This is a MCK-hosted group; if you are not a Motor City Kossack, you are still welcome to jump in and join us!
This week's readings: Chapters 1 and 2 "Arsenal of Democracy" and "Detroit's Time Bomb"
This was an interesting, but unsettling, read for me this week, because I ran head-on into my privilege and have been grappling with that. Growing up, my family was far from an exemplar of progressivism, but there was no tolerance for espousing or promoting stereotypes. I have no doubt that we benefited from our whiteness, but I never got the sense that it was exploited. As a result, I grew up with little race consciousness (the very definition of privilege); there was a strong emphasis on "being polite" to anyone and everyone without regard to race, and "group" identification was just not discussed. I do recall vividly a family gathering where my uncle used a racial slur; my normally mild-mannered grandmother went ballistic. She reminded my uncle that as a family of German immigrants, they had been subjected to slurs related to their heritage after WWI and during WWII, and she would not tolerate that sort of talk about "people of any sort" in her house.
During the course of these two chapters, I found myself reacting with the sort of naivete and privilege that I was raised with; my overwhelming reaction was, "I had no idea it was that bad." Of course, I know that the North was not the paradise for persons of color that some would like to believe, but it was a true smack-in-the-face for me to see that laid out with statistics and anecdotes.
I'm going to be light on questions this week and heavy on links with supporting and supplemental information.
This week's observations/questions: Sugrue states in Chapter 1 (page 23 in my edition) that Detroit was "above all, a city of homes." How does that work for and/or against the prospects for revitalization today?
Sugrue provides a bare-boned description of the June 1943 riots in Detroit; more detail, with period photos, here: Hatred on the Home Front (I found Slide #17 particularly compelling, as it shows the grassroots activism that says "Detroit" to me.)
Sugrue describes the bleak living conditions in places like Black Bottom and Paradise Valley, as well as the destruction of these neighborhoods with the construction of highways and attempts at "urban redevelopment." Likely because it is not central to his thesis, he does not generally describe Paradise Valley in positive terms. These articles provides a different and slightly fuller perspective:
Paradise Valley
When Detroit paved over paradise
Sugrue says, "Above all, the success of racial covenants depended on neighborhood cohesiveness." (page 45 of my edition) Any thoughts on how we avoid making the mistakes of the past?
A blog entry that includes details about the role of Detroiters in the Supreme Court ruling re: racial covenants: Homeowners' Associations Invented to Discriminate
Sugrue makes clear that many decisions about "urban redevelopment" were made by the industrial and economic elite with little input from the actual stakeholders...the residents, for example, of Black Bottom or Paradise Valley. In light of Detroit's recent history with an emergency manager and bankruptcy, what groups are working to ensure this mistake is not made again? (A supplemental read, expressing similar concerns here: Detroit's New Task Force Report Is "Blight" On Cue)
Next week: Chapter 3, "The Coffin of Peace" and a recap discussion of all of Part One: Arsenal. Subject to change if comments indicate a longer read is preferable.