<p>That’s the thing. You read that article “Being White in Philly,” and you come away understanding that the city is very segregated. The whites say, “It’s for the schools,” which is, interestingly, how people explain the way they live in the Chicago suburbs, “for the schools.” </p>
<p>That is the party line. We’re not racist, we are pro education. For our kids.</p>
<p>I’m not “better than this,” either. I’m just saying, we don’t know just how deeply divided we are as a nation, and the prom is a horrible thing, absolutely, but the fact that most of the 50% of high school students who drop out in Philly are black is even worse.</p>
<p>I’m black and I’ve lived in the south my entire life. I think it largely depends on what kind of community you live in. I live in a rural, republican county but yet I haven’t experienced any major racism. My brother went to prom with a Caucasian girl. I have a diverse group of friends. The only racial problems I’ve experienced here is that some white guys say that they don’t date black girls, but that’s a really minor issue. I was shocked a couple years ago when I read about segregated proms. I live in south but I genuinely thought racism was 99% over. I was so naive at the time. I think it’s appalling that segregated proms go on. I can’t imagine not being able to share that experience with ALL my friends and not just my black friends. Stories like this sincerely hurt my heart. But I can promise that its not the entire south. I do wish I lived in the north though.</p>
<p>I think there is no need to demonize other than officially segregated anything (wherever it occurs). (But that’s just a start! ;))</p>
<p>Having said that, as I previously wrote:</p>
<p>“Racism is more than prejudice, and more than bigotry. People in groups defined any way one chooses can hold and even express hateful attitudes toward members of other groups. But the difference between prejudice and racism lies in the fact that in the latter, power to control institutional policies is bound up with prejudice to produce benefits for some, deficits for others. This power confers advantages whether or not those who receive the benefits had any part in creating or ensuring them. Racism is a system of advantage, not simply a set of personal attitudes. Differences in power and status between people of different color do not flow from personal animosity between them, and do not disappear even when personal animosity does. They are not a matter of individual feelings or private emotions, sympathy or the lack thereof. As a person with lighter skin-tones, I have substantial advantages. I didn’t ask for them, and they exist whether I hold prejudicial attitudes or not.”</p>
<p>poetgrl… I think we would be great friends. That said… I grew up in Tennessee and Texas, and lived in Atlanta for 5 years as an adult. I now live in an upper middle class suburb of Houston. My kids are the LEAST racist you will ever meet because their entire lives they have gone to school, been neighbors, and friends with EVERY race you can think of… over 70 native languages spoken at our large public high school alone. TOLERANCE and love for our neighbors IS what we preach AND practice around here… and every kind of tolerance. There are openly gay couples at our high school and in our neighborhoods, as will as mixed race families of every variety. NO ONE CARES. My son’s prom group this year will consist of Asians, Hispanics, African-American and plain ol’ vanilla white folk. His best friend has a Caucasian dad and an Asian mom… NO ONE CARES. Please don’t generalize and assume that because this happens in the South, it DEFINES the South. It is APPALLING, but sadly, some of those folks are just plain ignorant and truly THINK they are doing the right thing. It’s not right, but it’s NOT even close to the way the majority of Southerners think or behave. </p>
<p>Now, the COST of prom? That’s a whole other issue… tickets for our prom are between $100 and $200 per couple (earlier purchase, cheaper price), party bus (because no one wants them driving all over Houston) will be $80 per person for the evening, dinner (prom menu at a very nice upscale restaurant) will be $50 per person. ProjectProm tickets (substance free all night after party) will be $60 for seniors, $80 for their guest if they are not a senior. Then add in tux rental or dress, flowers, pictures, etc… and my son is going to his prom AND another school’s prom this year. OUCH.</p>
<p>Post is gone or edited now, but someone said they are sure that THEIR kids would not attend a segregated prom. Mine wouldn’t either…for sure. They would be sickened by such a thing. Especially since D1 has dated outside of her race, and D2 is in a very serious relationship outside of hers.</p>
<p>They have a “black prom” and a “white prom”…I wonder what the “others” do…besides laugh or cry at the insanity.</p>
<p>My younger one couldn’t attend a segregated prom, because no matter which one she went to, she’d integrate it! (It is interesting, though, that she much prefers to date AA men on the move, as white ones, she says, wanna talk about race too much.)</p>
<p>As for my older one, or myself, we have to figure out race. On government forms, I usually put Mongol-Semitic, or 200 meters - the government wouldn’t let my grandfather into the country because he was “oriental”; but I guess we pass.</p>
<p>You see segregation by choice everywhere. Not many AAs at all in Scarsdale, Greenwich, Bronxville. Look at Yonkers which borders the two NYtowns and Stamford/Portchester which borders Greenwich, and there is a disproportionate percentage of families with color.</p>
<p>Yes, on price of prom: My D goes in a group, no date. Ticket is $50, Dinner is $30, Flower is $25, Dress is $250, Shoes are $85, Necklace, earrings, hair band, purse are $200, wearing the same bracelet from last year. Hairdo is $75, Nails are $50. OUCH indeed.</p>
<p>When I was in college, this definition of “racism” was usually promoted the most by those non-white people who had the most racist (or bigoted or prejudiced if you prefer) opinions against white people. Basically, they wanted to call every white person “racist” while claiming not to be themselves.</p>
<p>Cpt,
Housing patterns in westchester and Fairfield counties, etc are not necessarily by choice. Some communities like Scarsdale and Bronxville may be out of reach economically for many blacks. However, Westchester does have a history of housing discrimination and I believe there’s an ongoing lawsuit with HUD or some other federal agency. I think fairly recently there have been studies that show that minorities with similar incomes and credit are steered away from certain communities in Westchester. I’ll have to see if I can find a link.</p>
<p>And that’s because they were NOT themselves - they gained nothing in the way of privileges or advantage from their skin color. But they could of course be bigoted or prejudiced - big difference.</p>
<p>Main issue with the prom at my NYC SHS back in the mid-'90s was economic. Tickets were $94/person. </p>
<p>I almost didn’t go to mine for that very reason before some older relatives heard about it at a family gathering and insisted on paying for it as “it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity”. </p>
<p>Racial breakdown at my HS back then was slightly more than half Asian-American with around 25% being of Chinese descent. </p>
<p>Then again, the proportion of AA/Hispanic students was much higher back then than it seems to be in the last few years. </p>
<p>However, I am hearing one key factor is greater boarding school/private school scholarships targeting URM students who would have attended NYC SHS. </p>
<p>Another is the further dilution of public K-8 curricula according to some of my old HS teachers still teaching there…a factor in why nowadays students do need to spend more time prepping for the exam when that wasn’t as much of a case back when I was in junior high. </p>
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<p>The only ones from my graduating HS class who had after-prom parties were the well-off upper-east siders. </p>
<p>Most of us couldn’t afford to host/attend them and/or didn’t want to be stuck on the subway that late as NYC wasn’t as safe/nice as it is nowadays…especially past 2 am.</p>
<p>I don’t know what the reason is as to why certain districts have so few AA and Latinos when the populations certainly is here. Funny, you can do better going to a very expensive private school here in terms of getting diversity. The AA families I know , by the way, who have incomes so that they could afford some of these areas have chosen not to live there. Some of these neighborhoods fight low income housing tooth and nail. One of guys in Scarsdale government was actually quoted as saying that they believe strongly in low income housing, but not in Scarsdale. </p>
<p>THere are a lot of after prom parties and extravaganzas here. Some of them are very much segregated by race, not by intent, but the way they just work out. I don’t think the “soul train” limos that had private parties all included others not in those cars. Though the school part of the prom was integrated, the other parts of them were not necessarily so, though there were occasional attendees of color or not, who were guests. But, yes, even within an integrated scenario, there can and is segregation.</p>
<p>H graduated from an urban public high school in a major metro area in the south. At that time (late 70’s) the school was in transition from a 50-50 black/white mix to becoming a mostly black school. His junior year, he was asked to prom by a (white) senior girl. The band was white. His senior prom was cancelled due to disagreement about the music. Vote on the band was 50-50 and they couldn’t break the tie. Even the principal didn’t want to because whatever was selected would disappoint 1/2 the class. (Not sure why they needed a live band, but that was “what was done” at this school.) In general whites wanted a white band and blacks wanted a black band. (Not that some of the bands weren’t mixed, but the style of music they played tended to be one or the other–rock vs soul). So no prom that year. By the following year, the school was more than 50% black, and they selected the black band. H was still home doing a gap year, and was asked to the prom by a black girl. He said very few whites attended prom. (H identifies as white.)</p>
<p>Birds of a feather flock together. Most people want to live with and hang out with people who are “like themselves” --whether in income, education level, political views,interests, language, ethnicity, age, looks, lifestyle, religion, etc. I’ve read that studies show that people who are more alike (less diversity, more in common) form stronger communities. Doesn’t matter if it is the school lunch table or the whole county. You can’t stop people from sorting themselves. The neighborhood I live in is disproportionately Asian. Should we try to “balance” that out by asking some to leave so a proportionate number of whites/blacks/Hispanics can move in? BTW, they came here for the schools–as did just about everyone who lives here. There are a lot of people who are not represented in this neighborhood. We don’t have young adults. Or never-married people. We don’t have childless people. We don’t have old people. We don’t have poor or rich people. We have almost all middle/upper middle class married couples aged 30s-60s with school-age children who care about education and are willing to maintain their homes and take care of a small lawn. (Religion/Ethnicity/Sports team affiliation not important.) Very segregated. Very much lacking in diversity. And very much what people who live here were looking for.</p>
<p>BTW, our prom is $25/ticket. Nice, but not over the top. Mostly paid by fundraising. Also, often held in another state–that just means we are close to a state line.</p>
<p>If someone subscribes to the point of view that “white people are inherently racist, and only white people can be racist” (as the noisy campus activists tended to define “racism”), then what is the incentive to refrain from being racist/bigoted/prejudiced (whether one is white or non-white)?</p>
<p>Indeed, the noisiest promoters of this definition of “racism” seemed to take pride in being strongly bigoted/prejudiced, or at least did not think that was a bad thing.</p>
<p>Only people who benefit from their race position (whatever that is) can be racist. It isn’t only necessarily white. But everyone can be bigoted or prejudiced. Racism is a system in which people choose (sometimes unconsciously) to participate; bigotry and prejudice is an individual thing.</p>
<p>White people are not inherently racist; they can actively reject the advantages that they gain as a result of their skin color. But if they passively accept those advantages (and believe that they “earned them”), well, if the shoe fits… If you accept that others may be stopped on the roads for “driving while Black”, or allow for the racial profiling of allowing hundreds of thousands of people to be stopped and frisked without any probable cause, or if you accept the fact that you will get a loan or mortgage at a different rate for the same product than someone with exactly the same income, or accept that you will receive different treatment by health providers even when you carry exactly the same insurance, well, if the shoe fits…</p>
<p>I never went to a prom. My older d. the Mongol Semitic never went to a prom. My younger d. went to the promo with not one, but two people of different races. What races they all were escapes me, except I think one, oh horrors!. was Belgian!</p>
<p>Such distinctions seemed to be lost among most of the noisy campus activists (who generally subscribed to the view that “white people are inherently racist, and only white people can be racist” while taking pride in their own racism/prejudice/bigotry); perhaps a few of those who thought about them tended to use “institutionalized racism” or some such term to describe what you are saying and distinguish it from the more commonly used dictionary definition (though others corrupted the meaning of that to say that the institutions were inherently racist and must be destroyed as they could not be changed, or something like that).</p>
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<p>Exactly what can you do individually if you find such things unacceptable, but are diffuse and difficult to detect and stop on an individual basis, even though large enough sample sizes indicate a high likelihood of racial profiling and such? (whether you are a member of the “favored” group or the “disfavored” group)</p>
That said… I grew up in Tennessee and Texas, and lived in Atlanta for 5 years as an adult. I now live in an upper middle class suburb of Houston. My kids are the LEAST racist you will ever meet because their entire lives they have gone to school, been neighbors, and friends with EVERY race you can think of… over 70 native languages spoken at our large public high school alone. TOLERANCE and love for our neighbors IS what we preach AND practice around here… and every kind of tolerance. There are openly gay couples at our high school and in our neighborhoods, as will as mixed race families of every variety. NO ONE CARES. My son’s prom group this year will consist of Asians, Hispanics, African-American and plain ol’ vanilla white folk. His best friend has a Caucasian dad and an Asian mom… NO ONE CARES. Please don’t generalize and assume that because this happens in the South, it DEFINES the South. It is APPALLING, but sadly, some of those folks are just plain ignorant and truly THINK they are doing the right thing. It’s not right, but it’s NOT even close to the way the majority of Southerners think or behave. </p>