Talking Points VI: Lawrence

This article dealt with the strides of Brown vs. Board along with a number of cases that are related to segregation and discrimination. The article focused on a number of very different aspects of different cases as well as the formation of segregation and the ideas of it correlates with the idea that minority groups cannot get to a higher class level because of segregation being imposed on them. One specific quote from the piece that I am extremely fond of is this…


"The refusal of white Americans to accept responsibility for the relative educational, economic, social, and political disadvantage of blacks is legally and intellectually justified by ignoring the continuing vitality of the Institution of Segregation and their own role in its maintenance. White Americans deny responsibility for the position of blacks by denying that they have created a system of oppression that will continue to exist and operate to their benefit until they have destroyed it."


The power of segregation cannot be eradicated until everyone works towards destroying it. No matter the amount of money that spent in diverse schools of diversity programs will not cause the institution of segregation to collapse, it still is prevalent in modern times. It’s important to remember that the ruling that schools were “separate but not equal” was found only 50 or so years ago, it’s still a relatively new idea. These programs designed to integrate society on an equal level (class, race, and even gender) there needs to be a teaching of codes of power and ideas of how to succeed in today’s white majority upper class world. The amounts are good paying political jobs are held by high class whites, because they dominate the field and there isn’t an exact integration other groups of people and genders cannot plant a foot into these work environments. Many GED programs are directed towards minorities, but this country seems to point out that “we need ditch diggers” and it just happens the country directs it towards lower class minorities. There isn’t anything wrong with people working lower wage manual labor jobs, the country does depend on it and there’s no way to dispute it, however it isn’t right to direct it to a specific group of people.


I have also included some links that might be of interest to some people. The first two are bits from a video documentary entitled “a Class Divided” which deals with the powers of segregation, inequality, and racism. For those who are interested in racial role reversals and the unbelievable power of segregation these two videos are very interesting and I hope some of you will watch them.


Click Here to View: A Class Divided - Part I


Click Here to View: A Class Divided – Part II


A second piece I have included is a brief description of the findings from the doctors who preformed an experiment for Brown vs. Board involving groups of young children of different races and dolls of different races. The finds were unbelievable and helped fuel a verdict that was found “separate but not equal” in the courts.


Click Here to View: Doll Experiment


As a follow up to that article here is an excerpt from Wikipedia.com that shows that those findings in the Doll experiment are still prevalent in today’s society, showing that there still are issues of inequalities that need to be addressed…


Excerpt from Wikipedia.com...


“In 2006 filmmaker Kiri Davis recreated the doll study and documented it in a film entitled A Girl like Me. Despite the many changes in some parts of society, she found the same results as did the Drs. Clark in their study of the late 1930s and early 1940s.”