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I'm not saying that. I know some areas can have more whites than blacks and vice versa (or more Asians, Latinos, etc.). But many suburban areas (for example) areas that have uniform classes (regardless of racial dispersion). There are usually wealthy whites, with wealthy blacks, and wealthy Latinos, wealthy Asians, etc. with varying degrees of density based on preference. For example, Sandy Springs has a black population, but it is not a disproportionately poor black population.
How do you know the socioeconomic status of blacks in Sandy Springs?
Id wager that at least 75% of the black people in Sandy Springs live in the apartments along Roswell Road and Dunwoody Place, especially in the "North Springs" area. There are no single-family neighborhoods in Sandy Springs that are even half black. Try again.
Okay, I keep posting quotes from Kruse's actual text and y'all keep telling me you can't put your finger on it but you think he's saying something different.
It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, But soon... I'll post quotes from both books that I mentioned.
The reality is that whites vigorously resisted desegregation for years, with every tool at their disposal. Including violence, intimidation and organized political pressure. That's simply historical fact and Kruse and others have documented in detail. A lot of us lived through it ourselves and have firsthand knowledge of what happened.
True.
It is certainly true that many neighborhoods transitioned very rapidly when white resistance finally crumbled. And there's no doubt that there was a lot of manipulation by realtors (and realtists) to maximize their profits. "Blockbusting" -- instilling the fear in white neighborhoods that blacks were about to move in and that property values would plummet -- was a very common practice. Whites struggled to draw artificial boundaries and even created physical barriers to blacks moving into their communities. (Freeways are pretty handy for that).
True.
But the suggestion that white flight was driven by the desire of whites to vastly inflate home prices in order to sell to blacks is, frankly, nonsense.
Here's the problem. The blanket statements. I'm not saying all whites conspired to do this, but it happened. White flight was primarily driven by ignorance and racism. Period. Not all, but some communities did organize and plan their fight, then their flight. Are you saying that absolutely no white families/communities in Atlanta were enticed by the money to be made by selling to blacks, even against the wishes of the community? That is why Kruse explains white resistance collapsed. I remember the book saying that most unified white communities rankled because of the profit that could be made by selling. I'll find the quotes...
My only point in the OP is that Blacks paid way higher prices to own a home in those areas. I'm not talking about evil plots or conspiracies, the simple fact is that for a wide variety of reasons (and I think everyone in this discussion with you - including yourself - mentioned a few), Blacks paid a whole lot more for their homes when integration initially occurred. How about we get to the larger points of the original post.
To the contrary, whites fought tooth and nail to "defend" and "protect" their neighborhoods from what they felt was an invasion by blacks. That's what Kevin Kruse documented.
True.
I'll post a few more quotes to verify that. If any of you have quotes to the contrary by all means put them up, but until you back it up, the claim that Kruse is actually saying something else is pretty hollow.
How do you know the socioeconomic status of blacks in Sandy Springs?
Id wager that at least 75% of the black people in Sandy Springs live in the apartments along Roswell Road and Dunwoody Place, especially in the "North Springs" area. There are no single-family neighborhoods in Sandy Springs that are even half black. Try again.
You are not paying attention. I'm not saying the racial demographic is equal. I'm saying the economic status is... generally.
Whatever percentage of blacks that are in the areas you mentioned, whether it be 2% or 15%, I'd wager that they are of the same or similar economic status as the whites who live there. I'm saying that this is not as true in intown communities and I am proposing a reason as to why this is the case.
And again, Kirkwood and East Lake are Neighborhoods/Communities. Sandy Springs is a city. Regardless of the races, I wager that all the apartment dwellers are of a similar economic status. As do all the residents (regardless of race) that live in an affluent community/neighborhood/subdivision. I'd wager that the few black people in those nice subdivisions make about as much as the whites who live there.
In the areas that I am discussing, the blacks you see generally seem to be poorer overall than the whites that you see in the same neighborhood... street... next door. Do you understand what I'm saying?
I know, i know, i brought up Sandy Springs... (a city), but hopefully you get my clarified point...
Last edited by equinox63; 07-21-2010 at 05:09 PM..
You are not paying attention. I'm not saying the racial demographic is equal. I'm saying the economic status is... generally.
Whatever percentage of blacks that are in the areas you mentioned, whether it be 2% or 15%, I'd wager that they are of the same or similar economic status as the whites who live there. I'm saying that this is not as true in intown communities and I am proposing a reason as to why this is the case.
And again, Kirkwood and East Lake are Neighborhoods/Communities. Sandy Springs is a city. Regardless of the races, I wager that all the apartment dwellers are of a similar economic status. As do all the residents (regardless of race) that live in an affluent community/neighborhood/subdivision. I'd wager that the few black people in those nice subdivisions make about as much as the whites who live there.
In the areas that I am discussing, the blacks you see generally seem to be poorer overall than the whites that you see in the same neighborhood... street... next door. Do you understand what I'm saying?
I know, i know, i brought up Sandy Springs... (a city), but hopefully you get my clarified point...
I get now what you were saying. Thanks for clearing it up. And yes I would agree with this point.
But the suggestion that white flight was driven by the desire of whites to vastly inflate home prices in order to sell to blacks is, frankly, nonsense.
Here's the problem. The blanket statements. I'm not saying all whites conspired to do this, but it happened. White flight was primarily driven by ignorance and racism. Period. Not all, but some communities did organize and plan their fight, then their flight. Are you saying that absolutely no white families/communities in Atlanta were enticed by the money to be made by selling to blacks, even against the wishes of the community? That is why Kruse explains white resistance collapsed. I remember the book saying that most unified white communities rankled because of the profit that could be made by selling. I'll find the quotes...
My only point in the OP is that Blacks paid way higher prices to own a home in those areas. I'm not talking about evil plots or conspiracies, the simple fact is that for a wide variety of reasons (and I think everyone in this discussion with you - including yourself - mentioned a few), Blacks paid a whole lot more for their homes when integration initially occurred. How about we get to the larger points of the original post.
Well, we may not disagree too much. Yes, there's absolutely no question that some whites sold their homes to blacks and made money on the deal. Maybe some of those whites thought the neighborhood would become integrated and they wanted out. Maybe some blacks were unhappy living in black neighborhoods and were willing to pay a premium to move out. Those may not be the most laudable motives on either side, but they are understandable considerations by both buyer and seller.
But that is NOT what characterized white flight. The vast majority of white neighborhoods bitterly resisted selling out. They battled it for years with all the tools at their disposal, and did not sell out en masse until panic set in over racial fears, anxieties about falling property values, worries about declining schools, and so forth. White flight was not driven by the desire of whites to wildly inflate their home prices and profit by selling to blacks.
Trust me, I lived in a neighborhood on the west side of town that went through this, and many tears were shed. We did not want to move, and my father said many times later in life that he regretted being stampeded into selling. We only got a fraction of what we thought the house was worth, but realtors were telling my parents that they needed to get out immediately or they would lose everything. For Southerners of their era, my folks were pretty progressive and their concerns were not primarily about race. They were told that the schools would go downhill and that their property value would disappear. We wanted to stay, especially us kids, because we loved our neighborhood. But it was a scary time -- many, and then most, of the houses in the neighborhood went up for sale, and rumors were flying everywhere.
There's no doubt that white neighborhoods organized to try to prevent incursions by blacks. When those efforts failed and resistance crumbled, there's no doubt that people were scrambling to get whatever they could. But it was a time of panic and falling prices, not one where people sat back and said, "Well, all our neighbors are moving out but we'll just jack the price up and make a killing. Those black folks are so dumb they won't notice that every house on the street is for sale, and they want in so bad they'll pay whatever we ask."
This was not one of society's most shining moments. But there was much less information in those days, and there seemed to be no leaders or role models to show us how change should happen. And there were haters and fear mongers who made things worse, although I believe they were truly a small minority.
But I can tell you for a fact that it's a mistake to try to re-write history by claiming this was the product of some weird economic scheme to rip off blacks by selling our homes at wildly inflated prices. If that was the case, why did white neighborhoods fight so long and hard NOT to sell? Why were so many tears shed, and why was the fighting so fierce? In those days a nice home was very much a treasured dream for white middle class and working class people, too.
White flight was one of the great debacles of the latter 20th century and its reverberations will last a long, long time. It was bad enough for what it was without trying to imagine it into something it was not. That does a disservice to everyone.
Not quite my friend. I said "initially". Crack didn't even come out in America until the eighties. Who are the criminals? At what level? How did it get to your local drug dealer? Ralph from Simpson Rd. didn't just hop on a plane to Columbia and bring it back to the 'hood.
Initially it was brought in by criminals, most likely from latin america. Certainly they were interested in expanding their sales of cocaine from "affluent whites" to a broader base via a cheaper (and more addictive) substance, ie., crack cocaine. Usually, most things come down to economics.
As soon as we touch up question #2.
There, touched up
No. Meth can be made at your house. You can't just make cocaine in your kitchen. It has to come from somewhere. I'm not saying the gov't is spearheading the drug trade right now... But they definitely introduced it in the 1980's. Every single link I put up here seems fraudulent to you? Every single one?
"The govt" is very broad. By that do you mean white people within govt? They sure did an amazing job of keeping it quiet. There are plenty of blacks working in govt and nobody every had any real proof? Amazing, dont you think...
You can post a thousand links and everyone can be bogus. This is the internet, where the lies, mistruths and half truths far outweigh the real deal.
It doesn't. I know I'll catch a lot of heat for this, but here goes: You had the civil rights movement in the 1960s which pressured legislation to do many things that they really did not want to do. Then you had Malcolm X and the black power movement in which young militant blacks were becoming organized and politically active. I think the "gov't" felt that too much was happening too soon and that this would upset the status quot. Look up "Cointelpro." Who do you think was behind King's death? You think James Earl Ray was a lone gunman? After systematically murdering or jailing most of the black leaders, cocaine emerged in affluent communities. Coincidentally, crack emerged in the poor black communities and devastated it. Look up Rick Ross. Then you have the "war on drugs" (in which crack possession results in "exponetially higher" jail sentences...)
I think certain powers were afraid of the power that black Americans would hold if they were unified and not fragmented and marginalized... After all, the Black Panthers were considered terrorists. According to the CIA, Dr. King was called "the most dangerous man in America."
Remember, during Reconstruction, one of the arguments for the continued oppression of blacks was that they would unify, gain power, overpower the white establishment, and then vie for revenge for slavery. This is one of the reasons that many southern whites during this time consisently oppressed and marginalized blacks after slavery.
The Black Panthers were and are terrorists. Seen some of their latest videos? Intimidating voters, outright calling for the killing of "cracker babies". But Im sure they mean well....
Seems to me the longer jail sentences for crack were meant to DETER drug use, not encourage it. After all, if the penalty was less, wouldnt they be a kind of inducement to use it? You apparently are determined to see this giant conspiracy of "white people in govt" all agreeing they need to bring down the black folk by whatever means. And its just not true.
There is nothing stopping african americans from succeeding in this country except themselves. Same as is true with anybody. How many highly paid black celebreties, athletes, etc are there? These are some of the most hightly sought after careers on the planet. Why hasnt "govt" put a stop to it?
Blacks, at 12% of the US population, were never a serious threat to overpower the "white establishment". Look, white culture is the dominant culture in the US, and will be until the country naturally (or violently) dissolves. But truly, Barack Obama would never have been elected if he spoke with a "black diction". That is the plain truth of the matter.
Themselves. 1st. Curiosity/Peer Pressure/Societal Pressure (Just like many whites with cocaine) 2nd. Addiction.
Another good question is "who made the residents of these communities sell the crack cocaine?" The answer is: Their own Poverty, Greed, Ignorance, Disunity, and lack of Leadership.
Also: Easy money.
It's not. If someone sets a trap. I guess it's the person's fault for falling into it. The sad thing is that many blacks don't even know they are being exploited... and more often than not, they are exploiting themselves.
[Some people on this forum have heard this before, but] there is an old story about how indigenous people in the Arctic would hunt for wolves. They would stick the butt of a knife in the ice/ground and cover it with blood. A wolf would come by and lick the blade and cut it's tongue, but it would continue to lick the blade because it thinks that it is being fed, but really it is drinking its own blood and bleeds to death. This is an analogy of what the selling of crack does to impoverished kids/communities. I know it is the wolf's fault for licking the blade... and only the victim can do something about it. Nobody's asking for handouts. But we would be remiss if we did not acknowledge who put the knife in the ice in the first place...
d:
This country was built on the premise of the supremacy of the individual. The individual is responsible for their own success or failure, and anything else is just an excuse. Its not a perfect system, by any means (what is?), but it does the best job of rewarding those who make the best decisions and punishing those who dont. That is what it all comes down to.
arjay57, I guess I can agree with you on one point. It wasn't necessarily a scheme of the white residents to benefit economically by jacking up the prices for incoming blacks. Most of these white residents of transitional neighborhoods were far too racist and ignorant to benefit economically themselves. Their REAL ESTATE AGENTS on the other hand were rewarded handsomely for playing on the racial fears and ignorance of blue collar Atlanta whites in the 1960s. Please read the following excerpt from The Double-edged Sword of Gentrification in Atlanta by Lesley Williams Reid and Robert M. Adelman, Georgia State University :
"Between 1960 and 1970, these neighborhoods changed from being almost 100% white to almost 100% black. In Kirkwood, for example, 91% of residents were white in 1960; by 1970, 97% of the population was black.
This earlier transition in Kirkwood, East Lake, and East Atlanta was not peaceful. Between 1960 and 1970, these neighborhoods experienced raw, neighbor-to-neighbor racial hostility. Real-estate agents used white anxieties about having black neighbors to blockbust, convincing white families to sell their homes at below-market prices and then reselling these same homes to black families at prime market prices, pocketing the profits. In 1969, a white Kirkwood resident told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that he sold his home to a realtor at well below market value only to have a black family buy that same house for the highest price ever recorded. Paired with racial prejudice, this economic exploitation created enmity between long-standing white residents and black newcomers. The manifestations of this antagonism ran the gamut from the arson of a black family�s home, to the incorporation of Eastern Atlanta, Inc., an organization created for the sole purpose of buying property that might fall into the hands of blacks. But the endgame of this hostility was the creation of �vanilla suburbs� as whites moved out of the city en masse. This racial tension from the 1960s set the stage for the racial tensions that undergird gentrification in Atlanta today."
I am still failing to see where you think this massive resistance to neighborhood transition (it was most certainly not integration) took place over a long period of time. Here is your excerpt from Kruze’s “White Flight”:
Quote:
Neighborhoods with a cohesive identity
and strong local institutions (such as Adamsville and Kirkwood) were
able to hold back residential desegregation, for a few years at least, while
a place without such identity and institutions (Adair Park) underwent
swift racial transition. By the early 1960s, however, with the advent of
the civil rights movement and the continued pressure on the part of blacks
seeking homes, all of these "white communities" underwent racial transition,
regardless of their "integrity."
By your own admission, even those neighborhoods that attempted to resist racial transition were only able to do so for a few years at the most. The market forces of the windfall of profits to be made from newly-enfranchised blacks by white banks and real-estate brokers were too strong. This was doubly profitable because it also destroyed black business districts such as Auburn Avenue due to the rapid decompression of their business thresholds. Blue Collar White Atlanta in the 1960s was simply too racist and not business savvy enough to garner a slice of the pie from their former properties. If you think this is a sweeping generalization, look at the history of Shaker Heights, OH. The whites of Shaker Heights were not as racist as to massively resist or all bail out of their neighborhoods when the first blacks moved in. They actually colluded together to refuse to sell their houses to the same type of unscrupulous agents that were parasites in 1960s Atlanta. As a result, to this day Shaker Heights is one of the most racially-integrated, higher-income suburbs in the United States. This is remarkable considering the overall depressed nature of metropolitan Cleveland. So no excuses of how “that was just the way things were”. There was a model for how integration could be done the right way and Atlanta failed miserably in that regard.
To give a little reality check about the gentrifying neighborhoods. while there may be affluent whites and poor blacks attending the same public schools, they could hardly be called "neighbors" or part of the same community - in fact most of the whites consider their neighborhoods to be "transitional" meaning they are going from all poor and black to gentrified. The whites are just waiting for all of the old black "grandmas" you speak of to either sell out at a good profit (and have a yuppy couple come in and gut and remodel the house) or die off and the same thing happen with "grandma's" children getting the profit.
You have to remember that a large percentage of the intown black population in the Old Fourth Ward, for example continues to live in apartments while the gentrification is taking place in the single family homes on the surrounding streets. To give a micro example, the apartments along Boulevard are all black, while the surrounding streets of single family homes are being slowly gentrified. What happens when the owners of the old apartmtents along Boulevard choose to sell out to a developer who wants to put in lofts from the $300,000" Where do you think the diversity of that neighborhood will go? Will the whites in the homes make a plea to keep the lower income residents of their neighborhood, or will they be happy that as the newer, pricier real estate comes in, their homes will now be as expensive as their neighbors to the north of Ponce de Leon in Virginia Highlands (when they paid a lot less when their neighborhood was in the early stages of gentrification)?
The dirty little secret is that there has been a deliberate campaign by the City of Atlanta to tear down public housing and give the former public housing residents a Section 8 Voucher and encourage them to scatter to Clayton, County, Dekalb and southwest Cobb. Back in the early 1990's, Atlanta had the second highest percentage of public housing residents in the nation (after #1 Newark). At that time, the City used the Hope 6 Program to tear down public housing complexes (it started with Techwood) and rebuild "mixed income" communities and scatter most of the former residents with Section 8 Vouchers to suburban locales.
Your hopes of truly integrated communities is unrealistic and when the housing market picks up, gentrification in the intown neighborhoods will accelerate and the poor black population will decrease - evidence of this was seen in the last mayoral election. Right now, the integration you see in intown neighborhoods is just a transition phase and not a permanent condition.
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