Is Chicago’s legacy of segregation causing a reverse Great Migration?

[goat314]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

I think this is where my being “brown” helps. I just don’t experience this kind of stuff anywhere I go.

If I go to a white area I fit in, if I go to a Latino area I definitely don’t stand out, if I go to a black area I might stand out a tad but not as much as a white person, and if I go to an Asian/Indian area I also fit in, of course.

So in other words, I have no idea what you’re talking about...

Well you're not black. Must be nice?

[eschaton]

I'm not even sure if this is really about racial dynamics per se. I mean there are basically two major domestic migration trends in the U.S.

1. Young, single educated professionals move to major metropolitan areas and locate within stable or rapidly improving urban neighborhoods.

2. Everyone else tends to move to places with available jobs, cheaper housing, lower taxes, better weather, and lower crime.

Now, the individual destinations do tend to vary a bit. For example, a young white professional is more apt to pick Portland, while a young black professional might pick Atlanta. And a white retiree might choose South Carolina while a black retiree picks North Carolina. But I don't think that the things drawing someone to a given place - or away from where they grew up - are fundamentally all that different.

[liat91]

Cost, crime, tolerance, jobs and herd mentality.

[Kenmore]

Originally Posted by the suburban politician

I think this is where my being “brown” helps. I just don’t experience this kind of stuff anywhere I go.

If I go to a white area I fit in, if I go to a Latino area I definitely don’t stand out, if I go to a black area I might stand out a tad but not as much as a white person, and if I go to an Asian/Indian area I also fit in, of course.

So in other words, I have no idea what you’re talking about...

the racism is chicago is extremely palpable, if you don't notice it on a near daily basis, you're just not paying attention...or live in the suburbs

[woodrow]

Originally Posted by maru2501

In my experience in what I will call the new Chicago (say the last 10 years) is two things are going on.. (and I have lived here since 1977)

The new Chicago is not as racist as the old one. It is economically biased, more like new york. If you have money, no one cares what you look like and you can live wherever you want and eat wherever you want and city hall will answer your phone calls.

Disadvantaged neighborhoods are their own world, and they are emptying probably for good reason. YES, in part they became disadvantaged because of the racist reality of old Chicago

New Chicago is liberal and moneyed and doesn't know what to do about it except think about voting for a more progressive mayor. This place is filling with multi-racial rich millennials who are too busy texting each other about what bar to go to. They are accidentally displacing minorities in some areas but in some cases people of the same race are displacing each other. Weird town

^^One of the best comments of the day, with a caveat - I cannot lay the "too busy texting" on Millennials alone.

I do think racism is a still bigger deal than you say, but income disparity is becoming a bigger factor in large swaths of the city, or cities, since Chicago is really 2 cities - Rich / growing / multiracial and Poor / shrinking / largely minority, esp. black.

[woodrow]

I think some of the power structures in certain city departments are still Old Chicago, and that is a real problem.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by goat314

I generally like Chicago and have been there many times, but there is a palpable racial tension in the city.

Would you say that applies a bit to St. Louis as well? Or not? Just curious.

I got lost in STL a couple years ago (on an evening, in a really heavy thunderstorm), ended up stopping for directions and food and a break from the driving at a McDonald's where absolutely everyone was black (all employees and all customers). Upon noticing that I briefly wondered if I should feel out of place, immediately decided I shouldn't, and I frankly did not pick the slightest signal from anyone to indicate they found it weird that I was there. Ended up spending a good bit of the evening there.

I'm looking at a map right now to try to figure out where that was - maybe the McD's on Hampton south of the St. Louis Zoo?

[goat314]

Originally Posted by lio45

Would you say that applies a bit to St. Louis as well? Or not? Just curious.

I got lost in STL a couple years ago (on an evening, in a really heavy thunderstorm), ended up stopping for directions and food and a break from the driving at a McDonald's where absolutely everyone was black (all employees and all customers). Upon noticing that I briefly wondered if I should feel out of place, immediately decided I shouldn't, and I frankly did not pick the slightest signal from anyone to indicate they found it weird that I was there. Ended up spending a good bit of the evening there.

I'm looking at a map right now to try to figure out where that was - maybe the McD's on Hampton south of the St. Louis Zoo?

I would say it definitely applies to St. Louis. Biggest difference is really scale. Chicago is so large that the racial segregation is way more stark. For example, somebody from North St. Louis (mostly black) is much more likely to bump into a person from South St. Louis (mostly white), because the urban scale just isn't there. The large Latino population in Chicago also creates an interesting dynamic in terms of race relations. In Chicago, you have ethnic tensions between Latinos and Blacks because of the competition for jobs, political office, housing etc. In St. Louis, it's really a black and white city, the small Latino population really doesn't hold any clout.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by lio45

Would you say that applies a bit to St. Louis as well? Or not? Just curious.

I got lost in STL a couple years ago (on an evening, in a really heavy thunderstorm), ended up stopping for directions and food and a break from the driving at a McDonald's where absolutely everyone was black (all employees and all customers). Upon noticing that I briefly wondered if I should feel out of place, immediately decided I shouldn't, and I frankly did not pick the slightest signal from anyone to indicate they found it weird that I was there. Ended up spending a good bit of the evening there.

I'm looking at a map right now to try to figure out where that was - maybe the McD's on Hampton south of the St. Louis Zoo?

i think it very much applies to st. louis. interestingly, thats my old neighborhood (the actual pre-war human scaled commercial district is on the interior of the neighborhood to the west, not hampton which is a mess), where white palace (1990) (ha) was partially filmed, and that neighborhood is well, is 90% white. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Palace_(film)

st. louis has extreme economic segregation, and you will find restaurants in far west suburban (or west urban) st. louis county staffed by people that ostensibly had to take extremely long bus rides to get to because the locals (high school/college aged children) find the service industry beneath them.

as a really white dude who has lived all over metro st. louis, including north county, all over south city, a farm in lincoln county, st. charles county, maplewood, central west end, university city, etc in my opinion metro st. louis is like a scaled down, warmed up, slowed down chicagoland with regards to racial tension and regional structures/patterns. you have old democratic power structures, and you find the same sub-regional analogs (northwest indiana/granite city...schaumburg/chesterfield...beverly/dogtown...outrageously corrupt cops) over and over. i mean, st. louis IS sort of chicagos prototype in a way.

[Centropolis]

long story short - racial tension is very real and can get pretty rough in the metropolitan midwest. it's very much a pan-midwest issue and isn't relegated to just chicago (or st. louis). i also think the culture clash between white and black tends to increase the further north you go in the midwest, to the point that by the time you get to (say) milwaukee the space in between starts to feel really noticeable, whereas it's a bit more blended in st. louis. sadly that doesn't decrease tension or racism.

[IrishIllini]

Originally Posted by Kenmore

the racism is chicago is extremely palpable, if you don't notice it on a near daily basis, you're just not paying attention...or live in the suburbs

Can you elaborate?

[skysoar]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

long story short - racial tension is very real and can get pretty rough in the metropolitan midwest. it's very much a pan-midwest issue and isn't relegated to just chicago (or st. louis). i also think the culture clash between white and black tends to increase the further north you go in the midwest, to the point that by the time you get to (say) milwaukee the space in between starts to feel really noticeable, whereas it's a bit more blended in st. louis. sadly that doesn't decrease tension or racism.

No, racial tension is problematic throughout the U.S., anyone denying that is being delusional. If you are in Miami, or Seattle, or Boston, or San Diego its all the same. The reason why it seems moreso in Chicago, is because Chicago is a more high profiled city, anything that happens here is magnified over and over again. For instance look how President Trump has beat down Chicago during his tenure over crime, now that crime is down, its like crickets. Meanwhile crime is high in cities like Baltimore, Memphis, St.Louis, and nationally not a word is spoken.Likewise racial tension is not regional but is nationwide, we just have to hope that each generation plays a part to make this nation more tolerant than the generation before.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by edale

I don't really mean neighborhoods, but moreso people talk about ethnicity a lot. My sister lived in Chicago for 11 years, and when I'd visit I'd always hear people saying stuff like "This fucking Pollock cut me off" or "that's a total guido bar"....stuff like that.

you can certainly still find those attitudes (mostly deep NW and SW side bungalow belt), but as maru pointed out, that is textbook "old chicago" and it is going the way of the dodo. so much of that world has already died-off and/or moved to schaumburg/phoenix.

i'm a white male in my early 40s and have lived inside city limits for over 2 decades now (little italy, lakeview, rogers park, river north, west loop, edgewater, and lincoln square), and none of my peers in my social circles think along those lines, except perhaps in a joking, sarcastic way when teasing each other.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by skysoar

No, racial tension is problematic throughout the U.S., anyone denying that is being delusional. If you are in Miami, or Seattle, or Boston, or San Diego its all the same. The reason why it seems moreso in Chicago, is because Chicago is a more high profiled city, anything that happens here is magnified over and over again. For instance look how President Trump has beat down Chicago during his tenure over crime, now that crime is down, its like crickets. Meanwhile crime is high in cities like Baltimore, Memphis, St.Louis, and nationally not a word is spoken.Likewise racial tension is not regional but is nationwide, we just have to hope that each generation plays a part to make this nation more tolerant than the generation before.

k...didn't say it wasn't but i'm speaking as a midwesterner, of the places i know best. it's also not true about high crime in the aforementioned cities not being nationally spoken of, although that would be drowned out coming from a chicago point of view since you are correct that trump and nationalist leaning media loves to berate chicago.

[maru2501]

Originally Posted by woodrow

I think some of the power structures in certain city departments are still Old Chicago, and that is a real problem.

thanks for the comment

and I would agree with this (cough, cough CPD)

[Baronvonellis]

I think also that Chicago is a really competitive city, that different groups see any slight advantage that you have as a slight against them. There are so many Type-A people in Chicago, in other cities people are more laid back and maybe they give people the benefit of the doubt more. People in Chicago seem really snappy and quick to judge, and they want to get every advantage they can over you.
Then they have all these community organizers here that want to get people riled up over everything. In the south there might be issues, but people are more chill and don't get worked up about every little thing.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by skysoar

No, racial tension is problematic throughout the U.S., anyone denying that is being delusional. If you are in Miami, or Seattle, or Boston, or San Diego its all the same. The reason why it seems moreso in Chicago, is because Chicago is a more high profiled city, anything that happens here is magnified over and over again. For instance look how President Trump has beat down Chicago during his tenure over crime, now that crime is down, its like crickets. Meanwhile crime is high in cities like Baltimore, Memphis, St.Louis, and nationally not a word is spoken.Likewise racial tension is not regional but is nationwide, we just have to hope that each generation plays a part to make this nation more tolerant than the generation before.

We could go further and just say the obvious, people around the WORLD are racists to some degree.

Racism is everywhere.

[hammersklavier]

Pete Saunders -- the author of this article -- has run a blog called The Corner Side Yard for many years, and it's very much worth a read, whether or not you agree with his viewpoints.

Something that I have yet to see pointed out is that there were historically not one but two types of segregation in the US: Jim Crow-style segregation might be more (in)famous, but spatial segregation -- usually realized in the form of ethnic neighborhoods -- was quite common throughout Northern conurbations.

White flight worsened spatial segregation. There is a reason Southern cities tend to be more spatially integrated today: the civil rights movement succeeded in undoing de jure Jim Crow-style segregation, which had a more pronounced impact on the south, where physical proximity was a relatively unimportant part of the segregation regime, but modern urban planning, and especially the zoning paradigm upheld in Euclid v. Ambler, worsened spatial segregation.

In many of the more extreme cases, like St. Louis, Chicago, or Philadelphia, whole quarters of the city became demesnes of specific ethnicities -- black, white, Latino -- while the paradigm segued into more class-based segregation in the suburbs. This process, little-remarked-upon, has continued unabated.

Meanwhile, as black families have achieved the middle class, they've moved out of the city, following in their cousins' footsteps from a half century prior.

Though this raises the question of why there's a "reverse Great Migration" ... why Chicago's black population is leaving the region entirely? Migration on that scale has to be driven by push and pull factors -- lack of opportunity in Chicago (push); opportunity elsewhere (pull).

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by hammersklavier

Pete Saunders -- the author of this article -- has run a blog called The Corner Side Yard for many years, and it's very much worth a read, whether or not you agree with his viewpoints.

thanks for the head's up!

really great blog.

these posts are very pertinent to the discussion at hand:

http://cornersideyard.blogspot.com/2...ropolitan.html

http://cornersideyard.blogspot.com/2...m-chicago.html

http://cornersideyard.blogspot.com/2...nequality.html

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by hammersklavier

Pete Saunders -- the author of this article -- has run a blog called The Corner Side Yard for many years, and it's very much worth a read, whether or not you agree with his viewpoints.

Something that I have yet to see pointed out is that there were historically not one but two types of segregation in the US: Jim Crow-style segregation might be more (in)famous, but spatial segregation -- usually realized in the form of ethnic neighborhoods -- was quite common throughout Northern conurbations.

White flight worsened spatial segregation. There is a reason Southern cities tend to be more spatially integrated today: the civil rights movement succeeded in undoing de jure Jim Crow-style segregation, which had a more pronounced impact on the south, where physical proximity was a relatively unimportant part of the segregation regime, but modern urban planning, and especially the zoning paradigm upheld in Euclid v. Ambler, worsened spatial segregation.

In many of the more extreme cases, like St. Louis, Chicago, or Philadelphia, whole quarters of the city became demesnes of specific ethnicities -- black, white, Latino -- while the paradigm segued into more class-based segregation in the suburbs. This process, little-remarked-upon, has continued unabated.

Meanwhile, as black families have achieved the middle class, they've moved out of the city, following in their cousins' footsteps from a half century prior.

Though this raises the question of why there's a "reverse Great Migration" ... why Chicago's black population is leaving the region entirely? Migration on that scale has to be driven by push and pull factors -- lack of opportunity in Chicago (push); opportunity elsewhere (pull).

The Book Sundown Towns went into this too.

Basically traditional southern racism was somewhat conflicted, because even though it was harshly repressive towards black people, there were all sorts of service positions which were considered "black work." This meant that in the pre-automotive era you needed to have a population of black people within walking distance to engage in those occupations. Thus you had a patchwork fabric of black and white which lasted for quite some time.

In contrast, northern racism was unconflicted, because black people were not seen as a servile class, but as a rival labor force who could take jobs away from white people - often working for less money. Thus after the initial, more open-minded era around Reconstruction, northern racial attitudes began hardening, and black people in the north fled from the integrated communities they settled in to black enclaves within larger cities for self-defense.