And if you think the answer is no, do you think the better strategy might be to forgive her anyway?

She was my least favorite angel.

no, no.

Seriously, I should care about Kate Smith and her legacy because ....?

Put another way, Flyers remove her statue, so what?

Going “hard to the paint” regarding Kate Smit’s legacy seems ridiculous to me but ymmv.

Which way that isn’t forgiveness and condemnation?

Can a Dee Jay take a song out of rotation because they don’t like an influence it represents?

Its important because it alleviates me from having to come up with a thought experiment like "suppose there was a beloved singer from the the 30's who..... but then in 1945..... etc. etc."

Who the **** is Kate Smith? Seriously is the new politics forum going to be all ridiculous threads like this?

Three questions:

1. Did you know about her 1945 tolerance comments?

2. Would you change either answer if 80% of black Americans forgave her?

3. Would you pretend to change your answer and proclaim your forgiveness to the world (confiding in no one for the rest of your life) if you somehow knew that proclamation was the single reason Trump was not reelected?

singer from the 30's who sung a couple super racist songs including one called "why darkies are born" (or something close) with lyrics like, "someone has to pick the cotton."

she's "beloved" for singing god bless america, and the philly flyers recently decided to take down her statue because it didnt mesh with their values.

Cool.

Yeah and I forget the exact numbers of people who don’t even know who the the VPOTUS is but I see where David is going with this.

@David - I need some thinking time on this.

I mean the Flyers and Yankees do what they feel is in the best interests of their organizations. I have no problem with that. I always thought renditions of God Bless America during the 7th inning stretch during games at Yankee Stadium were pretty nice, thought it was a uniting thing more than an exercise in white priviledge and racism but heh some folks don’t agree.

And of course the real reason it is somewhat important is because, much like Bernies "let murderers vote", stance not appearing to forgive her is likely to cost more votes than it gains. Which seems not worth it for something that would indeed otherwise be fairly trivial and not completely clearcut.

i supplied a jokey answer, but really i guess it may depend on what you call "forgiven". am i ok with people taking her statues/plaques/portraits down, absolutely. do we need a special "kate smith" category under famous racists in history, probably not.

1. nope, did she give away all the money she made on her songs to african american charities?
2. no
3.is this like a bastardized "is it worth it to kill 1 person to save 1000's" scenario? would i lie to people about my values to guarantee trump isn't re-elected? idk, possibly.

people shouldn't be disenfranchised ever, imo. so i don't know what you mean.

the important part of the letting felons vote isn't the pearl clutching over a couple murderers voting, its the idea that areas with prisons get to claim those inmates as residents without actually representing them. so areas get increased political clout through disenfranchised voters. no one should be ok with that.

Starting a thread about a culture war issue du jour and how progressives should keep quiet about their view that some beloved icon among old people is a racist seems likely to cost more votes than it gains.

questions:

1. Did you know about her 1945 tolerance comments?

An odd answer to a straightforward, non hostile yes or no question. The question was did you know about the comments. You apparently answered a different question, like maybe do you accept her comments as being sincere. Seemingly your answer should have been, it doesn’t matter to me what said in 1945 if she didn’t give all her money to Afro-American charities, it is the only path to redemption for her.

2. Would you change either answer if 80% of black Americans forgave her?

Why not? The vast majority of people most directly affected forgiving her seems like a powerful signal that maybe it is time to move on to more important issues that are more significant. Of course this a hypothetical. Another hypothetical, say 80% of Afro-Americans thought that removing her statue was not nearly sufficient. The Flyers should donate a substantial amount of money, 10s of millions, to charities/organizations that benefit Afro-Americans. That would be another powerful signal that removing the statue is a significant event in the civil rights quest, that we need to have a lot more conversations about rectifying the past.

3. Would you pretend to change your answer and proclaim your forgiveness to the world (confiding in no one for the rest of your life) if you somehow knew that proclamation was the single reason Trump was not reelected?

To end the oppression of minorities by TRUMP you would have reservations about compromising your publicly stated values? There is a question in your mind of whether or not your publicly stated values are more important than ending the oppression of minorities by TRUMP, really?

Yes, she should be forgiven. You should generally always offer a path to redemption as long as it has reasonable odds of being sincere, even after death.

Otherwise you remove some incentive for racists to reform and that makes the world a worse place.

YES, she does, and without condition.

All human beings are flawed and all human beings show bias. You show a bias (not positive or negative, but simply bias) in asking this question, because you take an interest in it, and you have a preference on one side or the other. If you didn't you would not ask.

No different than a historian writing about the atomic bomb in WWII. They show a bias because that find it of interest, whether they are for or against it. They can change their opinion afterwards, but that would also show a changed bias.

Bias is no different than perhaps the apparent synonymous meaning of prejudice, which is not necessarily associated with racism. If taken to the extreme, then that specific prejudice is extreme. But prejudice is also a preconceived opinion, without knowing the truth, but at times, with issues like this, the truth itself is subjective to the individual.

Deserve is no different than saying earn. The following is an individualized parallel, but (kind of) a parallel nonetheless:

Can someone who violates the trust of someone else really ever earn back trust? Do they deserve future trust? Only if forgiven by the other, and forgiven without condition.

Can a cheating spouse earn back trust? If so, how? I say no. They can only be forgiven because the individual loves the other. Someone who violates trust cannot ever prove to the other that they will not repeat the flaw.

What about someone who is racist? Can they earn or deserve to be forgiven by those affected? Only if those on the opposite end of the issue at hand believes they are not flawed as well, because every human being is flawed. (except maybe one).

I guess there is always cause and effect. A cause usually leads to an effect. How can it not? In this type of issue, someone may (later on after they caused something), demonstrate that they have changed. But never can one know their real truth on the issue. If the later effect is someone doing something against the other, then should their flaws be forgiven, and if so, why?

I think prisons represent their "residents" if they have the care, custody and control of their residents. They might not represent them in a lawsuit, but on an everyday basis they do represent them as they have that care, custody and control. The police do not have the care or custody of city or state, but they do have control over the residents. Some might argue against this, but it is pretty easy to find out if the residents have control or not.

Felons should lose the right to vote whether in or out of prison. That is part of cause and effect. If you want to retain the right to vote, do not commit or (be convicted of) a felony. That's the bottom line.

But what about the precious feelings of racist Boomers?

In the spirit of a new forum with high value discussions, could you do us a favour and try to expand on your OPs a little? Provide a link to the story, give a short summary of the issues, and tell us your perspective.

+1 to this from me, fwiw. I actually had no idea who Kate Smith was.

i said i hadn't heard about her tolerance comments, and then i asked if she put her money where her mouth was to show her remorse..

if 20% of a racial group are upset about her super racist songs against their racial group than that is more than enough to remove the statues/plaques or whatever, imo.

the 3rd hypo is illogical and would require a ridiculous answer

What’s that about tolerance? What’s supposed to be tolerated?

Can racists tolerate having their racism disrupted and destroyed? Let’s watch...

it should be noted that there seems to be some controversy about whether the songs were meant to be racist or actually anti racist. the latter fully exonerates Smith. also my comments about her and Sanders were basically involving election strategy only.