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May 07, 2008

Urban White Interlopers Ignite Racial Conflict

Christopher Alleva
The well documented post world war white flight from America's cities seeking the greener spaces of the suburbs to raise their ever contracting families has been gradually subsiding in the last 5 to 10 years. In the 1950s Northern cities like Philadelphia and Baltimore went from negligble African-American populations to majority minority in a few short years. Heruclean efforts and profilgate spending by the Democrat leaders of these cities and states did nothing to stem this inexorable tide. Along the way they created a blindly loyal dependent underclass seemingly cursed with a disproportionate share of man's social ills.

After five decades this trend reversed course several years ago driven largely by the run up in suburban real estate prices that impelled families to reconsider residing in the cities that they shunned just a few years earlier. High gasoline prices can only throw gasoline on this fire. 

Historically, the vast majority of white families that lived in the  cities sent their childeren to private schools. Recent white migrants are generally less well-heeled and forced to send their children to the failing public schools. 

Not unexpectedly, but disturbing nonetheless, this is causing unrest and racial conflict. An ugly display of this is being played out in a section of Baltimore that has seen a large influx of white settlers in recent years. The Baltimore Examiner is reporting that a full blown neighborhood war has broken out in the Canton section of town over the closing of a public middle school and its replacement with a private operator. 

The Examiner provides a vivid account of the verbal and physical taunts being exchanged writing:

"Then they flung a ream of papers out the window and yelled "F-- in' white people!" to a group of residents sitting on row house stoops across the street.

"We're heckled ever day," said Larry Korycki as he stood with neighbors Friday afternoon complaining about the troubled school. "We're called white bastards. This is nothing unusual."  They add, "Threats from students aren't just verbal, say residents, who complain of attacks, fights and vandalism. "Teens in groups are attacking young women, old women and old men," said Sue Thompson, an activist. people screamed, shook their heads and cried at an emotionally and racially charged meeting about the proposed school Thursday night. "The complaints tonight are thinly veiled code for ‘We can't wait to get these little black kids out of our neighborhood,' " sad Douglas Bahr, a Canton resident.

Korycki was still bristling at Bahr's comment Friday afternoon.

"Just because we don't want what the system is cramming down our throats, we're called racist...." 

Such an open display of raw racial sentiments is unsettling. This is one reason why so many have invested such hope in Barry Obama. Americans of all races want to put this kind of thing behind them. Clearly, we have a long to go before we can achieve this ideal.

Posted at 02:17 PM | Email |

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