White people in the United States were addicted to cheap labor.
After buying and selling people like chattel was outlawed, we could have moved into a better system in which everyone was given an honest day's pay for an honest day's work.
No such thing happened. In fact, the sharecropping system of the South is an illustration of how White people managed to make slavery continue. They threatened and lynched those who did not follow the system. They trapped Black people into debt cycles and low wages based on unpredictable productivity levels in the agricultural establishment. They prevented people who were not already White and wealthy from obtaining the means of production such as land and equipment. They used the one drop rule to maintain their own power structure.
No such thing happened. In fact, the sharecropping system of the South is an illustration of how White people managed to make slavery continue. They threatened and lynched those who did not follow the system. They trapped Black people into debt cycles and low wages based on unpredictable productivity levels in the agricultural establishment. They prevented people who were not already White and wealthy from obtaining the means of production such as land and equipment. They used the one drop rule to maintain their own power structure.
Many lately have argued that the worst sin in the United States is the perversion of sexual intimacy. I disagree.
The greatest commandments that Jesus gives us is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. Enslaving people, addiction to cheap labor and disposable goods, and prioritizing money over humanity fly in the face of that commandment. We essentially make idols out of money and power. This is the generational sin, and the greatest sin, of White America.
When people are discussing the state of the US, they sometimes say things like, "Employers just don't care about their employees anymore." Or "Corporations no longer take care of their employees."
Let me submit to you that in the brief window when employers did take
care of their employees, it was not because employers cared to or were more ethical. It was because either unions forced them to do so or
because they realized that it made good business sense to pay their workers a fair wage for fair work. (For example, Henry Ford realized that he
would retain better employees if he paid them above the going wage, and
he also realized that he was better off being able to market his product
to his employees, who would not have been able to afford automobiles if
they did not make wages sufficient to purchase one.)
Corporations fought unions tooth and nail. They moved to states with right to work. They outsourced labor. They downsized and pink-slipped.
They developed a new system of sharecropping in the United States.
We have a system where corporations have hired lobbyists to convince our legislators to allow the federal minimum wage to fall so low as not to provide full-time workers with enough to subsist on, even with careful budgeting. Minimum wage workers are then trapped in cycles of debt, and shamed for having this debt. They are trapped in cycles of needing public assistance, and being shamed for using public assistance. While the workers are blamed, it is in fact the labor system that is broken.
I assert that this is a generational sin. I come from a lineage of White privilege, of consumerism, of individualism. I had to learn to see my privilege for what it is. I had to study history and sociology to see how conditions favor me and how they trained me to see a meritocracy where none exists. At this point, even many White workers are falling into modern sharecropping, despite a system designed to benefit them, because so few people in the country take such a large percentage of the wealth.
I have admitted to being a workaholic. I have admitted to sometimes sacrificing my love for others and my love for God to a need for ever greater financial security, and need for greater power within my employment situation. I have confessed this to you. I am working on it.
The sins of our ancestors have cursed many. While sins can be forgiven through repentance, the effects of them are not erased so easily. It is going to take a generation of people who truly understand that humans are not commodities and that every human life is priceless, and who act accordingly, to start momentum toward atonement and equality.
Join me in confession.
We have a system where corporations have hired lobbyists to convince our legislators to allow the federal minimum wage to fall so low as not to provide full-time workers with enough to subsist on, even with careful budgeting. Minimum wage workers are then trapped in cycles of debt, and shamed for having this debt. They are trapped in cycles of needing public assistance, and being shamed for using public assistance. While the workers are blamed, it is in fact the labor system that is broken.
I assert that this is a generational sin. I come from a lineage of White privilege, of consumerism, of individualism. I had to learn to see my privilege for what it is. I had to study history and sociology to see how conditions favor me and how they trained me to see a meritocracy where none exists. At this point, even many White workers are falling into modern sharecropping, despite a system designed to benefit them, because so few people in the country take such a large percentage of the wealth.
I have admitted to being a workaholic. I have admitted to sometimes sacrificing my love for others and my love for God to a need for ever greater financial security, and need for greater power within my employment situation. I have confessed this to you. I am working on it.
The sins of our ancestors have cursed many. While sins can be forgiven through repentance, the effects of them are not erased so easily. It is going to take a generation of people who truly understand that humans are not commodities and that every human life is priceless, and who act accordingly, to start momentum toward atonement and equality.
Join me in confession.
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