The race issue in the US always seems to draw out widely differing viewpoints. Part of the problem is the limited social interaction between races (and social classes as well). Therefore many people have little personal experience on which to base their opinions.

On TV there are now a large number of all black comedies and family dramas where everyone is well spoken, attractive and fairly well off economically. If white audiences watch these at all they are likely to take this as typical.

The situation in New Orleans was the first time in a generation where many people from other economic and regional classes got an actual look at conditions in a black ghetto. Many commentators are trying to treat this as a unique case and thus the situation in other parts of the country is still ignored. Cities like Detroit have been in economic decline for several decades and only those of limited economic potential tend to remain.

There are also objective measures that are ignored or minimized. Tests of employment and housing opportunities show that when similar people present themselves, the blacks are turned away more frequently than the whites. In a stark example a poll of employers found that a white ex-felon would be hired in preference to a black person with a higher level of educational accomplishment.

The other area that is ignored is the difficulty with blacks in obtaining capital. Banks are much more reluctant to lend money to small businesses when they are run by minorities. Once again, in New Orleans, there are statistics showing that blacks are having a much harder time getting loans to rebuild their homes then are whites.

Some of this may even be unconscious racism, but the effects are the same. I'm just guessing, but I would suspect that the issues with Muslim immigrants in France and Germany would reveal similar patterns of economic discrimination.


Policies not Politics
---- Daily Landscape