Race v. Ethnicity
As an African American, I have never been asked “What ethnicity are you?” As we discussed in class, race in America is the most recognizable marker of “otherness” and it is assigned to you by other people. Ethnicity is something that is individually constructed and harder to distinguish by the general public. In America, it is more desirable to be any other ethnicity than African American (regular black).
The African American culture has become devalued and things associated with the culture are markers of being a racialized minority. Although my grandmother was half Native American, this is not a part of the race that I have been assigned. The only time I am ever asked about my heritage is by other African Americans; they can tell by my hair and skin tone that I am “mixed with something”. Until we had the discussion in class on racialization and how race and ethnicity play a role in inequality, I had never thought about how the question of what ethnicity I identify myself with has affected my life.
One of my favorite movies growing up was Imitation of Life. In the movie, the story centers on an African American mother and daughter who struggle with race and ethnicity during the 1920’s. The mother, Annie, was very dark skinned and worked as a nanny for a White family. Her daughter was very fair skinned and could pass for white. Throughout the movie, the women struggle with the implications of being African American at a time when this association caused them physical and mental abuse. I have often wondered what life would be like if I had stronger looks that denoted my Native American heritage. Perhaps I would be even more stigmatized or maybe its best that I identify with the same race that people designate me as.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
St. Louis Housing Market
Racial Discrimination in the Housing Market
The discussion that we had in class about they way that race becomes a marker of “otherness” and how it is used to keep racialized minorities out of certain aspects of American life reminded me of a conversation that I had with my grandmother and my great aunts. My mother’s family has been in St. Louis for generations and the slides that we saw about the discrimination in the housing market here is something that I had just discussed with them the week before.
The church that I attend is in the Ville neighborhood which was historically an area of St. Louis where the well-to-do Black people lived. The Ville was home to its own supermarket, schools, tailors, cleaners, printers and even college at one point. This city within a city arose out of the housing laws in St. Louis that banned Black people from most communities. At our church, there is a copy of one such document that clearly forbids the sale of any houses in that particular neighborhood to “colored” people.
My aunt told me that when she first went to buy her house back in the 1960´s she had a similar experience with realtors. They would only show her houses in certain areas of St. Louis regardless of where she requested. She also said that when she finally found the house that she wanted, she went to make the down payment which she paid cash for and the banker hassled her about where she got the money from and warned that they didn’t take drug money. If she had been a White woman, the banker would have happily taken her payment and welcomed her business.
Something so essential to achieving the American Dream has been taken away from many Americans through housing discrimination. As the market starts to stabilize and people begin to buy homes again, one can only hope that this type of discrimination will be outweighed by the need for the market to go up again.
The discussion that we had in class about they way that race becomes a marker of “otherness” and how it is used to keep racialized minorities out of certain aspects of American life reminded me of a conversation that I had with my grandmother and my great aunts. My mother’s family has been in St. Louis for generations and the slides that we saw about the discrimination in the housing market here is something that I had just discussed with them the week before.
The church that I attend is in the Ville neighborhood which was historically an area of St. Louis where the well-to-do Black people lived. The Ville was home to its own supermarket, schools, tailors, cleaners, printers and even college at one point. This city within a city arose out of the housing laws in St. Louis that banned Black people from most communities. At our church, there is a copy of one such document that clearly forbids the sale of any houses in that particular neighborhood to “colored” people.
My aunt told me that when she first went to buy her house back in the 1960´s she had a similar experience with realtors. They would only show her houses in certain areas of St. Louis regardless of where she requested. She also said that when she finally found the house that she wanted, she went to make the down payment which she paid cash for and the banker hassled her about where she got the money from and warned that they didn’t take drug money. If she had been a White woman, the banker would have happily taken her payment and welcomed her business.
Something so essential to achieving the American Dream has been taken away from many Americans through housing discrimination. As the market starts to stabilize and people begin to buy homes again, one can only hope that this type of discrimination will be outweighed by the need for the market to go up again.
The Dreaded Pink Slip
Unemployment
I recently got laid off from my job and I have had to navigate through the Missouri unemployment filing system in order to get the money I need to pay bills. During this process, I have been cognizant of what we discussed in class that it is expensive to be poor. I don’t need the money as much as the other people who have to go through the same thing but it was still extremely frustrating.
The first thing you must do is file a claim with the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations which you can do online, on the phone or in person. This is where the first hassle reared its head. Because I worked for the federal government, I had to file my claim over the phone. As I continued to hold for going on the second hour after numerous hang-ups, I thought about how many people who are unemployed don’t even have access to a computer or a reliable phone to stay on hold for two hours. These are the people who have to go to the office in person which will most likely require the use of public transportation. This can cost upwards of $15 per week before they can even start receiving money.
After I finally filed and was determined to be eligible, the waiting game began. It ultimately took me 5 weeks to receive any money, which I did get all at once when it finally came. During this time, those who really depended on their jobs to provide for themselves and/or their families would really have to be resourceful. I assumed that the process was slowed due to the high volume of claims from the rocky economy but I don’t think that would be much help to someone who has an entire family depending on them for their basic needs.
I have never complained about the amount of taxes that I paid before and now that I have seen and experienced first hand how important unemployment benefits are to those who really need them, I don’t think I ever will. There will always be people who abuse the system but as long as those who really need the services get them and benefit from them, I think it should be kept in place.
I recently got laid off from my job and I have had to navigate through the Missouri unemployment filing system in order to get the money I need to pay bills. During this process, I have been cognizant of what we discussed in class that it is expensive to be poor. I don’t need the money as much as the other people who have to go through the same thing but it was still extremely frustrating.
The first thing you must do is file a claim with the Department of Labor and Industrial Relations which you can do online, on the phone or in person. This is where the first hassle reared its head. Because I worked for the federal government, I had to file my claim over the phone. As I continued to hold for going on the second hour after numerous hang-ups, I thought about how many people who are unemployed don’t even have access to a computer or a reliable phone to stay on hold for two hours. These are the people who have to go to the office in person which will most likely require the use of public transportation. This can cost upwards of $15 per week before they can even start receiving money.
After I finally filed and was determined to be eligible, the waiting game began. It ultimately took me 5 weeks to receive any money, which I did get all at once when it finally came. During this time, those who really depended on their jobs to provide for themselves and/or their families would really have to be resourceful. I assumed that the process was slowed due to the high volume of claims from the rocky economy but I don’t think that would be much help to someone who has an entire family depending on them for their basic needs.
I have never complained about the amount of taxes that I paid before and now that I have seen and experienced first hand how important unemployment benefits are to those who really need them, I don’t think I ever will. There will always be people who abuse the system but as long as those who really need the services get them and benefit from them, I think it should be kept in place.
Private v. Public schools
Miss Porters School for Girls
I went to visit boarding schools with my mom and sister this weekend that she will be potentially attending next fall. The two schools, Loomis Chaffe and Miss Porters´ School for Girls were both located in Hartford Connecticut. After reading Jay MacLeod´s Ain´t No Makin´´ It, I thought that it would be interesting to compare the school for the upper class to that of the schools I attended and the school in MacLeod’s book. As I suspected, the environments were completely different.
As we toured the schools and sat in on classes, I kept going back to the part of MacLeod’s book that talked about equal opportunity as a crude invitation to the party that they know you will inevitably decline. One of the classes that we observed was a 9th grade Ethics class . . . I’m taking the same class now as a senior in college. They talked about the traditional applications of ethics such as Kant’s deontology and Aristotle’s virtue ethics; we just did this in my class the week before. When children are privy to such high levels of academic coursework at such young ages while others are barely learning to read, is there ever really going to be an equal playing field?
Another thing that I kept replaying in my mind as we wandered through the castle-like campuses was the ides that children are socialized through the education system into workers and leaders. To go back to the ethics class, the teacher asked the girls to apply the there ethical theories to leadership roles . . . not homosexual marriage or euthanasia like we discussed in our class . . . but to a situation that you will encounter as an executive. He asked them what they would do if they were the head of a company who that was downsizing and they had the list of those being laid off when a close friend asks them if their name is on it. These girls are being trained to be leaders and not workers. Just as the Hallway Hangers and Brothers were being funneled into low-wage work, these children are being groomed to be the next movers and shakers of America.
I went to visit boarding schools with my mom and sister this weekend that she will be potentially attending next fall. The two schools, Loomis Chaffe and Miss Porters´ School for Girls were both located in Hartford Connecticut. After reading Jay MacLeod´s Ain´t No Makin´´ It, I thought that it would be interesting to compare the school for the upper class to that of the schools I attended and the school in MacLeod’s book. As I suspected, the environments were completely different.
As we toured the schools and sat in on classes, I kept going back to the part of MacLeod’s book that talked about equal opportunity as a crude invitation to the party that they know you will inevitably decline. One of the classes that we observed was a 9th grade Ethics class . . . I’m taking the same class now as a senior in college. They talked about the traditional applications of ethics such as Kant’s deontology and Aristotle’s virtue ethics; we just did this in my class the week before. When children are privy to such high levels of academic coursework at such young ages while others are barely learning to read, is there ever really going to be an equal playing field?
Another thing that I kept replaying in my mind as we wandered through the castle-like campuses was the ides that children are socialized through the education system into workers and leaders. To go back to the ethics class, the teacher asked the girls to apply the there ethical theories to leadership roles . . . not homosexual marriage or euthanasia like we discussed in our class . . . but to a situation that you will encounter as an executive. He asked them what they would do if they were the head of a company who that was downsizing and they had the list of those being laid off when a close friend asks them if their name is on it. These girls are being trained to be leaders and not workers. Just as the Hallway Hangers and Brothers were being funneled into low-wage work, these children are being groomed to be the next movers and shakers of America.
Private v. Public schools
Miss Porters School for Girls
I went to visit boarding schools with my mom and sister this weekend that she will be potentially attending next fall. The two schools, Loomis Chaffe and Miss Porters´ School for Girls were both located in Hartford Connecticut. After reading Jay MacLeod´s Ain´t No Makin´´ It, I thought that it would be interesting to compare the school for the upper class to that of the schools I attended and the school in MacLeod’s book. As I suspected, the environments were completely different.
As we toured the schools and sat in on classes, I kept going back to the part of MacLeod’s book that talked about equal opportunity as a crude invitation to the party that they know you will inevitably decline. One of the classes that we observed was a 9th grade Ethics class . . . I’m taking the same class now as a senior in college. They talked about the traditional applications of ethics such as Kant’s deontology and Aristotle’s virtue ethics; we just did this in my class the week before. When children are privy to such high levels of academic coursework at such young ages while others are barely learning to read, is there ever really going to be an equal playing field?
Another thing that I kept replaying in my mind as we wandered through the castle-like campuses was the ides that children are socialized through the education system into workers and leaders. To go back to the ethics class, the teacher asked the girls to apply the there ethical theories to leadership roles . . . not homosexual marriage or euthanasia like we discussed in our class . . . but to a situation that you will encounter as an executive. He asked them what they would do if they were the head of a company who that was downsizing and they had the list of those being laid off when a close friend asks them if their name is on it. These girls are being trained to be leaders and not workers. Just as the Hallway Hangers and Brothers were being funneled into low-wage work, these children are being groomed to be the next movers and shakers of America.
I went to visit boarding schools with my mom and sister this weekend that she will be potentially attending next fall. The two schools, Loomis Chaffe and Miss Porters´ School for Girls were both located in Hartford Connecticut. After reading Jay MacLeod´s Ain´t No Makin´´ It, I thought that it would be interesting to compare the school for the upper class to that of the schools I attended and the school in MacLeod’s book. As I suspected, the environments were completely different.
As we toured the schools and sat in on classes, I kept going back to the part of MacLeod’s book that talked about equal opportunity as a crude invitation to the party that they know you will inevitably decline. One of the classes that we observed was a 9th grade Ethics class . . . I’m taking the same class now as a senior in college. They talked about the traditional applications of ethics such as Kant’s deontology and Aristotle’s virtue ethics; we just did this in my class the week before. When children are privy to such high levels of academic coursework at such young ages while others are barely learning to read, is there ever really going to be an equal playing field?
Another thing that I kept replaying in my mind as we wandered through the castle-like campuses was the ides that children are socialized through the education system into workers and leaders. To go back to the ethics class, the teacher asked the girls to apply the there ethical theories to leadership roles . . . not homosexual marriage or euthanasia like we discussed in our class . . . but to a situation that you will encounter as an executive. He asked them what they would do if they were the head of a company who that was downsizing and they had the list of those being laid off when a close friend asks them if their name is on it. These girls are being trained to be leaders and not workers. Just as the Hallway Hangers and Brothers were being funneled into low-wage work, these children are being groomed to be the next movers and shakers of America.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Education v. Experience
How Much Education is Enough?
The articles that we read for this week about social mobility made me think about my own family’s mobility and how it has affected my perception of class and status. Egan’s article about the two factory workers that were laid off and were without college degrees has stark similarities to what is going on now. Many people are finding themselves out of work and don’t have college degrees to fall back on. More and more, people are finding themselves becoming entangled in the cycle that lack of education and job availability leads to. Although I have had an extremely difficult time finding a job for when I graduate in May, I know that I am in a better position to succeed than others. It makes me wonder just how valuable my degree will be ten years down the road.
Like many blue-collar employees, both McClellan and Martinelli forewent going to college and instead chose to work in the Kaiser Aluminum factory. At the time, there was not the big of a disparity in wages between those that had degrees and those did not. As McClellan and Martinelli both explained, working in the factory placed them comfortably in the middle to upper middle class. Now that they have been laid off, they are struggling not only to maintain their status but also to make ends meet.
This story has become a familiar one especially in the last months. In towns where the automobile plants provided a huge source of jobs, many are left unemployed as business has slowed if not come to a screeching halt. They are left to choose between taking jobs that pay less than what they were receiving or taking a chance on going back to school to get the degrees they need. This is an especially hard decision when unemployment assistance is maxed out and bills are mounting.
I have not been able to get a full time job thus far because I don’t have a lot of relevant work experience, but I will have a college degree. I can’t help but worry that my bachelor’s degree might put me in a similar position to McClellan and Martinelli in a few years. Whose responsibility is it to make sure that people have the opportunity to develop the skills that they need to maintain their occupational status as the times change? Is it up to the individual to try to get as much education as possible to fall back on? Or is it the responsibility of employers to plan ahead and predict changes to the way they do business that will affect the lives of many?
The articles that we read for this week about social mobility made me think about my own family’s mobility and how it has affected my perception of class and status. Egan’s article about the two factory workers that were laid off and were without college degrees has stark similarities to what is going on now. Many people are finding themselves out of work and don’t have college degrees to fall back on. More and more, people are finding themselves becoming entangled in the cycle that lack of education and job availability leads to. Although I have had an extremely difficult time finding a job for when I graduate in May, I know that I am in a better position to succeed than others. It makes me wonder just how valuable my degree will be ten years down the road.
Like many blue-collar employees, both McClellan and Martinelli forewent going to college and instead chose to work in the Kaiser Aluminum factory. At the time, there was not the big of a disparity in wages between those that had degrees and those did not. As McClellan and Martinelli both explained, working in the factory placed them comfortably in the middle to upper middle class. Now that they have been laid off, they are struggling not only to maintain their status but also to make ends meet.
This story has become a familiar one especially in the last months. In towns where the automobile plants provided a huge source of jobs, many are left unemployed as business has slowed if not come to a screeching halt. They are left to choose between taking jobs that pay less than what they were receiving or taking a chance on going back to school to get the degrees they need. This is an especially hard decision when unemployment assistance is maxed out and bills are mounting.
I have not been able to get a full time job thus far because I don’t have a lot of relevant work experience, but I will have a college degree. I can’t help but worry that my bachelor’s degree might put me in a similar position to McClellan and Martinelli in a few years. Whose responsibility is it to make sure that people have the opportunity to develop the skills that they need to maintain their occupational status as the times change? Is it up to the individual to try to get as much education as possible to fall back on? Or is it the responsibility of employers to plan ahead and predict changes to the way they do business that will affect the lives of many?
How Does It Feel?
Poverty Simulation
I attended a poverty simulation on Saturday that was sponsored by Big Brothers Big Sisters. The purpose was to help us as Bigs be able to better understand what types of situations that our Littles and their families deal with on a daily basis. It was not mandatory but I thought it would also be a good opportunity to learn how stereotypes about people who are in poverty affect how they feel and to learn what it feels like to struggle to make ends meet. It was also interesting to me to see how Barbara Ernereich’s book would relate to working minimum wage jobs.
The proctor divided us all into groups that would represent family units. My group was a family of three: a single mother and two teenage kids. We were given our materials that explained our circumstances and what we needed to take care of in a month’s time span. The mother in my family was a 34-year-old high school drop out who had no job or skills besides working as a cashier for a few months prior to her first pregnancy. The father left recently with nothing but $10 in cash to survive on. There was a 17-year-old son who was also a high school dropout, had been arrested for drugs and had a pregnant girlfriend. Finally, there was a 15-year-old daughter who was the only person in the household with a job as a dishwasher making $112 a week. Needless to say, the odds were stacked against our pretend family and we had no income to pay the surmounting bills.
During the simulation, each fifteen minute interval represented a week and at the end of an hour all of our bills had to be paid or we would be evicted and our utilities would be disconnected. At the end, neither the mom nor the son were able to find jobs with their limited education. We got evicted, all of our utilities were disconnected and we were reported to social services for child neglect. Even though it was just a simulation, I felt the stress of being uneducated and trying to get work. I felt the pressure of trying to make a legal living. I felt the frustration of not being able to contribute to my household and take care of my family.
It made me more cognizant of what people have to go through everyday to get things accomplished that I sometimes take for granted. Instead of having the luxury of being able to get in my car and go where I need to, I had to use a transportation ticket that took up a lot of my money since I was unemployed. I couldn’t apply for jobs online and wait to hear back from someone, I needed money and I needed it fast, I had to go to the employment office every week to see if I got a job. It also made us aware that although there are a lot of resources available to the poor, it is not easy to access them and it does not always make ends meet. I really enjoyed participating in the exercise because it gave me a more personal perspective on some of the things we’ve talked about in class.
I attended a poverty simulation on Saturday that was sponsored by Big Brothers Big Sisters. The purpose was to help us as Bigs be able to better understand what types of situations that our Littles and their families deal with on a daily basis. It was not mandatory but I thought it would also be a good opportunity to learn how stereotypes about people who are in poverty affect how they feel and to learn what it feels like to struggle to make ends meet. It was also interesting to me to see how Barbara Ernereich’s book would relate to working minimum wage jobs.
The proctor divided us all into groups that would represent family units. My group was a family of three: a single mother and two teenage kids. We were given our materials that explained our circumstances and what we needed to take care of in a month’s time span. The mother in my family was a 34-year-old high school drop out who had no job or skills besides working as a cashier for a few months prior to her first pregnancy. The father left recently with nothing but $10 in cash to survive on. There was a 17-year-old son who was also a high school dropout, had been arrested for drugs and had a pregnant girlfriend. Finally, there was a 15-year-old daughter who was the only person in the household with a job as a dishwasher making $112 a week. Needless to say, the odds were stacked against our pretend family and we had no income to pay the surmounting bills.
During the simulation, each fifteen minute interval represented a week and at the end of an hour all of our bills had to be paid or we would be evicted and our utilities would be disconnected. At the end, neither the mom nor the son were able to find jobs with their limited education. We got evicted, all of our utilities were disconnected and we were reported to social services for child neglect. Even though it was just a simulation, I felt the stress of being uneducated and trying to get work. I felt the pressure of trying to make a legal living. I felt the frustration of not being able to contribute to my household and take care of my family.
It made me more cognizant of what people have to go through everyday to get things accomplished that I sometimes take for granted. Instead of having the luxury of being able to get in my car and go where I need to, I had to use a transportation ticket that took up a lot of my money since I was unemployed. I couldn’t apply for jobs online and wait to hear back from someone, I needed money and I needed it fast, I had to go to the employment office every week to see if I got a job. It also made us aware that although there are a lot of resources available to the poor, it is not easy to access them and it does not always make ends meet. I really enjoyed participating in the exercise because it gave me a more personal perspective on some of the things we’ve talked about in class.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Cycle of Poverty
Can Theories of Poverty also become Theories of Crime?
The readings that we have done on theories of poverty have given me the feeling of déjà vu . . . “Have I heard this before or am I just really smart?” is the question that kept coming to me as I read American Apartheid by Douglas S. Massey and Nancy A. Denton. The way that they pointed out Oscar Lewis’s theory that a culture of poverty encourages and prolongs poverty as one that blames the victim sounded very familiar to me. As I continued to read and think about how black society is segregated and how that separation permeates through every part of our lives, it came to me that this did sound like something I’ve heard before. Just as they describe a cycle of poverty that comes from structural problems, criminologists have described a cycle of crime that also comes from problems with policies.
Massey and Denton describe how residential segregation leads to this cycle of poverty and it is encouraged by structural choices rather than individual choices. Urban areas where minorities are concentrated lack adequate educational systems, social and economic services, and most importantly, safety. Because residents don’t have access to proper education, they cannot get jobs that pay more than minimum wage and they often have to work more than one at a time. This translates into not being able to move into a better neighborhood so they can have access to better schools to get better jobs. . . and the cycle repeats, family after family, generation after generation. Massey and Denton place the blame on policy rather than a “defective culture”.
In the same way, criminologists Shaw and McKay were the first to attribute criminality to environmental and structural influences rather than ethnic and racial differences in their published studies of the Chicago area in 1942. They began to recognize ongoing factors that influenced crime and then lead to continued patterns of criminal behavior in urban areas. Modern theories of crime attribute recidivism to a cycle of crime that is in large part due to structural issues in the criminal justice system. Once a person is convicted of a crime, even after their time is served and their debt is repaid to society, they can never reach that sense of normal life again. A criminal conviction automatically disqualifies a person from job opportunities, educational opportunities, and some forms of public assistance. This in turn creates an even bigger obstacle for that individual to make a living for themselves which can lead to a return to criminal activity and a return to prison . . . and the cycle repeats itself.
It’s interesting that these two theories seem to overlap because most of the 2million plus Americans under control by some form of the criminal system are poor. Likewise, a lot of the population considered impoverished have criminal histories. Do we punish people for being poor by making them stay that way or locking them up? Can policies aimed to help people out of poverty also be used to funnel people out of the criminal justice system? Is it our job as concerned citizens to advocate for both or is it the responsibility of the individual to better himself?
The readings that we have done on theories of poverty have given me the feeling of déjà vu . . . “Have I heard this before or am I just really smart?” is the question that kept coming to me as I read American Apartheid by Douglas S. Massey and Nancy A. Denton. The way that they pointed out Oscar Lewis’s theory that a culture of poverty encourages and prolongs poverty as one that blames the victim sounded very familiar to me. As I continued to read and think about how black society is segregated and how that separation permeates through every part of our lives, it came to me that this did sound like something I’ve heard before. Just as they describe a cycle of poverty that comes from structural problems, criminologists have described a cycle of crime that also comes from problems with policies.
Massey and Denton describe how residential segregation leads to this cycle of poverty and it is encouraged by structural choices rather than individual choices. Urban areas where minorities are concentrated lack adequate educational systems, social and economic services, and most importantly, safety. Because residents don’t have access to proper education, they cannot get jobs that pay more than minimum wage and they often have to work more than one at a time. This translates into not being able to move into a better neighborhood so they can have access to better schools to get better jobs. . . and the cycle repeats, family after family, generation after generation. Massey and Denton place the blame on policy rather than a “defective culture”.
In the same way, criminologists Shaw and McKay were the first to attribute criminality to environmental and structural influences rather than ethnic and racial differences in their published studies of the Chicago area in 1942. They began to recognize ongoing factors that influenced crime and then lead to continued patterns of criminal behavior in urban areas. Modern theories of crime attribute recidivism to a cycle of crime that is in large part due to structural issues in the criminal justice system. Once a person is convicted of a crime, even after their time is served and their debt is repaid to society, they can never reach that sense of normal life again. A criminal conviction automatically disqualifies a person from job opportunities, educational opportunities, and some forms of public assistance. This in turn creates an even bigger obstacle for that individual to make a living for themselves which can lead to a return to criminal activity and a return to prison . . . and the cycle repeats itself.
It’s interesting that these two theories seem to overlap because most of the 2million plus Americans under control by some form of the criminal system are poor. Likewise, a lot of the population considered impoverished have criminal histories. Do we punish people for being poor by making them stay that way or locking them up? Can policies aimed to help people out of poverty also be used to funnel people out of the criminal justice system? Is it our job as concerned citizens to advocate for both or is it the responsibility of the individual to better himself?
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Reaction to By Invitation Only
Do our social circles reflect our structure of inequality?
Watching the movie in class brought the readings that we have had into another light. Growing up in the south, I had been exposed to debutant balls and things of that nature. These of course were African American clubs; I don't remember ever seeing anyone of a different race. I was never involved in the debutant balls but my mom had friends whose daughters were. I remember going to an event in the Cascades, a very wealthy area of Atlanta, at a country club. This was the first time that I experienced anything like it and I was surprised t learn that kids who looked like me lived so extravagantly. When I asked my mom why the other kids were so stand-offish towards me she explained that they have been raised around each other and I was an outsider. Even at the young age of 11, I realized that discrimination did not just come from white people; it came from my own people as well.
The documentary forced me to look at my own social practices and how they might encourage inequality. I think that it is easy for us as a society to place the blame for discrimination and inequality on others; rarely do we turn the magnifying glass inward. Just as her dad justified his continued membership in one of the krewes that refused to open its membership to minorities, we attempt to justify our support of organizations that are discriminatory. It becomes difficult to separate what others should not do from what we should not do.
I am a member of a historically black sorority. We were founded because there was a great need for an organization that encouraged sisterhood among women of color in an academic setting. Although I have met members of my sorority from all different ethnicities, does our history encourage discrimination? Am I encouraging it by being a member?
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