Several posts ago I mentioned that the rumors of the Michigan Civil Rights Intiative‘s death are premature, and that volunteers as well as paid workers are now actively gathering signatures to put the measure on the ballot in 2006.
Proving my point that MCRI is still very much alive, two key people associated with it, Jennifer Gratz and Chetly Zarko, independently called my attention to a remarkable recent decision by the Detroit city council that, as a Detroit Free Press headline put it, “touts racial separation.”
A majority of the Detroit City Council wants to implement an economic development plan it commissioned for $112,000 that preaches racial isolation and rails against immigration in its bid to gain economic success for poor blacks.
The crux of the plan is the creation of a business district — dubbed African Town — that would be funded in part with city money and made up of black-owned businesses catering to a black clientele.
The report also complains that immigrants from Mexico, Asia and the Middle East are stealing resources, jobs and other opportunities from blacks and calls on city leaders to stop the economic shift.
This, boys and girls, is not a pretty picture, and the sad thing — or rather, one of the many sad things — about it is that this sort of ethnic fighting over scraps was not only predictable; it was often actually predicted.
As I’ve already mentioned once before (here), back in 1975, when he presciently predicted the consequences of a regime of racial preference, Nathan Glazer wrote (in his book, AFFIRMATIVE DISCRIMINATION) preferences would surely produce
a real Balkanization, in which group after group struggles for the benefits of special treatment…. The demand for special treatment will lead to animus against other groups that already have it, by those who think they should have it and don’t.
… and, as we can see in Detroit, by those who have it who don’t want others to get it. In my post cited above I quoted Keith Murphy, a radio talk show host in Milwaukee with a primarily black audience, taking the same tack:
“It’s still a matter of distrust,” he said. “It’s a feeling among African-Americans that Latinos are coming in and getting the jobs and are getting preferential treatment.”
It was not clear whether Murphy objected to “preferential treatment” in principle, or only when it goes to non-blacks.
Hey, I’ve got a good idea! Why don’t we dump preferences and just treat everyone, you know, equally, i.e., without regard to race, religion, ethnicity? Oh wait, someone already thought of that. Too bad so many of us have forgotten.
John,
How would NOT having government sanctioned racial preference programs prevent the “balkanization” and “separation” caused by the generations old PERSONAL racial preference programs of white flight, gentrification, and division that has made Detroit the most segregated large city in the United States?
Nathan Glazer in his quote would lead
the reader believe that America was a happy, integrated society where all groups lived together in harmony before those nasty little preference programs popped up in the early 70’s.
I would love to live in a nation like you speak of in your last paragraph. Unfortunately, America society hasn’t held up it’s end of the bargain.
–Cobra
I am struck by the claim in the article that
immigrants from Mexico, Asia and the Middle East are stealing resources, jobs and other opportunities from blacks [ . . . ]
“Stealing”? Cobra, would you endorse that way of putting it? I hope not.
Detroit segregated? Nonsense. It’s 83% diversified. And if the discriminatory practices that Cobra is defending are put into place, it will have 100% diversity.
This program, a direct attempt to discriminate against other minority groups (while laughingly creating a “majority minority” classification to try to deflect criticism) is just another pathetic self-assessment by the black leadership of Detroit. In a city where blacks constitute 83% of the population, city leaders are not content to properly institute small business support measures or pass legislation to aid the business community in general. And why? Because such assistance would also aid the “privileged” newly arrived, barely English-literate immigrants that would “unfairly” compete with black businesses. Why not just require non-black owned businesses to charge higher prices, or work shorter hours, or treat customers less professionally, or whatever it is that causes the 83% black population to prefer the immigrant and other-minority owned businesses.
The white flight reference is revealing of a deep sense of black crime privilege. With the inter-racial crime statistics reflecting an incredible disparity between black on white and white on black crime (despite the reverse demographics), it is no surprise at all that the past and future victims flee at the first chance.
Reading Cobra’s increasingly hateful and divisive remarks in the last several weeks has made me pessimistic and, frankly, less sympathetic to the worsening problems of the black community. Detroit’s efforts to legitimize racial discrimination and the nonsensical assertions of unfair competition from newly arrived immigrants (chuckle) are not endearing.
Michelle,
You’re right. A better choice of words than “stealing” could be used. It almost sounds like another group upset with minority preference programs.
Mikem,
Where are my remarks “hateful and divisive?” I disagree with your viewpoint. That doesn’t mean I “hate” you. That’s why people can’t have an honest discussion about these matters.
–Cobra
Hold it! Cobra has actually come up with a new argument: everything that humans do is a “racial preference program.”
I’ve noticed that blacks overwhemingly prefer to live among blacks. Is this also a racial preference program?
What is “America’s end of the bargain?” Racial utopia? The lion laying down with the lamb? Blacks can only be expected to compete when they attend “elite prep schools” in which butlers serve them breakfast in bed?
Hell, I’d love to live in Nirvana and win the Lottery. Cobra, is there a drug you could take that would cause you to occasionally think about something else?
Well, call me silly (or worse), but I continue to believe that governments classifying people by race so that they can reward some and and punish others contributes to racial hatred and division. The claim that we cannot have equal treatment until we have equality is backwards, and self-defeating.
Cobra,
You’re right. A better choice of words than “stealing” could be used. It almost sounds like another group upset with minority preference programs.
Huh? Cobra, this was a description of the City Council-commissioned report. It’s not a direct quotation of the report’s language, so I don’t know if “stealing” is actually in the report or is the writer’s gloss on it. But that’s pretty bizarre language for what, in ordinary parlance, we’d call “getting a job,” “starting a business,” “driving a cab,” whatever.
What would you propose?
John,
I agree with your first sentence, actually. You describe American society to a tee, except I think you and I disagree about exactly who gets punished and rewarded.
Your second sentence is fascinating.
>>>The claim that we cannot have equal treatment until we have equality is backwards, and self-defeating.
What is the purpose of treating people equally if equality is NOT the goal?
That, as much as possible, the path of our lives is our own to choose. That if we are fulfilled we know it was through our own labor, and that if we encounter obstacles we know they are within our power to overcome. People who are given responsibility for their own fates, and who believe that nothing limits them so much as their own selves, will strive against the disappointments of life.
The goal is not equality but a general uplifting of all our existences, such that the poorest, saddest man a hundred years from now lives as does the richest, happiest man today.
Nels,
If you’re not a speech-writer, my friend…you should be. That was an excellent post. I still disagree with it, but I wish more people on both sides of this discussion had such idealism.
Now, back to this article in question. I never quite get where Gratz or Zarko
stand on this issue of bringing black-owned industry and commerce into a poverty filled Detroit.
Are they in SUPPORT of hometowner Claud Anderson’s attempt to give back to the community here:
>>>The crux of the plan is the creation of a business district — dubbed African Town — that would be funded in part with city money and made up of black-owned businesses catering to a black clientele.>Detroit is the first city to begin to implement his Powernomics philosophy, Anderson said. He wants to create a business district for blacks, like Mexicantown or Greektown, that would include a fish factory with its own hatchery, black hair-care supplier, popcorn factory and fruit juice producers
Nels,
If you’re not a speech-writer, my friend…you should be. That was an excellent post. I still disagree with it, but I wish more people on both sides of this discussion had such idealism.
Now, back to this article in question. I never quite get where Gratz or Zarko
stand on this issue of bringing black-owned industry and commerce into a poverty filled Detroit.
Are they in SUPPORT of hometowner Claud Anderson’s attempt to give back to the community here:
>>>The crux of the plan is the creation of a business district — dubbed African Town — that would be funded in part with city money and made up of black-owned businesses catering to a black clientele.>Detroit is the first city to begin to implement his Powernomics philosophy, Anderson said. He wants to create a business district for blacks, like Mexicantown or Greektown, that would include a fish factory with its own hatchery, black hair-care supplier, popcorn factory and fruit juice producers
Cobra, I suspect that the difference is that “Mexicantown” and “Greektown” weren’t created with City dollars, but just sprung up of their own accord, as ethnic neighborhoods generally have in US cities. (I’ve never been to Detroit, so I don’t know what these places are like, just analogizing via the cities I do know.)
Really, this is very strange. Every large city in this country has ethnic enclaves of one sort or another, but they grow from the bottom up. This is the first time I’ve ever heard of one being proposed to be constructed from the top down. “Chinatown” in NY or SF or Oakland is something that grew. “African Town” is going to be made. In a city that’s overwhelmingly Black in the first place. What’s the point?
Cobra: “That’s why people can’t have an honest discussion about these matters.”
You have got to be kidding me. After declaring neo conservatives to be the KKK with nicer clothes and better PR, as well as the many, many times you have accused others of wishing for the “good old days” of lynchings, jim crow and cross burnings simply because they would not support skin color preferences, now you are shocked to have your comments characterized as hateful and divisive? I used to enjoy your postings. Although I often disagreed with you, I enjoyed reading the back and forth that your challenges evoked. But you became a sore loser and decided to start dropping the bomb on your opponents with hateful accusations when things got tough. So forget about getting a free pass for your own racism. Forget about me, at least, overlooking the ignorant racism that infects the ‘liberal’ majority of the A-A population. To use your style of lately, why don’t you incite your friends to burn down a Jewish store and kill a few people. With the increased support you gain from the A-A community, you can run for President.
Well, I’m floored. I thought we had finally found a proposal so obviously racist that even Cobra couldn’t support it.
Guess I was wrong. I underestimated his religious devotion to any proposal to take from non-blacks — even other minority groups — and give to blacks, no matter how overt the discrimination is.
Oh, and to answer his question: What is the purpose of treating people equally if equality is NOT the goal?
The purpose of treating people equally is… treating people equally. It’s not a means to an end; it’s the end, the goal.
Sure, we hope good things — racial harmony, puppies and kittens for everyone, the Yankees finishing in last place — result from treating people equally, but those aren’t the reasons we do so. We treat people equally because that’s the right thing to do, regardless of what happens after that.
David,
My tax dollars are taken all the time to subsidize white run corporations. It happens through corporate welfare, and at a far higher degree than anything proposed by Anderson in Detroit. How many stories on ethynol research do you need? How many no-bid government contracts? How many “incentive” programs and corporate tax relief schemes do you need? Basically, the gist I’m getting here is, these programs are aimed to HELP THE PEOPLE IN THE INNER CITY OF DETROIT, which happen to be overwhelmingly African American.
I would hazzard to guess that if it was HALIBURTON or ENRON making these proposals, you wouldn’t hear a peep from Gratz, Zarko, or anybody else on this board.
–Cobra
David,
Who exactly is the “we” in your sentence “we treat people equally because it’s the right thing to do?”
I KNOW you aren’t talking about ALL Americans, because that’s factually inaccurate.
Michelle,
I can’t say that other ethnic group EVER received tax incentives, preferential contracts, grants or loans from local governments in cities throughout America during the course of American history.
I would wager that many HAVE. Given the fact that Anderson claims to have investors lined up, would you be against African Town if it was 100% privately funded?
Mikem,
Are you claiming that there are no white racists who are against racial preference programs?
–Cobra
When I say “we” I’m talking about the same group as when I say, “We don’t murder people because it’s the wrong thing to do.”
Does that statement apply to “ALL Americans”? Of course not. There are thousands of homicides every year. Does that make the statement about murder “factually inaccurate”? If one is looking for an argument, I suppose it does. Otherwise, it doesn’t; it’s pretty clear who the “We” refers to.
—————–
As for corporate welfare, I vote “No.” I don’t think there should be agricultural subsidies, export subsidies, direct grants to failing airlines, bailouts of Chrysler, etc.
But that having been said, these do not constitute subsidies to “white run corporations.” These subsidies are race-neutral. AOL-Time-Warner didn’t suddenly stop getting corporate welfare when Richard Parsons was named CEO.
Basically, the gist I’m getting here is, these programs are aimed to HELP THE PEOPLE IN THE INNER CITY OF DETROIT, which happen to be overwhelmingly African American.
No; unless the original article is wrong, these programs are aimed to help black people, who happen to be in the inner city of Detroit. The article says the program is explicitly designed NOT to help people in the inner city of Detroit who aren’t black; it specifically denounces “immigrants from Mexico, Asia and the Middle East.”
David,
How would a Mexican Town, Greek Town, or China Town “help” African Americans?
–Cobra
Cobra,
How would a Mexican Town, Greek Town, or China Town “help” African Americans?
Well, hmmm, I can think of a lot of ways. Beginning with food. Thriving ethnic communities really do produce the best restaurants.
But you’re missing David’s point. You said that this was an initiative to help the people in the inner city of Detroit; and he said that it was, obviously, an initiative to help the people in the inner city of Detroit, so long as they were Black.
You write,
I can’t say that other ethnic group[s] EVER received tax incentives, preferential contracts, grants or loans from local governments in cities throughout America during the course of American history.
I would wager that many HAVE.
What this has to do with recent immigrants starting up businesses in Detroit I don’t know. If there is positive discrimination against Blacks vis-a-vis recent immigrants in Detroit in getting loans, rentals, cab medallions, whatever, that needs to be utterly stamped out. But it’s ridiculous to hold current immigrants accountable for benefits a completely different group of people might have gotten generations back.
Michelle,
I understand your points, but you didn’t answer my question.
If African Town was 100% prviately funded, would you have a problem with it?
–Cobra
Michelle,
I meant to say “privately”.
–Cobra
Cobra, I would think it a very silly idea, but as long as there was no hiring discrimination by the “Black-owned” businesses in question, it wouldn’t be illegal. Would I have a “problem with it”? Yes, I would.
Michelle,
Might I inquire WHY you would have a problem with African Town? Do you have the same problem with China Town, Mexican Town, Little Italy, Little India, etc?
–Cobra
Cobra, it’s not clear what you mean by “China Town.” I don’t know about Detroit, but in most cities, “Chinatown” simply refers to a neighborhood where a lot of Chinese immigrants tend to cluster. (And hence there are lots of Chinese restaurants, etc.) It doesn’t refer to a government program to give special benefits to Chinese people or businesses, and it doesn’t refer to a private organization giving special benefits to Chinese people or businesses.
So it’s not clear what you mean by “Africa Town.”
If you mean a place where Africans cluster and, say, there are restaurants that serve African-style food, museums which exhibit African art, etc., then great.
If you mean a place where black people get special treatment in some fashion — say, subsidies for businesses owned by blacks — then I’d have a moral objection to it, but no legal objection as long as it were 100% private.
Would you have a problem with Chinatown if it was created by legislation using specific racial barriers to keep out black businesses? Are you just pretending to not see the difference between Chinatowns, Mexicantowns and Little Italy(s) and so on, and this legislation? Are you really not ashamed at the laughable and revealing excuses being put forth to legitimize obvious racism?
“Are you claiming that there are no white racists who are against racial preference programs?”
No, but what is the point? Is that your rationale for calling neo-cons the KKK with nicer clothes and better PR, as you did earlier. To use your angle, are you claiming that there are no racist, or lazy, or unambitious blacks that support racial preferences or discrimination? Should we then accuse all blacks of those traits? Of course such a statement is nonsensical and hateful, just as your’s was and is. Your readiness to use racial barriers to hurt minority and immigrant owned businesses would never be tolerated in a more civilized community.
What David and mikem said.
Cobra, the ethnic neighborhoods that do exist in most large cities are things that evolved over time as new immigrants settled where old immigrants already were. They never were government (or even private) projects. They happened. This proposed “African Town” is a completely different beast.
Michelle,
I disagree. Segregation and Jim Crow were government projects. “Irish need not apply”, and other racially divisive themes were the MOTIVATION for ethnic collectivism. You’re not arguing against ME. You’re in denial of American History.
–Cobra
Cobra,
Jim Crow was a “government project,” yes. “No Irish need apply” [that was the standard wording AFAIK] was a popular prejudice, not written into law anywhere so far as I know. (And what are the Irish doing in this argument anyway? Are there still “Irishtowns”? None that I know of.)
And immigrant communities will grow up spontaneously. The reasons are obvious. Newcomers to this country will settle where people around them speak their own language; where they can buy the foods they’re accustomed to and read the news from their former countries. And, yes, settling in one place in numbers has been a defense against intolerance; and yes, some ethnic enclaves (SF’s Chinatown being one) were partly government-created in the same sense as Jim Crow. (The history of anti-Chinese racism in CA is not pretty at all, and is something to bear in mind when hearing accounts of the privileged Asians crowding Blacks and Latinos out of the university system, &c.)
All that said, I have never heard of a public or even private project to create an ethnic enclave in the sense of funding it, as opposed to just herding the despised Others into it.
Cobra’s remarks re: an ‘Africatown’ in Detroit reminded me of some of the 70’s militant black acivists’ avowed goals of a ‘black African homeland’ in the U.S.
Wonder what they would say if you offered to give them an area of the U.S. for their very own, which they say they want? I can already hear the cries of ‘Racist!’….
The Detroit city council may try this, but it will never get off the ground. It’s more than just affirmative action – all other things being equal, giving the job to the one with the darkest skin pigmentation. Rather, it is a blatant attempt to not only ignore but to rip up the Constitution.
I have to admit that I still wonder, if blacks are so disenfranchised in Detroit then who owns all the businesses in Detroit? The last few times I was there, I didn’t see a single white person anywhere until I got away from the ‘avenues’ and into the suburbs.
In a city where most of the elected government, most of the government employees, and most of the residents are black, tell me just WHO is stopping the blacks from being successful? Is an 83% black majority not enough? What if there was virtually 100% blacks in Detroit – would that be enough? And if it still didn’t improve, who would you blame then?
Claire,
Simply inhabiting a place doesn’t neccessarily mean you have ownership. African Town is a proposal to create a successful, prosperous community in areas where there is 26% poverty now. There have been no proposals on the books in this plan to BAN white people from coming to African Town with their patronage. There are all types of urban renewal strategies. Commerica Park was built downtown with private funds for the Detroit Tigers, in an effort to bring people (and money) back downtown, but the bottom line is, the ownership of the stadium, and the Tigers is not in the hands of African Americans. I’m not saying that it’s a requirement, of course. As far as “black nationalism” goes, it’s interesting you bring that up. “Blacks having a place of their own” was the government policy of the US for 190 of the 228 years of its existance. The fact that segregation is still rampant in America today is testimony to the MYTH of color-blind society. Although I don’t agree with everything Claud Anderson and his Powernomics movement stands for, I can’t deny the basic concepts he brings up.
During segregation, out of neccessity, African Americans created their own industries, services and companies to serve their communities, because they were either denied access by the majority white society. Therefore, black car services, health care facillities, resturants, hotels, night clubs, hair care facillities and etc. were part of a symbiotic economy. The black community, for the most part, not only lived together, but supported each other financially.
What Anderson believes is that there is still segregation, despite laws on paper, and African Americans return to creating symbiotic economies where they live. It’s not about getting a job to the unemployed. It’s about acquiring wealth, political power, and education.
Traditional, majority run corporations have no loyalty to ANYONE, save the bottom line. The outsourcing of unskilled labor and manufacturing has decimated the inner cities of America, from Detroit to Cleveland to Newark, NJ to Syracuse to Pittsburgh, to Buffalo. Here is a proposal to bring something back to a community ABANDONED by tradional, white-owned and run companies, and the only complaints I see so far on the board is that there will be black faces in charge and making money.
–Cobra
Michelle,
You’re making my points for me. You agree with the neccessity for ethnic enclaves, and gave reasons for their development. We disagree on their creation. You don’t want to private or public funding to create them, but hey…somebody’s got to build infrastructure. Somebody builds the churches, temples, synagogues and mosques. Somebody’s got to have capital to build the resturants, museums, stores and business. Hey, the Amish in Pennsylvania’s Dutch country live in an insular, self-supporting society within America with no desire to integrate, yet they sell their produce and handiwork at market to all who come to their shops. Even THEY had to get their initial start up goods SOMEWHERE.
Michelle, blacks at various times did exactly what these other immigrant groups did, especially in light of segregation. Often, even the protection from intolerance you accurately write about, was not enough in these enclaves, and you had tragedies like Tulsa–http://www.cnn.com/US/9908/03/tulsa.riots.probe/
Fort Negro, and other disasters.
–Cobra
Cobra,
I didn’t say that ethnic enclaves were “necessary”; I said that it was obvious why they’d arise spontaneously among immigrants from the same countries. Repeat: spontaneously. If you have to pour money into creating an officially Black neighborhood in an 87% Black city, something is very wrong. Which parts of Detroit are not “African Town,” exactly? And why aren’t they?
Cobra is a a very selective student of history, ignoring more recent events and reaching back a century or two to find white initiated race riots. (Actually Fort Negro wasn’t a riot. It was a military action, but certainly racist.) He could have been more contemporary and listed dozens of race riots in LA (twice), Detroit, Baltimore, Washington, DC and so on. These resulted in hundreds of deaths, thousands of injuries and billions in damages. Unfortunately for his viewpoint, these were all initiated by blacks against non blacks and in fact were responsible for much of the white flight that Cobra finds so reprehensible. In a sad coincidence Koreans, whose businesses were burned out by the hundreds during the most recent black race riots in LA, are also under the racist gun in Detroit.
Mikem,
You didn’t see me write a post saying white flight was reprehensible. I’m just saying it’s REALITY, and you would be far more intellectually honest if you would admit that for the most part, white America was never in any hurry to allow blacks to assimilate into the population.
To imply that the riots in Detroit, Washington DC, Los Angelos, et al were because African Americans had nothing better to do is ridiculous. If you want to know why they happened, maybe you should ask why many white police officers in those areas had a fetish for beating and shooting unarmed black people, and why all white juries, such as the one in Simi Valley found nothing wrong with it, even with videotaped evidence. Mikem, your post is reflective of an attitude that is far too prevalent in the majority society, which is the belief that African Americans should remain silently impotent and docile in the face of brutality and injustice from the majority.
My response is…why should we?
There were over 300 incidents categorized as race riots perpetrated against African Americans between the mid-19th and mid-20th Century. Many of these attrocities not only included destruction of property, but beatings, lynchings, murders, mutilations,
castrations, and beyond.
http://www.blackwallstreet.freeservers.com/index.html
Mikem, many of these incidents had the full support, if not participation, of white law enforcement, and sometimes members of the national guard. Just because these incidents aren’t included in most suburban high school history text books, it doesn’t mean they didn’t happen.
But enough on riots. I think the crux of the issue here is that there seems to be a psycological discomfort among many posters here with any collective resourcing of non-white controlled groups to accumulate wealth or political power. This seems especially true with African Americans.
I watch as report after report on the race gap wealth widening:
“THE RACIAL WEALTH GAP
The wealth gap is particularly stark for blacks and Latinos. In 1995, the median black household had a net worth of just $7,400, (compared to $61,000 for whites). Median net worth excluding home equity was only $200 for blacks (compared to $18,000 for whites). Nearly one in three black households had zero or negative wealth. Latino households are even worse off – their median net worth was $5,000 including home equity and zero otherwise. Half the Latino population in the United States have more debts than assets.
The racial wealth gap reflects the reality that wealth accumulation occurs over generations, as parents pass on assets to their children in the form of homeownership, savings and estates. Past and present racial discrimination in asset-building, including slavery, Jim Crow law, discriminatory employment, insurance and bank lending practices, have kept many people of color from getting on the asset-building train.”
–http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2548/is_1999_Sept/ai_56027397
There is another excellent article by Robert Kuttner on how GOVERNMENT enacted programs that essentially helped build the white middle class in America here:
http://www.prospect.org/print-friendly/print/V14/5/kuttner-r-sr.html
To suggest that Government has NEVER provided programs and incentives that favored one racial group is sheer nonsense. I’m just asking the bloggers here why it’s wrong now to do for African Americans in Detroit, what Presidents like Jefferson, Lincoln and FDR did for white Americans nationwide.
–Cobra
Cobra, why were Asian-American businesses targeted in so many of the recent riots if the problem is white racism? Why are immigrants singled out as the problem in the Detroit report if the problem is white racism? What do you suppose is the average net worth of an Arab or Cambodian or Pakistani immigrant on arriving here? Higher than Black net worth, or lower?