Civil rights figure: US divided by race again

[Teh One Who Knocks]

By CAIN BURDEAU - The Associated Press


http://i.imgur.com/Joez1T5.jpg

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Civil rights pioneer Ruby Bridges says America today looks a lot like the world she helped break apart 54 years ago: A nation with segregated schools and racial tension.

"You almost feel like you're back in the '60s," said Bridges, who is now 60 years old. "The conversation across the country, and it doesn't leave out New Orleans, is that schools are reverting back" to being segregated along racial lines, she said. "We all know that there are schools being segregated again."

On Nov. 14, 1960, Bridges — then 6 years old — became the first black student to attend a previously all-white elementary school in New Orleans.

On Friday — 54 years later to the day when she first walked up the steps to William Frantz Elementary School — she commemorates that event with the unveiling of a statue in her likeness at her old school. Also, she is reuniting with the white teacher who taught her and with the sole-surviving U.S. marshal who walked her to school. Her mother, who was adamant about sending her daughter to the all-white school, will be at the reunion too.

Bridges said racism remains painfully real today.

She pointed to the tense events in Ferguson, Missouri, after a police officer shot and killed an unarmed black man, revelations about racist comments made by owners in the National Basketball Association and how so many American schools have failed to become racially mixed.

Back in 1960, Bridges, flanked by U.S. marshals, had to walk past a mob of jeering segregationist protesters and Confederate flags to enter her school. One woman shouted threats to poison her. Another woman showed up at protests with a coffin with a black baby doll in it. All the white students at the school were pulled from classes and teachers quit — leaving Bridges as the school's only student.

Bridges said racism was a problem before President Barack Obama's election but that his presidency has fueled racism.

"Race is a very hot topic right now," she said.

She looks at her own experiences as evidence of a new segregation.

For example, white students returned to William Frantz and the school became integrated, she said. She added that she went to integrated middle and high schools in New Orleans. Fast forward to today: The school now occupying the William Frantz building is 97 percent black, according to school data.

In New Orleans, after integration, whites generally sent their children to private or parochial schools — and that preference continues today. Blacks today make up 86 percent of the public school enrolment, according to 2013 data from the Cowen Institute for Public Education Initiatives at Tulane University.

She called demographic shifts since Hurricane Katrina — whites now make up a higher percentage of the city than before the 2005 flooding of the city — as evidence of gentrification rather than integration of schools and neighborhoods.

She wondered why lawmakers and school officials can't do more to make schools more racially mixed.

"How did we integrate schools back in the 1960s? If those people did it back then, I can't understand why we can't do it today for the betterment of a community or for a society."

She said the key to a more integrated society lies with children.

"Kids really don't care about what their friends look like. Kids come into the world with clean hearts, fresh starts," she said. "If we are going to get through our differences, it's going to come through them."

Since the mid-1990s, Bridges has become a speaker at schools across the nation, telling her story and talking out against bullying.

[Loser]

You know why most schools in the ghetto are black and hispanic?

Because us white folks fled the crime riddled areas.

[RBP]

Sorry, but if 50 years later you still don't have your shit together, I think it's fair to say it's no longer our fault.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

#TakeResponsibility

[Teh One Who Knocks]

You know why most schools in the ghetto are black and hispanic?

Because us white folks fled the crime riddled areas.

:racist:


Sorry, but if 50 years later you still don't have your shit together, I think it's fair to say it's no longer our fault.

:racist:


#TakeResponsibility

:racist:

[RBP]

#TakeResponsibility

I mean can you imagine Angela Merkel saying that Germans can't succeed because of Nazis? That's basically the same as Holder's argument.

I encourage everyone, when discussing race, to ask a simply question. What's the statute of limitations on slavery or pre-1964 racial policies? I have been repeatedly told "none". Problem identified.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

#CheckYourPrivilege :hand:

[RBP]

:lol: and my brain, apparently.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

I mean can you imagine Angela Merkel saying that Germans can't succeed because of Nazis? That's basically the same as Holder's argument.

I encourage everyone, when discussing race, to ask a simply question. What's the statute of limitations on slavery or pre-1964 racial policies? I have been repeatedly told "none". Problem identified.

:racist:

[Teh One Who Knocks]

The only people that don't want racism to end are the blacks. Fact.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

#AlSharpton
#JesseJackson
#WatchoTakinBoutWillis

[FBD]

The only people that don't want racism to end are the blacks. Fact.

while I agree in a % based sense, one cant assert that only a certain race is racist....

well, unless we're in that realm of racism is strictly against black people and no black person could ever do anything racist :lol:

[Muddy]

Im sure thats Whiteys fault, too.

[perrhaps]

The only people that don't want racism to end are the blacks. Fact.

I know what you're saying here, but my experience of once spending four days on business in Mobile, Alabama leads me to dispute this.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

http://i.imgur.com/vGYCOKG.jpg

[RBP]

I know what you're saying here, but my experience of once spending four days on business in Mobile, Alabama leads me to dispute this.

So you believe that whites still have a strong stake in perpetuating actual racism? What would that benefit be, at this point?

As opposed to the stake that blacks have in perpetuating the idea of racism?

[PorkChopSandwiches]

I think he saying in the south they are still just plain racist. My father in law works in Tennessee quite a bit and seems to see the same.

[RBP]

while I agree in a % based sense, one cant assert that only a certain race is racist....

well, unless we're in that realm of racism is strictly against black people and no black person could ever do anything racist :lol:

I think we discuss racism primarily in terms of blacks for the same reason we discuss gender issues in terms of feminists. As we have discussed with Muslims, when you have a loud, vocal, militant minority setting the agenda, the majority becomes irrelevant. That is the case in discussing racism... the black population sets the agenda. Hispanics have different issues.

[RBP]

I think he saying in the south they are still just plain racist. My father in law works in Tennessee quite a bit and seems to see the same.

Okay, but that wasn't the question. Who has a vested interested in perpetuating the idea of racism in America?

I know lots of people that would be considered racists, but they reap no benefit from it.

[Teh One Who Knocks]

Okay, but that wasn't the question. Who has a vested interested in perpetuating the idea of racism in America?

I know lots of people that would be considered racists, but they reap no benefit from it.

:agreed:

Exactly my point I was trying to make with my statement...there's a big difference between someone being an ignorant racist and a group of people that want to keep on perpetuating the idea of racism.

[RBP]

Yup.

[Muddy]

http://i.imgur.com/cwJKGKy.jpg

[PorkChopSandwiches]

:lol:

[Goofy]

Y'all a bunch of honkeys :hand:

[PorkChopSandwiches]

#ReverseRacism

[perrhaps]

:agreed:

Exactly my point I was trying to make with my statement...there's a big difference between someone being an ignorant racist and a group of people that want to keep on perpetuating the idea of racism.

Maybe another way to put it would be to analyze who profits from the present-day American status of supposed racism. That would be the Al Sharptons and Jesse Jacksons. However from my experiences in the Deep South, there are folks that just plain take pride in being down-and-dirty racist.

Let me give you one example. In November, 2001, when I was in Mobile, a bartender who apparently thought we were pals because I had tipped more than a quarter him for my first beer, said, and I quote him verbatim, "Hey, B, let me show you how we keep the Darkies out."

He then went to a storage closet, and took out a stuffed monkey that had big white lips and a noose around its neck and hung it in the front window right by the door.

On our way back to the hotel that hosted our Meetings, friends and I saw two identical monkeys hanging in the windows of two other bars.

This is what I was talking about.

[DemonGeminiX]

My neighbor across the street from me is the single most racist person I've ever met.

[RBP]

No one is saying there aren't racist people and even communities, of course there are. But the notion that all black people (and women for that matter) are limited in opportunity and intentionally repressed by some evil white male systemic conspiracy is killing us. It is perpetuated by race and gender baiters who serve to profit off the perpetuation of 50 year old issues.

But for god's sake let's not discuss personal responsibility or cleaning up your own house. Let's only focus on how racism makes it impossible for blacks to succeed. Cut the teenage birth rate, cut the unwed birth rate, and actually graduate from high school. Those three things might have a chance to break the cycle. Screaming racism has zero chance of making it better, and I would suggest it makes it worse in two primary ways, 1) by telling a class of people from infancy that they can't succeed, and 2) by pissing off the rest of society to the point that could care less if they stay in the ghetto and kill each other. We're there now... and the majority is just getting more pissed off about it.

NPR did a series of stories this summer about what it means to be a man in America. I heard many of them because they played them during my evening commute. One was what it meant to be a black man. The entire segment was comments from black men about racism, and only racism. Not a single other item. No education, no rebuilding the family, not even a discussion about what defines a man in the black community. Only racism.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

No one is saying there aren't racist people and even communities, of course there are. But the notion that all black people (and women for that matter) are limited in opportunity and intentionally repressed by some evil white male systemic conspiracy is killing us. It is perpetuated by race and gender baiters who serve to profit off the perpetuation of 50 year old issues.

But for god's sake let's not discuss personal responsibility or cleaning up your own house. Let's only focus on how racism makes it impossible for blacks to succeed. Cut the teenage birth rate, cut the unwed birth rate, and actually graduate from high school. Those three things might have a chance to break the cycle. Screaming racism has zero chance of making it better, and I would suggest it makes it worse in two primary ways, 1) by telling a class of people from infancy that they can't succeed, and 2) by pissing off the rest of society to the point that could care less if they stay in the ghetto and kill each other. We're there now... and the majority is just getting more pissed off about it.

NPR did a series of stories this summer about what it means to be a man in America. I heard many of them because they played them during my evening commute. One was what it meant to be a black man. The entire segment was comments from black men about racism, and only racism. Not a single other item. No education, no rebuilding the family, not even a discussion about what defines a man in the black community. Only racism.

We have a black president #EndOfDiscussion

[RBP]

We have a black president #EndOfDiscussion

Who makes it worse by crying racism all the time. #thanksobama

[PorkChopSandwiches]

You know, if there can be a black president then all this talk really is bullshit. Its the highest job in the land

[perrhaps]

No one is saying there aren't racist people and even communities, of course there are. But the notion that all black people (and women for that matter) are limited in opportunity and intentionally repressed by some evil white male systemic conspiracy is killing us. It is perpetuated by race and gender baiters who serve to profit off the perpetuation of 50 year old issues.

But for god's sake let's not discuss personal responsibility or cleaning up your own house. Let's only focus on how racism makes it impossible for blacks to succeed. Cut the teenage birth rate, cut the unwed birth rate, and actually graduate from high school. Those three things might have a chance to break the cycle. Screaming racism has zero chance of making it better, and I would suggest it makes it worse in two primary ways, 1) by telling a class of people from infancy that they can't succeed, and 2) by pissing off the rest of society to the point that could care less if they stay in the ghetto and kill each other. We're there now... and the majority is just getting more pissed off about it.

NPR did a series of stories this summer about what it means to be a man in America. I heard many of them because they played them during my evening commute. One was what it meant to be a black man. The entire segment was comments from black men about racism, and only racism. Not a single other item. No education, no rebuilding the family, not even a discussion about what defines a man in the black community. Only racism.

I live near Harrisburg, PA, which laughingly calls itself a city when it has less than 50,000 residents.

Of those residents, only 30 % or so are White. Two of the most recent murder victims were a 18-year-old shot down by his 15-year-old cousin, who had "eloped" from a juvenile detention facility. The victim was a dropout with 4 kids at the age of 18!

The other victim had spent @8 of his 39 years in State prison. He left behind 9 children.

Anybody need to guess the race of these two gentlemen?

It's really simple, and not even religious:
1. If you can't afford something, don't steal it.
2. If you can't afford a kid, don't ask me to pay for it.
3. It's fine with me if you want to stay in that shithole you're raised in, but don't blame me for your problems if you drop-out of school, knock-up one of the local coke whores, or commit a crime.

I'm old enough to remember when welfare used to be a Hand-up, and not a "hand-out". I'm sick of being labeled as "racist" for being sick and tired of paying for other's bad choices, particularly because I always paid for mine.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

I live near Harrisburg, PA, which laughingly calls itself a city when it has less than 50,000 residents.

Of those residents, only 30 % or so are White. Two of the most recent murder victims were a 18-year-old shot down by his 15-year-old cousin, who had "eloped" from a juvenile detention facility. The victim was a dropout with 4 kids at the age of 18!

The other victim had spent @8 of his 39 years in State prison. He left behind 9 children.

Anybody need to guess the race of these two gentlemen?

It's really simple, and not even religious:
1. If you can't afford something, don't steal it.
2. If you can't afford a kid, don't ask me to pay for it.
3. It's fine with me if you want to stay in that shithole you're raised in, but don't blame me for your problems if you drop-out of school, knock-up one of the local coke whores, or commit a crime.

I'm old enough to remember when welfare used to be a Hand-up, and not a "hand-out". I'm sick of being labeled as "racist" for being sick and tired of paying for other's bad choices, particularly because I always paid for mine.

The upside is now that dad is dead, the children will all qualify for benefits

[RBP]

It's fine with me if you want to stay in that shithole you're raised in, but don't blame me for your problems if you drop-out of school, knock-up one of the local coke whores, or commit a crime.

I'm old enough to remember when welfare used to be a Hand-up, and not a "hand-out". I'm sick of being labeled as "racist" for being sick and tired of paying for other's bad choices, particularly because I always paid for mine.

That sums up where we are right now. The approach has done nothing to help the black community and has the rest of the citizens saying that could give a fuck less. And it's not going to get better.

But that's obviously because we're all racists, right? [/sarcasm]

[Muddy]

The problem really isn't the black people.. It's the white people that feed and propagate this shit and try and guilt the public into acceptance of bad behavior.

[PorkChopSandwiches]

You're the problem then, if you dont think they should take some responsibility for their own life. :klan:

[RBP]

The problem really isn't the black people.. It's the white people that feed and propagate this shit and try and guilt the public into acceptance of bad behavior.

So you think the black community is taking on the issue of personal responsibility and trying to fix it from within, but white people are preventing the improvements?

Are we impregnating their young women too?

Single mothers
http://i.imgur.com/oDxERgm.jpg

[RBP]

By the way, feminists HATE that answer. It doesn't fit with the "I don't need a man" mentality.

[perrhaps]

The upside is now that dad is dead, the children will all qualify for benefits

Trying to stroke me out?

[Muddy]

So you think the black community is taking on the issue of personal responsibility and trying to fix it from within, but white people are preventing the improvements?

Are we impregnating their young women too?

Single mothers
http://i.imgur.com/oDxERgm.jpg

No no... I think that liberal white people have fueled and shifted the blame into our court..

http://i.imgur.com/i4rpu4I.jpg

[Hal-9000]

:agreed:

Exactly my point I was trying to make with my statement...there's a big difference between someone being an ignorant racist and a group of people that want to keep on perpetuating the idea of racism.

We see both sides of the above up here. Plain old idiots who think a person of color is ____ because of their color. And people who claim to be oppressed because of same and actually benefit from the claim. Easier working conditions, more money, better treatment socially...

I think a person can make a racial comment, without being a racist. It is an observation of fact, rather than an inbred need to hate automatically because of appearance.

Brown people in my world (trucking and warehousing) work slower, make more mistakes, never acknowledge the previous and make the same money. They inherently know that 'whiteys' have to be careful when criticizing. So in an offhand way, the brown people benefit and thrive in the environment.


Up here folks are so scared to say out loud what I've related above, that the brown people pick up on that dynamic and continue to do less and turn a blind eye to their shortcomings.

Not all brown people are lazy....just the ones that I've worked with and met........


:lol: oops