to house people victimized by the system. These people would have a conniption at the mere idea of the government paying for something like this though.
But wait… black people pay taxes, too!
Might some of our tax dollars be routed to a fund like this? And could more dollars be re-routed from monies that go toward aiding countries like Israel or things like the prison-industrial complex? I mean, it’s not like the government doesn’t owe us something for our contributions here, right? Instead of helping to fund another country or paying to imprison mothers for things like using someone else’s address to send a child to a better school (i.e. a “white” school), wouldn’t that money be better spent paying the debt that this country owes black people? Instead of asking us to pay for things that are used against us, how about asking us to help fund something that might help us?
People will say this is crazy, but I think it’s a completely rational idea. Even if they didn’t pay for an entire trip, couldn’t they subsidize part of a trip for black people to touch earth in Africa at least once in their lifetimes?
And, for the record, I’m not ONLY imagining the United States’ government doing something like this, but what if countries like England, France, Belgium, Brazil, Jamaica and Portugal all decided this was a good idea, too? How amazing would that be?
So, if the government provided a grant for your trip, would you go? Most of us, I imagine, will say yes, but do you know any blacks who would not go? And, if so, why do you think they’d refuse?
The floor is now yours, so let’s talk about this below.