The laws and Acts of the Civil Rights Movement promised a more racially diverse society whereby Blacks could live peaceably alongside whites, learn, work and eat alongside whites. Revaluating this promise today means that we should look at society and determine whether the "dream" was fulfilled, and if not, if the dream will ever become a reality.

Granted, Blacks have come a long way since Jim Crow and blatant ghettoization; we can live, learn, work and eat pretty much where we want to since these type discriminations are against the law. However, these opportunities have not and will seemly never fulfill the "dream" of harmonious integration. Simply because we can do these things does not mean racial segregation has been defeated.

By nature, people with like characteristics will assemble together. It is not a crime to want to live among your own people. Whites have every individual right to want to live among their own, and so do Blacks. But when that choice leads to violence and hatred against another group it then becomes unnatural as well as inhumane.

Given this absolute right to choose where and among whom you want to live, why do Blacks feel their lives would be any better simply because they live around whites? The answer is that during the Jim Crow era, because Blacks were treated like infectious disease and distanced from whites, many Blacks felt the need to stand up for their rights as a people, and this also, is only natural. But measuring oneself according to the ability to stand beside another can be unwise in the end.

For instance, housing. There is a difference between buying a house and buying a house to live near someone. The ability to buy a house strengthens a person's social standing as a productive citizen but buying a house to live near someone or even to get away from someone exhibits an error in priority. When the Civil Rights laws were formed, it was to give a people a right to be people, not the right to be like other people. Why has Black America decided to measure themselves and their freedom against what whites have?

The more Blacks fill suburban neighborhoods the more whites move away. Since the Civil Rights era, not much has changed at all; whites simply do not desire to live among Blacks. Granted, again, integration is nowhere near as bad as it once was, but how much better has it really gotten? According to studies, when there are too many Blacks in one area, whites move to begin another area for themselves. And this is applied in housing, work, and dining. When will we wake up?

"More neighborhoods in metropolitan America are shared by blacks and whites today than a decade ago, and many racially integrated neighborhoods appear reasonably stable. The assumption that once a neighborhood becomes racially mixed it will inevitably "tip," becoming more and more predominantly black, is not supported by the evidence.

Nonetheless, many neighborhoods remain either exclusively white or exclusively black, and neighborhoods where blacks are in the majority are more likely to gain black population than to become more racially integrated. These findings indicate that, despite considerable progress, achieving and sustaining widespread stable racial integration remains an unmet challenge."

Source from: http://www.urban.org

If asked, most suburban Blacks would deny that they live in the suburbs to be around whites, as well as deny that they moved from the Black neighborhood to get away from Blacks. Most would reason that they moved to the suburbs because the job opportunities and schools are better. And they would be justified in their reasoning; however, by noticing the pattern in unemployment, housing segregation, and group assimilation, can we really say that the purpose of the Civil Rights promise was truly fulfilled?

Allow nature to take its course by refraining from the added anxiety of succeeding for the purpose of integration and "getting what the white man has," and concentrate on building the foundation of the Black communities that are. Many problems can be eliminated if more energy was put into the Black community other than striving to equate oneself with the white.

© 2004 by CR Hamilton