Requiem for Detroit. Right now on BBC2.

[lafayette]

Whitehouse, that's kind of in the general ballpark, albiet missing some key points, about the cause of the riots. But this thread was about the documentary's subject, which is the demise of Detroit. The documentary isn't about what caused the riots.

My point is Detroit's demise wasn't triggered by two, key traumatic events [[riots and union troubles), as devastating as the riots and corporations leaving the city for nonunion pastures in the suburbs were. To focus primarily on those two events when looking at the city's demise is woefully oversimplistic and sensational. The city's demise was caused over a looooooooong period of time because of a handful of dramatic events and a ton of not-so-dramatic, everyday events.

Again, for a complete explanation, Thomas Sugrue literally and figuratively wrote the book [[not the only book) on the demise. Please read it.