I actually just read that article, "The Case for Reparations," after following the link at the end of this article to the NAACP website supporting HR 40. Not being particularly familiar with reparations for blacks, I was curious to learn more. After carefully reading his article, and as someone who believes in equality and justice for all regardless of race, it's hard for me to not support HR 40. America has had a long history of white supremacy and to deny that it continues today is itself one of the modern manifestations of institutional racism. I bristle at the notion that I should be punished for being born white into a society of white supremacy, but at the same time, I cannot deny that my life has been affected positively by my race, in ways which are both nebulous and largely invisible to me. I don't wish to benefit from racism any more than I wish to see someone suffer under the yoke of racism.

I have seen the topic of reparations brought up before by divisive public figures who frame it as an issue of "white people need to pay money to black people," when in reality, it is much more complicated than that. Institutionalized injustices along racial lines have been occurring for as long as there has been history, and finding ways to overcome them and ensure that justice prevails for future generations should be the ultimate goal of everyone.

The pervasive and pernicious injustices of racism against black people seem clear and present when considering American history over the past couple centuries, but it by no means stops there. How can one even begin to address the injustice of two entire continents stolen from Native Americans by Europeans over the last five hundred years? Their cultures and races have almost entirely been wiped out to the point where there is nobody left to even offer reparations to, not to mention the fact that so much more than just "wealth" was denied to them; and if the most dire predictions about global warming turn true for future generations, will we all deserve reparations from those at the top of the global capitalist pyramid? I don't mean to distract from the topic at hand, but these systemic and institutionalized injustices seem to be everywhere when you start looking for them, and I am at a loss when it comes to formulating specific solutions to any of them.