

This Is My Racism - jlipps
http://www.jonathanlipps.com/blog/2015/07/this-is-my-racism/

======
marcusgarvey
>My point is simply that living in a segregated society from early on, and the
early whispered conversations about Black people as a “they”, set in motion a
force very much like compound interest.

Ta-Nehisi Coates' landmark Atlantic article, The Case for Reparations [1],
helps explain how this segregated society came to be:

> The American real-estate industry believed segregation to be a moral
> principle. As late as 1950, the National Association of Real Estate Boards’
> code of ethics warned that “a Realtor should never be instrumental in
> introducing into a neighborhood … any race or nationality, or any
> individuals whose presence will clearly be detrimental to property values.”
> A 1943 brochure specified that such potential undesirables might include
> madams, bootleggers, gangsters—and “a colored man of means who was giving
> his children a college education and thought they were entitled to live
> among whites.”

The federal government concurred. It was the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation,
not a private trade association, that pioneered the practice of redlining,
selectively granting loans and insisting that any property it insured be
covered by a restrictive covenant—a clause in the deed forbidding the sale of
the property to anyone other than whites. Millions of dollars flowed from tax
coffers into segregated white neighborhoods.

“For perhaps the first time, the federal government embraced the
discriminatory attitudes of the marketplace,” the historian Kenneth T. Jackson
wrote in his 1985 book, Crabgrass Frontier, a history of suburbanization.
“Previously, prejudices were personalized and individualized; FHA exhorted
segregation and enshrined it as public policy. Whole areas of cities were
declared ineligible for loan guarantees.” Redlining was not officially
outlawed until 1968, by the Fair Housing Act. By then the damage was done—and
reports of redlining by banks have continued.

The federal government is premised on equal fealty from all its citizens, who
in return are to receive equal treatment. But as late as the mid-20th century,
this bargain was not granted to black people, who repeatedly paid a higher
price for citizenship and received less in return. Plunder had been the
essential feature of slavery, of the society described by Calhoun. But
practically a full century after the end of the Civil War and the abolition of
slavery, the plunder—quiet, systemic, submerged—continued even amidst the aims
and achievements of New Deal liberals.

[1] [http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-
case...](http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-
reparations/361631/)

~~~
hoopd
> Millions of dollars flowed from tax coffers into segregated white
> neighborhoods.

Wait, wouldn't it be the other way around? Inflating property values would
increase tax revenue. Even if they were subsidizing white home ownership they
may have come out ahead.

It's one of the driving forces of gentrification: if investing X gets the city
X + Y in tax revenues then it's an economically sound decision.

~~~
marcusgarvey
I think the point is that there was a de facto subsidy of segregated white
neighborhoods in the first instance.

~~~
hoopd
Perhaps a de facto or indirect subsidy, but the cost of moving into those
neighborhoods went up while the cost of housing for those being excluded went
down. It's also arguable that cities made money with these practices (it would
take some work to figure out.)

So the subsidy argument falls apart. If it doesn't cost the city money overall
and white people end up paying more both for housing and in taxes then the
problem with redlining lies elsewhere. (I am not trying to defend redlining,
by the way.)

~~~
marcusgarvey
Even if the cost of moving into the neighborhood went up, the white homeowners
surely also benefited from higher home equity values which they can borrow
against; realized gains from selling the homes -- for them and for their
heirs; better public school systems; better public facilities.

So, no I don't think the subsidy argument falls apart.

~~~
hoopd
Only if the market goes up enough vs the other neighborhoods and what would
have happened. Which maybe you can argue it does. I'm not racist enough to
believe that the presence of people with black skin is that detrimental to
property values. It seems clear that redlining is about class more than race.

You still have the problem that subsidies are generally thought to cost money.
If redlining makes the city money it goes from "this is evil and doesn't work
economically" to "this is evil but it makes money."

~~~
hoopd
Lost another 10 karma overnight for trying to join this discussion without
going "hoo, haaa, obviously the whole world is racist and sexist and that
disgusts me..." before voicing contrary opinions.

~~~
hoopd
Yeah downvote that one, too.

I'm starting to interpret the "don't complain about downvotes" guideline as
"don't shed light on how this community misuses downvotes to quietly
marginalize contrary views while maintaining the illusion of civil discourse."

------
codygman
Amazing article, I'm a white male who grew up in rural north central Texas as
well and can understand where the author is coming from.

------
paulhauggis
"We’ve seen videos of innocent black citizens gunned down by the police that
is supposed to protect them"

Really? Where are these videos. I think I only saw one video making the rounds
where this was the case. The rest was speculation and mob mentality. "Hands up
Don't shoot", for instance, never happened.

"We’ve seen a community devastated by a terrorist attack that can only be
described as pure, premeditated evil"

This sort of "evil" happens almost every day in the inner city. Chicago, for
instance, had 7+ shootings in only one weekend. Why are we focusing on the one
rare nutcase and someone making it into proof that an entire community of
people are racist (ironic that this is exactly what we are trying to stop:
judging an entire group of people on one person's actions).

How about the college event in Ohio that stated that only "African Americans"
can attend and the guy (who was not African American" filming was pushed
around and bullied??

How about the trans-gendered guest on the Dr. Drew HLN show that not only put
his hand around the another guest's throat he was supposed to be debating, but
threatened him with violence??

"It was only recently, when White-on-Black police brutality and terrorism
began to surface in the news,"

How can you possibly call this "terrorism"?? In nearly all cases I've seen so
far, the police offers asked the person in question to stop or comply..and
they resisted, which resulted in a use of justified force.

"that I was turned on to a stream of different voices. Reading the
#drivingwhileblack tweets"

Which is bullshit. I'm not black and have gotten stopped multiple times in my
life for things I considered bullshit. If you give the cop an attitude, you
will suffer the consequences. If you comply and are cool about everything the
officer asks, he will let you go or write you a ticket.

You need to think about it from his/her perspective: If you overpower the
officer, they could lose their life.

"I think we need to readily acknowledge that we are racist,"

Speak for yourself. I give everyone an equal chance, regardless of race. It's
their actions later that determine whether I like them or not. I'm sick and
tired of the thought police somehow trying to convince me that I'm racist.

If the majority of people in this country were really racist, we wouldn't have
people of color in pretty much every position of power and
occupation..including the presidency.

~~~
hoopd
Have you considered an anonymous account?

You should know that what you've said is considered totally racist these days
and you'll have to write an article like the one you just criticized if you
ever want to clear your name.

~~~
brightshadow
I'm not sure if this response is serious or not, but it's this kind of
thinking that makes me lament the loss of reasonable discourse in this
country.

~~~
rmxt
"Reasonable discourse" doesn't start with denying that racism exists in the
United States, as the grandparent post does. "We have a black president so we
can't be racist" is a pretty damn tired trope.

I think people should be able to speak freely, but I won't lament systemic
racism's demise.

~~~
ebfe
>"Reasonable discourse" doesn't start with denying that racism exists in the
United States.

Would you mind quoting the part of his post where he says that racism doesn't
exist?

~~~
rmxt
Let me rephrase: the original post denies that racism exists and/or plays a
significant role _in some very serious recent events_ , such as police
interaction with members of minority communities and resultant citizen deaths,
police interaction during routine traffic stops, and racially motivated mass
shootings. Also, they off-handedly dismiss the experiential evidence of others
while tooting their own horn about their experiences during police encounters.

~~~
Nadya
Everything seems large when viewed under a microscope.

~~~
rmxt
I'm guessing this is a criticism? Well, it's a faulty one: much like
scientists deepened the field of biology by looking both under a microscope
and at the macro-scale (population studies, etc.), we can improve society for
all people involved by both looking at micro-interactions (individual traffic
stops) and macro-interactions (social forces and policies).

~~~
Nadya
In another comment someone listed three micro-interactions [0] as evidence of
a media narrative. So I'll provide three micro-interactions.

Dillon Taylor, Gilbert Collar, Christopher Roupe.

My criticism is about placing small, isolated incidents under a microscope. A
seemingly large amount of evidence gets national media coverage - so it
appears to be a bigger problem than it is. Ebola fear-mongering is a good
example of that. There are local pandemics of much more immediate danger that
receive far less coverage for far less time than ebola did.

It's confirmation bias at best and media propaganda at worst. The media is a
business, people seem to forget that. They have no issues towing lines if it
brings in more revenue. That also means they'll tug political ideologies that
align closely with their viewers.

I also have no issue admitting that a problem likely does exist. But it's much
smaller than the media would have you believe: they just put it under a
microscope. So to you, it seems much larger. That's the problem with
microscopes.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9971212](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9971212)

