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The word that sums up this article is duality. As we simplify, we regularly misremember and therefore misunderstand. Although many of you have not grown up in the northeast, I did, a product of Boston, Massachusetts and Washington D.C. The truth is much messier than the myth, and if we are to overcome the unfinished revolution from the era of Reconstruction in the 1860s and the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, then I think we need a movement. An organized, led, massive movement needs to form to bring this country forward. How do you think progress will be achieved? Gradually forward with intermittent setbacks? Or massive, organized protests?
I have only been to the Northeast once, but I have been to the South many times. In New Orleans, the majority of the population is black but there are a fair amount of whites and Hispanics mixed in as well. There are no distinct "Black" or "White" areas: everything is mixed. In D.C and even here in San Francisco there are distinct Black only and White only neighborhoods. I think it's ironic that Louisiana, a former slave and confederate state, is more racially tolerant and mixed than the "Democratic" or "Liberal" capitals of the US. I definitely think there need to be some reforms, and the Ferguson riots are doing a good job to keep pressure on the government to consider some.
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