It seems to many in the US that racial divisions and conflicts have worsened in America over the last ten years or so.
Before that, I saw conditions and attitudes continue to improve through the 70s and 80s and even part of the 90s.
No doubt I was raised with discriminatory attitudes that I learned to later discard. So were other black and white Americans of my generation. But we grew up. So did America. Now there's a reversion and it's so sad to see.
To me (and dare I say it, the majority of others of either race of our generation), bringing up the misunderstandings and mistaken attitudes of our past serves no good purpose. It just reignites old wounds. Wounds that we were mature enough to overcome, to get past.
We had gotten to the point that the majority of Americans just didn't even see the color of another's skin, only the individuals in front of them. Why is that changing again? Why so much emphasis on skin color? How is that a good thing?
Why do the younger generations want to keep picking at old wounds? How can America heal and move forward when so many want to focus on the past and keep stirring up old stuff?
It's like taking a family fight from 30 years ago, a fight that was resolved with apologies, hugs, genuine compassion and love - a fight from which we all learned an important lesson, then bringing it up again as if we'd never made up, never learned, never gone forward.
I don't like this. It's tearing up America.
This is a problem made worse or even originated now by lack of leadership (passive) and outright destructive intent and action (aggressive).
Tearing America up is the desired product. When things get bad enough for enough people they will demand a change from the "savior" that presents itself. School children have been purposefully dumbed-down. As an example, we no longer teach civics. I just saw a video where college students were asked if they approve of Karl Marx being Hillary Clinton's running mate in the election. The students shown were in favor. In another video people did not know who Joe Biden is. To expect such people to make an intelligent choice when voting is totally absurd. Compounding the problem, we have not a reporting media of fact but much editorial opinion and outright propaganda lies. Even if intelligent, a person can't make a rational choice on faulty data.
I agree with your observations in that the black/white situation appears to be getting worse. There was high hope that with a black/white president improvements would accelerate. Instead he has served to foment division. He could not have gotten into office without the support of a lot of white people. If having a black president was key, we could have had Herman Cain, not a politician but a successful business man. Oh, wait. He ran as a Republican. Democrats couldn't have that. Cain reached the point in his campaign where he and his family were mercilessly attacked so he dropped out. Allan West, a military vet and patriot, was pushed out of his Senate seat in Florida. Another Republican.
On the plus side, I read of a high school in NY for blacks with a graduation rate approaching 100%. Students are going on to and graduating college.
Here is one:
Brooklyn College Academy has ushered many students like Bridgewater and Polite successfully through high school: 100 percent of the school's black students graduated on time last year, and almost all of them went on to four-year colleges. In contrast, the overall graduation rate for black male students in New York City was 58 percent in 2014.
School officials say their model is replicable – but only in schools where the adults are willing to pay relentless attention and to hold the students to consistently high expectations.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/07/14/at-this-low-income-brooklyn-public-high-school-100-percent-of-black-students-graduate
This reminds me of a situation I noticed many years ago in auditing pc's at the mission. It is very disheartening to help a person get their thoughts and emotions sorted out (clearing) making a virtual clean slate in the areas being addressed, only to have someone or something
else come along writing on that slate. We used to say the pc was PTS to an outside influence. But I have seen many lose clarity as the organization writes on that clean slate. They end up joining staff or spending all their money that was designated for a different purpose. Results are the same as if PTS to someone outside only the organization is never found to be the suppressive source until they wake up and finally escape.
Back to the community, black, redneck, druggie, upper-class snobs, gangs, whatever, the community will not permit certain individualities to emerge, grow, and prosper according to the individual's own desires. Where, as mentioned above, the adults are willing to pay relentless attention and hold the students to consistently high expectations, they have effectively changed the culture surrounding those students thus enabling success.