Apologies, meaningless and otherwise

There's a big push on now to get the state of Maryland to apologize to blacks for slavery.

I find this utterly ludicrous.

First of all, how's 'bout an apology from the people who sold 'em in the first place. No seller, no buyer, right? Weren't those (or at least some of them) who sold slaves black? And African?

If this country, never mind any of the states, needs to apologize to anyone, then it needs to be our Native Americans. The ones we screwed over to get the land that we now call ours. The land that was once theirs.

Native Americans have been mistreated from the beginning. Of course, there are the reservations, but the unemployment rate is unbelievable there, and the last time I'd read any statistics, the alcoholism rate was about 50% or more.

What are we supposed to apologize to blacks for? How is that going to help anything?

All four of my grandparents wereborn to families of 12 to 13 children here in the U.S. My father's parents were so poor that they had their wedding reception outside on a pier because they couldn't afford to have one inside. Yet, all four of their children did well for themselves--going to college and working hard. No one stood on the docks as my great-grandparents arrived on U.S. soil to welcome them and hand them the keys to the city. You know how they got where they got? Hard work. Menial labor. More hard work. More menial labor. Did my father's ancestors blame anyone because the Irish were branded as lazy alcoholic across the board, and therefore not worthy of hiring? No. They worked hard and proved themselves. My German ancestors didn't even speak English, but they damn well straight learned. My mother's mother told me stories of being so poor that her underwear was made out of a potato sack (or was it a coffee sack?), yet I have heard blacks complain bitterly because they are forced to wear hand-me-downs because white society is holding them back. Oh, the trauma!

Blacks need to stop pointing fingers and placing blame. Black society holds itself back when it glorifies the gangsta, bling-bling lifestyle. If the party that got the white student from Johns Hopkins University suspended last year because it was "racist" had been hosted by blacks, it would have been just another "celebration of black culture." There were blacks at that party, too, and yes, they were some of the ones protesting after the party made news. Talk about hypocrisy.

I wonder how many blacks busy pointing fingers and placing blame bother to play Big Brother or Big Sister, or actually do something constructive instead of playing the victim.

It's old, stale, and needs to be put to rest.

Was slavery wrong? Yes. Is dwelling on it now right? No.