Why is everyone in this bar white?
August 21, 2019 4:50 AM Subscribe
Despite living in a diverse city, I often find myself in spaces where the vast majority of people are white, without looking for that. Why is this?
For background, I am a south Asian male in my late twenties. I grew up in the Midwest in a suburb that was mostly white and thus had mostly white friends. But for the past 5 or so years, I've lived in New York City, and my social circle is diverse enough that I am very rarely the only non-white person in the group of friends I am with, and for the most part, the other non-white people are not south Asian either. Exceptions mostly include when it is just me and one other friend who is white, or the group includes people who are white but moved to the US from a different country after becoming an adult. And obviously I am never in a group where everyone is white, as I am not white myself.
However, when we are out, it is often the case that we are the only group as diverse as we are. Most groups are all white, and the ones that are not often just include one person who is not white. To be honest, a lot of times I feel like we stick out.
This happens whether I'm with friends from grad school, friends from college, my roommates (who I met off craiglist) and their friends, friends I've made from activities, friends of friends, and friends I've made from the internet whose race I don't know until I meet them. This happens whether we go to bars we find on yelp, cool looking restaurants in our neighborhoods, places we choose because they're central to everyone, bars we choose because they have trivia, clubs that give you a speech about how racism, homophobia, transphobia will not be tolerated before you can enter, and even if we are just walking around looking for the closest place where we can sit. This is despite the fact that New York City is majority-minority. Exceptions mostly include events/spaces that cater towards a specific ethnic group, think Afropunk or a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown.
I've been wondering for a while how it is possible for so many people to be out in all white-groups no matter where we go, and I still really have no idea. Every once in a while it occurs to me that possibly New Yorkers aren't as liberal as I assumed. But I've also noticed this at protests against ICE, or at a debate watch party at a local bar where everyone was vocally in support of Cynthia Nixon.
For background, I am a south Asian male in my late twenties. I grew up in the Midwest in a suburb that was mostly white and thus had mostly white friends. But for the past 5 or so years, I've lived in New York City, and my social circle is diverse enough that I am very rarely the only non-white person in the group of friends I am with, and for the most part, the other non-white people are not south Asian either. Exceptions mostly include when it is just me and one other friend who is white, or the group includes people who are white but moved to the US from a different country after becoming an adult. And obviously I am never in a group where everyone is white, as I am not white myself.
However, when we are out, it is often the case that we are the only group as diverse as we are. Most groups are all white, and the ones that are not often just include one person who is not white. To be honest, a lot of times I feel like we stick out.
This happens whether I'm with friends from grad school, friends from college, my roommates (who I met off craiglist) and their friends, friends I've made from activities, friends of friends, and friends I've made from the internet whose race I don't know until I meet them. This happens whether we go to bars we find on yelp, cool looking restaurants in our neighborhoods, places we choose because they're central to everyone, bars we choose because they have trivia, clubs that give you a speech about how racism, homophobia, transphobia will not be tolerated before you can enter, and even if we are just walking around looking for the closest place where we can sit. This is despite the fact that New York City is majority-minority. Exceptions mostly include events/spaces that cater towards a specific ethnic group, think Afropunk or a Chinese restaurant in Chinatown.
I've been wondering for a while how it is possible for so many people to be out in all white-groups no matter where we go, and I still really have no idea. Every once in a while it occurs to me that possibly New Yorkers aren't as liberal as I assumed. But I've also noticed this at protests against ICE, or at a debate watch party at a local bar where everyone was vocally in support of Cynthia Nixon.
It's really hard to opine on your question without having a better idea of the sorts of places you're patronizing and in which neighborhoods. For example, a high-end cocktail bar in the East Village is for sure going to be majority white because the people who habituate that neighborhood and have an interest in high-end cocktails as well as the means to pay for them is largely white. A high-end cocktail bar just north of Columbia in Harlem that also sells ramen and oysters will have a much more diverse clientele, because the people who habituate that neighborhood and have an interest in high-end cocktails as well as the means to pay for them is more diverse. So, if you like high-end cocktail spots but tend to hang out mostly in the East Village you're going to see less diversity than you will if you hang out in lower Harlem. The thing is that the "young hipster scene" (for lack of a better descriptor) places tend to be pretty white. People who are looking on Yelp for the cool new places are largely white. Trivia night people? Mostly white.
posted by slkinsey at 5:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [9 favorites]
posted by slkinsey at 5:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [9 favorites]
I’m white and I have the same experience if I’m not thinking about it. Something that might make difference, although I’m not sure how to put it —- if you’re going to places that feel racially uncoded to you, they’re plausibly places that feel marked as white spaces to POC (and of course you are POC, but you’re not a local so maybe not feeling the same cues as strongly?) If you actually head for spaces that feel coded as black, or Dominican, or whatever to you, they might end up being more integrated in a minority-white kind of way. Even in the absence of overt or intentional racism, it’s hard for a white-feeling space to seem welcoming to POC, and so a lot of spaces end up being almost exclusively white.
posted by LizardBreath at 5:53 AM on August 21, 2019 [14 favorites]
posted by LizardBreath at 5:53 AM on August 21, 2019 [14 favorites]
New York may be majority-minority as a whole but it is likely there are pockets with much larger minority populations and other whiter areas and it could be that the places you end up going to are in those. Where I live, Toronto, is also majority-minority but our downtown is much whiter than the suburbs.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:01 AM on August 21, 2019 [7 favorites]
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 6:01 AM on August 21, 2019 [7 favorites]
New York City is diverse but still very segregated. A long, long history of deliberate housing segregation is hard to shake even when you're actively trying, but unfortunately there are still a lot of landlords out there who straight up won't rent to people in certain ethnic groups.
I know you're asking about where people hang out, not where people live, but housing segregation has huge ripple effects. It touches everything.
posted by lampoil at 6:02 AM on August 21, 2019 [20 favorites]
I know you're asking about where people hang out, not where people live, but housing segregation has huge ripple effects. It touches everything.
posted by lampoil at 6:02 AM on August 21, 2019 [20 favorites]
I grew up in the Midwest in a suburb that was mostly white and thus had mostly white friends.
Perhaps the color of your skin has less to do with it than the culture you grew up in. A lot of things seem normal to you because they've been there all your life -- the way rooms are layed out, the color schemes, the general noise levels, the way people interact with one another. These are more particular than you think, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the white people in the bars you gravitate to also grew up in Midwest suburbs. And as you mention you are often narrowing down the choices even further by requiring tolerance to be openly enforced.
Basically you grew up surrounded by a certain white-heavy culture and when you want to relax you gravitate towards the same. Your race makes you a bit of an outsider in that culture, but it's still what you grew up with.
You've likely accumulated friends (as we all do) with common experiences and perspectives. So being the token outsiders in a bar of white people seems very, well, normal.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:21 AM on August 21, 2019 [8 favorites]
Perhaps the color of your skin has less to do with it than the culture you grew up in. A lot of things seem normal to you because they've been there all your life -- the way rooms are layed out, the color schemes, the general noise levels, the way people interact with one another. These are more particular than you think, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the white people in the bars you gravitate to also grew up in Midwest suburbs. And as you mention you are often narrowing down the choices even further by requiring tolerance to be openly enforced.
Basically you grew up surrounded by a certain white-heavy culture and when you want to relax you gravitate towards the same. Your race makes you a bit of an outsider in that culture, but it's still what you grew up with.
You've likely accumulated friends (as we all do) with common experiences and perspectives. So being the token outsiders in a bar of white people seems very, well, normal.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:21 AM on August 21, 2019 [8 favorites]
Yeah, any portmanteau... and lampoil have it. I have never lived in such a segregated place as New York City. It was especially galling because NYC is touted as this global melting pot of diversity -- and in aggregate of 8 million+ people, it is. But on street view? The Dominicans live HERE (Washington Heights). And the Russian Jews live HERE (Inwood). And the American Jews live HERE (Upper West Side). And the WASPs live HERE (Upper East Side). Etc etc for every neighborhood. This is partly the result of explicitly racist housing policies, and partly the result of high rent limiting neighborhood mobility.
I found my way out of this hypocrisy by leaving New York for good. There are many, many cities and towns in the United States that do a much better job of integrating their citizens.
posted by basalganglia at 7:45 AM on August 21, 2019 [2 favorites]
I found my way out of this hypocrisy by leaving New York for good. There are many, many cities and towns in the United States that do a much better job of integrating their citizens.
posted by basalganglia at 7:45 AM on August 21, 2019 [2 favorites]
I have never lived in such a segregated place as New York City.
I don't know what cities you've lived or spend significant time residing in, but I'm gonna call a little bit of bullshit on this. Although it's true that the most diverse cities can be the most segregated in certain metrics, NYC doesn't even crack the top 25 most segregated cities in the US. The map you linked makes NYC look especially segregated due to sharp borders created by high population concentration, but I don't see that it's obvious that it's any more segregated than the other cities mapped there. The segregation in those cities is just as apparent if you zoom out on those maps. Moreover, my experience in cities and metropolitan areas with lower density is that the day-to-day lived experience has a far more segregated feel. In Houston, for example, if you live inside the loop in a neighborhood like West University Place, you have to travel pretty far out of your way to see any economically disadvantaged people or non-white people who aren't engaged in service work. In NYC this is simply impossible even for those who live in the wealthiest neighborhoods.
posted by slkinsey at 8:15 AM on August 21, 2019 [3 favorites]
I don't know what cities you've lived or spend significant time residing in, but I'm gonna call a little bit of bullshit on this. Although it's true that the most diverse cities can be the most segregated in certain metrics, NYC doesn't even crack the top 25 most segregated cities in the US. The map you linked makes NYC look especially segregated due to sharp borders created by high population concentration, but I don't see that it's obvious that it's any more segregated than the other cities mapped there. The segregation in those cities is just as apparent if you zoom out on those maps. Moreover, my experience in cities and metropolitan areas with lower density is that the day-to-day lived experience has a far more segregated feel. In Houston, for example, if you live inside the loop in a neighborhood like West University Place, you have to travel pretty far out of your way to see any economically disadvantaged people or non-white people who aren't engaged in service work. In NYC this is simply impossible even for those who live in the wealthiest neighborhoods.
posted by slkinsey at 8:15 AM on August 21, 2019 [3 favorites]
My guess is much of the above, plus that NYC has large enough non-white populations with enough economic capacity to support non-white-majority spaces.
NYC also has enough actual physical spaces. I share your observations of Chicago -- while there might only be 2 or 3 families of color on my block, there will be a solid percentage of people of color in the corner bar. Because honestly, there are only so many bars,* and people are willing to go a little ways to get to them, and that means they come out of their somewhat segregated residential areas and mix it up. There is also a greater division here, I feel, between residential blocks and commercial blocks, whereas Manhattan largely blends the two.
*I mean, still a ton compared to, say, a suburb, but the sheer density of restaurants and bars in NYC is another level.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:27 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
NYC also has enough actual physical spaces. I share your observations of Chicago -- while there might only be 2 or 3 families of color on my block, there will be a solid percentage of people of color in the corner bar. Because honestly, there are only so many bars,* and people are willing to go a little ways to get to them, and that means they come out of their somewhat segregated residential areas and mix it up. There is also a greater division here, I feel, between residential blocks and commercial blocks, whereas Manhattan largely blends the two.
*I mean, still a ton compared to, say, a suburb, but the sheer density of restaurants and bars in NYC is another level.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 8:27 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
Seconds/thirding/fourthing what everyones said about NYC being pretty segregated on the micro level while "diverse" as a whole.
I heard someone once say that (white) new yorkers love to talk about the superficial diversity of riding the subway with people of every background, but that most of them socialize almost exclusively with people just like themselves. Recent efforts to reduce school segregation have proven just how disinterested many affluent white new yorkers are in actually integrating.
Toronto is an interesting comparison - obviously its had a ton of development/gentrification but in general i get the strong sense when im there that most people dont thing that the "default canadian person" is a white man, and you see much more class diversity across races (or its felt that way on my frequent visits). As an example I was there last week and went to a barber shop owned by a carribean guy, got my hair cut by a syrian while a colombian dude cut the hair of a white-bearded-hipster-dad in the chair over. it was a neighborhood spot, almost everyone were regulars, and what stood out to me was that in New York that scene might exist but it would be almost assuredly mono-ethnic. I used to go to the puerto rican barber in my old neighborhood, there is a whole cartel of bukharian jews running barber shops elsewhere.
Its been a while since i was young and fun enough to go out regularly but i remember maybe 5-8 years ago when i was newer here, going to Franklin Park (a bar in prospect heights a pretty thoroughly gentrified neighborhood by this point but maybe still getting there at that time) and they had two rooms and i literally ended up calling them the white room and the black room. We ended up spending time where the music was better and no one looked at us weirdly (unlike the time I was the only white customer at the jamaican place in canarsie).
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 8:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
I heard someone once say that (white) new yorkers love to talk about the superficial diversity of riding the subway with people of every background, but that most of them socialize almost exclusively with people just like themselves. Recent efforts to reduce school segregation have proven just how disinterested many affluent white new yorkers are in actually integrating.
Toronto is an interesting comparison - obviously its had a ton of development/gentrification but in general i get the strong sense when im there that most people dont thing that the "default canadian person" is a white man, and you see much more class diversity across races (or its felt that way on my frequent visits). As an example I was there last week and went to a barber shop owned by a carribean guy, got my hair cut by a syrian while a colombian dude cut the hair of a white-bearded-hipster-dad in the chair over. it was a neighborhood spot, almost everyone were regulars, and what stood out to me was that in New York that scene might exist but it would be almost assuredly mono-ethnic. I used to go to the puerto rican barber in my old neighborhood, there is a whole cartel of bukharian jews running barber shops elsewhere.
Its been a while since i was young and fun enough to go out regularly but i remember maybe 5-8 years ago when i was newer here, going to Franklin Park (a bar in prospect heights a pretty thoroughly gentrified neighborhood by this point but maybe still getting there at that time) and they had two rooms and i literally ended up calling them the white room and the black room. We ended up spending time where the music was better and no one looked at us weirdly (unlike the time I was the only white customer at the jamaican place in canarsie).
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 8:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
I’m a POC who has lived more than a decade in NYC here; I’ve had the same observations.
1) My theory is that it’s because NYC is seen as a ‘beacon of culture’, and attracts a certain kind of lefty book-reading debating artsy type from people all over the US — who are often white, and unconsciously more comfortable hanging out with other white people.
I’ve also noticed that certain conversational patterns (debating about books or ideas or art) will privilege certain forms of liberal arts education background that can serve as an effective racial filter. I have many friends like this (and I dearly love them), but as a result, they do create pools of whiteness.
2) This is neighborhood specific, in that the new transplants of Williamsburg, Greenpoint, or Bushwick, can be incredibly white. I think this is a large part due to 1), as white people come to neighborhoods that fit what they want culturally from NYC (creative, cool, grungy, dense, walkable, cafes, bars, bookstores, DIY spaces, art galleries).. so those neighborhoods tend to have an influx of white people who mostly hang out with other white people (but are totally comfortable having a few non-white friends, etc).
3) Gentrification means that there’s a strangely segregated set of bars / cafes / restaurants / commercial establishments in many neighborhoods; the bars that have been there all along, and the new cool bar that opened a few years ago. The new establishments are all filled with the above (mostly white) NYC transplants. Crown Heights is a great example of this — white people go to the new ramen/pizza/burger restaurants, and very few white people are going to the Trinidadian doubles places or the hot food joints or the fried fish stores or the existing neighborhood bars.
Also, as a whole, white people are generally REALLY uncomfortable going to spaces where they’re the only white person. PoC are way more comfortable going to all-or-mostly-white spaces (it’s an unfortunate and common part of life).
4) Bars are for white people!
Okay, I’m being a little snarky, because it’s definitely not true.
But there are a lot of awesome POC-run spaces and venues and groups out there, created by and for POC folks! Often times there’s a heavy overlap with the queer community, or with dance culture, etc. And these communities work largely by word of mouth — even if they’re open to the public, you probably go there because you have a friend, you’ll see friends, etc,
So I rarely go to bars anymore. I’ll hang out with friends and go to friends’ events. I’ll go to spaces and venues and events that are run by poc folks. So I’m rarely in all-white spaces. And it feels to me that most of my poc friends do the same thing — we rarely go to a random bar, or over time, will find venues and bars that aren’t super white, and will stick with going to them.
posted by many more sunsets at 8:48 AM on August 21, 2019 [18 favorites]
1) My theory is that it’s because NYC is seen as a ‘beacon of culture’, and attracts a certain kind of lefty book-reading debating artsy type from people all over the US — who are often white, and unconsciously more comfortable hanging out with other white people.
I’ve also noticed that certain conversational patterns (debating about books or ideas or art) will privilege certain forms of liberal arts education background that can serve as an effective racial filter. I have many friends like this (and I dearly love them), but as a result, they do create pools of whiteness.
2) This is neighborhood specific, in that the new transplants of Williamsburg, Greenpoint, or Bushwick, can be incredibly white. I think this is a large part due to 1), as white people come to neighborhoods that fit what they want culturally from NYC (creative, cool, grungy, dense, walkable, cafes, bars, bookstores, DIY spaces, art galleries).. so those neighborhoods tend to have an influx of white people who mostly hang out with other white people (but are totally comfortable having a few non-white friends, etc).
3) Gentrification means that there’s a strangely segregated set of bars / cafes / restaurants / commercial establishments in many neighborhoods; the bars that have been there all along, and the new cool bar that opened a few years ago. The new establishments are all filled with the above (mostly white) NYC transplants. Crown Heights is a great example of this — white people go to the new ramen/pizza/burger restaurants, and very few white people are going to the Trinidadian doubles places or the hot food joints or the fried fish stores or the existing neighborhood bars.
Also, as a whole, white people are generally REALLY uncomfortable going to spaces where they’re the only white person. PoC are way more comfortable going to all-or-mostly-white spaces (it’s an unfortunate and common part of life).
4) Bars are for white people!
Okay, I’m being a little snarky, because it’s definitely not true.
But there are a lot of awesome POC-run spaces and venues and groups out there, created by and for POC folks! Often times there’s a heavy overlap with the queer community, or with dance culture, etc. And these communities work largely by word of mouth — even if they’re open to the public, you probably go there because you have a friend, you’ll see friends, etc,
So I rarely go to bars anymore. I’ll hang out with friends and go to friends’ events. I’ll go to spaces and venues and events that are run by poc folks. So I’m rarely in all-white spaces. And it feels to me that most of my poc friends do the same thing — we rarely go to a random bar, or over time, will find venues and bars that aren’t super white, and will stick with going to them.
posted by many more sunsets at 8:48 AM on August 21, 2019 [18 favorites]
I'm Canadian, but spent a lot of time in NYC by virtue of an LDR. It's an observation I share about NYC as well as highly diverse Canadian cities like Toronto. I remember observing ethnically and culturally diverse social groups as being the norm when I was in high school and university, and then...something happened.
PoC are way more comfortable going to all-or-mostly-white spaces (it’s an unfortunate and common part of life).
In my experience, a lot of PoC have a strong preference toward spending time in spaces that explicitly cater to PoC due to fear of "sticking out" or legit discrimination. I suspect that this is different for people of different ethnicities due to their different histories in North America and/or other socioeconomic factors, but there are a lot of people who are wary of wading into a space that they perceive as being coded as white. The challenge with this, as some people have alluded to up-thread, is that spaces and events that require money and/or a certain kind of cultural capital* to access or fully enjoy end up being thought of as white.
On top of that, you get PoC and allies with those resources who create similar spaces that are explicitly PoC-friendly, which attract PoC with those concerns as well as those who simply have friends who like those spaces. The other thing going on here, which isn't really about fear of discrimination, is that a lot of children of immigrants (as well as first-gen immigrants) seem to get really interested into getting back into their roots. So a lot of South Asian contemporaries of ours start prioritizing spending time in very desi spaces, as an example. These two factors become more common in cities that are majority-minority, where nearly everyone's more likely to find an active population for their diaspora.
*To many more sunsets' point about a certain sort of liberal arts education culture acting as a racial filter: kinda sorta, yet what happens is that PoC with these kinds of backgrounds seem to siphon off into spaces that are explicitly PoC-coded.
posted by blerghamot at 10:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
PoC are way more comfortable going to all-or-mostly-white spaces (it’s an unfortunate and common part of life).
In my experience, a lot of PoC have a strong preference toward spending time in spaces that explicitly cater to PoC due to fear of "sticking out" or legit discrimination. I suspect that this is different for people of different ethnicities due to their different histories in North America and/or other socioeconomic factors, but there are a lot of people who are wary of wading into a space that they perceive as being coded as white. The challenge with this, as some people have alluded to up-thread, is that spaces and events that require money and/or a certain kind of cultural capital* to access or fully enjoy end up being thought of as white.
On top of that, you get PoC and allies with those resources who create similar spaces that are explicitly PoC-friendly, which attract PoC with those concerns as well as those who simply have friends who like those spaces. The other thing going on here, which isn't really about fear of discrimination, is that a lot of children of immigrants (as well as first-gen immigrants) seem to get really interested into getting back into their roots. So a lot of South Asian contemporaries of ours start prioritizing spending time in very desi spaces, as an example. These two factors become more common in cities that are majority-minority, where nearly everyone's more likely to find an active population for their diaspora.
*To many more sunsets' point about a certain sort of liberal arts education culture acting as a racial filter: kinda sorta, yet what happens is that PoC with these kinds of backgrounds seem to siphon off into spaces that are explicitly PoC-coded.
posted by blerghamot at 10:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [1 favorite]
Basically, if you're a white person in anywhere but a significant-majority-minority neighborhood, you will not end up socializing in non-majority-white spaces by default. It will only be the result of conscious choices. That's the way whiteness works in our culture (and its specific manifestation in NYC). I don't think one should necessarily be striving to be in such places just to be in such places--that would be a little weird--but it's good to notice that this is happening and to ask yourself if you have other interests or tastes you could be cultivating to get out of the bubble.
posted by praemunire at 10:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [7 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 10:34 AM on August 21, 2019 [7 favorites]
The Sporkful had a mini-series a few years ago on how spaces code for particular types of clients: http://www.sporkful.com/who-is-this-restaurant-for-pt-1-us-versus-them/
There are many places I feel comfortable going or not going, or feel like are meant for me or not meant for me...as someone who has had similar experiences to you, I think nonwhite-I and my majority-white friends go places that speak to us, which turn out to be places that code white, and don't even know or think about the places which don't, unless some (white-coded) media outlet/blog/etc. mentions them. I live in a slightly-majority-Hispanic/Latino suburb, and the part of town I live and spend most of my time in skews majority; I didn't even know there were so many White people in my town until an independent, liberal-sign-posting, community-art-space, open-mic-hosting, wood-paneled coffeeshop with expensive drinks opened up next to one of the taquerias.
posted by spelunkingplato at 10:40 AM on August 21, 2019 [6 favorites]
There are many places I feel comfortable going or not going, or feel like are meant for me or not meant for me...as someone who has had similar experiences to you, I think nonwhite-I and my majority-white friends go places that speak to us, which turn out to be places that code white, and don't even know or think about the places which don't, unless some (white-coded) media outlet/blog/etc. mentions them. I live in a slightly-majority-Hispanic/Latino suburb, and the part of town I live and spend most of my time in skews majority; I didn't even know there were so many White people in my town until an independent, liberal-sign-posting, community-art-space, open-mic-hosting, wood-paneled coffeeshop with expensive drinks opened up next to one of the taquerias.
posted by spelunkingplato at 10:40 AM on August 21, 2019 [6 favorites]
Lots of good responses here, but also - NYC is getting whiter and richer. Insane gentrification, driven by out of control property development is making many neighborhoods absolutely exclusive only to those who have tons of discretionary bucks, and those people are whiter than most New Yorkers. The stats on Brooklyn are startling - its whitening extraordinarily fast. And with gentrification, comes the spaces that are coded white.
And if you are going to anti-ICE demos where the majority of people there are white... you are going to the wrong demos.
posted by RajahKing at 11:30 AM on August 21, 2019 [4 favorites]
And if you are going to anti-ICE demos where the majority of people there are white... you are going to the wrong demos.
posted by RajahKing at 11:30 AM on August 21, 2019 [4 favorites]
I lived on the East Coast most of my life, but I recently moved to Los Angeles. It's amazing how different it is here in terms of bars, restaurants, and other public places being waaaaay waaaaaay less segregated. There's a great book that touches on some of the history of recent movements of people around the US - it could provide further insights. It's called The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson.
posted by acridrabbit at 1:37 PM on August 21, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by acridrabbit at 1:37 PM on August 21, 2019 [4 favorites]
Also, as a whole, white people are generally REALLY uncomfortable going to spaces where they’re the only white person.
This has shown to be true in lots of different ways in lots of research. I am pretty sure most white people (even of the lefty variety) don't realize they might feel this way. But white folks tend to seek out majority white places, especially majority white neighborhoods. Once there's a certain amount of people of color, white people tend to feel uncomfortable and will move.
Here's an article that talks about the kind of self-segregating that white people do (and keep in mind the bigger picture, that suburbs and the interstate highway system were pretty built to enable white folks to move out of cities).
I know urban gentrification makes this feel wrong, but that's a smaller phenomenon.
posted by bluedaisy at 4:09 PM on August 21, 2019 [3 favorites]
This has shown to be true in lots of different ways in lots of research. I am pretty sure most white people (even of the lefty variety) don't realize they might feel this way. But white folks tend to seek out majority white places, especially majority white neighborhoods. Once there's a certain amount of people of color, white people tend to feel uncomfortable and will move.
Here's an article that talks about the kind of self-segregating that white people do (and keep in mind the bigger picture, that suburbs and the interstate highway system were pretty built to enable white folks to move out of cities).
I know urban gentrification makes this feel wrong, but that's a smaller phenomenon.
posted by bluedaisy at 4:09 PM on August 21, 2019 [3 favorites]
Also, to me a bar seems like a pretty white space. I ended up going to a pub last week because a (white) friend was visiting from out of town and that's where he wanted to go. The last time before that I went to one was to see the Men's World Cup finals last summer. And the time before that was probably when the same friend was in town 2 years ago. If I'm meeting with friends to eat we'll go to an actual restaurant and if we just want to hang out there are enough coffee or bubble tea places to go to - but we're all middle-aged now so my friends don't drink as much as they used to.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 7:13 PM on August 22, 2019
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 7:13 PM on August 22, 2019
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by daisyace at 5:26 AM on August 21, 2019 [10 favorites]