The Race Card Project
By Michele Norris
Jane Meacham,
Washington, DC.
My dad is a lawyer in Kansas City, MO, who always had mostly black, working-class clients. When the city school district started to decline in quality in the early 1970s, we moved away to a nearly all-white suburban school district nearby. So I realize now, all these years later, that his African-American clientele’s fees inadvertently helped us flee the changing complexion of a busing-integrated school system.
Clara Silverstein,
Boston, MA.
As one of the white children in Richmond, Virginia in the 1970s whose family willingly participated in busing, I had few friends of any race. What we could have used at the time was leadership instead of racist rhetoric, white flight, and school administrators who cancelled all after-school activities. The possibility of an interracial dance horrified them. The longest-lasting lesson: Race is a malignant social construct. Many of us wanted to reach out to each other but generations of misinformation and mistrust stood in the way. I have written about my own experiences and also use my background to help teens of all races express themselves in writing – their struggles to fit in and find a place for themselves – when fear too often silences all of us.
Misty Johnson,
Lilburn, GA.
I moved to Georgia in 1988 when I was 8 years old. My father left his job on the oil rigs to start his own landscaping company in Lithonia, Georgia. I was a minority at my elementary school back in Texas, which was predominately Hispanic. The move to Atlanta was different because of the largeer African American population. After a year or so of living in the suburban neighborhood, all of the white people started moving. My family didn’t have the means to move but within a year and a half I was the only white girl in my class in school. My nickname was actually white girl at one point and I really absorbed the African America culture. I even went so far as to get braids in my hair to look like Janet Jackson from Poetic Justice. (Loved that movie) There is no way anybody can ever tell me that race does not play a role in who you are or how you are perceived. Who I’am today was shaped by by my childhood of being around different cultures and races.
Richard Bacon
Chicago, IL
Mid 1970s living in perfectly nice middle class neighborhood in NE Dallas Texas. The desecration, by busing, of the neighborhood school (which was mediocre anyway) caused about half the families with school age children to move out in one summer. My best friend moved. Those of us who stayed were dispersed to private schools, or lived in families that “didn’t care.” It was like surviving a plague–half the people you knew were suddenly gone.
By high school, I was back in Dallas public schools, at a superior high school with multiple academic magnet programs and about 40-50% white kids. But by early 1980s it was clear that the “best” white kids had moved to suburbs or private schools. Dallas ISD is now only 5% white.
As an adult I moved to Chicago, to the South Side, for grad school, living in a neighborhood surrounded by a sea of neglected and abandoned neighborhoods, beautiful places with tree-lined boulevards, right by Lake Michigan, that white people fled a generation earlier.
Then I married a South Side Irish/Polish woman. Here entire extended family & friends had fled multiple times, moving en masse and replicating whole streets in a new suburb, only to flee that new refuge when a black family moves in. And every move some get left behind and the familial and social connections get frayed a little more. For 3 generations white flight has been organizing principle of this population.
I now live in one of those abandoned/neglected South Side neighborhoods, not wanting to recapitulate the white flight story of my life. It’s a wonderful street, rehabed and infill dwellings, with really wonderful neighbors. But I still feel like refugee.
I don’t blame black people for all this. I blame the white folks who disrupted and dislocated our lives. They wanted to be “safe,” but they create self-fulfilling prophecy with their fear.
Glenny Brock,
Submitted via Twitter: @glennybrock
Always code. In fact, most of the people I’ve heard say this were people who themselves CHANGED neighborhoods by leaving.
Jeffrey Kingdon
Danville, IN
Whether my 50’s era parents chose their life in the suburbs due to racial considerations or were simply following the trend to find affordable post war housing, the effect was the same. The west suburban central Indiana communities were largely small farming towns rapidly on their way to becoming bedroom sprawl to their larger urban neighbor. These communities were almost homogenously white. Growing up there, I knew no one of another race. And how did this affect my life? Well, I didn’t think too much about it. As a child, adolescent & young adult it seemed normal. My schools were white. I chose to go to a small college, Presbyterian & predominantly white. When it came time ultimately to find a place to raise our family, we moved home … to west suburban Indianapolis.. still white after all these years. However, primarily through the work world, I began to “come to” and realize that my white world wasn’t the only reality. I find myself today sometimes saddened by not knowing the “other.” This breeds fear & distrust when there need not be any. We have not enjoyed each other’s company or shared different food, or taken part in varied family & cultural traditions. In very tangible ways we have missed out by holding ourselves apart. Why? It didn’t seem consciously done, we just gravitate to what we know, what feels normal & comfortable in making life’s choices.
Our kids however are making different choices. Both live in large urban centers. They engage this life with their spouses and enjoy it completely. They have opportunity to live side by side with every ethnicity, gay or straight, young or old. How did this happen? I do not know. There lives will be more complete, richer. Good for them and good for all of us.
Glenny Brock ,
Birmingham, Al.
Submitted via Twitter: @glennybrock
Always code. In fact, most of the people I’ve heard say this were people who themselves CHANGED neighborhoods by leaving. Glenny’s 6Word essay launched an interesting exchange via Twitter, follow along below…How do you weigh in on the topic? Comment below. I hate hearing “The neighborhood changed.” Glenny Brock @glennybrock
“neighborhood changed” definitely code word for “no longer white”. Coworker told me this when her family moved to Montana. Mana @fuun57
Theresa Fichter
Council Bluffs, IA
Council Bluffs, IA in the early eighties was mostly white. Middle class and drugs and alcohol was a problem in school. But, not as bad as pregnancies and bad
administration, in schools.
Robert Robillard
Roanoke, VA
I teach at a white flight private school that now aims to be diverse. Another element that must be as true in Tuscaloosa as it is in Roanoke or Richmond, is that black families who have the means (not just money but social capital), frequently get their best and brightest into successful county schools or private schools. This brain drain from the city school districts adds another challenge to improving test scores. Educating all of our students well is the most important problem we face as a society.
Subscription to our newsletter open soon.
Indulge in timeless elegance with our hand-curated collection of luxury vintage men’s fashion. From classic suits to iconic accessories, our online store offers a premium shopping experience for the modern gentleman who appreciates quality and style. Shop now and elevate your wardrobe with our carefully selected pieces that celebrate the art of craftsmanship and heritage fashion.
