Racial diversity is not a strength.

Is racial diversity a strength in the United States? Many of us would blindly say “yes” without really considering the implications of diversity. My argument will be twofold. We will examine (1) diversity in private life and (2) diversity in public life. I. Diversity in Private LifeI have had many friends throughout my life. I have had many family friends throughout my life. However, I have only ever had two minority friends. I have never had any minority family friends. It came as a shock to my family’s household when my older brother decided to marry a minority. I can distinctly remember the day that my brother’s wife (then girlfriend) was first visiting my father’s house. I was in the car with my father and he said “no wetback jokes tonight, huh? ”I was most certainly raised in a racially conscious household, as most kids are. Most kids are very aware of their own race and who is not a part of it. Dr. Erin Winkler from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee wrote that “research clearly shows that children not only recognize race from a very young age, but also develop racial biases by ages three to five that do not necessarily resemble the racial attitudes of adults in their lives. ” [1] What does this mean? Why are we born with an innate sense of race? Why are children, even if it may contradict the beliefs of their parents, raised with a consciousness of race? These are questions that must be addressed if we are to accurately understand whether or not racial diversity is a strength. How diverse if your social life? I do not mean speaking with coworkers, classmates, etc. I mean the people that you speak with on a regular basis for your own enjoyment. People who you speak to outside of an institution such as work or the classroom. Odds say that you either don’t speak to people of another race or that if you do then it is a very small number. A 2013 Reuters/Ipsos poll found that 40% of whites in America have no close friends who are non-white. It also found that only 20% of whites said they had five or more close friends who were non-white. [2] Of course, these numbers play into another statistic: interracial marriage. I have already stated that many of us blindly accept racial diversity as a strength without really considering it. That is why one poll found that Americans ages 18 to 29 nearly unanimously accepted interracial dating and marriage within their own families. The numbers become different as the age bracket is moved up. [3] Yet in 2008, only one in seven new marriages were interracial. [4] This just shows the contrast between what Americans perceive to be a strength (i. e. , racial diversity) and what they actually choose to do with their own free will. What about schools? Many in the civil rights era believed that if only the schools could be desegregated then it would not take long for the rising youth to rid themselves of racial consciousness and move past this archaic social construct. But that has not been the case. Schools in the United States have in almost every instance segregated themselves voluntarily. Business Insider put out a wonderful set of maps that display just how this sort of school segregation works. [5] An article put out by the New York Times about the “resegregation” of Charlotte, NC schools said the following:“Under the new ‘Family Choice Plan,’ students were largely made to attend the schools in their neighborhood. But most neighborhoods in Charlotte are deeply segregated and racially homogenous communities […] and so schools that were once integrated and high-achieving soon became stratified by race and income. […] When Charlotte-Mecklenburg eliminated race as a factor in student assignment, it not only meant less diverse schools; it also created a feedback loop that made the problem worse. Families with the means—most often white families—started to move into whiter neighborhoods, where they knew their kids would go to whiter schools. As a result of the relationship between race and wealth, the social, political, and economic capital became ever more concentrated in a small number of very white neighborhoods. ” [6]You see, white parents want their white children to go to white schools. And who can blame them? African Americans score lower than whites in almost every subject. They also perform wrorse on tests that measure scholastic aptitude and intelligence. [7] One article highlights the difference in criminality in schools based on demographics. “When broken down into racial/ethnic categories, 82 percent of schools that are more than 50% Black have recorded at least one violent crime compared to 77% of majority Hispanic schools and 71% of majority White schools. ” [8]It is no-brainer for white parents to want their children to go to white schools. But how do the students themselves interact on their own in schools? The most common way to analyze this is by observing student behavior in the cafeteria. In most schools, there are no assigned seats in the cafeteria. There is nothing preventing a white and a non-white sitting together and eating lunch. Yet study after study shows that students naturally segregate themselves in the cafeteria. One study concluded: “Multiple processes of segregation were found to operate in the cafeteria. To begin with, interethnic exposure at the level of social units—the spaces where customers chatted as friends or acquaintances whilst eating a meal—was consistently lower than would be expected under conditions of random mixing. ” [9]I will conclude this section regarding diversity in private life by addressing segregation in housing. A wonderful set of maps put out by the New York Times break down regions by ethnicity. It is not hard to see the high levels of segregation that occur in our society. [10] If diversity is such a strength, then why is it that people naturally drift away from it? Why do white people want to live with white people if they can benefit more from living in a diverse neighborhood? Why would white parents send their white children to white schools if it would be more beneficial to the children if they went to a mixed school? Why do children naturally identify race and segregate themselves if it is not beneficial for them to do so? II. Diversity in Public LifeSince I covered schools in the section of private life (perhaps a bit too hasty), I will only really cover prisons in this section. I say that prisons are “public life” in the sense that they are a public institution (I acknowledge that there are private prisons, of course). Other than the fact that blacks engage in significantly more criminal activities than whites and Asians, prisons themselves are riddled with race based violence. [11]The New York Times published an opinion article regarding California’s policy of segregating new inmates for sixty days. It reads:“Prison officials argue that the practice reduces racially motivated violence. […] When inmates arrive at California Department of Corrections facilities, either as new inmates or transfers, they are temporarily held in double cells at a prison ‘reception center. ’ When cell assignments are made, the inmates are divided into four general categories: black, white, Asian and other. Inmates are almost invariably assigned cellmates of their own race. The State of California says its policy, by which hundreds of thousands of prisoners were segregated last year, reduces violence in the cells. After 60 days, the state says it has enough information to decide whether particular inmates are dangerous. ” [12] Jared Taylor, writing on the issue of race in prisons, wrote the following:“Gangs are segregated in the most obvious way–by race–and race permeates every aspect of prison life. The balance of gang power determines the order in which the different races go through the chow line, what parts of the prison yard are their exclusive territory, which benches people can sit on, who can use weights or basketball courts at what hours, etc. ” [13]The reality is that prisons have to be segregated. There are countless black, Hispanic, white, and Asian gangs that naturally formulate and compete with each other within the prison system. If they are not forced apart, they will naturally drift that way. And if they are not forced apart, they will violently attack one another. Why would this be the case if diversity is such a strength? Why would the inmates not embrace the strength of diversity? ConclusionMy presentation is clear. If racial diversity were a strength, then people would not naturally oppose it through their actions. I challenge my opponent to find one real example of diversity strengthening the United States. Sources:[1] . https://www.academia.edu...[2] . http://www.nbcnews.com...[3] . http://www.pewsocialtrends.org...[4] . http://www.pewsocialtrends.org...[5] . http://www.businessinsider.com...[6] . http://www.newyorker.com...[7] . http://www.nytimes.com...[8] . http://blackdemographics.com...[9] . http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com...[10] . https://www.nytimes.com...[11] . https://2kpcwh2r7phz1nq4jj237m22-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com...[12] . http://www.nytimes.com...[13] . https://www.amren.com...