I wonder how many black people are celebrating July 4th?

[Cyrano]

July 4th, 1776, was the day the Continental Congress declared independence from Great Britain.

But slaves did not gain independence from their owners. And many of those who signed the Declaration of Independence were slave owners.

I also doubt if any native Americans have much to celebrate.

Sorry for this downer post while people are at a bar-b-cue and/or setting off fireworks. But since the wingnuts are trying to erase history, I though it best to remind ourselves about the particular history being celebrated today.

[ITAL]

1. Who Knows

But the first guy this morning who wished me a Happy 4th was a Black guy getting BBQ stuff ready, so I don't think it's an insignificant number.

[jimfields33]

2. I agree. I doubt many people will change their typical annual plans.

[Srkdqltr]

3. Most people will be celebrating. Most of the angst is on du here.

[Cyrano]

4. Yep.

When I posted this, I thought I'd either take a lot of crap, or be totally ignored. It's really hard to look at the reality of a day that many/most? of us have celebrated throughout our lives.

[Srkdqltr]

5. Not giving you crap, it's just that people here are more passionate about things than the general

Public. Very few will give up the holiday.

[applegrove]

6. I wonder how many anti-democratic white people are celebrating?

[Cyrano]

7. Five members of the SCOTUS ... plus one

[CatWoman]

8. actually, I've never understood black people going all out on July 4

but that's just the radical in me.

[Cyrano]

10. Just as a guess, it's just like

many, many people "celebrate" Christmas, even though they aren't Christians. It's a holiday on which to go shopping.

July 4th is a holiday to bar-b-cue and watch fireworks. -- My guess for this day is that millions of people don't know it's when the colonies told the United Kingdom to fuck off.

[Solly Mack]

30. Growing up in Atlanta, it was more a case of celebrating family. Not the holiday itself.

Got a new red, white, and blue outfit and got together with family to celebrate each other.

Every now and then someone wanted to make the connection between how we celebrated the day to the actual holiday but not usually.

We did always try to watch the fireworks coming from the (old) Atlanta Stadium, but we could see them from our front yard.

[Red Mountain]

9. I don't think many white people are REALLY celebrating the reason for the holiday

just a day off from work that's an excuse to get together with family and friends.

Black people do that, too.

For that matter, I know plenty of black people that consider themselves patriotic Americans and why shouldn't they? I as a white person don't have to embrace every aspect of our shared history nor should they.

[mackdaddy]

11. I look at July 4th as the birth of an imperfect Union with aspirations to get better.

And although we have and will have more setbacks along the way, the United States is a much better place that it was 250 years ago, and the world is a much better place than it would be with out it.

The flaws and sins of our past as a country exist, but much has been accomplished to address and improve on them. We of course have to keep on pushing for the progress to keep improving on them to 'Form a more perfect Union'.

I think that is why we call ourselves 'Progressives'.

[Deuxcents]

12. Nicely put

[electric_blue68]

26. Yeah. I said something like this a day or two ago. 👍

[ShazzieB]

35. Well stated!

[nolabear]

13. Where I am, lots.

The Fourth is a time to have summer fun for most people. BBQ, picnics, parades, seeing friends, drinking a little, music, laughter, all the joys of just living. The politics is secondary, or indulged in those for whom it’s not.

[Cyrano]

17. Yes, in some ways, it's a day of joy.

And it's a day of celebration which I've always enjoyed. For too many years, I just didn't "get it."

Watching today's Republicans trying to erase American history and normalizing hatred of "The Other," diminishes us all. And that's exactly what's currently happening.

And by the way, politics were not "secondary" to those who toiled, suffered and died in the cotton fields of those miserable, fucking Southern Plantations.

[nolabear]

33. I don't mean they're secondary in everyday life. Not at all.

But celebration is possible, for a different reason, the joy of being together in spite of the horrors wrought on so many. Of being able to play together. Maybe of surviving.

[Elessar Zappa]

14. In my experience, most.

[treestar]

15. Why this year?

This could have been said every year.

It seems people are letting TFG and his minions wreck the idea of America for them.

There is no slavery now. Black people have in theory at least, been included. I don't see why they would not celebrate and many black people have been in the military and why be as divisive as to think they are outside the whole thing now?

Not everyone is either black or white now, either. If someone's parents were interracial are they supposed to be stuck in a quandary over everything?

[Cyrano]

18. "Black people have in theory at least, been included."

treestar, I've always enjoyed and respected your posts. But can you read or watch today's news and believe that Black people are included. Nearly a day doesn't go past where we don't see a story of a white cop shooting a black child/man/woman.

I must disagree with you here. We still live in a black and white world. One problem is that most whites don't realize it.

[treestar]

19. that's rare enough, I mean you can't say those shootings mean

that black people should still think of themselves as entirely excluded. This either/or thing is too much. What about that black people have been in the military and there are some black generals? What about the black president, vice president, supreme court justices, Senators, representatives? Professionals and even millionaires? It's no good ignoring all the progress. The shootings in fact are likely fewer than they were back in the 50s, and better publicized than back in those days, so they seem more frequent. There are a lot more black cops now than back then too. Teachers, desegregated schools. The younger generation has a lot more desegregation than when I went to school, and yet it's only now that black people shouldn't celebrate the 4th? They were probably celebrating it back when things were actually a lot worse.

[dembotoz]

16. define celebrate

have a picnic, enjoy the day off, watch some fireworks, maybe a beer...many

spending time contemplating freedom or lack there off.....far fewer

is that bad? I dunno.
It is a less expensive holiday so lets celebrate that i guess

[Raine]

21. Most, from what I've seen and heard. nt

[NotVeryImportant]

22. Less and less every year.

[JI7]

23. Most are celebrating.

[ARandomPerson]

24. Oh, get over yourself.

The history of every country is complicated. People can process the bad parts however they want.

But I know plenty of black people who celebrate this country, who have served with honor in its armed forces. I imagine they would be offended by your implication that black Americans somehow have less reason to think this country is theirs and to celebrate it.

Speak for yourself, but don't pretend to know what others think.

[malaise]

25. (1852) FREDERICK DOUGLASS, "WHAT, TO THE SLAVE, IS THE FOURTH OF JULY"

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/speeches-african-american-history/1852-frederick-douglass-what-slave-fourth-july/

On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass was invited to address the citizens of his hometown, Rochester, New York. Whatever the expectations of his audience on that 76th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Douglass used the occasion not to celebrate the nation’s triumphs but to remind all of its continuing enslavement of millions of people. Douglass’s speech appears below.

Mr. President, Friends and Fellow Citizens: He who could address this audience without a quailing sensation, has stronger nerves than I have. I do not remember ever to have appeared as a speaker before any assembly more shrinkingly, nor with greater distrust of my ability, than I do this day. A feeling has crept over me, quite unfavorable to the exercise of my limited powers of speech. The task before me is one which requires much previous thought and study for its proper performance. I know that apologies of this sort are generally considered flat and unmeaning. I trust, however, that mine will not be so considered. Should I seem at ease, my appearance would much misrepresent me. The little experience I have had in addressing public meetings, in country schoolhouses, avails me nothing on the present occasion.

The papers and placards say, that I am to deliver a 4th [of] July oration. This certainly sounds large, and out of the common way, for it is true that I have often had the privilege to speak in this beautiful Hall, and to address many who now honor me with their presence. But neither their familiar faces, nor the perfect gage I think I have of Corinthian Hall, seems to free me from embarrassment.

[CatWoman]

37. Thank you Malaise

[malaise]

38. You're welcome sis

[RussBLib]

40. Just watched the HBO special on Douglass

Frederick Douglass in 5 speeches. It was very good, and should be required reading (or viewing) in school. I was never exposed to him until college. While the show was good, they totally left out the Lincoln-Douglass debates, which I found odd. It seems likely that Lincoln's interactions with Douglass moved Lincoln from opposition to emancipation to insistence upon it.

Douglass is an integral part of US history.

[malaise]

41. I need to watch that

He also played a role in the Caribbean in Hispaniola

[BlackSkimmer]

27. What a curious post. Do you not know any "black people"?

My neighbors across the street have a huge party every July 4th. They are doing so now. And yes, they're black.

My Hispanic neighbors up the street are also partying. The neighborhood is a hodgepodge of different music right now...I love it.

Not a fan of the fireworks that I can also hear nearby, but I expect all races are setting those off too.

[B.See]

32. Not to condemn the op

for a query that might have genuinely come from either a lack of information or understanding of said subject,

but fact is there ARE factions in America who work diligently to discredit, disassociate and disavow Black Americans and other minorities as "real" Americans, when actually the CONTRARY is true -

because Black Americans and other minorities have, through trials, tribulations, and triumphs, EARNED THE RIGHT to be Americans, at least as much as anyone ELSE

in spite of what our MAGAS, Nazis, supremacists and run of the mill bigots and racists would WANT us to believe.

Don't ever let 'em get away with it.

[BlackSkimmer]

34. Well put.

Almost every house has the flag out, but the black and Hispanic families seem to be the biggest bbqers around here!

None of my close neighbors set off fireworks, for which I’m always grateful. They have kids too, but no fireworks. The rest of the town was another matter.

[B.See]

44. Thanks for getting it what I'm saying. Someone apparently missed the point.

[malaise]

39. Have earned the right?

Isn't being born in the USA all tha tis needed to earn the right to be a US citizen?

Let's set aside immigrants who qualify for citizenship - do white people born in the USA have to earn the right to be citizens?

[B.See]

43. I was speaking of those who, in spite of that and all that I referenced, somehow believe OTHERWISE.

[roamer65]

28. My whole neighborhood cooking out, relaxing, etc.

I live in a mixed race neighborhood and love it.

It’s American as hell.

[BlackSkimmer]

36. Exactly the same in my hood.

[Progressive Lawyer]

29. All the black people in my office (15) and in my neighborhood (about 5) are celebrating...

...since you asked.

[Kennah]

31. At a Juneteenth event in Tacoma, WA

I saw a number of T-shirts expressing sentiments such as "June 19, 1865 because my ancestors weren't free on July 4, 1776."

I daresay you'll need to more narrowly define the word "celebrate." I know lots of people who treat damned near EVERY holiday as just another day I don't have to come to work.

[betsuni]

42. "I thought it best to remind ourselves"

[Showbizkid]

45. What an incredibly arrogant post

Do you not consider black people to be Americans? How about Hispanics?

And if they were celebrating, were you looking down on them?

I'm going to assume you are white and make a generalized complaint. And I apologize in advance if I'm wrong.

But there is a weird feature among white some political leftists where they feel the need to tell minorities how to behave.

Minorities are allowed to be police officers, soldiers, patriots, christians, and - dare I say - Republicans if they want to be. That's the entire goddamn point.