Were the anti-segregation movements useless?

While de facto segregation still exists in many places, it is not inherent in the legal structure as it was before 1965. It used to be illegal to sell a house to minorities, and that is still on the deeds of some properties. (It is hard to get even unenforceable illegal things taken off a deed.)

So the anti-segregation movement was quite beneficial, and beneficial for all. People that grow up with diversity succeed much more than people who grow up in insular societies.

Lets use your example. While it is is now officially legal to sell to minorities, this can and is easily circumvented by selling a minority a house in a minority neighborhood rather than a white neighborhood. It is very difficult to prove that owners of apartment buildings are refusing to sell to blacks based on skin color. Any deviation of such practice is counterbalanced with the consequence of white flight. In the end, while officially this is illegal, unofficially, it naturally corrects itself back to segregation.

How else do you explain how neighborhoods are entirely composed of a single demographic? I’m sure minorities get their house/apt, but in their own segregated neighborhood.

@JJark I think you’re looking for Stormfront.org, not Fluther.com

There is a difference between people choosing to segregate themselves, and having a law that says they have no choice.

@FutureMemory

I don’t like their web interface.

@Dutchess_III

In practice, the difference is useless since it is still segregation.

You asked a question, then presented your conclusion in the details with no room for argument.
As @zenvelo points out, the legal ramifications, if not entirely eliminated, were seriously diminished, and as @Dutchess_III mentions, demographics tend to clump together based on cultural and economic circumstances. Bigotry and exclusionary practices still run rampant, but without the legal sanction of the past.

Your research of demographics is only a small part of the ongoing human/social story.

I’m guessing you weren’t around to see how it was before these “achievements” were…well…achieved. No one expected then that social change would happen overnight, but it has happened. It’s far from finished, but it’s continuing.

Well, if you say there is no room for argument, then that means you’re validating my conclusion.

Legally, yes. Practically, useless.

I wasn’t debating the cause of my why segregation continues to occur. I’m debating the uselessness of pro-segregating movements.

I wasn’t around, but I don’t need to be around back then to see that it was useless. That this social change is an illusion. That is not to say that it is entirely as such, only that the segregation is still at large.

It is not useless. Plenty of people integrate with other classes and colors and they couldn’t before. In our neighborhood we have Vietnamese on the West, and a black/white couple across the street. Before the laws changed that wasn’t even possible. A black family couldn’t move to a higher class neighborhood even if they had the means or desire. They can now. That means the law is NOT useless. It has brought about a lot of positive changes, like inter racial relationships that wouldn’t have even been allowed before.

You seem to be arguing from the stand point that ALL people segregate themselves by culture or color. That’s not true, of course.

@Dutchess_III

True. It does have the usefulness to at least allow people to desegregate if they want to.

Also, anybody can go into any restaurant and sit where ever they want. Couldn’t do that before.
There are no bathrooms set aside for people based on their color.
They don’t have separate swimming pools for children based on their color.
The list of things that have changed, because of the law, goes on and on.

Yes, but that is not my argument. You’re looking at it from a perspective that it gives a choice for people. While that is true, I’m looking at it as since people still continue to segregate, the laws are useless.

In many ways, I have to say it was a wash. The problem was desegregation based on the color of skin and not the ethnicity of the children in question. This forced a lot of expense and angst in order to get children who’s minds and experience sets were incompatible to the curriculum, and little common ground in which to create any lesson plan. Unfortunately the outcome came at great cost.
White flight, dilution of the curriculum, violence, all kinds of unintended consequences. Culturally ethnic groups tend to find comfort in locating close to things and others they are familiar with. Thus Chinatown-like enclaves throughout urban centers. Ohio stopped trying to desegregate a long time ago because of the strains on the system were too great for too little return.
Now, on another front. Social desegregation, which I prefer to think of as assimilation, was a great thing that came from the social educational experiment that failed. White, black, brown, etc.. all found that absent the outer cladding we are all about the same. Someday we may have a homogenous culture. But then, what would be the joy in that?

@JJark: “Well, if you say there is no room for argument, then that means you’re validating my conclusion.” Reread my post. I did not say that.

You are very naive if you believe that laws prohibiting behaviors by certain groups and people choosing not to engage in those behaviors is the same thing.

Some people segregate them selves. It has nothing to do if the law. It has everything to do with personal freedom and choice, which is what the law was intended to grant.

@canidmajor

Tell me then the difference between segregation by force and segregation by choice. The conclusion is segregation. What would choice and force matter at this point? The goal failed from the perspective that racial segregation is still prominent today.

@Dutchess_III

I disagree. The laws were put in place to end racial segregation. To disaggregate. It loses its usefulness if segregation continues. It is like a war on drugs. There are laws to stop people from doing drugs, but drug use is not slowing down anytime soon which makes the laws useless. Youre better off legalizing it.

No because they made the country free. Anyone can go anywhere they like which wasn’t the case before.

Answer me this: Why did they want to end racial segregation?

You can’t tell the difference between force and choice?

Your premise that the laws were put in place to ban segregation is false. The laws were enacted to prevent exclusion based on race. There’s a difference.

Never mind. You are wedded to a rather limited perspective and want validation for it. Sorry, I can’t help you.

Let’s see if he can answer my question. (I am assuming he is a he, and he is white. Am I wrong?)

Whoa! I just caught this: “but drug use is not slowing down anytime soon which makes the laws useless. Youre better off legalizing it..” By that logic ALL laws should be thrown out the window. Rape, murder, burglary, all that should all become legal because there are some people still doing it.

As stated above, there are distinct and endless differences regarding consequences to the society between legalized segregation and lingering inequities from the days when it was upheld by law. There’s the matter of accommodation in public spaces, like subway cars and lunch counters. Then there is the truly onerous practice of restricting the opportunities for individuals when it comes to employment and education. It’s one thing to clandestinely restrict opportunities, and quite another to do so openly with government backing. And the differences in the distribution of peoples employed in the public sector alone are so striking since passage of the Civil Rights Act, that it’s rather silly to argue that it made no difference.

There is nothing inherently wrong about segregation. If folks want segregate, then that’s fine.

@Dutchess_III Answer me this: Why did they want to end racial segregation?

To end the injustice that minorities were experiencing.

Now even though blacks are allowed to enter white schools if they choose to, the fact is that if an entire neighborhood is white, the black guy is still not going to go to that white school. It doesn’t reach the point where a black guy moves into a white neighborhood. I repeat, I’m not saying in all cases. I’m saying segregation is still very much alive and well. Theoretically, it is outlawed, but in practice, the black guy is not going into the school of the white neighborhood.

@canidmajor

I can tell the difference. I cannot understand its relevance. You refuse to explain. Again, what is the difference between a law that prevents exclusion of race and the fact that an entirely white neighborhood only has white students going to the local school? The conclusion is still segregation. No black students are present. What, then, is the relevance of a law that prevents exclusion based on race?

@Dutchess_III

I specifically used drugs as an example due to its highly prominent rate of use despite the laws attempt to crack down on it. Murder rates are not even close to comparison which means the law actually works here.

You’re being obtuse @JJark. You’re acting like segregation of any form should be illegal. Like It should be illegal for black folks to congregate in a certain neighborhoods, or for white folks to do the same. Well, of course, that’s ridiculous.

As to your bland answer that desegregation was to ”To end the injustice that minorities were experiencing.” Well, that what that “useless” law did. It was a start, anyway.

Voluntary segregation is not bad, and it has nothing to do with the law that eliminated the legality of forced segregation.

BTW, no one is “circumventing the law,” as you stated in the details, because there is no law to circumnavigate. Segregation is not illegal.

No, that is what you keep on insinuating.

Voluntary segregation is a circumvention. It bypasses a law that would otherwise force a white employer to hire a black employee. Likewise, it bypasses the law that would force white school administrators to accept black students. Thus, through voluntary segregation, you’re in an environment where all employers/employees are of the same demographic. All students and all those who use public transportation are of the same demographic. This makes anti-racial segregation laws useless.

Just FYI “Insinuation: an indirect or covert suggestion or hint, especially of a derogatory nature: ”

I’m not “insinuating” anything. There is no segregation law that applies to where people live and congregate. If there was a law, it would be completely unconstitutional.
If their choice limits their employability, or the kind of school their kids go to, that’s their choice. It’s their choice to move, too. They can live where ever they want or where ever they can afford. That’s the key word here, CHOICE.

Your’e talking theoretics again. In practice, you get this link

Freedom of choice and these anti-segregation laws become irrelevant if at the end of the day, the black guy is still unemployed, poor, and going to a school with only blacks. The injustice is still there.

It’s up to him to change it if he doesn’t like it. They have the justice in their control now.

Theoretics.

If you have such a hard on for freedom of choice, what about the freedom of choice of the employer? If an employer doesn’t want black employees, why can’t he CHOOSE not to accept them?

Why can’t the white building owner CHOOSE to reject black tenants?

Because it’s wrong to discriminate against a certain group of people just because of their color. The needs of the many outweigh the personal preferences of the few.

It’s NOT theoretic, @JJark. They may choose to not try and do something, but if they do decide to move they have the government backing up that right.

@JJark:Why not then women, Jews, people with SAT verbal scores less than 460, people who invent words such as “theoretics,” men who wear double-breasted suts, and non-pet owners?

And I can’t get hard ons. I’m a female.

The employer is denied the “freedom” to refuse employment to anyone on racial grounds. It’s illegal. Your argument that since there is still segregation, the law making it illegal must be irrelevant is nonsense. The law is about FORCED segregation backed by statute. Just because no law has been enacted to force integration, doesn’t make the law forbidding legally sanctioned segregation irrelevant. People can be and are routinely prosecuted for forced segregation. Your position is equivalent to stating that since murder is against the law, and yet people are killed everyday, the law forbidding homicide is somehow irrelevant. It’s bullshit!

I’m waiting for a letter now from the government telling me I have to move out of my neighborhood so they can get more black people in, and I’ll be forced to sell my house.

It is not illegal to not want to live around black people. It is and SHOULD be illegal to post a sign reading “no blacks allowed” Both you and the black person should be entitled to live where you choose. If someone were to post a “no whites allowed” sign on the front door of a restaurant in Harlem, the culprit should be prosecuted.

Is it illegal to post a sign on your front door that says, “No Jehova’s Witnesses allowed?”

Since I was thinking about this topic today, I will skip what I think, and tell something that I know.

There is a subdivision in my Midwestern hometown of about 20,000 that had in the deed a codicil stating that the owners could not sell to blacks. 1950’s.

Although there might still be a “heritage” element there, I bet the neighborhood is integrated.

@ DutchessIII It isn’t illegal to post a sign on your front door that reads “no blacks, whites, chinese, native americans or rhinoceroses allowed” You could post the sign without fear of legal consequences. On the other hand, if your house is a business or venue open to the general public, you should and would be prosecuted.

@Dutchess_III The needs of the many outweigh the personal preferences of the few.

Then you’re against the U.S constitution. The constitution specifically protects the individual from mob rule. That a mob cannot take away an individuals rights just because it serves the mob in some way. This isn’t star trek.

You’re also a hypocrite. In your previous answer, you made if very clear, in bold letters, telling me the importance of freedom of choice, but apparently you only want minorities to have that freedom. A white employer or a building owner should not have that freedom? Mob rule = anti-constitution.

@gailcalled

This is a free country. I’m all for it. Freedom of choice. If you don’t want women in your store, you should be able to ban them for it. Just like everyone has the freedom to voluntarily segregate.

@stanleybmanly

What you said was already responded by me in a previous answer. Also, this isn’t a legal or illegal issue. This is about the uselessness of anti-racial discrimination laws.

But they aren’t any more useless than laws against embezzlement or shoplifting. The laws define what is permissible and what is not. The law removed the legal sanctioning of FORCED segregation. That’s a really BIG deal.

Not true. There are percentiles. Rates are not the same. The rate of drug use is not the same as murder rates. Can’t compare segregation with shoplifting.

Of course you can compare them. You can go to jail for either. They’re both crimes.

That is not the criteria to judge a laws usefulness. The criteria is the rate.

So what is it you’re suggesting? That the segregation laws had no value? So we should take them off the books so people should be able to discriminate without concern about prosecution?

The needs of the many outweigh the personal preferences of the few. Yes, the constitution specifically protects the individual from mob rule. Which is why those anti-segregation laws were put into place, so the needs of the few couldn’t be trampled by the mobs.

@JJark Here’s the difference. Before the law, if a black man walked into your restaurant, you could call the police and have him evicted. After the law, if a black man walks into your restaurant, and you tell him to leave, he can call the police to come get YOU

If your position is that the law doesn’t change people’s minds, you might have a point. But to state that it doesn’t change their behavior is just flat out wrong.

And people’s legal individual preferences should be protected. Illegal preferences should not.

If a creep has a preference for children, does the constitution protect his preference? No. Of course not.

So the needs of the many outweigh the preferences of the few. We have a need to protect our many children from the personal preferences of an individual creep.

So there goes your ” That a mob cannot take away an individuals rights just because it serves the mob in some way.” argument.

@Dutchess_III

How is rejecting someone for employment a violation of his freedom? It isn’t. Your mob argument doesn’t work here. You’re also forgetting another right, called property rights. An employer has property rights in addition to his freedom of choice. Now you want to violate property rights as well? I don’t think so.

@stanleybmanly

I’m saying a natural relocation is a form of circumvention of the law. Using your own example, instead of it coming to the point where if a black person walks in the restaurant and the owner cannot throw him out and would have to service him, instead the white restaurant owner closes shop or opens up shop in in white neighborhood, thus avoiding the situation of where the anti-racial discrimination laws would otherwise apply to him. That is not to say that he would not be required by law to service a black man who would come to his white neighborhood. It is just that the chances are much lower.

That is the behavior modification that you speak of. That is the natural response to such laws.

@Dutchess_III

You’re comparing apples and oranges. An employer that denies employment to a black man is not harming him in any physical way and is not denying him the right to find employment elsewhere, where as a pedophile is abusing a child, a clear violation on all accounts.

@JJark

You asked a question, then closed off any room for discussion. Were you really interested in discussion or just in getting validation of your own view?

We’re 52 responses in to this question. I hardly think I’m closing off the discussion. I welcome all answers. I am really interested in a discussion but I’m not just going to agree with anyone who offers an answer. I have no problem changing my views if I’m convinced with compelling answers.

You’re going around in circles. That does not constitute a discussion. One minute you’re arguing one side, the next the other.

“How is rejecting someone for employment a violation of his freedom?” If you reject someone for employment based only on his or her color, how is that NOT a violation of their freedom?

Just accusing me of going in circles without pointing out where, what, and how, sounds like you’re more interested in libel/defamation rather than continuing the discussion.

It is not a violation of his freedom because he has the freedom to choose employment elsewhere or open up his own business. He is also not being abused emotionally or physically. In fact, there is no mention of race at all. The employer simply rejects him. He does not have to justify his reasoning or state that he is not hiring him because he is black.

You’re also not looking at employers rights. He has the same freedom of choice as a black man and in addition to that he has property rights. Who are you to deny the employer freedom of choice and violate his property rights just because a black man needs a job? Freedom works when everyone has it equally, not when you selectively choose one group over another.

Don’t make arguments in favor of freedom of choice, if you selectively choose which group gets it and in which type of situation. That is not equality under the law.

Why are people feeding this troll?

/boggle.

That is because I’m not trolling. You’re apparently too sensitive to have an intellectual discussion about this topic.

@FutureMemory Because it’s sadly the closet thing to a sensible debate here.

@JJark That may be the natural response to such laws, but you’re missing the point. Your assertion that human nature has led to the same outcome as before the legal remedy is demonstrably false. As a result of the law, it doesn’t matter where our harrassed and beleaguered white man roams, or whatever secluded corner of the country he plans to open shop. Any black man who by mischance stumbles into his place can expect to be served rather than lynched.

In my earlier responses, I agreed to this, but the reason why I still say it is useless is because of the low rate in which this stumbling occurs. Blacks don’t normally walk in and out of white neighborhoods. Hence, why I keep repeating theoretics. Yes, the law would be useful if the black man stumbles in, but they don’t stumble in, thus the law is useless.

This law is more useful in a diversified neighborhood. That I agree, but there are a lot of neighborhoods that are not diversified, hence why I judge usefulness by the rate.

Segregation persists. Agreed! But you’re on thin ice positing the civil rights law as irrelevant in the aftermath. Segregated neighborhoods do doggedly hang on, but any casual drive through any Southern state will disabuse you instantly of the notion that nothing has changed. Come to think of it, you’d have to be old enough to have traveled through the South before 1964. Perhaps this is why you have this idea. Are you merely too young to know better?

Well, my idea comes from data crunching. I plugged in a bunch of random zipcodes, and looked at the demographics. The logical conclusion that anti-racial segregation laws are useless follows when an entire neighborhood is composed of a single ethnicity.

You have to break it down to zip codes. As I mentioned before, New York City is one of the most diverse cities in the country, but it is also one of the most segregated. If you plug in zip codes, you’ll see that italians are with the italians or otherwise known as “little italy”. The chinese with the chinese or otherwise known as “chinatown” and so on. If you plug in zipcodes in the southern states, you’ll see the same results. I just did a few random codes.

However, I did run into zipcodes that were much more diversified.

Again, so what are you suggesting? That we do away with the laws because they are “useless?”

I’m not suggesting anything actually. I’m arguing the uselessness of a specific law. That is all.

So what do you envision the US to be like without those ‘useless’ laws?

The idea that anti-segregation laws are useless because people tend to flock to people like them is asinine. Yes, many neighborhoods tend to be rather ethnically homogeneous. What of it? There are no separate lunch counters. No separate drinking fountains. No separate schools, and so on. A black person cannot be arrested for not giving their seat on the bus up to a white person. This has been explained to you, so why do you persist in your folly?

There is no need for separate lunch counter, drinking fountains and schools because the entire neighborhood is of one ethnicity. I have explained this countless times. Of what use is an anti-racial segregation law if it doesn’t apply in practice? White employers continue hiring only whites, not because they’re white, but because the entire neighborhood is white. White administrators continue filling schools with only whites. Drinking fountains are occupied by whites. It never reaches the point of a black man coming on to a bus. If and when it does, it is rare.

The law is only valid theoretically. In actuality, the racial segregation is intact.

You’re crazy. That’s all there is to it. And very dense.

Ok.

Yes.

So called groups self-segregate.

Who does one thing they are to attempt to interfere?

Yep, you keep saying the same thing and we keep explaining why it’s fallacious. Quite honestly you do seem rather obtuse by this point.

You’re doing a piss poor job at explaining the fallacious part. I think you and dutch are pretty thick yourselves, but I was being more of an optimist.