Integration is not the Opposite of Segregation

[Rhondazvous]

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Yes, there were a lot of things going on. When you have a nationwide phenomenon, it’s never just one cause.

You can call it failed integration or whatever it was it failed the black community. It did not result in an integrated economy. There was money going out but none coming in and that too had several causes.

Financial services was one area where there was an integrated economy (if there weren't....then the blank banks could not have lost their customers).  An integrated economy does not mean that money flows back to the community.  Frankly, it doesn't do so for "white" banks or communities either.  

For one thing, blacks did not understand there’s more to business than the retail store. They opened up little mom and pop stores and restaurants but they didn’t go into manufacturing, wholesale and distribution.

Well, more than a little bit of that had to do with available capital.  There weren't alot of black people with enough cash to open a factory - mom and pops were more achievable.  Since then, however, all the mom and pops are gone.  White, black, what have you.  It's unfortunate that history left black americans with few opportunities when they became enfranchised, and perhaps even moreso that those opportunities open to them then were, with the full light of history available to us now, very shortly doomed regardless of the ethnicity of the owner.  

So what happened? They had to get their products from Koreans, who over course overcharged them and gave the Korean storeowners discounts.  Then the retailers had to overcharge the black consumers just to break even, much less make a profit. “Oh, you call yourself a brother and charging me $6 for a jar of cream I can get from the Koreans for $2!”

Add to that the government is subsidizing Koreans to set up businesses in the black community. The Koreans hate us because that’s what they saw fighting them during the Korean War.

Not a whole lot of koreans where I'm from, whites blacks and hispanics..mostly, so I can't really comment on what the koreans did wherever you're from. Pretty sure a korean who hates americans because of the korean war is going to be an equal opportunity hater with regard to ethnicity.  Why did you have to get your products from koreans..btw?  

Now we got integration. We can go work for “the man.”

You could always work for "the man"......you just couldn't bank at the same institutions or eat lunch at the same counter or go to the same schools or drink from the same water fountains or marry his son..... 

But they don’t go out with the idea of using the money to support black communities. Growing up in the ghetto, the black child learns to think of his neighborhood as someplace he must escape. Like a jail. The only income coming in from the outside is when white kids come to buy drugs. Black businesses where doing good when they were supported by policy, but first the Irish and Italian gangs then the government took that over and now it’s called the state lottery. Again money going out, none coming in.

I also grew up learning to escape my neighborhood.  Again I;d suggest that your problem lies..not with integration, but with divestment in local communities, wich is endemic to all communities, at present, regardless of ethnicity. 

I've gotta say, these things that you've been laying on the koreans, and the irish, and the italians...they seem more like self inflicted wounds, and nothing at all to do with integration itself.  Integration gave black communities choices and oppurtunities they did not previously have.  What they did with those, well.

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As you said integration doesn’t equal incoming  cash flow. And as I said integration is not preclusive of segregation (when a community is controlled by those outside that community).

You’ve pointed out some things that all communities share in common, i.e., the financial abandonment of the local entrepreneur.   I see this happening across the board, so I can’t disagree with you there.

I used to live in Los Angeles where the Koreans were the only people selling black hair products. Why was this the case? Why were black businesses trying to sell me $300 African dresses but never things I would buy?

Irish and Italian gangs violently wrested policy (playing the numbers) away from blacks, shooting up establishments so that customers were afraid to go there. Calling this a self-inflicted wound is like calling the brutalization of the Freedom Riders by the KKK a self-inflicted wound.

I do not, by any means, think that all blacks’ problems can be laid at the feet of other ethnic groups, or that blacks are always the innocent victims in their encounters with others.  I do think that we are in a cycle where everybody plays a part and few are willing to take responsibility for the part they play.

BTW, I don’t have a problem. As a child, I grew up in Washington D.C. when the city was 87% black, but I never lived in that part of the city that could be called the “ghetto.” I never felt underprivileged because of my ethnicity.

Notice I use the term ethnicity rather than race, because to my knowledge there’s no scientific evidence that Homo sapience are divided into meaningfully distinct races. But ethnicity involves heritage and culture.

[The Grand Nudger]

As you said integration doesn’t equal incoming  cash flow. And as I said integration is not preclusive of segregation (when a community is controlled by those outside that community).

It's difficult for me to understand this line of thinking, as segregation is the setting apart of a group - my local community is controlled, at least insomuch as you seem to be speaking of control, by those outside our community.  I don't, personally, consider this segregation.  I don't consider my community to be segregated for having fit such a definition.  It's certainly not segregated in any sense that wouldn't generate a chuckle from people who did have to live with segregation.

You’ve pointed out some things that all communities share in common, i.e., the financial abandonment of the local entrepreneur.   I see this happening across the board, so I can’t disagree with you there.

I used to live in Los Angeles where the Koreans were the only people selling black hair products. Why was this the case? Why were black businesses trying to sell me $300 African dresses but never things I would buy?

You'd have to ask them.  Chances are....because it was profitable to do so, same reason that anyone overcharges anyone else and nothing to do with integration whatsoever.  Probably not much to do with the korean war either.  So what did you do, when black businesses didn't have what you wanted to buy?  Did you take your money elsewhere?  Maybe start up your own business?

Irish and Italian gangs violently wrested policy (playing the numbers) away from blacks, shooting up establishments so that customers were afraid to go there. Calling this a self-inflicted wound is like calling the brutalization of the Freedom Riders by the KKK a self-inflicted wound.

I'm pointing out that lotteries, legal or...in this case illegal...-are- a self inflicted wound to the poor who predominantly play them. That the people who run them are ruthless thugs doesn't change the fact that the people who get conned are harming themselves and their communities of their own accord. "They stole our illegal enterprises" is...iffy, imo, as a comment on anything we're discussing and just iffy in and of itself. Criminal rackets aren't the Freedom Riders...and irish and italian organized crime winning out over black organized crime isn't the KKK..the comparison is absurd.

There was an effort to get people to stop playing the numbers altogether, I assume?  How did that go?  

I do not, by any means, think that all blacks’ problems can be laid at the feet of other ethnic groups, or that blacks are always the innocent victims in their encounters with others.  I do think that we are in a cycle where everybody plays a part and few are willing to take responsibility for the part they play.

Sure, but I'm not making any remarks on such sweeping generalities...I'm simply pointing out what I see as misattribution with regards to your specific examples.  I do not see how integration forced or compelled blacks to shop "elsewhere", or play the lottery.  It seems, to me, like you're talking about a range of other things not specifically related to integration, or even a failure of integration.  

I assume that, as we continue to discuss those things you saw as contributing to the demise of the black community, I'll better understand what you mean by this and by your novel use of terms such as segregation and integration.

[Whateverist]

I really enjoyed shopping in a 'gay' business area in Philly some years ago.  Didn't occur to me at the time I was financially supporting a form of segregation or apartheid.

And that pride march I was in back in '79, the route went by all the gay bars in Chicago I had ever heard of or been in.  I suppose tying up traffic  on the Magnificent Mile might have raised more awareness, but we still had 250,000 out and about.

Have you been to SF?  They've got a bar called the White Swallow you might enjoy.

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Oh and I remembered the guy on TV, it was Tony Brown and the program was called Tony Brown's Journal: http://www.tonybrownsjournal.com/meet-tony-brown

[Regina]

I think we can achieve color/ ethnic/ gender/ sexual orientation blindness whi!le respecting our historical / cultural / sexual/ uniqueness which adds flavor to the soup in the melting pot. I think we can eat our cake and hold on to it too. It is a worthy goal.

It depends how it is done.

There is a difference between a "melting pot" and "multiculturalism", and I really would say those are opposites of eachother. A melting pot is where everyone just throws in their little bit and contributes to the greater culture, while multiculturalism is preserving segregated tribes on grounds of culture or race.
 
Multiculturalism does not work, and contemporary Europe is a prime example of that. Here we've tried to preserve minority immigrant cultures and ended up with ghettoised communities (of Muslims especially) who often hold views and attitudes at stark contrast with the wider population, and it creates tension and even conflict sometimes. It's not sustainable as a long-term policy to expect radically different cultures to just peacefully co-exist, right next to eachother on a small plot of land.

I certainly don't think a physical/genetic melting pot should be a policy, the government has no right to interfere with marriage and breeding to where we either force miscegenation or, opposite extreme, ban it. True integration to me is about finding and promoting common values, and holding everyone to the exact same standards of behaviour under the common law.

[vorlon13]

I really enjoyed shopping in a 'gay' business area in Philly some years ago.  Didn't occur to me at the time I was financially supporting a form of segregation or apartheid.

And that pride march I was in back in '79, the route went by all the gay bars in Chicago I had ever heard of or been in.  I suppose tying up traffic  on the Magnificent Mile might have raised more awareness, but we still had 250,000 out and about.

Have you been to SF?  They've got a bar called the White Swallow you might enjoy.

---

Oh and I remembered the guy on TV, it was Tony Brown and the program was called Tony Brown's Journal:  http://www.tonybrownsjournal.com/meet-tony-brown

Quite a few of my friends from my college era wound up in Frisco.  Curiously, for the most part they experienced a far lower mortality rate from HIV than my stay in the Midwest cohorts had.

That's not saying they haven't had their own challenges.  A couple have dire issues with drug abuse, and one I'm aware of is into a scene even I find extreme and disturbing.

One was murdered too, but the circumstances are at best ambiguous as to the degree of culpability he has for his own demise.  I wouldn't have done once what he did three times and expected to survive.  That he got 3 bites at that particular apple is remarkable, medical science being able twice to save him borders on the miraculous.

As for my touring Frisco, I think seeing some of the AIDS memorials and places I am familiar with from Randy Shilts's book would be too much for me to take.  A park bench with Bill Kraus's name on it, the building where Gary Walsh had his office, any reference to Bobbi Campbell, there would be hundreds of things altogether, that city would be filled with emotional landmines for me to an extent I can't see ever visiting.

[Regina]

Curiously, for the most part they experienced a far lower mortality rate from HIV than my stay in the Midwest cohorts had.

That's not so surprising tbh. It's commonly observed that STD rates and mortality from STDs are lower where people are more liberal and open with talking about the problem. It raises awareness and people have more space to take responsibility when they're not so wrapped up in being discreet.

[Rhondazvous]

---

As you said integration doesn’t equal incoming  cash flow. And as I said integration is not preclusive of segregation (when a community is controlled by those outside that community).

It's difficult for me to understand this line of thinking, as segregation is the setting apart of a group - my local community is controlled, at least insomuch as you seem to be speaking of control, by those outside our community.  I don't, personally, consider this segregation.  I don't consider my community to be segregated for having fit such a definition.  It's certainly not segregated in any sense that wouldn't generate a chuckle from people who did have to live with segregation.

You’ve pointed out some things that all communities share in common, i.e., the financial abandonment of the local entrepreneur.   I see this happening across the board, so I can’t disagree with you there.

I used to live in Los Angeles where the Koreans were the only people selling black hair products. Why was this the case? Why were black businesses trying to sell me $300 African dresses but never things I would buy?

You'd have to ask them.  Chances are....because it was profitable to do so, same reason that anyone overcharges anyone else and nothing to do with integration whatsoever.  Probably not much to do with the korean war either.  So what did you do, when black businesses didn't have what you wanted to buy?  Did you take your money elsewhere?  Maybe start up your own business?

Irish and Italian gangs violently wrested policy (playing the numbers) away from blacks, shooting up establishments so that customers were afraid to go there. Calling this a self-inflicted wound is like calling the brutalization of the Freedom Riders by the KKK a self-inflicted wound.

I'm pointing out that lotteries, legal or...in this case illegal...-are- a self inflicted wound to the poor who predominantly play them. That the people who run them are ruthless thugs doesn't change the fact that the people who get conned are harming themselves and their communities of their own accord.  "They stole our illegal enterprises" is...iffy, imo, as a comment on anything we're discussing and just iffy in and of itself.    Criminal rackets aren't the Freedom Riders...and irish and italian organized crime winning out over black organized crime isn't the KKK..the comparison is absurd.  

There was an effort to get people to stop playing the numbers altogether, I assume?  How did that go?  

I do not, by any means, think that all blacks’ problems can be laid at the feet of other ethnic groups, or that blacks are always the innocent victims in their encounters with others.  I do think that we are in a cycle where everybody plays a part and few are willing to take responsibility for the part they play.

Sure, but I'm not making any remarks on such sweeping generalities...I'm simply pointing out what I see as misattribution with regards to your specific examples.  I do not see how integration forced or compelled blacks to shop "elsewhere", or play the lottery.  It seems, to me, like you're talking about a range of other things not specifically related to integration, or even a failure of integration.  

I assume that, as we continue to discuss those things you saw as contributing to the demise of the black community, I'll better understand what you mean by this and by your novel use of terms such as segregation and integration.

---

Yes, some of what I said was in answer to your questions and not specifically about integration. Hopefully, we can get on the same page with this. I appreciate your investment of time and energy and will do my best to be clearer.

I don’t use the conventional meanings of integration and segregation because they just deal with numbers without touching the social and political realities. The majority of whites live in all white neighborhoods and only encounter other ethnic groups on the job or on TV. Yet, they don’t themselves segregated. Absent is the caged in and controlled feeling one gets when one is truly segregated.

What I’m going to have to say is that it wasn’t integration but the black response to integration that caused the black community to collapse.

It’s true, as you said, that integration opened a lot of opportunities for blacks, but it also weakened their incentive to invest in their community. This, of course, was their fault and short sightedness.

There are examples of other groups who used integration to help their communities. The Japanese, for example. After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they sent their children to America to learn everything we knew about technology. They took that knowledge back to Japan and now japan is a leader in technology. The Mexicans come here to work and send the money back to Mexico. Of course, many things going back to slavery contributed to the shame and aversion blacks feel toward their own. But they still have the power to do things differently.

One note on playing the numbers. The money was used to fund black businesses and when it was taken over, that capital dried up making it impossible for black businesses to compete yes, it was illegal, but it was all they had.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yes, some of what I said was in answer to your questions and not specifically about integration. Hopefully, we can get on the same page with this. I appreciate your investment of time and energy and will do my best to be clearer.

I don’t use the conventional meanings of integration and segregation because they just deal with numbers without touching the social and political realities.  The majority of whites live in all white neighborhoods and only encounter other ethnic groups on the job or on TV. Yet, they don’t themselves segregated. Absent is the caged in and controlled feeling one gets when one is truly segregated.

What I’m going to have to say is that it wasn’t integration but the black response to integration that caused the black community to collapse.

It’s true, as you said, that integration opened a lot of opportunities for blacks, but it also weakened their incentive to invest in their community. This, of course, was their fault and short sightedness.  

One might wonder whether or not the decline of black communities would more closely mirror the decline of white communities in similar economic predicaments had other societal and institutional barriers not been present (and to be fair.....the similarities are already striking as is).  Conversely, one might wonder whether or not..had a sort of "in-house" economy continued unabated, black wall street would have ended up being the great black hole for black wealth..in other black communities...that wall street has become.  

I present these two examples as a way to suggest that even the black response, as it were, to the situation of post-integration america would not have, in and of itself, necessarily lead to either the current situation or even a beneficial or significantly different one had they gone entirely the other way with it.  It seems as though history was trending towards this dilemma for every community, and people were making largely the same decisions, but that other factors hastened or exacerbated the demise of a community that had been historically lacking in opportunity, with far less accumulated wealth to bleed away.  

It may have been that no choice, then, would have significantly altered the status of communities, now. We have to keep in mind that we are, ultimately, dioscussing a minority community in a much larger (and whiter ) river. It would be difficult to see how the black community could have escaped what happened to many similar white communities in the same time frame...even if they had a great idea and tried their best with no hiccups. We'd have drug you down with us if you'd managed to do better than we were.

There are examples of other groups who used integration to help their communities. The Japanese, for example. After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they sent their children to America to learn everything we knew about technology. They took that knowledge back to Japan and now japan is a leader in technology. The Mexicans come here to work and send the money back to Mexico.   Of course, many things going back to slavery contributed to the shame and aversion blacks feel toward their own. But they still have the power to do things differently.

I'll share one of my fears with you, as a hardcore booster for local ag and local business in general, here in my own community.  We may not have the power to stop this train.  None of us.  The time to do things differently may have already passed...and it's a hopeful thing to think, that we can turn back the clock on the transfer of wealth and transformation of business since the 60's.....but it's a long shot.  More fundamentally than that....there's a great quip..can't remember where I heard it, but another word for self sufficiency (at an individual or community level)...is poverty.  

But fuck me, Mr. Doom and Gloom, what sorts of solutions have you heard about or think might be worthwhile for the problems you see in your community, or the black community in general?  

One note on playing the numbers. The money was used to fund black businesses and when it was taken over, that capital dried up making it impossible for black businesses to compete yes, it was illegal, but it was all they had.

The italian and irish gangs had similar claims made by them, for them, and about them.... but the reality of organized crime is that it's not what "anyone" has except for the criminals themselves.  The rest of the people around them are victims.  Not Robbin Hood, just robbing you.  I wouldn't lament it's loss even if it was all -I- had......though I can understand the symbolic importance. They took it all, even the fuckin crime...lol, brutal.

[vorlon13]

Curiously, for the most part they experienced a far lower mortality rate from HIV than my stay in the Midwest cohorts had.

That's not so surprising tbh. It's commonly observed that STD rates and mortality from STDs are lower where people are more liberal and open with talking about the problem. It raises awareness and people have more space to take responsibility when they're not so wrapped up in being discreet.

A recent article on HIV DNA analysis of stored medical samples shows circa 1978 5% of the gay men in Frisco were HIV+, we weren't to even know nationally something big was going on till '81 (for me it was  7/11/81 and I did nothing for 5 years after that).  These friends of mine were moving to Frisco from '76 on.  The first 'indigenous' case I'm aware of in my Midwest peer group was in '87, a friend of mine who hadn't been out of state and therefore contracted it here, and likely later than '81.  (I'm not counting 'D' here, a '77 fatality that also 'never went anywhere', but we have no samples to test to see if he did in fact have HIV).

I'm remaining amazed my Frisco friends escaped the worst of it, not knowing anything was going on for years while they lived there wouldn't have been conducive to their odds.  Once it was realized something was going on, individuals like Bill Kraus did their best to sound the alarm, but it was unfortunately years too late for so many of them.

Bill included . . .

[Rhondazvous]

One might wonder whether or not the decline of black communities would more closely mirror the decline of white communities in similar economic predicaments had other societal and institutional barriers not been present (and to be fair.....the similarities are already striking as is).  Conversely, one might wonder whether or not..had a sort of "in-house" economy continued unabated, black wall street would have ended up being the great black hole for black wealth..in other black communities...that wall street has become.  

I present these two examples as a way to suggest that even the black response, as it were, to the situation of post-integration america would not have, in and of itself, necessarily lead to either the current situation or even a beneficial or significantly different one had they gone entirely the other way with it.  It seems as though history was trending towards this dilemma for every community, and people were making largely the same decisions, but that other factors hastened or exacerbated the demise of a community that had been historically lacking in opportunity, with far less accumulated wealth to bleed away.  

It may have been that no choice, then, would have significantly altered the status of communities, now.  We have to keep in mind that we are, ultimately, dioscussing a minority community in a much larger (and whiter ) river.  It would be difficult to see how the black community could have escaped what happened to many similar white communities in the same time frame...even if they had a great idea and tried their best with no hiccups.  We'd have drug you down with us if you'd managed to do better than we were.

There are examples of other groups who used integration to help their communities. The Japanese, for example. After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, they sent their children to America to learn everything we knew about technology. They took that knowledge back to Japan and now japan is a leader in technology. The Mexicans come here to work and send the money back to Mexico.   Of course, many things going back to slavery contributed to the shame and aversion blacks feel toward their own. But they still have the power to do things differently.

I'll share one of my fears with you, as a hardcore booster for local ag and local business in general, here in my own community.  We may not have the power to stop this train.  None of us.  The time to do things differently may have already passed...and it's a hopeful thing to think, that we can turn back the clock on the transfer of wealth and transformation of business since the 60's.....but it's a long shot.  More fundamentally than that....there's a great quip..can't remember where I heard it, but another word for self sufficiency (at an individual or community level)...is poverty.  

But fuck me, Mr. Doom and Gloom, what sorts of solutions have you heard about or think might be worthwhile for the problems you see in your community, or the black community in general?  

One note on playing the numbers. The money was used to fund black businesses and when it was taken over, that capital dried up making it impossible for black businesses to compete yes, it was illegal, but it was all they had.

The italian and irish gangs had similar claims made by them, for them, and about them.... but the reality of organized crime is that it's not what "anyone" has except for the criminals themselves.  The rest of the people around them are victims.  Not Robbin Hood, just robbing you.  I wouldn't lament it's loss even if it was all -I- had......though I can understand the symbolic importance.  They took it all, even the fuckin crime...lol, brutal.

Well, that's true. By the time whites caught a cold, blacks would have pneumonia and befo whites got a headache blacks would have a stroke. But I'm not familiar with the decline of white communities. What are some examples of what you're talking about?