Coming together on race......

Even today, fifty years after laws were passed to outlaw segregation children in school are still segregated in their own way.  Today it's not because there are laws saying that we have to be segregated, it's something mentally that is keeping us apart from each other.  In school cafeteria's most black and mixed kids today sit on one side of the cafeteria and the white kids sit on another side.

Even in today's society there are "black neighborhoods" and "white neighborhoods".  There is no one saying to stay away from each other, it's just something we do naturally.  In our town we segregate each other by having our own "end" of town.  The majority of white people live in the north end, the black people live in the south or west end.

In our school there is a mixture of whites, blacks, Asians, and Mexicans  that walk through these halls together every day as friends and classmates.  There are interracial relationships in this school as well.  Still, even today, some people think in a racist way that offends people.

75% of the U.S. citizens are white and only 23% are black.  The other minorities equal only 2%.  Black income equal only 58% of white family income.  Why is this?  Is it because blacks are not getting the chances that white people are getting for the best jobs?  The disadvantage of blacks is worse than it has been since the mid-1970s.

In today's ghettos, poor black families live in horrible living conditions.  Most middle-class families live in suburbia.  In the late 1960's most urban black people were locked into deteriorated, and almost completely segregated ghettos.  Public housing funds were unavailable at this time, even though people were trying to develop public housing. Still, since the 1970s, there is a growing black middle class that is competing with the white majority for jobs and other resources.

Also in the 1960s De facto school segregation was a problem.  Racial separation was partly created by the location of schools.  White school boards that made decisions could be accused of allowing this segregation because they selected sites for new schools.  Housing segregation intensified when whites looked for homes in area by "good white schools."

Stores in the ghettos were owned mostly by whites, which does not make much sense since blacks made up most of the ghetto. They took advantage of the black residents by overcharging them for products.  The black residents couldn't do much about  it because of  the fact that they did not have reliable transportation.

Black people are no longer required to eat at separate tables, drink from separate water fountains or sit in the back seats of the bus.  To a large extent black people are still second-class citizens.  Today in 1998, black professionals live in formerly all white suburbs and earn middle-class incomes. Black people have made some economic progress since the 1950s and 1960s.  Still though, people are living in low class developments and still do not have decent chances at jobs.

As Americans, we should realize that there are no longer laws requiring that different races should be segregated from each other.  We are all equal and we should all have the same opportunities to live, work and live together in one community, instead of feeling we should all stay on different sides of town.
 

                                                                            REFERENCES 
 

Elliot, Jeffrey M.,  "The Ghetto:  From Bad to Worse."
      Guilford:  Dushkin Publishers Co., 1989.

Reitman, Janet,  "Coming Together on Race".  Scholastic Inc., 1998.

Finsterbusch, Kurt,  "No Progress for Black Americans."
      Guilford:  Dushkin Publishers Co., 1989-90.
 

Jennifer E.
Dustin K.
Mike H.
Stephen C.

  George Cassutto's Cyberlearning World: 
http://www.cyberlearning-world.com

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