Quote:
Originally Posted by R1070
This was the exact point I was trying to make waaaay earlier in this thread but got jumped on. Its great that Atlanta has something about it that attracts blacks but it is glorified so much there that it is borderline offensive to other races/cultures that live there. All you hear in the media or on these threads are about what Atlanta offers its black community. I made a reference to hip hop giving Atlanta a bad image and someone responded with a statement saying "well why didnt it give NYC a bad reputation as well?". The answer to that is because NYC doesnt just focus on one race/culture, NYC takes pride in being multicultural. The whole black mecca thing will indeed slow down Atlanta's growth because other races have slowed their migration to the area. If you feel like blacks are the only ones welcome why would you move there?
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People took the "Black mecca" appellation and blew it up into something it was never meant to convey. The fact of the matter is that when you consider the history of Blacks in this country and how Atlanta, a Southern city, was very quick to embrace civil and economic equality for Blacks, it is very laudable and significant. Atlanta thus became a center of Black culture, and rightly so. At one point, it was one of only a handful of cities where Blacks weren't just doing OK for themselves, but they were actually prospering and thriving. Now other cities, such as my own, are joining that club and that's a great thing. But Atlanta has been and continues to recognized as a trailblazer in that era. The historic prosperity of Blacks there evokes a time when Blacks had their own self-sufficient, well-to-do communities (the Black "Wall Streets" in various cities) that were destroyed for one reason or another. Regardless as to what some think, Atlanta wouldn't be what it is today had it not been for early progressive leadership that caused the city to be a magnet for African Americans. And neither does the city's status as a "Black mecca" preclude other people of other races/ethnicities from moving to the city and doing well for themselves, which they have done and continue to do.