Why are black people so hated?

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As long as the educational system is more concerned with meeting demographic criteria rather than educating their students this cannot change.

I don't believe it is impossible, just highly, highly unlikely.

That will never prevent me from trying though. We get as close as I've seen on these boards, though we clearly still have a long way to go.

But-head topic

Cynical racism is still racism--individualized into examples, the BUTs I referred to in another related thread, then generalized into rationalizations.

These are mostly public school districts we're talking about, so I have no idea what "demographic criteria" you imagine they're trying to meet. They take whoever lives in their zip code.

So many special ed students to qualify for this or that taxation benefit regardless of whether they belong there. So many of these people in this program, so many of those people in that program, etc. It's a number game for pencil pushers at a desk job.

Which is exactly why you feel the way you do. You have no idea what it's really like here. And don't say you can because you live in Florida. Florida is just another Yankee state with a lot more beaches. The only thing that Florida has in common with where I live is a similarly abysmal housing market. Pretty soon they'll all be crack houses and meth labs, just you wait!

And given the hispanic population, it's not really part of the United States, anyway. More like a democratic version of Cuba. You know, like Taiwan and China.

And yes, in all seriousness, I KNOW these schools suck. I've taught in a couple of them. A friend of mine showed up one day to teach her "home ec" class. Her students were all ready for her arrival, and they all had eggs.

She didn't come back the next day.

So yeah, I know how horrible kids can be. I've been victim of student pranks myself, and I've just shaken them off and kept going. I've had to do the whole "tough guy" routine to get all the gang members off my case. It's not bad teaching to learn who to make friends with, and it's not bad teaching to understand and "teach to" the culture you're dealing with. That's psychology 101 and sociology 101. Being a white teacher and gaining the respect of "gangsta" mentality street creds is not easy, especially when your job is teaching them Music Appreciation and they get to listen to dead Europeans all hour. Good luck making that interesting. But we also had some fun along the way, and I've had kids come up to me in the years since saying how sorry they were for giving me a hard time. I just say, "hey, don't worry about it--YOU aren't the reason I left, and I had a good time there." Knuckleheads they may have been, but they were PEOPLE first and foremost. It's an honor to have been part of their lives.

So I agree with you: The schools CAN suck, and I understand that you can't blame the kids for that. But I've BEEN there, and I DO blame administrators, "guidance" counselors, certain teachers, and most CERTAINLY their parents for not opening the doors and showing them that there is life beyond this endless, flat, muddy hole. I also blame the kids for sitting in my classroom, listening to me describe the world "out there," and not caring enough to do a single thing about it. If this is all they want, FINE. Who am I to judge? But don't you DARE moan and groan about how this is all there ever will be. If you make the wrong decisions and end up paying for it for the rest of your life, don't you DARE blame THIS "white man" because I put my own blood, sweat, and tears into trying to help you get OUT.

Call me a racist if you want, sounds to me like some have already made up their minds. But know this: My work now is strictly one-on-one teaching, roughly half my students are minority, and my reputation has grown such that people will drive from as far as an hour away to take lessons from me. I love what I do and I love my students. And I will work with people regardless of skin color. But if you approach me with that kind of "you owe me" kind of negative attitude, I don't care what your skin color is, I don't need you, nor can I teach you. I can't help but notice that I don't get that attitude from white students or students from other minorities--in fact, I teach a pair of identical twins whose roots are in India, and they are a real joy to work with. What is really interesting to me is that you can always tell the difference between a black person who's been a lifelong resident and a Yankee with Delta roots. It so happens, not surprisingly, that my BEST student is a 3rd grader. Her family comes from the Chicago area, but decided they wanted to stay close to their cultural roots in Mississippi. These parents and the little girl are all business, all the time, and they'll take anything I can dish out, including my frequent temper tantrums. That's the kind of person who'll end up at Juilliard one day, and not because I'm a great teacher, but because they know how to overcome the negative cultural influences of the rural Mississippi Delta.

If racism still exists in the south, it has to do with the continued resentment and negative attitudes on the part of many blacks who live here and the reaction of whites to it. It has nothing to do with feelings of superiority or supremacy.

Someone else mentioned that it has nothing to do with geography. I wasn't trying to ignore inner city racial issues. Larger, metropolitan areas in the north seem to have similar problems as what I've been writing about, but I can't speak on inner-city problems from experience. The inner-city mentality is glamorized among the youth where I live, and their reality is NOTHING like the inner-cities. I think that's probably more a product of watching too much MTV or something, but I honestly can't tell you because I don't know that first hand. From working with young people, I found that their artistic and cultural vision was appallingly myopic, whereas caucasians tend to have a wider diversity of tastes and influences. I'm not saying that it's a good/bad thing, but it's just an observation. The parallels between rural blacks who only THINK they are inner-city and what we tend to expect from inner-cities is astounding, and the realities are that their lives are WORLDS apart. I did get SOME exposure to the inner-city, gangland mentality during hurricane Katrina because so many New Orleans and Gulf Coast expats enrolled at my school and ended up in my classroom. What I found was that they often tended to look down on their classmates, as though they really were inferior or something, all the while just barely tolerating "that white music teacher." So, from what I observed, there IS a wide difference between urban and rural culture. The resentment, though, seems to be a commonality between the two, even if it is expressed differently.

And I think that may also play a part in Northern misperception of apparent southern racist attitudes. Northern blacks appear to be concentrated in urban centers, while MOST whites are concentrated more suburban and rural areas. I would dare say, actually, that many Yankee whites are shielded from the same resentful attitudes that we southerners get all the time. Because you tend to be thus sheltered, it's much easier to point to the south and say we're "rife with racism." You wouldn't accuse us all of being bigots if you were confronted with the same cultural barriers. Of that I'm sure.

Regarding Teach for America: I see those TA kids all the time, and I think they are snobby, rude and condescending to locals. Someone should teach them some manners.

But in all seriousness, my only criticism is they rotate in and out of rural schools so fast that they don't really build any real lasting connection with the students and parents, much less the community at large. I think that is so important for teachers to do, and TA doesn't really accomplish that in any meaningful way. Those TA kids (and they ARE kids) don't really leave here any different than they came in, and that's a shame I think. I've worked with one or two at the local community theater, and they seemed really ambitious and ideological. I just hope they are sincere about their ambitions, that they hang on to their ideals, and that they don't burn out.

this shows that the meta-issue is more about socioeconomic class, and less about race per se. people in the lower class need to band together as a united front and not be so insipidly contentious.

Last edited by auntblabby on 27 Oct 2010, 12:43 am, edited 1 time in total.

To take a time out here for a second, what purpose does is it serving to shout "racist!" at people who are here trying to explain their thoughts and feelings and the reasons behind them? Is that making the world, the internet, or even just this site a better place? I understand the idea behind shaming and social conditioning and such, but this isn't the place for it, this is a forum for DISCUSSING ideas, whether or not we find some of them personally offensive we should at least be able to TALK about them in a civil manner. I'll be the first to admit to not always being perfect in this respect, but at least I'm making the effort.

Now the question is how do you get into a socioeconomic class? Is there some variable like possibly race that determines likelihood of acquiring social and financial status?

strictly the luck of the draw. you need to get the right genes, the right timing, the right place, the right family. it ALL has to gell from the get go, or else it's just zip.

No so sure about that personally, at the top of the socio-economic ladder in America I can't name anyone who is black, unless you think NFL/NBA players are up there with Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, etc.

if one includes mere millionaires as being at the top, then what about condi rice? colin powell? chris rock? denzel washington? bill cosby? oprah? the president? too too too many of 'em to list here. just my 2-cents' worth.

Okay agreed, there are some very talented actors and a talk show host along with members of the cabinet in the multi-million dollar arena but we could probably add up Tom Cruise, Johnny Depp, Ellen Degeneres and all the white stars in their class and we'd probably have a shocking white to black ratio.

Well, obviously you have the soc-ec class you're born into, which you have no control over. The kids I used to work with did not have a concept of actually overcoming circumstance.

But the truth is you DO have control over these things to a large degree. I was born into a lower-middle class family. We held our own, but not affluent by any means. My wife and I struggled together to maintain a certain lifestyle, but then we were caught by circumstance ourselves and have yet to find ourselves in any kind of situation where we can really do anything about it.

In other words, sh!t happens, and thus class and lifestyle are not guarantees of the life you're born into. That doesn't mean we have to resign ourselves to circumstance, though. I'm doing what I do because it allows me to independently work on realizing a lifelong dream of mine, and so far things are going well. For all I know, you might be seeing my name in Hollywood film credits as the composer in the next year or two, or I might go back to school for a doctorate and teach college for the rest of my life.

I don't want to get into religion HERE, but I also see it as a test of faith, doing what I'm MEANT to do or at the very least reevaluating what I've been doing all along. I mentioned my brief 3-year teaching career in public schools (the latter two years I talk about, the first one I don't). Being a teacher was never my dream, just something I was technically qualified and licensed to do. But the classroom is not the place for me, and the aspie thing certainly doesn't help in that arena. So I think being ejected from education after moving to a private school for two years was the final straw for me, and I'm making good progress doing what I do now.

The main point is that the "minority" students I worked with may have been caught as victims of circumstance, but by no means do they have to STAY that way. That was a battle I faced every day that I taught them, and I count my greatest victory the ONE student who actually listened and believed me. The problem is that they aren't surrounded by enough adults who can convince them enough that they are in the prime of their academic lives while they're still kids, and going to college is just another way to see the world. I may not agree with affirmative action, but they ARE at an advantage in that they can get preferential treatment to attend pretty much any public university ANYWHERE, practically a free ride. They have a chance to get up to speed with what they don't know or what they're high school teachers couldn't/wouldn't teach them. So they have no legit excuse if they are relegated to a lifetime of poverty. If they chose to remain victims of circumstance, it is their own fault if they do. And I've already said what I feel about the role of schools and parents in this matter.

My personal experience is such that I've fallen victim to circumstance, but I've responded by making a business out of what I do while pursuing my real interests. Students often learn best by example, and the example they often see with their peers, parents, and relatives is that they give up. And I'm not going to say it's right for whites to hate them for it. But you can't really blame the rest of society for looking down on a culture that they see as going down the wrong path and blaming others for what they do to themselves. Yes, I blame my former employer for letting me go, but it does no good to dwell on it. Same goes for anyone without regard for race, ethnicity, skin color, or other circumstance.

I don't really agree. Statistics support the idea that the percentage of poor black folks is a lot higher than the percentage of poor white folks. Same with other minority groups.

Minorities that are born into a lower socio-economic class are less likely to go up a class than white folks are.

you just reinforced my point.