Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Politics / News / Media / Clout City Two mayors, two Chicagos
Posted by Steve Bogira on 05.17.11 at 10:16 AM
But does growing up in any Chicago neighborhood give a person a visceral feel for every Chicago neighborhood?
Bridgeport was zero percent black when Daley was born in 1942. When he turned eight in 1950, it was still zero percent black. By his 18th birthday in 1960, Bridgeport had climbed to .2 percent black. The neighborhood’s poverty rate was low throughout his childhood, as was its unemployment rate; anyone who could ring a doorbell qualified for a city job. The streets were swept, the trees trimmed, the garbage picked up promptly, the snow cleared from the streets almost as soon as it hit the pavement. Did growing up in such a place create in Daley an organic understanding of life in Englewood, or in Lawndale, or in any of Chicago’s other black ghettos? Did his schooling at Nativity of Our Lord grammar school develop in him a visceral sense of what school was like in Woodlawn?
Elsewhere in the same New York Times, reporter Monica Davey observed that Daley “sees his biggest accomplishment as overcoming the racial, geographic and ethnic divisions that tore the city apart in the 1980s. 'No more "Beirut by the lake,”’ Mr. Daley said.”
The "Beirut by the lake” label came from the political fights between white and black aldermen in the mid-1980s. That was when Harold Washington, an African-American, was mayor, a fact that troubled most of the city’s white aldermen. The City Council rumbles were halted not by Daley but by Washington’s fatal heart attack in 1987, after which the white aldermen managed to install Eugene Sawyer, a spineless black colleague, as mayor until they could get one of their own elected. That turned out to be Daley in 1989.
“Beirut by the lake” was a passing phenomenon, sensational but far less important than the racial segregation that has been an organic trait of Chicago since 1910. Our intense segregation has made Chicago two cities, and prevents a child raised in one of the Chicagos from having a visceral understanding of the other one. Chicago has been more like Pretoria than Beirut, albeit with de facto and not de jure apartheid. Daley did little to change that, racial peace being much easier to achieve than integration and equality.
The demolition of the city’s housing projects, executed on Daley’s command, dispersed many of Chicago’s blacks to the southern suburbs. The hollowed-out neighborhoods they left behind are, with few exceptions, no less segregated. As the Reader documented in February, most black Chicagoans live in 21 community areas, 18 on the south side and three on the west side, that are astonishingly segregated for these "post-racial" times—their aggregate population is 96 percent black. And these neighborhoods are no less afflicted now than before Daley by the inequities that racial segregation dependably harvests: higher rates of crime, fire, joblessness, school dropouts, physical and mental illness, alcoholism and drug addiction, single-parent families, child abuse and neglect. It would be unfair today to call Chicago “Pretoria by the lake”—unfair to Pretoria, which has made progress.
Segregation is a choice, not a fait accompli. Other regions are taking steps to challenge it—the Minneapolis-Saint Paul metro area, for one, prodded by the University of Minnesota's Institute on Race & Poverty. In Chicago, the steps lately have been backward: the city's Commission on Human Relations, the agency charged with combating discrimination in housing, has absorbed deep cuts in recent years, and the main private group fighting for desegregation here, the Leadership Council for Metropolitan Open Communities, folded in 2006.
Emanuel, like his predecessor, has a politician’s visceral understanding of the volatility of race as an issue—so he won’t confront segregation directly. Chicago's defining problem wasn't even mentioned in the new mayor's inauguration speech; there are many words Emanuel is willing to utter, but segregation isn't one of them. Attacking segregation would truly require a steely resolve, and Emanuel is more likely to rely on his impressive political smarts. He'll address the problems of the city’s poor black neighborhoods with his own versions of the separate-but-equal strategies Daley tried. And probably with the same results.
Comments (51)
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I think as long as Black, Latino & Asian populations as a whole have an issue with going outside of their comfort zone, this issues isn't going to change. I'm not saying landlords don't still get selective when it comes to race, nor am I blind enough to see that businesses might not hire based on race, but you're much more likely to find a job based on a referral and if you live around people who are unemployed or under employed your chances of getting that referral is less. Is it going to be an easy thing to move? No. But not even the mayor of Chicago can stop the fact that this country shafted just about every immigrant group that came to this country and while none has had the hardship of African-Americans, there's not a thing the government can do that will force people to diversify themselves unless they want to.
Apathy and ethnocentrism may not be "racism" as we know it but exists because it's just human nature to feel comfortable to be around those that look and act like us.
Chicago and every city in America I've been to has been like this and will remain this way in our life time and perhaps the next... We live in a nexus of racial armistice ... End of story
As usual Steve Bogira, though he overstates things, points to serious problems that have a strong basis in reality and for which few others significantly discuss. But unfortunately, he always frames it as much more of a race issue than a question of how to overcome class-based segregation and to pull neighborhoods and people out of the cycle of poverty. Sometimes you almost get a sense from him that he would think the problem would be solved (or at least on the road to being solved) if all the neighborhoods were racially integrated but still each had the same level of poverty as they do now. Obviously, poverty in Chicago and most other cities has a very strong historical basis in racism. That is why there is so much difference in poverty rates between the races. But the solutions have nothing to do with race. And it just distracts people from the real issues when it is discussed as a racial problem instead of as a problem of income inequality and lack of opportunities. As a result, it makes it more difficult to deal with the problem.
"Our intense segregation has made Chicago two cities, and prevents a child raised in one of the Chicagos from having a visceral understanding of the other one."
I'm curious in which of these two Chicagos Bogira would put neighborhoods that are predominately Hispanic. Or what about Chinatown? Does that go into the white Chicago or the black Chicago? It almost certainly wouldn't make sense to put it into the black Chicago. But using Bogira's premise, I'm not sure it would make all that much sense to put it into the white Chicago either.
"In Chicago, the steps lately have been backward: the city's Commission on Human Relations, the agency charged with combating discrimination in housing, has absorbed deep cuts in recent years"
Obviously, the solutions to this issue are very complex and many things would need to happen for there to be a significant improvement with regard to the poverty and class-based segregation.. But I guarantee you that the level of funding for an agency investigating housing discrimination is not going to have a noticeable effect on anything. For one thing, it is 2011. It is not 1955. Racial discrimination is almost entirely nonexistent. Racial segregation right now has nothing to do with housing discrimination.
"Racial discrimination is almost entirely nonexistent."
What a fucking sap you are.
That's a very persuasive post, FGFM. I especially like how you used detailed reasoning and provided strong examples to illustrate why you believe racial discrimination is currently a much bigger problem than I do.
"Segregation is a choice" -- exactly, it's a choice, something people choose of their own accord, which they have the right to choose of their own accord, and governments have no business trying to force people to choose otherwise.
"That's a very persuasive post, FGFM. I especially like how you used detailed reasoning and provided strong examples to illustrate why you believe racial discrimination is currently a much bigger problem than I do."
Thanks, consider it a public service.
FGFM, I am curious what parts of IAC's quote below you disagree with.
I think the point was simply that the legal racism (Jim Crow laws, redlining, etc) has largely been undone, and that there are legal remedies in place to address backsliders (ie, steering black homebuyers to black neighborhoods).
The inequalities persist in the macro sense as jobs, as in, the lack of well-paying ones that minority Chicagoans specifically are properly educated for that would provide more social mobility.
But it's not like anyone is *against* creating jobs - it's just not that easy in a global economy where its cheaper to do business overseas or even in the suburbs. The sustainable jobs that Chicago seems able to create are government jobs, which in turn raise taxes/add to the cost of living here.
The micro problem is how does an individual/family go about "seeking diversity" and what does that mean/how does public policy either help or hinder this?
Let's say for the sake of argument that every ward should ideally look like larger Chicago, having a healthy population of whites/latinos/blacks/asians.
How would you actually accomplish this?
And what would we do about wards that are going from black to hispanic according to the 2010 census/"black flight"? Would you support some program busing in thousands of poor whites to live in neighborhoods like Englewood if we can't encourage white people here to do so? Because middle and upper class white folks moving into minority neighborhoods are often greeted with extreme skepticism for good reason, as they are leading indicators that the neighborhood is gentrifying.
What's the happy middle ground? I think a lot of us sincerely would like to know & how to help get us towards simply trading a less racially-segregated City for a more economically-segregated one.
I tend to agree this is more of a class issue - I don't think anyone would be complaining about segregation if we had a stronger, more vibrant middle class where we currently have extreme poverty.
I'd suggest this could be partially tackled by reducing our reliance on property taxes and shifting school funding to an income tax-based system, but the devil is in the details.
"Obviously, poverty in Chicago and most other cities has a very strong historical basis in racism. That is why there is so much difference in poverty rates between the races. But the solutions have nothing to do with race. And it just distracts people from the real issues when it is discussed as a racial problem instead of as a problem of income inequality and lack of opportunities. As a result, it makes it more difficult to deal with the problem."
"FGFM, I am curious what parts of IAC's quote below you disagree with."
I disagree with the part I quoted.
this?
"Racial discrimination is almost entirely nonexistent."
OK, so are you talking about policies which discriminate, or people? The answer is IMO going to suggest two very different approaches to the problem in terms of resource allocation.
I think there's plenty of both, but there is little you can do about racist mindsets but let those people die off and educate their children better.
Tying in to the jobs problem is the the war on drugs, which drives up prices and creates black markets/wealthy organized crime gangs. It is historically racist and continued that way with sentencing disparities, etc. But the answer isn't to lock up more non-minority people for non-violent drug crimes, it's to legalize/decriminalize the controlled substances.
But just like Prohibition, the cry for that has to come from within the impacted communities, not just dreadlocked trustafarians who are on their summer break from college.
FGFM, you're neither clever, witty, nor smart. Give it a break, you just look like an attention whore.
I think working-class people need to stop allowing ourselves to be divided by the color of our skin, period.
This is quite revealing:
http://wweek.com/portland/article-17350-9_…
"OK, so are you talking about policies which discriminate, or people? "
You tell me.
"Give it a break, you just look like an attention whore."
Concern troll acts concerned.
"I think working-class people need to stop allowing ourselves to be divided by the color of our skin, period."
Just as soon as a white ward elects a black alderman.
Just to be clear, the only point I was making with the part that FGFM indicated he disagreed with (but, of course, still hasn't explained why) was that spending more money for a bureaucracy to deal with housing discrimination is going to have virtually no or no effect at decreasing segregation and improving upward mobility. It would have been different 40 to 50 years ago when discrimination was still a huge reason for segregation. But whether one agrees with me or not that it is not virtually nonexistent there certainly is no question that current housing discrimination is not a major force that prevents blacks from living in white neighborhoods at the present time. Even if someone runs it to real discrimination they normally would easily be able to find another place to live very quickly. Steve Bogira makes himself look like a stereotypical liberal by suggesting that just throwing money at a government agency looking into discrimination would go a long away into solving this issue. And that's unfortunate because I don't think he is a stereotypical liberal. He delves deep into things and looks at the root of problems in a manner that few others do.
"Steve Bogira makes himself look like a stereotypical liberal by suggesting that just throwing money at a government agency looking into discrimination would go a long away into solving this issue."
Maybe we should send some money to Germany to teach them how to be entrepreneurs.
"Just as soon as a white ward elects a black alderman."
Hey, I'll see you and raise - this white country elected a black president.
Or are you in the "Obama is not really black" camp?
Let us know when you have actual solutions. I asked a slew of questions related to IAC's point about HOW we would actually desegregate the City, I'm not sure why you think I'm being insincere, I'd like to know exactly what you think would work. Better yet, is there a similar City that has been successful we could learn from? I'm certainly not pretending I know all the answers here.
"Hey, I'll see you and raise - this white country elected a black president. "
And people loved Dennis Rodman!
*Or are you in the "Obama is not really black" camp?*
You are the guy with the crackpot theories.
"Let us know when you have actual solutions."
You'll be the first to know.
"I'm certainly not pretending I know all the answers here."
I doubt you'd be able to fool anyone.
Skeptic:
And you must be in the "I'm white liberal with a lot of minority token friends ...and I did my good deed to support a minority today ... praise me now" camp ...
We as people have to evolve but it won't happen in our lifetime and perhaps not the next generation but eventually. There's just too many people in this world that perpetuates race alienation. (Politics, hollywood, news, etc etc.)
"You are the guy with the crackpot theories."
Where exactly does Skeptic argue any crackpot theories? I'm completely baffled as to what you are referring to. Everything he says is perfectly reasonable. It always amazes me how often when someone is losing an argument they think it is better to make a fool of themselves than just to say nothing (or even, gasp!, admit they might have been wrong about something). It's as if they think that the last person to post is automatically the one who wins the argument.
Native Chidude,
I have no iota of a clue what you are attempting to express.
"Where exactly does Skeptic argue any crackpot theories? I'm completely baffled as to what you are referring to. Everything he says is perfectly reasonable."
QED.
"It always amazes me how often when someone is losing an argument they think it is better to make a fool of themselves than just to say nothing (or even, gasp!, admit they might have been wrong about something). It's as if they think that the last person to post is automatically the one who wins the argument."
Indeed.
IAC:
It means you are all naive to believe there is some quick solution to "desegregate".
Racial tension and mistrust are visceral intuitions that are centuries old and it can't be solved with some phony, liberal gestures of bullshit or political strategies.
We just have to ride this out for a few more generations and then maybe people will really believe "color" sincerely won't matter. Right now we are no where close to that resolve.
"...you almost get a sense from him that he would think the problem would be solved (or at least on the road to being solved) if all the neighborhoods were racially integrated but still each had the same level of poverty as they do now."
Yes, IAC, I do think that racial integration would put us on the road to diminishing poverty. We'd have far less poverty today if we'd have been racially integrated all these years, and we'll have far less 20 years from now if we figure out how to break down our racial segregation. As I wrote in February, the problem isn't merely poverty, it's the kind of concentrated poverty that racial segregation has produced in, for instance, Englewood. It's hard to be poor; it's much harder to be poor and have so many others around you also poor. Role models in a neighborhood matter less today, what with everyone inside staring at screens, but they still matter. Integration also makes it much harder for the haves to ignore the troubles of the have-nots, since it puts some of those troubles in the haves' backyard.
You allow that poverty in Chicago "has a very strong historical basis in racism"--but think it would be less distracting if we now forgot all that. Race does add heat to the argument, which can be distracting, and, like you, I once felt it was better to focus on class. I've come to think that racism has intertwined poverty and race so completely in Chicago that it's naive to talk only about the one.
I think you're right that the kind of direct racial discrimination that caused segregation and concentrated poverty has diminished. I think you're wrong about it diminishing to the point where the work of an agency like the Commission on Human Relations is unimportant. Studies have indicated that blacks who call about apartments for rent in white neighborhoods are more likely to be told the apartments are no longer available than are whites--just by the sound of their voices. But, yes, solving this problem will require a lot more than the work of such an agency, and the work must include efforts aimed squarely at poverty, not just racial segregation. I think we need to work on both. I expect to write more on solutions in stories to come.
"Race does add heat to the argument, which can be distracting, and, like you, I once felt it was better to focus on class. I've come to think that racism has intertwined poverty and race so completely in Chicago that it's naive to talk only about the one."
I would never say we should only talk about the one - but the fact remains that if you want a "rising tide lifts all boats" holistic approach, policies that improve the life of the poor will de facto benefit (at least in Chicago) minorities disproportionately better.
Much harder to show how the opposite works - take the Minority/Women-owned Business policy. It creates a ton of red tape, but apparently hasn't done much or we wouldn't be having this discussion. And everyone I know who has had some experience with it tells me that existing companies are easily given "token" ownership in order to qualify for contracts, even though this doesn't translate to more jobs in the minority communities.
Perhaps they are more of a success than is widely known/acknowledged, but everyone I've ever talked too is frustrated by such approaches, which seem to create little mini-elites in the targeted communities but do little to affect large social and economic change.
Native-dude:
I personally don't see (nor do I see IAC suggesting that) we're going to get quick solutions by focusing on class, only that we might actually get LASTING ones that way.
Perhaps dismissing opinions/insights that aren't just reinforcing what you already believe are part of the problem.
I'm still trying to figure out what this actually means:
"And you must be in the "I'm white liberal with a lot of minority token friends ...and I did my good deed to support a minority today ... praise me now" camp ..."
You understand that the very concept of a "token" friend means there's only one or two, right? Having "many token friends" is an oxymoron, like FGFM and a well-thought out reply in a post.
Seriously, so your message seems to be that white people who make an attempt to integrate are bad? Do you understand that disqualifies your opinion regarding how we desegregate, since you are knocking the very concept?
I'm still awaiting solutions. And saying "it will take centuries" is just a pitiful cop-out.
Steve, you go first. Englewood. How do you make it more desirable for non-black folks without addressing the chronic poverty (and without fueling gentrification)?
I'd say you need to de-claw the gangs. That takes cutting off the black market revenue streams, which takes legalizing/decriminalizing drugs.
Got any examples of elected officials or community groups in Englewood working towards this? I think that's an unfair question, to be frank. But at least from a north-sider perspective, it seems like the attention/focus is on religious leaders preaching DARE programs, which work as well as celibacy ones.
As the old saying goes, it takes two to tango. That means be careful for what you wish for - do you think poor people in Englewood really would be better off if a bunch of well-heeled white people move in in gated communities?
"As I wrote in February, the problem isn't merely poverty, it's the kind of concentrated poverty that racial segregation has produced in, for instance, Englewood. It's hard to be poor; it's much harder to be poor and have so many others around you also poor. Role models in a neighborhood matter less today, what with everyone inside staring at screens, but they still matter. Integration also makes it much harder for the haves to ignore the troubles of the have-nots, since it puts some of those troubles in the haves' backyard. "
I agree with all of that. But would anything really be significantly different if this level of concentrated poverty were racially integrated? I don't think so. Throughout history in most countries there have been numerous instances where there was huge class-based segregation in which all classes were of the same race. And like always, some of the problems that result from this segregation partially come from "a child raised in one...(not) having a visceral understanding of the other one" (though the problem was much less the poor not having an understanding of the non-poor when there was virtually no chance for them to move up in the world legally, which is different now here in this country). Neighborhoods that have had a huge concentration of poor people have always had a level of hopelessness that cause crime and other problems. It isn't any less of the case if the race of the population in these neighborhoods is the same as the surrounding upper-income neighborhoods. So that is not something that changes with race-based segregation.
The lack of positive role-models in these neighborhoods is also clearly an important factor. But I don't really see how this would change if the same level of poverty were racially integrated. Everybody in the poor neighborhoods would still be seeing "everybody around them also be poor" and this would still be perpetuating a cycle of hopelessness. So when race is taken out of the equation in terms of finding solutions I don't see how the issue changes. What it does do is allow the issues to be discussed more directly and with likely a much lower level of defensiveness and emotional reactions. It also is easier to get things done legally since the Supreme Court has made it clear that it is unconstitutional for many policy decisions in these areas to be made based on race.
"Much harder to show how the opposite works - take the Minority/Women-owned Business policy. It creates a ton of red tape, but apparently hasn't done much or we wouldn't be having this discussion. And everyone I know who has had some experience with it tells me that existing companies are easily given "token" ownership in order to qualify for contracts, even though this doesn't translate to more jobs in the minority communities. Perhaps they are more of a success than is widely known/acknowledged, but everyone I've ever talked too is frustrated by such approaches, which seem to create little mini-elites in the targeted communities but do little to affect large social and economic change."
Exactly. That is a perfect example of the problems that result from focusing on race instead of moving people out of poverty. Even if those programs worked the way they were supposed to (and I agree with you that this is doubtful) they are completely based on an incorrect premise. This premise is that whites are racist and so therefore white business owners will discriminate against blacks. Therefore, if only the city would require minority business owners to receive certain contracts then this would make a big dent getting jobs for otherwise unemployed African Americans because these minority business owners, as a result of not being racist, would hire them. That's not the way the world works. People make hiring decisions based on who they believe would do the job well. I don't deny that there is still some racism that exists. But by and large, white and non-white employers in the same situation would hire the same ration of minority and non-minority employees. Yet, politicians and others spend a great deal of time crafting these types of programs and act as if it is a great accomplishment that would move people out of poverty. It does nothing of the sort.
Similarly, a few years ago people acted as if the country's racial diversity hung in the balance based on whether the Supreme Court would allow law schools to consider race as one factor in admissions. Nothing about that is going to deal with poverty and lack of opportunities. If someone is being seriously considered for an elite law school slot, whether they end up with it or not, they obviously are not going to have to worry about poverty. Yet most well-known activists and politicians on one side of that issue were acting as if that Supreme Court case was an issue of decreasing segregation and improving opportunities for African Americans. Bizarre logic like that distracts from the real issues.
Thinking more about this, one solution that appears to both be "colorblind" while also being in practice a way to enact some affirmative-action goals is for the government to provide free or heavily-subsidized college tuition to the top (fill in the blank) number or percentage of kids at every public high school.
This would ensure that at least *some* percentage of kids in really poor and/or highly segregated areas start seeing some light at the end of the tunnel that isn't just the proverbial train coming at them. This would remove the excuse I so often heard in the public schools of "why bother studying, I can't afford to go to college." This would remove the excuse "only those rich white kids in the suburbs get to go to college."
I think we have a serious problem both distinguishing as a society, and then communicating to the kids, between what are serious and legitimate obstacles to achievement and what are just lame excuses every slack-jawed teenager uses when being pressed to perform by a teacher or other authority figure.
I had a student who used to tell me there was no point doing her homework since she could just get shot any day. Well, after a few weeks I went out of my way to (gently) remind her that she was still around, but her homework still hadn't been done, and she wasn't acquiring any of the skills she was supposed to/would need in order to succeed.
Adding to this is the notion I encountered in poorer schools where kids all think they're going to play pro ball or be a millionaire rapper. And don't tell me this is a stereotype, I polled my classes as it was drove me nuts when I realized this wasn't just wishful-thinking but actually revealed a "plan for the future."
The numbers just don't support that - and I totally believe you don't want to kill any kid's dreams, but everyone can't be above-average, much less massively-above-average. Kids need a reality check on what's out there, and they need to see the 8 zillion shades of gray between playing for the Bulls and stewing in Stateville.
Remember Mark Aguirre? Aguirre went to the NBA and had a great career, but his teammates apparently all assumed they would be going with him, which of course is not how that system works. And no, paying kids to play college ball isn't a sustainable solution, that's not going to do anything but postpone the reality check.
For the record, I have no problem with affirmative action in theory. How it has actually played out is a different story altogether.
On the M/WB program, the real problem is nobody involved is really respecting the spirit of it, they're just covering their asses legally. And the really lucrative contracts that employ loads of highly-skilled people are going to the Walsh Constructions of the region, who know how to play the game and submit lowball bids which later escalate out-of-control once it's too late and the project is well underway (cough - Millenium Park).
But to get back to the whole integration thing, I'd like to ask what people honestly think would happen to some nice white professional women in her 30s trying to walk from a home/apartment in Englewood to the train. Do you think she's going to be welcomed? I have serious doubts. Hell, all we hear about in the media is how women from those neighbors are preyed upon, how are you going to sell that neighborhood to people who know how to go to Everyblock and look up crime stats?
And some of this change has to come from within the communities themselves if they don't want to keep getting pushed out into poorer suburbs. Whether the residents know it or not, the South Side and the West Side of Chicago are still primo real estate to most of the world, which lives in abject poverty. Chicago has infrastructure like public transportation, sewers, a freshwater lake, etc. that will always attract immigrants, many coming from war-torn, water-starved and jobless regions who aren't as daunted by co-existence with the GD's as yuppie north siders might be.
Something else to keep in mind - black folks are doing exactly what every immigrant group did before them, leaving the City in droves for the "better life" of the suburbs.
The demographics are changing for better and for worse, and the day is coming when people long accustomed to being ignored/slighted by the City will realize that it's a double-edged sword to suddenly be viewed/hyped as an attractive community to live in. I can tell you from first-hand experience that many white folks who grew up in now gentrified north side neighborhoods aren't very pleased with how that worked out for them (and that would be the understatement of the millennium).
This piece makes the mistake most of liberal America (of which I am a proud member) makes: it thinks segregation's the problem. Segregation isn't a problem in and of itself. Humans instinctively segregate themselves, even from other people they respect. It's human nature. No, the problem is that Chicago's segregated black neighborhoods are full of poor people, who are poor because they're undereducated and beset by other social disadvantages that were originally the result of institutionalized racism and now are self-perpetuating almost regardless of government effort or neglect.
If we bemoan segregation, we miss the point and the chance to help the needy. If black neighborhoods were vibrant, clean and economically thriving, the residents would have a chance to be more accomplished -- and vice versa: it's a virtuous cycle. (By the way, to achieve this, we'd also need to radically change our laws on guns, drugs and prostitution, because our backwards approaches to all of these only make them more entrenched in poor neighborhoods, including poor white rural "neighborhoods.") And if blacks increasingly became accomplished, we'd see – as a by-product – more integration of neighborhoods.
Think about it. When a person of a different race or significantly different ethnicity moves next door to you -- even you, the bleeding-heart liberal -- you worry slightly. Your worry doesn't have to do with the person's skin color or language, per se. It has to do with a concern that that person's habits are uncomfortably unlike yours. Again, this is pure anthropological human nature. Now if, say, that black family turned out to be like yours – functional, educated, considerate, economically sound – suddenly you'd feel no concern. "Nice neighbors. Like us." Right?
So my point is: stop thinking of segregation as wholly unnatural or a *root* problem in our society that must be addressed before others or whose solution is possible in isolation. Segregation is human nature -- but so is intermingling; so what prevents integration is not the persistence of segregation but the persistence of poverty. You might say that we're more color-blind than we think but also less comfortable with the effects of economic segregation than we realize.
To help our ghettos we need to stop focusing on segregation and focus instead on economic empowerment. At that point, segregation will take care of itself, to the extent that human nature encourages it..
read through (it's long, I know) this, you will see some very thoughtful comments from parents with kids in CPS trying to wrap their heads around these issues in a way that I think we can all relate to:
http://cpsobsessed.com/2011/05/11/rahms-ed…
Bullshit, as FGFM says, and then some. The problem, Noah maintains, is liberal America has focused too much on segregation, which is merely "human nature," and because of that misplaced focus has squandered its chance to help the needy. But liberal America hasn't focused at all on segregation for at least three decades now. Instead it has pushed, along with conservative America, for less threatening separate-but-equal "community development" programs that keep blacks in their places. And the needy have remained needy. Community development should be pursued, but desegregation must also be. In fact, community development will never be pursued wholeheartedly without desegregation, because in a segregated city, whites needn't care that much about what's going on over in North Lawndale and Englewood.
Saying that segregation is simply human nature betrays a lack of knowledge, to put it politely, of Chicago history. It's been human nature plus restrictive covenants, redlining, panic peddling, ghetto-sited public housing, bricks, bottles, and dynamite.
I'm going to call a respectful bullshit on Mr. Bogira's calling bullshit on my post. You are exactly right that all of America has neglected the issue of the urban poor. But your interpretive mistake is revealed precisely in your choice of words: keeping blacks "in their places." The "place" that we should be pushing for is "up the economic ladder." At that point, where you live is less important; and as I pointed out, with economic wherewithal, it's easier for people to live wherever they want -- in an integrated neighborhood or one that's more homogenous. In fact, when people live in very homogeneous neighborhoods but are economically sound and happy with life, we don't call this "segregation," do we? And we don’t agonize over it. This further suggests that the issue is really an economic one, not geographic.
I think you are right that when the poor are ghettoed, there is an additional layer of practical and emotional disincentive to improving their lot. But the logical answer is in making their ghettos not be ghettos any longer. Viewing integration as a tool rather than an end result forever ignores that it's hard, clumsy, expensive and somewhat against human nature to integrate people. Do Englewood residents want to live in Ravenswood Manor? Or do they want to prosper in a thriving Englewood?
I didn't mean to sound bigoted or ethically cynical or lazy in saying that segregation is in human nature. But we don’t need to be afraid of this fact. And I'm not offering an excuse for doing nothing. I'm suggesting a way to sharpen our focus on our noble goal, which is to bring the poor to the better "place" of economic self-sufficiency and happiness.
"Do Englewood residents want to live in Ravenswood Manor? Or do they want to prosper in a thriving Englewood?"
My guess is that they probably don't believe there is any chance whatsoever that there will ever be such a thing as a "thriving Englewood" before at least the end of their grandchildren's lifetime. And I think they most likely would be correct. And this largely is because of the concentrated poverty that feeds on itself and will not change because the neighborhood doesn't. Those residents of Englewood and other poverty-stricken neighborhoods who do manage to succeed and become upwardly-mobile are almost never going to remain in Englewood. That contributes to the problem of concentrated poverty and in some ways answers your question.
I don't think anybody is suggesting that people be forced to live in neighborhoods they don't want to live in. Bogira's February article discusses such things as vouchers for people to live in affordable housing places in more upper-income integrated neighborhoods. Obviously, nobody has to take those vouchers if they don't want. It also mentions organizing the schools so that they are not so segregated. None of this seems to do anything to upset what you call "human nature". Most of it is actually pretty modest and would probably be beneficial. But it MUST be based solely on income level and not race. It is not only wise to do it that way because it focuses on the problem instead of stereotypes about the problem but it also, in fact, would otherwise be unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has been very clear about this.
I've never seen any evidence that it is natural to "worry slightly" or self-segregate based on race or what you call "a significantly different ethnicity" (I wonder what the difference between this and a "slightly difference ethnicity is", by the way.). Its true that people sometimes self-segregate based on experience. And, of course, this correlates with race and ethnicity (as well as class) to a certain extent. But I think when people are adverse to being integrated with other races it results from things that are learned. It isn't an innate natural instinct, as you seem to be implying. Therefore, if this is the sole reason for wanting to segregate it is normally just prejudice.
Many of the people who live in those segregated neighborhoods live in fear everyday because of the crime and violence.
Correct this and relieve those residents of fear and they will progress on their own, well maybe a little hand up will be needed. Hand outs do nothing but perpetuate the status quo. The people I have worked with in the past are good workers, love their families and church, and took pride in the work they did.
This race card theme that emerges so often has lost it's bang and is used as a last resort when no other answers come to mind. We are talking about people, not skin color.
It seems the liberals are bemoaning the plight of the black people constantly. How about giving credit and highlighting the black people who have achieved a successful life. Would love to see articles like that. So much is written about the negatives that it seems to give the black people little hope for a good life.
So, Chicago. Clean it up for them and enforce your laws.
"It seems the liberals are bemoaning the plight of the black people constantly. How about giving credit and highlighting the black people who have achieved a successful life."
You know that black fella who's now the President of the United States?
The liberals nominated and elected him.
-- MrJM
MrJM, yes the liberals did nominate and elect our president. He is one person, there are many others not being recognized. I would like to read about them.
"It seems the liberals are bemoaning the plight of the black people constantly. How about giving credit and highlighting the black people who have achieved a successful life. "
Conservatives constantly praise black people who happen to be conservatives that have made a career out of attacking liberals. Other blacks, not so much.
"Conservatives constantly praise black people who happen to be conservatives that have made a career out of attacking liberals. Other blacks, not so much."
Agreed, Alan Keyes being Exhibit A.
But I'd suggest it's not productive or correct to assume that Joe Blow having concerns about social engineering being a way to address segregation is a sign of some underlying conservatism.
I'd say that lots (not all) of people might very well be happy to pay extra taxes to address segregation, but in what amounts and in what roles is - and should be - up for debate.
What is the proper size and function of government? That's really what we're talking about here.
I think more money for education is a good thing, I think it could be tied into this goal nicely. But society could also do some things that wouldn't require much money at all, but would require broad buy-in, such as getting better coverage of the history of institutionalized racism into high school history standards.
Steve is right/the history isn't debatable, but who knows about it outside of Chicago, and to what extent do kids in the now almost fully-gentrified neighborhoods such as Lincoln Park have knowledge on the topic?
"But I'd suggest it's not productive or correct to assume that Joe Blow having concerns about social engineering being a way to address segregation is a sign of some underlying conservatism."
Concern troll acts concerned.
"This race card theme that emerges so often has lost it's bang and is used as a last resort when no other answers come to mind. We are talking about people, not skin color."
Yet you're the one here who has complained that the media doesn't do enough stories that for the purpose basically of saying "Look at this Black. He is successful and has had a good life." Isn't that playing the race card? It is saying that someone's achievements are especially notable simply because of his race. It many cases I think what you are arguing for would be demeaning towards both the person and blacks in general.
"Conservatives constantly praise black people who happen to be conservatives that have made a career out of attacking liberals. Other blacks, not so much."
If one twists that phrase around any way they want it would be just as correct. You could say "liberals constantly praise white people who happen to be liberals that have made a career out of attacking conservatives. Other whites, not so much". Or "liberals constantly praise black people who happen to be liberals that have made a career out of attacking conservatives. Other blacks, not so much." Or "conservatives constantly praise whote people who happen to be conservatives that have made a career out of attacking liberals. Other whites, not so much. Similarly, "liberals/conservatives constantly praise Hispanic people who happen to be liberals/conservatives that have made a career out of attacking conservatives/liberals. Other Hispanics, not so much.". You get the idea. If someone is of a particular political ideology they will likely praise people who agree with their ideology. So I don't quite get what your point is.
"Agreed, Alan Keyes being Exhibit A."
I didn't realize that Alan Keyes was hugely popular amongst conservatives. I think most conservatives, like most liberals and others, feel (correctly) that he is a nutcase. Nobody is "constantly praising Alan Keyes" except for himself.
"So I don't quite get what your point is."
No surprise there.
"I didn't realize that Alan Keyes was hugely popular amongst conservatives."
In fact, he's so unpopular that the IL GOP brought him in from out of state to run for the US Senate against Obama.
The Original IAC's reply to my second post doesn't convince at all. He says that because (he assumes) Englewood residents have given up on their neighborhood, they should be offered housing vouchers and integrated schools. Take these propositions to their logical conclusions: If you move some folks out of Englewood with vouchers, what do you do for those who remain? Ignore them? And to integrate schools, doesn't this require a somewhat arbitrary and thus unfair selection process? And do you require one student from a good school to attend an Englewood school to maintain balance? Or do you simply deprive Englewood schools of their good students? The ethical implications are serious.
And now let's talk about those lucky residents who get to get out or students who get to attend a better school. What if the families they represent aren't solid -- one parent, drug use, domestic abuse, gangs? What if the adults aren't well-educated? Will they have have better luck simply because they have a voucher or a new school? Or is this like watering only the leaves of a tree?
And how can you doubt the innateness of human self-segregation? You see it the minute there are more than two of us in a room. You see it in school from kindergarten through college graduation. It's so pervasive, it's like breathing air. It's as natural as its opposite is -- curiosity about "other" -- and it becomes a matter of law only when it takes the form of institutionalized discrimination. Otherwise there'd be an amendment preventing the frat boys from laughing at the Dungeons and Dragons geeks at college.
Recognizing the naturalness of some kinds of self-segregation frees us to grapple with the pernicious kind and frees us to distinguish organic, viable social programs from the mechanistic and arbitrary. Do you want me to knock on 100 doors in Englewood this weekend? I'll ask each person, "Which would you prefer, a voucher to move up north or an Englewood with good stores, good schools, fewer gangs and good jobs?" I'll happily hand vouchers to the minority who want out if you'll see to the majority who would gratefully remain.
"Recognizing the naturalness of some kinds of self-segregation frees us to grapple with the pernicious kind and frees us to distinguish organic, viable social programs from the mechanistic and arbitrary."
So I guess that my black classmate shouldn't have been offended when someone threw a brick through her window the very first (and last) evening she spent in her Bridgeport apartment. It was only natural!
"He says that because (he assumes) Englewood residents have given up on their neighborhood, they should be offered housing vouchers and integrated schools."
That's not what I said. I certainly don't believe that anybody who doesn't like their neighborhood should, for that sole reason, be given housing vouchers to live somewhere else. I was simply referring to what Steve Bogira discussed in his February article and pointing out that they didn't involve, as you seemed to think, forcing people to live somewhere they didn't want to. I also mentioned that they made a certain degree of sense with regard to possibly being beneficial with regard to reducing concentrated poverty and perhaps causing more possibility for upward mobility.
The rest of your first two paragraphs are basically the arguments that those against charter schools and school vouchers have made. You also apply them to housing vouchers. Essentially it is the argument that because you can't help everybody it is unfair to help only some people so you shouldn't help anybody. I don't find that to be particularly convincing. You also make the "inner-city kids wouldn't be able to succeed in better schools because their problems are solely the parents not bad schools (or by implication of your logic, poor peer-influence)" argument. That's been proven wrong time and time again. Many inner-city children are able to do significantly better in better schools. Its not as if there is no hope simply because you only change portions of their environments and not the whole. And a lot of them have good parents so moving them out of a bad school and/or a bad neighborhood is a significant change. As for the ones that have very poor familial situations, I actually think there is something to Bogira's point that giving more exposure of these types of problems to what he calls "the haves" will make it more likely that something meaningful could be done about it. I think that's true both on a personal basis and policy-wise. That's not going to solve anything. But I do think there would be a benefit there.
Its somewhat interesting, by the way, how often these issues highlight that what is thought of as the left/right ideological spectrum is simplistic and normally gets turned on its head if people are having meaningful discussions. In the beginning, I think I was arguing this issue from what would generally be thought of as your left but with regard to your objections about using charter schools for integration purposes I would be generally thought of as arguing from your right (though it would go back to the left when discussion your extension of this argument to housing vouchers). Here is a very interesting old article from Bogira from 1988 that I stumbled across a few months ago: http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/inter… It was truly striking how many of these ideas, framed as liberal at the time, would in later years become very similar to what are thought to be hallmarks of conservative positions on education reform. All this also indicates that liberals like Bogira who believe in these types of solutions will not only have to try to convince more conservative individuals but also people who believe in liberal ideology that conflicts with these ideas. For example, his colleague Ben Joravsky who has basically indicated that he thinks that any attempt to move from the neighborhood school system is abandoning the city's commitment to public education.
What I said in my earlier post was that I have seen no evidence that racial self-segregation is natural. It may very well be true that there is something innate that causes people to naturally self-segregate to a certain extent based on similarities of personalities and interests. Certainly, much of that is learned but I suppose some of it could be precipitated by presuppositions at birth. The frat boys do not self-segregate from the Dungeons and Dragons geeks (using your analogy, though it is somewhat simplistic as there are Dungeons and Dragons geeks who are frat boys) because of anything physical. It is about personality differences. It really doesn't make a whole lot of difference whether all of that is learned or it is a combination of some innate and some learned characteristics. Race does not in-it-of itself indicate personality differences. It can correlate with them and will in many cases when we are talking about such things as class differences. When people assume that those of a different race are so different that they automatically decide to self-segragate from them I think it normally is the result of stereotyping. In any case, the fact that such things as personality differences based on class among school-age children do exist doesn't necessarily mean that it is benefitial to self-segragate based on this. This type of segregation is not as harmless as "frat boy/Dungeons and Dragons geek" segregation. Societies normally progress better when people spend more time with others who have had different experiences.
I actually instead meant to link to this article in my last post: http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/schoo… Ignore the one that's there.
Of course she should.
So back to you - say you're mayor, what do you to prevent the below from happening?
btw, your cries of "Troll!" are about the most hypocritical thing I've ever read on these boards.
Try formulating a complete sentence or two when you respond. Agree or disagree with people's opinions here, some folks take the time to articulate a thought and POV, others just spew in order to hear themselves talk.
Go back through the thread and every comment by FGFM is approximately 3 - 4 lines, 2 of which are cherrypicked lines quoted from others.
"So I guess that my black classmate shouldn't have been offended when someone threw a brick through her window the very first (and last) evening she spent in her Bridgeport apartment. It was only natural!"
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