Refugees of Diversity

[marmar]

from The American Prospect:



Refugees of Diversity
Forget the suburbs. Prosperous white Americans are settling in even more remote -- and homogeneous -- communities.

Rich Benjamin | October 12, 2009


Imagine moving to a place where you can leave your front door unlocked as you run errands. Where the community enjoys a winning ratio of playgrounds to potholes. Where you can turn your kids loose at 3 P.M., not worry, then see them in time for supper. Where the neighbors greet you by name. Where your trouble-free high school feels like a de-facto private school. Where if you play hooky from work, you can drive just 20 minutes and put your sailboat on the water. Where you can joyride off-road vehicles (Snowmobiles! ATVs! Mountain bikes! Rock crawlers!) on nature's bold terrain. Where your family and abundant friends feel close to the soil. Where suburban blight has yet to spoil vistas. Just imagine.

If you could move to such a place, would you?

If so, you would join a growing number of white Americans homesteading in a constellation of small towns and so-called "exurbs" that are extremely white. They are creating communal pods that cannily preserve a white-bread world, a throwback to an imagined past with "authentic" 1950s values but with the nifty suburban amenities available today.

Call these places White Meccas. Or White Wonderlands. Or Caucasian Arcadias. Or Blanched Bunker Communities. Or White Archipelagos. I call them Whitopias.

What exactly is a Whitopia? A Whitopia (pronounced why-toh-pee-uh) is whiter than the nation, its respective region, and its state. It has posted at least 6 percent population growth since 2000. The majority of that growth (often upward of 90 percent) is from white migrants. And a Whitopia has a je ne sais quoi -- an ineffable social charisma, a pleasant look and feel.

A prediction that made headlines across the United States 10 years ago is fast becoming a reality: By 2042, whites will no longer be the American majority. With growing and intermixed minority populations, the country is following California, Texas, New Mexico, Hawaii, and the District of Columbia, which have "minority" populations that are in the "majority." Twelve other states have populations that are more than 20 percent Hispanic, black, and/or Asian. Soon, the words "majority" and "minority" may have no meaning. And as immigrant populations -- overwhelmingly people of color -- increase in cities and suburbs, more and more whites are living in small towns and exurbs. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=refugees_of_diversity

[handmade34]

1. this article is very interesting

I travel the U.S. and see this everywhere I go, along with the gated communities which are part of this movement.

This week's 'TOO MUCH' includes an article entitled "Mending America's Torn Social Fabric" ( http://extremeinequality.org/?p=188 ) which had links to many articles and information on groups that discuss this movement. White people relocate to familiar towns and 'safer' areas. My partner and I work together and when we talk about where to settle, we know it will be in a diverse area. When we go into neighborhoods, the upper income white neighborhoods appear to be the safest, the lowest income areas are usually the most crime ridden, the most interesting are always the low middle to middle income neighborhoods where we see and talk to residents of varying ethnic/culturally backgrounds. These are not so numerous.

http://commonsecurityclub.org/?page_id=9

[Igel]

3. Yes, it's rent.

The problem is that nobody's interested in even putting it as back together as it was.

You don't have to be of the same race to be of the same "tribe". But you do have to have common, shared frames of reference, shared outlooks, and a common view of history. It's also fairly important, at the beginning at least, for no group to feel put upon when it compares itself with it peers, for no group to feel that it's sacrificing too much or too little. It helps to share a language, to appear to be similar, etc., etc., but those aren't the crucial thing. Tribe membership is psychological.

Currently the prevailing view in much of the US is to emphasize differences, not commonalities; the impossibility of a shared view of history, or a shared view in which there are clear victims in need of some sort of recompense and clear victimizers in need of asbolution (even if they don't realize it).

The result has been that frequently cultural differences in some long-standing communities have diverged, even as new immigrants arrive and both try to assimilate and are told that they don't need to (or even that it's wrong).

Why is it important? Because if you perceive somebody to be in your group then you actively strive to interpret what they do to be innocuous or benign. You don't feel threatened by them. You try to find reasons to not be pissed at them, you give them the benefit of the doubt. Then real grievances can be ironed out while fictive grievances are cleared up. People from other groups tend to not get the benefit of the doubt: You feel threatened by them, you don't give them the benefit of the doubt, and by the time fictitious grievances are cleared up the psychological damage is done. In fact, you try to find reasons to feel outraged and to definitively prove that the other group or groups, your enemies, are somehow inferior and malicious.

Now look at the news. Each side--left/right, urban/rural, black/white/Latino/etc., etc., etc. tends to revel in outrage. Each believes itself to be better, the Real American responsible for the country's well-being, the wronged, the oppressed, the superior. Virtue consists in eschewing dialog. It's a proud race to the bottom, and to be honest I was sure we hit bottom 20 years ago. Boy, was I wrong. Who knows how deep the mire is?

[Demeter]

2. No, I Wouldn't

There wouldn't be anything to do there except housework for a woman.

[Igel]

4. It's damned weird going the other way, too.

You move into a neighborhood where you're not the majority, and people do two things at once--they want to show that they're friendly, regardless of your race/ethnicity, but at the same time they show they obviously don't trust you.

The net effect is not one of making you feel welcome, but rather to make you feel like you're plopped down on a bit of agar-agar.