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He didn't coin the phrase. This phenomena has been called "white flight" in the media for decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight http://en.wikipedi

He didn't coin the phrase. This phenomena has been called "white flight" in the media for decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight

meowmix 17y ago
Oh I know. I used to live in Baltimore, I'm quite familiar with the concept. Edit: My original point was more to demonstrate that it's easy to use an outdated term ("white flight") and continue to use it to promote the idea that white = wealth.
- dschobel 17y ago
  While White Americans made up roughly 75.1% of all persons in 2000, 87.93% of all households in the top 5% were headed by a person who identified as being White alone. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States#Race http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_...
- mnemonicsloth 17y ago
  How is the term outdated? Last I checked, economic parity between black and white Americans was a ways off yet. I'm sure you have the best of intentions, but from here it looks like you're objecting to a pithy truth that you don't want stated. Which is a worse signal to send, for people concerned about racial inequality in the US -- Thought Police, or Vocabulary Prudes?
- pw0ncakes 17y ago
  White flight is about racial anxiety more than it is about wealth or tax policies. It's not necessarily appropriate in the OP's case, because what he's describing doesn't have much to do with race inherently, although there is a correspondence between white racism and supposedly disinterested economic conservatism. The most flagrant opponents of government assistance programs have no problem with programs that benefit them-- "my opponent [Al Gore in 2000] wants to run Social Security like it's some kind of federal program" and "keep your government hands off my Medicare"-- but have a huge issue with "those people" (blacks and Latinos) on "welfare". Author's note: "Welfare" is not one US social program, but a disparaging epithet used by working-class conservatives against whatever social programs-- Medicaid, food stamps-- are used predominantly by people lower than them on the socioeconomic totem pole. I grew up in a low-income, traditionally white neighborhood, so I've seen this first-hand. There was one family notorious for this: they received benefits from some social welfare programs and would rip on those who were on more such programs for being "on welfare". Also, many racist whites are against "big government" not because of an inherent objection but because the government uses more affirmative action than private-sector employers, which leads them to the (wrong) conclusion that government is 100% staffed with underperforming women and minorities. This is what "government (except the military) can't do anything right" is actually about.
thinkers 17y ago
The concept of race is something large institutions and people in power use to divide and conquer, control distract and divert our attention. It is just a concept advanced 400 years ago that we are still talking about today. It is not real. I belong to the human race. By the way there are a lot of people on welfare including billionaires, farmers, corportations, sports teams etc. They all profit from government subsidy. Look at the Banks, their failure has been subsidies by government for years. We will be building stadiums for Billionaires and many people will critisize welfare and support the billionaires. Just like we will justify the billionaire subsidy we can justify the poor man subsidy, but whose subsidy will you support. It is obvious. You know what will happen when you say let kick them all of welfare. Exactly what you have today more welfare for the poor so we can give ten times that much to the rich.There are so many people geting rich on government and not being held accountable. Just like there are poor who are surviving on government. We just built a stadium for a billionaire. Think about that. Together we stand divided we fall. So many of our great thinkers and problem solvers spend their time and energy on crap like white flight, ethnic stats etc. We are all just people trying to make it in a difficult world and some of us are doing a whole lot better than others and I do not think race has as much to do with it as we would like to think.

He didn't coin the phrase. This phenomena has been called "white flight" in the media for decades. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight

meowmix 17y ago

Oh I know. I used to live in Baltimore, I'm quite familiar with the concept. Edit: My original point was more to demonstrate that it's easy to use an outdated term ("white flight") and continue to use it to promote the idea that white = wealth.

dschobel 17y ago
While White Americans made up roughly 75.1% of all persons in 2000, 87.93% of all households in the top 5% were headed by a person who identified as being White alone. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States#Race http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_...
mnemonicsloth 17y ago
How is the term outdated? Last I checked, economic parity between black and white Americans was a ways off yet. I'm sure you have the best of intentions, but from here it looks like you're objecting to a pithy truth that you don't want stated. Which is a worse signal to send, for people concerned about racial inequality in the US -- Thought Police, or Vocabulary Prudes?
pw0ncakes 17y ago
White flight is about racial anxiety more than it is about wealth or tax policies. It's not necessarily appropriate in the OP's case, because what he's describing doesn't have much to do with race inherently, although there is a correspondence between white racism and supposedly disinterested economic conservatism. The most flagrant opponents of government assistance programs have no problem with programs that benefit them-- "my opponent [Al Gore in 2000] wants to run Social Security like it's some kind of federal program" and "keep your government hands off my Medicare"-- but have a huge issue with "those people" (blacks and Latinos) on "welfare". Author's note: "Welfare" is not one US social program, but a disparaging epithet used by working-class conservatives against whatever social programs-- Medicaid, food stamps-- are used predominantly by people lower than them on the socioeconomic totem pole. I grew up in a low-income, traditionally white neighborhood, so I've seen this first-hand. There was one family notorious for this: they received benefits from some social welfare programs and would rip on those who were on more such programs for being "on welfare". Also, many racist whites are against "big government" not because of an inherent objection but because the government uses more affirmative action than private-sector employers, which leads them to the (wrong) conclusion that government is 100% staffed with underperforming women and minorities. This is what "government (except the military) can't do anything right" is actually about.

thinkers 17y ago

The concept of race is something large institutions and people in power use to divide and conquer, control distract and divert our attention. It is just a concept advanced 400 years ago that we are still talking about today. It is not real. I belong to the human race. By the way there are a lot of people on welfare including billionaires, farmers, corportations, sports teams etc. They all profit from government subsidy. Look at the Banks, their failure has been subsidies by government for years. We will be building stadiums for Billionaires and many people will critisize welfare and support the billionaires. Just like we will justify the billionaire subsidy we can justify the poor man subsidy, but whose subsidy will you support. It is obvious. You know what will happen when you say let kick them all of welfare. Exactly what you have today more welfare for the poor so we can give ten times that much to the rich.There are so many people geting rich on government and not being held accountable. Just like there are poor who are surviving on government. We just built a stadium for a billionaire. Think about that. Together we stand divided we fall. So many of our great thinkers and problem solvers spend their time and energy on crap like white flight, ethnic stats etc. We are all just people trying to make it in a difficult world and some of us are doing a whole lot better than others and I do not think race has as much to do with it as we would like to think.