...but whites don’t care, as long as
urban reservations keep violent blacks in their place.
“Race relations in
America, with regards to blacks, have always been about a series of gates.
Blacks who can behave themselves pass through the gate from the ghetto to the
suburbs. Blacks with something on the ball can enter into the managerial class,
assuming they are willing to accept their symbolic role in the system. The
violent and stupid, in contrast, cannot pass through those gates, so they are
penned up in urban reservations guarded by the police.
“Whites in America, have come to terms with this by never
thinking about it. Liberal whites invest their time in fantasies like
structural racism and white privilege, while normal whites just ignore it.
Blacks, on the other hand, are keenly aware of this reality. For those able to
pass through those gates, there is a need to obscure this reality, but also a
deep resentment for it. You’ll note that black anger at white America comes
from those able to pass through the gates, because they know the underlying
assumptions are true.”
Back in the Bad Old
Days (and in many ways, they really were), every town and city had an area
where “they” lived. Those places were, in polite conversation, designated by a
direction, North Side, East Side, South Side, West Side. In not-so-polite, but
reality-based, conversation, those places were known as “Nigger town.” Those
areas were configured by run-down houses, dirt streets, no street lights,
trashed yards, broken down cars and all the other regiments of poor.
The same areas exist
today, but we have grown too well-mannered to talk about them.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.