Another Detroiter makes the cycle

[canuck]

I detect in a lot of the above posts the definition of ghettoized, disenfranchised people, and it is that these people are ignored. When I was young, I had a difficult time understanding the meaning of "The Invisible Man" by James Baldwin; a very controversial title: now I am a bit more attuned to his expression of life for a negro in the forties and fifties.

There is a continual dismissal of poor black americans in all cities, and this brings about the kind of ignorance of wider society, fear and lack of potential in dealing with given codes of behavior. This kind of thing has a long standing, Black america has always been caricatured in baffling ways, and with time it has also managed to caricature itself in very negative regressive ways.

[iheartthed]

I detect in a lot of the above posts the definition of ghettoized, disenfranchised people, and it is that these people are ignored. When I was young, I had a difficult time understanding the meaning of "The Invisible Man" by James Baldwin; a very controversial title: now I am a bit more attuned to his expression of life for a negro in the forties and fifties.

There is a continual dismissal of poor black americans in all cities, and this brings about the kind of ignorance of wider society, fear and lack of potential in dealing with given codes of behavior. This kind of thing has a long standing, Black america has always been caricatured in baffling ways, and with time it has also managed to caricature itself in very negative regressive ways.

You mean Ralph Ellison... But great book and you are spot on in tying it into this discussion. I'm almost finished with another book titled Some of My Best Friends are Black by Tanner Colby, that also takes a hard look at the "Invisible Man syndrome" but it's not fiction like Invisible Man and it's written from a white person's perspective. It's a pretty extensive examination of how government policies and institutionalized racism has created such a racially segregated society in this country. That indirectly explains a lot of how Detroit ended up as it is today... I say indirectly because it's not specifically about Detroit, but a lot of the issues in it are things that have afflicted the city.

[canuck]

You mean Ralph Ellison... But great book and you are spot on in tying it into this discussion. I'm almost finished with another book titled Some of My Best Friends are Black by Tanner Colby, that also takes a hard look at the "Invisible Man syndrome" but it's not fiction like Invisible Man and it's written from a white person's perspective. It's a pretty extensive examination of how government policies and institutionalized racism has created such a racially segregated society in this country. That indirectly explains a lot of how Detroit ended up as it is today... I say indirectly because it's not specifically about Detroit, but a lot of the issues in it are things that have afflicted the city.

Yes, sorry about the mistake. I think that Detroit paid a heavy price; all of it for segregation of all kinds, including industrial imperatives steamrolling residential neighborhoods like that at Poletown or for highways and such. But the sadness is that the tail end of that story looks more like an insolvable puzzle. But it somehow has to be solved, the economic and social disparities, the iniquity, the criminal behavior, and the overall self-damnation of a ghettoized community.