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Old 02-06-2011, 07:28 AM
 
Location: Charlotte
265 posts, read 327,875 times
Reputation: 99

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Indentured Servant View Post
I think that what we as African Americans need to do is to start building and preserving and stop chasing. What I find is that we come in at the tail end of curves. In other words, when the trend is basically over that is when we get in on it and we usually get burned. Those on the front of the curve (trends) are those the profit the most from it while those at the tail end suffers some sort of loss. As a side note, the election of the first black president should have let everyone know that the country is now on a tail end of a curve (economic) and that the country is going down (not because of the black president). Historically when a city was getting its first black mayor it meant the tail end of a curve in which living in cities was no longer as desirable.

Anyway, it would be prudent and wise for African American, who can afford to, to start investing in inner-city real estate. Moving to the burbs from the city is being at the tail end of a curve. There is a new curve of moving back to central cities that is in its infancy and will explode soon. Many African Americans are already in the central cities and the black middle class should not seek to move to the suburbs but develope a critical mass that reinvest in the inner-city. I have seen whites come and turn around a decayed community within a decade (which is fine). There is no reason that African American middle class cannot do the same.

I think that for a long time many black families dreamed about moving to the suburbs or when you were a kid you dreamed of it. I know I did. Thus, when one rises to have the means to live in the suburbs....they go for it, fullfilling a dream. Now however, suburbs do not have the shine that they used to have as poverty and all sorts of issues have made their way to the burbs.
Good points. We're at the tail end of the curve because unfortunately, that's our history here in America. Substantial progress in the African American community overall only goes back by about 40 years or so, so that's something to keep in mind.

 
Old 02-06-2011, 07:39 AM
 
13,806 posts, read 9,637,612 times
Reputation: 5243
Quote:
Originally Posted by Poseidon704 View Post
Sure there are, but I seriously doubt that progressive, growing Southern cities like my own would trade places with Detroit just for a couple of historic homes and higher population density. Again, it seems as though you're missing my point which is that not every city in the North has aged gracefully. It seems a bit hard for you to accept that point. No region is perfect and all of them have their challenges to deal with, and for some Northern cities, that includes a significant amount of urban decay and abandonment. That's all I'm saying.
No I did not miss the point.....I was MAKING the point. The one thing you have to love about the South is that people love to praise it. However, remember that praise is subjective and often may involve hyperbole. I am not suggesting that one city or region change place with another or that people in Charlotte should look at Detroit, of all places, with envy. Its true that all cities up North did not age gracefully but its equally true that not all Southern cities shine well while new. Places like Houston simply look terrible without ample zoning restrictions. However, that is my subjective opinion. What might look bad to me might look good to you and what looks good to you might look bad to me.

I just tend to look at trends and cycles and whats happening globally and in all honesty I think the next 20 years will not be like the last 20 years. I don't think one can extrapolate that the South will enjoy the growth rates the next 20 years the way it did the previous. Many of the reasons for that growth simply do not exist to the same degree anylonger. Cheap oil allowed the Southern cities to grow in a white that preserved its low density appeal, which constrasted with high density Northern areas. Its simply not feasable to continue that construct and much higher fuel cost is going to radically change the way metropolitian area development takes place. Simply looking at things logically, any area or region that developed or boomed during the era of cheap gas prices and the automobile will have many problems when gas prices reach 7 and 8 dollars a gallon. When gas is expensive it changes everything and favors high density areas over low density areas.

Last edited by Indentured Servant; 02-06-2011 at 07:52 AM..
 
Old 02-06-2011, 07:50 AM
 
Location: Charlotte
265 posts, read 327,875 times
Reputation: 99
Quote:
Originally Posted by Indentured Servant View Post
No I did not miss the point.....I was MAKING the point. The one thing you have to love about the South is that people love to praise it. However, remember that praise is subjective and often may involve hyperbole. I am not suggesting that one city or region change place with another or that people in Charlotte should look at Detroit, of all places, with envy. Its true that all cities up North did not age gracefully but its equally true that not all Southern cities shine well while new. Places like Houston simply look terrible without ample zoning restrictions. However, that is my subjective opinion. What might look bad to me might look good to you and what looks good to you might look bad to me.

I just tend to look at trends and cycles and whats happening globally and in all honesty I think the next 20 years will not be like the last 20 years. I don't think one can extrapolate that the South will enjoy the growth rates the next 20 years the way it did the previous. Many of the reasons for that growth simply do not exist to the same degree anylonger.
I agree that growth rates in the South/Sunbelt will not be high indefinitely, but I do think that within the next 20 years, it will still see the majority of growth nationwide. I also hope that Northern cities that have fallen on hard times can find a way to reinvent themselves and become attractive again.
 
Old 02-06-2011, 08:07 AM
 
13,806 posts, read 9,637,612 times
Reputation: 5243
Quote:
Originally Posted by Poseidon704 View Post
I agree that growth rates in the South/Sunbelt will not be high indefinitely, but I do think that within the next 20 years, it will still see the majority of growth nationwide. I also hope that Northern cities that have fallen on hard times can find a way to reinvent themselves and become attractive again.
Thats a fair and true statement. The demographics of the South will ensure, if nothing else, that the birth rate is higher in the South than the North. I think migration patterns, domestic migration, will slow considerably, however.

I also think, and I hope and pray that I am wrong, that this country is going to go through a major depression within this decade. I think its going to be an era in which families will have come together for survival. Currently famalies are scattered all across the country. During a depression many people will have to move back to their roots, where there is a home or property owned and people who lost their jobs and cannot afford their mortgage can go back to. Many people who moved South may have to move back North if jobs dry up in a depression or visa versa. I know my folks own some land in Mississippi and I am seriously looking at it as part of my survival options if or when the fhit hits the san.
 
Old 02-06-2011, 08:14 AM
 
Location: Atlanta ,GA
9,067 posts, read 15,719,330 times
Reputation: 2980
Quote:
Originally Posted by Indentured Servant View Post
I think that what we as African Americans need to do is to start building and preserving and stop chasing. What I find is that we come in at the tail end of curves. In other words, when the trend is basically over that is when we get in on it and we usually get burned. Those on the front of the curve (trends) are those the profit the most from it while those at the tail end suffers some sort of loss. As a side note, the election of the first black president should have let everyone know that the country is now on a tail end of a curve (economic) and that the country is going down (not because of the black president). Historically when a city was getting its first black mayor it meant the tail end of a curve in which living in cities was no longer as desirable.

Anyway, it would be prudent and wise for African American, who can afford to, to start investing in inner-city real estate. Moving to the burbs from the city is being at the tail end of a curve. There is a new curve of moving back to central cities that is in its infancy and will explode soon. Many African Americans are already in the central cities and the black middle class should not seek to move to the suburbs but develope a critical mass that reinvest in the inner-city. I have seen whites come and turn around a decayed community within a decade (which is fine). There is no reason that African American middle class cannot do the same.

I think that for a long time many black families dreamed about moving to the suburbs or when you were a kid you dreamed of it. I know I did. Thus, when one rises to have the means to live in the suburbs....they go for it, fullfilling a dream. Now however, suburbs do not have the shine that they used to have as poverty and all sorts of issues have made their way to the burbs.
You hit the nail on the head.For me thats what I did.I bought my house in a very transitional area Downtown Atlanta 5 yrs ago.I grew up in the suburbs my entire life.Both parent with advanced degrees and still together.Many of the problems that see some black people are face with in the city were in stark contrast to my upbringing.

My parents think Im crazy but 5 years later things look like they are finally happening in this neighborhood within 4 blocks of the Georgia Dome.For me I don't think I will ever go back to the burbs.My parents even gave me one of the houses we lived in that they owned but moved out.Its 30min South of Downtown Atlanta but even though itis mortgage free,I just could not do it.

You cannot believe how many white people just in the last 2 years I have seen move in my neighborhood.Not an overwhelming amount by any means,but definitely a noticeable difference.I have no problem with that at all but I wish (like you said)more blacks would look at the long run and buy into or keep land in the city and be apart of the changing fabric.Some are but it could be better.
 
Old 02-06-2011, 12:48 PM
 
Location: Atlanta ,GA
9,067 posts, read 15,719,330 times
Reputation: 2980
Quote:
Originally Posted by brother's keeper View Post
The best way for AAs to improve our communities is to undue the many divisions created between us and ridding our communities of the negative thug drug/ culture created by the white power structure.
Moderator cut: orphaned

Oh and bout the IMF.Once again you made assumptions about who I am and what I know.I brought up that point as I will state again since you are obviously mentally challenged:That money was used by somebody in those governments.Regardless of who put who where and when,someone has to choose to do the dirty work.The fact that a black person does it makes it worse.Someone had to pull the trigger.At some point we gotta b smarter,its not always about being stronger.

Yes .I do believe can affect more change working in the confines of the government rather than driving myself numb with anger ,hate,and resentment. cant do anything with that when it consumes as it has you.

Moderator cut: off topic/personal

Last edited by Bo; 02-06-2011 at 02:53 PM.. Reason: orphaned - the post that you were replying to was deleted
 
Old 02-06-2011, 01:28 PM
 
Location: Wilmington, DE
257 posts, read 454,542 times
Reputation: 78
Quote:
Originally Posted by Poseidon704 View Post
Another reason is historical; the South is the ancestral homeland of African Americans. So for some of us, the reverse migration is "coming home" in a sense.
I'm gong to halfway agree with my brothers keeper on this.
Any black person who calls the south their "home" is twisted.
But at the same time thats all a lot of people know.
Most black people down south don't know where they came from, since there people have been there since slavery and beyond. The southern region of the USA should never be considered the "mecca" or the "motherland" of black people. Even after jim crow that didn't stop my people from all the racist attitudes and way of life down there. Poor black areas in the south look exactly like slave plantation. and now these southern rappers are making up these dumb songs and dances trying to entertain massa........
 
Old 02-06-2011, 02:23 PM
 
Location: Charlotte
265 posts, read 327,875 times
Reputation: 99
Quote:
Originally Posted by Internal Breathing Fire View Post
I'm gong to halfway agree with my brothers keeper on this.
Any black person who calls the south their "home" is twisted.
But at the same time thats all a lot of people know.
Most black people down south don't know where they came from, since there people have been there since slavery and beyond. The southern region of the USA should never be considered the "mecca" or the "motherland" of black people. Even after jim crow that didn't stop my people from all the racist attitudes and way of life down there. Poor black areas in the south look exactly like slave plantation. and now these southern rappers are making up these dumb songs and dances trying to entertain massa........
For some reason, people seem to not know the meaning of "ancestral homeland" which is different from the place that individuals may call home. I don't understand why this is so hard to comprehend especially since I explained what I meant in a historical, cultural, and even biological sense (i.e., we're all mutts due to tons of interbreeding). And the atrocities that were committed in the South against Blacks doesn't change that fact, just like the fact that Africans willingly sold other Africans into slavery and the subsequent colonialization of African countries which did as much, if not more, damage to indigenous Africans as slavery and Jim Crow did to African Americans doesn't change the fact that Africa is the ultimate "motherland." The same goes for European immigrants who came to America to escape the atrocities (fascism, Nazism, famines, ethnic conflicts, etc.) occurring in their home countries. We need to stop attaching all of these lovey dovey feelings to such terms and recognize that the reality is much complicated than what's being acknowledged.

Not to mention the fact that for millions of Black Americans whose family members were never part of the Great Migration, the South is literally their (our) home. Where do you get off calling us "twisted"? That's pretty ignorant of you.

Last edited by Poseidon704; 02-06-2011 at 02:33 PM..
 
Old 02-06-2011, 02:25 PM
 
1,605 posts, read 3,905,227 times
Reputation: 1595
Quote:
Originally Posted by Internal Breathing Fire View Post
I'm gong to halfway agree with my brothers keeper on this.
Any black person who calls the south their "home" is twisted.
But at the same time thats all a lot of people know.
Most black people down south don't know where they came from, since there people have been there since slavery and beyond. The southern region of the USA should never be considered the "mecca" or the "motherland" of black people. Even after jim crow that didn't stop my people from all the racist attitudes and way of life down there. Poor black areas in the south look exactly like slave plantation. and now these southern rappers are making up these dumb songs and dances trying to entertain massa........
^Second

I'm not going to go into the Africa/China/colonization thing, but what pisses me off is not that many blacks identify with the South, but how those blacks like myself who truly don't want to answer to the blackface minstrel mentality that has bastardized the black culture and considers places like the Western US more of a "home" than either the North or South get called "Uncle Toms" and "betrayers of the race." It's especially a pain in the a if most of the opposition forces between you and your personal ambition, dreams, and desires have been from those in your own "so-called" race. And YES, the black culture has been bastardized by plantation minstrel rap, multi-generational poverty, and the "thuggin and clubbin." You think MLK had this in mind for blacks in the 21st Century. Hell, for all you black separatists, did even Malcolm X had this in mind for blacks in the 21st Century.

For me, I'm one who likes personal freedom and the freedom to become my own man. I don't want to answer to either the culture who has historically oppressed (a part of) my ancestors, nor to answer to the same race and culture who has currently oppressed me for not fitting into their little cultural constraints especially while in the same mouths they talk about "we need to unite as brothas and sistas against the man." And for all you personal critics, just because I don't identify with the "Southern Black Culture" doesn't me I'm part of the "American White Culture" neither, especially the East Coast White Culture which (unfortunately) dominates the entire country. I guess this is why I like the Western US the best due to its historical opportunity to flee from the "Establishment East Coast" and "Confederate Southern" social orders and define one's own character, even though there has been attempts by the East and South to bring their baggage over there (Yuppifying San Francisco, constant racial strife in LA, etc.). Not to say there aren't good things about the East and South, but honestly, every place is suited for certain people, and if you don't fit into that mold, the area's populace won't be welcoming. If you're Italian, Irish, Jewish, or even Asian, than the East Coast/BosWash Megalopolis is great. If you're a White Irish-Scottish Southerner or a black person who traces his roots and defines his/her entire image by your race, than the South is a great option. For others, the region is irrelevant at best and uninviting at worst, as I have personally noticed from being on this forum with "these kind" of subjects and even dealing with some "family" members.
 
Old 02-06-2011, 02:47 PM
 
13,806 posts, read 9,637,612 times
Reputation: 5243
Quote:
Originally Posted by Internal Breathing Fire View Post
I'm gong to halfway agree with my brothers keeper on this.
Any black person who calls the south their "home" is twisted.
But at the same time thats all a lot of people know.
Most black people down south don't know where they came from, since there people have been there since slavery and beyond. The southern region of the USA should never be considered the "mecca" or the "motherland" of black people. Even after jim crow that didn't stop my people from all the racist attitudes and way of life down there. Poor black areas in the south look exactly like slave plantation. and now these southern rappers are making up these dumb songs and dances trying to entertain massa........
I here what you are saying about the south being our "home" tip. However, for me I cannot escape the fact that it feels like "home". Anywhere the bones of my ancestors rest I will feel a strong connection. What I also like about the South, Mississippi in particular, is that I can get off the highway in the middle of nowhere and see black people in the community. Once you leave the city up North....and exit off the highway, rarely do you see black people. Its the closest I can get to Africa where EVERYWHERE I go a see black folks and its seeing white folks that is rare.
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