I grew up in a project in Philadelphia in the 40's and 50's, It was all white then, so were my schools. My high school basket ball team regularly lost to Overbrook HS, and routinely lost as their center was a dude name of Wilt (the Stilt) Chamberlain.
There was a couple of dudes, about 10 years my senior that got jumped and knived on Rising Sun Avenue, outside Exide Batteries, they were blacks from,. of all places, Nice Town. I did not understand the racial tension.
In 1955 the City of Philadelphia decided to integrate the project, so they carefully selected families, only about four or five. The Edwards moved in about four doors up (row houses) and my mother, divorced trying to raise three kids on a $1 an hour bank analyst salary, dated the brother of one, my sister dated the nephew.
I never thought nothing of it, until I was told by my principal, that if I showed up at school the next day (ny 17th birrhday) I would be arrested and sent toDaniel Boone, basically a school for delinquents in south Phillie, and what a reputation it had.
Short story I wound up in a small town in NW Louisiana living with my grandparents in a shot gun cabin, owned by my Southern Baptist preacher uncle (from him I learned what racism was) .
Being an unredeemed punk, I fell in with the local bad boys, wild ass cajuns, thanks to my street knowledge we commited all kind of mayhem in that sleepy litttle town. Tjhe Cjhief of Police was a second cousin, and I was a bane to his existence.
Mostly there were fights behind the stands at rival football games.
Then one Saturday night the Dupreee brothers, and Gene Coyne thought that it would be fun to go miggah knocking. Dirving through the black side of town, with a hose draped over the roof of the car,when they approached a black the hose swungdown.
That was it, Monday I enlisted. And in the service I found best friendships with blacks, Puerto Ricans, Hispanics and a Lebanese who slept in the lower bunk,in a quonset hut in my year at Iqaluit on Frobisher Bay Canadian NWT.
One interesting point, the town built a new High school for the blacks, years before they built one for the whites. And the whole town boosted and was proud of the Abraham Lincoln HS football team. It was perpetually all state, never mentioned the white HS football team, as it was an embarrassment.
Very interesting and honest John, not all Trump supporters are racist, although many of them are, but not all. The problem with racism is generalising, creating or inheriting stereotypes and then believing them. The 'Trump bumper stickers,' is as much an 'othering,' or generalisation of the an outgroup as any form of racism, it's the same instinct, the same urge for 'them and us.' People are just people.
Thank you for writing this.
I grew up in a project in Philadelphia in the 40's and 50's, It was all white then, so were my schools. My high school basket ball team regularly lost to Overbrook HS, and routinely lost as their center was a dude name of Wilt (the Stilt) Chamberlain.
There was a couple of dudes, about 10 years my senior that got jumped and knived on Rising Sun Avenue, outside Exide Batteries, they were blacks from,. of all places, Nice Town. I did not understand the racial tension.
In 1955 the City of Philadelphia decided to integrate the project, so they carefully selected families, only about four or five. The Edwards moved in about four doors up (row houses) and my mother, divorced trying to raise three kids on a $1 an hour bank analyst salary, dated the brother of one, my sister dated the nephew.
I never thought nothing of it, until I was told by my principal, that if I showed up at school the next day (ny 17th birrhday) I would be arrested and sent toDaniel Boone, basically a school for delinquents in south Phillie, and what a reputation it had.
Short story I wound up in a small town in NW Louisiana living with my grandparents in a shot gun cabin, owned by my Southern Baptist preacher uncle (from him I learned what racism was) .
Being an unredeemed punk, I fell in with the local bad boys, wild ass cajuns, thanks to my street knowledge we commited all kind of mayhem in that sleepy litttle town. Tjhe Cjhief of Police was a second cousin, and I was a bane to his existence.
Mostly there were fights behind the stands at rival football games.
Then one Saturday night the Dupreee brothers, and Gene Coyne thought that it would be fun to go miggah knocking. Dirving through the black side of town, with a hose draped over the roof of the car,when they approached a black the hose swungdown.
That was it, Monday I enlisted. And in the service I found best friendships with blacks, Puerto Ricans, Hispanics and a Lebanese who slept in the lower bunk,in a quonset hut in my year at Iqaluit on Frobisher Bay Canadian NWT.
One interesting point, the town built a new High school for the blacks, years before they built one for the whites. And the whole town boosted and was proud of the Abraham Lincoln HS football team. It was perpetually all state, never mentioned the white HS football team, as it was an embarrassment.
In the South football is indeed a religion.
Very interesting and honest John, not all Trump supporters are racist, although many of them are, but not all. The problem with racism is generalising, creating or inheriting stereotypes and then believing them. The 'Trump bumper stickers,' is as much an 'othering,' or generalisation of the an outgroup as any form of racism, it's the same instinct, the same urge for 'them and us.' People are just people.