Sorry My Brother, Can't Let You In

Yesterday, our American Studies class went to see Clybourne Park, a play which demonstrates how communities change over time because of race and wealth movements.

In the first act, a white family in a white community is selling their house to African-Americans, which some of the neighbors have a problem with because they think it will screw up the culture of the town.  Fifty years later, the community is dominantly African-American as people feared because a process called "white flight" took place after that one house was sold.  This is when white people flee a neighborhood because of the increase in minorities that live there.  In the second act, however, there is a white couple looking to buy the house, which would begin the gentrification of this town, which is when there is a movement of wealth into a poor neighborhood.

On the radio, I heard "This City" by Patrick Stump (ft. Lupe Fiasco).  Lupe's verse in this song reminded me exactly of the play.  Both artists of this song are from the Chicago area, so I assume this is about Chicago, but even if it's just about any city in general, it applies very well to what has happened with Chicago communities and relates directly to Clybourne Park.

cropped with SnipSnip

Lupe says, "Parts of my city, certain colors can't step", which shows that Chicago right now is like neapolitan ice cream, a term that was frequently brought up in Clybourne, because it is a bunch of culturally different communities living so close to each other but never interacting due to racial barriers.

Much like the people Clybourne Park in the first act didn't want African-American people to live in their neighborhood and ruin their culture, Lupe makes the same point that people are being kept out of neighborhoods "because the property value might go down to something that's economically unacceptable", and nothing is more important to Americans than property value.  It's sad but true; things like property value have become so crucial to every American, and that is why some communities don't have the same privileges as others.

Interestingly and not coincidentally, Illinois is one of the few states that distributes tax money to schools based on the income of the people in the district.  This has led to many issues, and high schools in wealthy districts, like New Trier, benefit greatly from a higher income and can provide better services to their students, even though the Winnetka campus could still use a little bit of work.

Should money be distributed equally between school districts?

Personally, I think that all public schools should get the same funding per student.  Otherwise, it justifies people's fears of poor minorities ruining the value of their community because they actually are (in a very slight way but that is enough to cause widespread panic in people).

Equal distribution might not completely fix the racial boundaries that exist in the Chicago area, but it might help to form more of a homogenous blend of races rather than have neighborhoods set aside for one particular type of people as depicted in Clyborne and by Lupe Fiasco.