Segregation Vs. Separation

So the Supreme Court is gong to decide a case about using race in assigning students to schools in order to achieve some kind of "desegregation". You know, It really gets my blood pressure up to listen to people talk about how and where to send black children in order to get them educated. I'm kind of tired of the ole 1954, "if your kid isn't next to a white kid then they will be damaged for life", type of reasoning that is going on. I simply say: show us the money. Let us be clear here, today in 2006 there are no legally segregated schools. Period. Let all the multi-culti, kumbyaa singin', hand holdin' folks say what they want. They are lying to each and every one of you and they need to be called out.

first off, this is supposed to be a free country. given that it is a free country one can live wherever ones cash can land you. Aside from the fact of red-lining most people want to live around people like them. You want proof of that you look at Queens NY and all the black folk who live there. Look at any "ethnic" neighborhood and you'll see the same thing. It is f&*^% insulting to focus in on black folk and claim that we are "segregated" when the same can be said of any number of communities. However; you never, ever hear about those communities being segregated. The reason for this is that everybody thinks it is their duty to study the "darkies" and manipulate their lives.

So let's get the difference between segregation and separation clear since it appears that even the Supreme Court Justices have a problem understanding the difference. Segregation, in the social sense of the term means a lawful policy of separating people and accommodations by race. This is enforced by institutions and law and affected black people regardless of income. In stark contrast to this is separation. Separation, in the social sense, is when a group voluntarily decides to live, work, whatever with others in that same group. In terms of race that may mean that black students may choose to attend a black college or University in order to avoid the issues and complications found at white colleges. In terms of religion it may be an Evangelical Christian going to a Christian school thereby separating themselves from the secular society in terms of education. All of these examples are not only legal but they are rights guaranteed under the constitution. It's called freedom of association which also means the freedom to NOT associate.

This brings us to the public school system. The public school system is set up so that people go to zoned schools which is convenient and in some way can foster community cohesion by having age sets grow up together. The problem with the public school system is that it is funded from property taxes which means that in a country where income stratification is high, there are vast differences in the money available to public schools in wealthy neighborhoods and those available to poor neighborhoods. This results in a two tier system where the poor often get substandard resources though they often face the hardest circumstances. Due to America's particular history a disproportionate number of African-Americans are poor and therefore find themselves in the bottom of the system.

The solution to this problem is change how public education is funded. It is clear to anyone that the property tax model is not working. Clearly there needs to be a pot that is either split equally across a given state or proportionally to the population of each school in a state. Once that is done you have a means to bring the now poor schools up to par. The other issue is that in poor neighborhoods there are other social issues that impact the schools whether it be cracked out parents, gangs, under-employed parents, housing issues, whatever. Money will have to be spent on programs that address those issues that impact the quality of schooling as well.

Once the structural inequities of the schools are addressed the whole "what race is where" question won't even be a question. If all the schools provide an equal quality education, then the whole "school choice" thing becomes moot. Of course we'll be left with the social experimentalists who insist on telling us where our children ought to go or not to go and further distract black people from working with each other. We know this is the case because any number of black students will tell you outright that going to a black college is "not the real world" despite the numerous black college grads working all over the place in the "real world". But it tells you what the real reason is for spreading black students so that they form minorities in otherwise white school districts:

You will always be in the minority and you will always have to deal with us. Conform or else.

Technorati Tags: Black Education, critique, Supreme Court, US Constitution