Reparations for Housing Discrimination
Study: Black Americans Should Get Reparations for Housing Discrimination
Historic housing and lending discrimination against black Americans has created a significant discrepancy in their overall wealth – a gap that may take reparations to close, according to research published by two Oregon State University faculty members.
Jonathan Kaplan, associate professor and chair of the Department of Philosophy, and Andrew Valls, assistant professor in the Department of Political Science, published their study in the July issue of Public Affairs Quarterly. In the study, they argue for a shift from viewing reparations in the framework of slavery to emphasizing relatively recent housing discrimination practices which continue to put people of color at a disadvantage.
The average black American has only about 15 percent as much wealth as the average white American, even though black Americans earn about 60 percent as much as white Americans. And at every income level, white Americans have much more wealth than black.
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Anyone who’s interested in learning more about the extreme discriminatory practices that African Americans were subjected to in the years after slavery was abolished up until the late nineties in some instances should read “Sundown Towns” by James Loewen. A sad legacy for our country to be sure. Let’s hope this study pushes much needed reparations forward on the agenda in this country.
James
17 Jan 08 at 9:54 am
What about the discrimination against the emigrating Irish in the 1800′s? And the Jews? And the Native Americans? And the Handicapped?
DI
21 Jan 08 at 11:15 am
>And at every income level, white Americans have much more wealth than black.
Perhaps it’s because on average blacks have a higher time preference than whites.
Jim Sachsen
27 Jan 08 at 10:33 pm
Perhaps you are a white supremacist who frequently posts comments on a neo-nazi white supremacist website?
and to respond to your comment: So, while white folks were out buying houses (and accumulating wealth) because the institutions that they ran were giving them mortgages, and denying the same deal to African Americans, African Americans were out spending all their money? Give me a break!
Eric Stoller
31 Jan 08 at 9:38 pm
Your ad hominem attack in lieu of a rational argument is noted. Just for the record, I am not a white supremacist. I do not seek to rule over non-whites.
Blacks have a higher loan-rejection rate because generally speaking they are not as credit-worthy. Everyone in financial services knows this. The data back this buck.
A 2004 Texas Department of Insurance study found that of the 2 million Texans surveyed, “black policyholders had average credit scores that were 10% to 35% worse than those of white policyholders. Hispanics’ average scores were 5% to 25% worse, while Asians’ scores were roughly the same as whites.” http://tinyurl.com/3a8gt9
Jim Sachsen
3 Feb 08 at 4:18 pm
“The data back this buck.” Should be “the data back this up.” (I swear i wasn’t calling anyone a ‘buck.’)
Jim Sachsen
4 Feb 08 at 3:12 am
[...] Reparations for Housing Discrimination [...]
Comments in moderation » Eric Stoller’s Blog | social justice | higher education | technology
5 Feb 08 at 2:22 pm
Jim…. have you thought about why white policyholders have better scores? For example, could there be a historical explanation for this? Say, for example, easily verifiable and historically recent racism? (warning: PDF)
And is there any evidence for the “time preference” theory? I’ve never seen any – not that it doesn’t exist, but as an assertion without evidence, it lacks credibility.
Dennis
5 Feb 08 at 5:41 pm
DI asks, quite sensibly, “What about the discrimination against the emigrating Irish in the 1800′s? And the Jews? And the Native Americans? And the Handicapped?” All good questions!
Re: the Irish. The history of “whiteness” — how the Irish became white — is quite interesting. But from the standpoint of wealth formation, the 19th century in the U.S. is pretty close to irrelevant. No one could build wealth via owner-occupied housing during that time. I certainly don’t want to minimize the harms done to Irish immigrants in the U.S., but they were not primarily harms that influenced contemporary wealth. And again, while I don’t want to minimize the harms done to Jews in the U.S. via discrimination, racially restrictive covenants that were applied to blacks vastly outnumbered those that were applied to Jews, and FHA policies that emphasized race were applied disproportionately to Blacks rather than to Jews. There has been little systematic, government enforced, discrimination against people with physical handicaps that influence the intergenerational construction of wealth– this is not to say that they have not been discriminated against, and certainly government policies made that discrimination too easy. But our focus in the article was on a particular harm with long-term consequences for identifiable segments of society. Claims based on physical handicaps would, I think need to be made much more individually.
Native Americans and first-nations peoples in general present an enormously difficult case re: justice. We did not deal with native peoples in our article because our focus was on one very particular, quantifiable, recent harm and its implications for arguments surrounding black reparations movements in the U.S.. No doubt a similar case could be made for native peoples, but it would require more research and a careful attention to details.
Jim suggests that the wealth difference might be due to “because on average blacks have a higher time preference than whites.” Dennis asks for evidence for this theory.
Two things. First, Daly and Wilson have a nice, if someone dated, article “Life expectancy, economic inequality, homicide, and reproductive timing in Chicago neighbourhoods.” which they published in BMJ. (You can find the article here:
http://psych.mcmaster.ca/dalywilson/bmj_chicago.pdf) I actually think many of their explanations are crappy, but the key element here is to note that they argue that under different social conditions, different discount rates are rational. So insofar as one does find that there is a difference in discount rates between black and white Americans, one has to take the social circumstances into account.
And, as Dennis points out, certainly a big part of those social circumstances are historical (but recent) policies that prevented blacks from acquiring wealth via housing, prevented blacks from living in neighborhoods with sharply appreciating housing values, and systematically shifted government resources away from existing cities and towards newly constructed all-white suburbs.
So no, it isn’t at all surprising if, on average, black first-time homebuyers are worse off (credit-rating-wise) than white first-time homebuyers. That is more or less what would expect given that, currently, black americans have on average only about 1/6 as much wealth as white americans. While there is good evidence that housing discrimination continues, it isn’t (particularly) relevant to our argument. Even if the “playing field” re: mortgages, finding apartments, etc., were completely level *now*, the effects of recent discrimination would still make it much harder — on average — for blacks to gain wealth in the ways that whites are able to. Because that discrimination was state-endorsed (white americans in essence getting government subsidies to buy homes and build wealth, black americans being actively prevented from doing so), a state-sponsored solution is required.
As a final note, the original “Home Owner’s Loan Corporation” (HOLC) risk assessments (from 1933) rated neighborhoods on the basis of perceived default risk — and rated black neighborhoods as riskier. But, before the HOLC folded into the FHA, they had determined that there initial risk assessments were wrong — they were not seeing a difference in default rates corresponding to their initial perceived risk assessments. The FHA ignored this data, and simply refused to insure loans in “high-risk” areas, despite the fact that the so-called high-risk areas were, according to the HOLC data, not in fact high-risk at all. Black and mixed-race neighborhoods didn’t start out as risky — they were *made* risky by FHA policies that prevented FHA-insured loans from being issued in those neighborhoods.
The full text of our article can be found at: http://oregonstate.edu/cla/philosophy/ (look under “news and events).
Very best,
jk
Jonathan Kaplan
6 Feb 08 at 1:08 pm
Dennis,
I will take a look at that study, but I already have my doubts. especially when the authors claim that before 1933, “relatively few Americans owned their homes.”
Check out this article “The Real Scandal: How the Feds Invented the Mortgage Mess.”
“February 5, 2008 — PERHAPS the greatest scandal of the mort gage crisis is that it is a direct result of an intentional loosening of underwriting standards – done in the name of ending discrimination, despite warnings that it could lead to wide-scale defaults.”
Lenders are damned if they do, damned if they don’t.
Jim Sachsen
6 Feb 08 at 2:17 pm
The NY Post, Jim? Really?
All I have is questions.
The mortgage crisis is a direct result of loosening underwriting standards, which was done in order to end discrimination? Oh boy.
Do you know anything about economics?
SarahMC
6 Feb 08 at 2:20 pm
Stan Liebowitz wrote the article, and somehow I doubt he is a “neo-nazi white supremacist.”
He is in fact the Ashbel Smith professor of Economics in the Business School at the University of Texas at Dallas where his specialty is the economics of intellectual property. But who knows, Sarah? Maybe when it comes to economics, he’s just an idiot who doesn’t know as much as you do.
Dennis,
Michael Levin discusses the higher time-preference of blacks in his book, Why Race Matters (2005).
Jim Sachsen
6 Feb 08 at 9:02 pm
Mmmmm… Michael Levin.
I checked Levin’s book on Amazon, and it’s recommended by none other than Jared Taylor of American Renaissance (to which I will not link). A sample title from a Jared Taylor article: “Integration Has Failed, Part I.” (And this is from February 2008!)
AR is a well-known white supremacist website, if the last sentence didn’t convince you.
I think I’m going to go ahead and write Michael Levin off, given his source of support.
Seriously – American Renaissance? It’s like Stormfront with a better web designer and more articulate commenter base: It looks nice, but it’s still populated by white supremacists and spelling errors.
Eric, how do you attract such wonderful commenters?
Uuuhhh…. Also, I’m going to go ahead and evaluate Stan Liebowitz’s statements in the op-ed from the NY Post on the merits of the op-ed, and not on his holding a professorial position. On such grounds, Liebowitz is, um, wrong. I’ll agree with SarahMC on this one: If he thinks the recent mortgage crisis is in any way due to an effort to end discrimination, I’d say Liebowitz is a little off his rocker. Mortgage and loan companies were equal-opportunity exploiters this time around….. unless you think it was people of color who bought all those multi-million-dollar homes in California that have since been foreclosed.
Yeah. Me neither.
Oh yeah – Liebowitz is the director of something called the “Center for the Analysis of Property Rights and Innovation,” on whose webpage I found the statement “Property rights are at the center of civilization.”
Not only is that insulting, it’s historically incredibly inaccurate.
I’m getting bad vibes from this guy. He’s not an active neo-nazi, but I’m thinking he’s off his f*cking rocker nonetheless. Propertarians usually are.
Dennis
6 Feb 08 at 11:20 pm
Dennis – my site does attract a diverse readership. In fact, Jonathan Kaplan’s comment made me want to go back to school and get a masters degree in philosophy
…it was an awesome comment.
By the way, this was the first time that the author of something that I cited actually commented on the same post. Is that meta or what?
Eric Stoller
7 Feb 08 at 12:15 am
Well, Dennis, that’s the difference between you and me. I seek out opinions that contradict my own.
I look at how liberals deal with issues of race, how they reacted to geniuses such as William Shockley, Arthur R. Jensen, Michael Levine, and James Watson. I look at how the left seeks to shut down voices with which they disagree, such as Jared Taylor, Nick Griffin, Jim Gilchrist. Look at how the Canadian “Human Rights” Commission – dominated by left-wing ideologues – acts as a censor against politically incorrect individuals, how the Canadian government now has prisoners of conscience. Look at your own rationalizations for not reading one of the most articulate books on race realism. You fear that Levine might just be right, so better to ignore it. Deep down, you are terrified that our observations about the reality of race are true.
And yes, property rights are the keystone of a free society, civilization and prosperity.
Jim Sachsen
7 Feb 08 at 12:39 am
Jim…. historically, the comment that property rights are the keystone is simply not true. I can see why an economist would argue that – it’s in their best interests, since modern economics as a discipline rests on that assumption.
But historians and anthropologists would, by and large, disagree, having neither a vested interest in putting property on a pedestal nor being limited to looking at things through such a narrow lens as economics.
James Watson? The DNA guy? Yeah, he was pretty sharp for discovering DNA. But his racist beliefs are not backed by the best science – he has been long surpassed by others. Just because he made one amazing discovery in the 1950s does not mean his opinion is gold forever.
Eric, you’ve got a great theatre here – or, at least, some awesome projection. I am “terrified” that their “observations of race might be true.” Who knew?
I’ll get counseling and convert to a white supremacist belief system immediately! What was I thinking?
Dennis
7 Feb 08 at 9:30 am
Dennis,
Which “racists beliefs” espoused by James Watson are you talking about?
Watson: “All our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours — whereas all the testing says not really.”
It’s not merely a question of Watson’s opinion. The data in fact support Watson. See IQ and Global Inequality by Richard Lynn and Tatu Vanhanen. Lynn is Emeritus Professor of Psychology of the University of Ulster. Vanhanen is Emeritus Professor of Political Science of the University of Tempere, Finland, and Emeritus Docent of Political Science of the University of Helsinki. Have you even examined the data?
You claim that Watson’s “racist beliefs are not backed by the best science.” How would you know? I don’t say that with any malice to you, Dennis, but how could you possibly know what “the best science” is when you are not willing to read anything that challenges your your preconceived notions?
There are other books which discuss the latest science on the question. See Race Differences in Intelligence: An Evolutionary Analysis by Richard Lynn.
Race, Evolution, and Behavior: A Life History Perspective (3rd Edition) by J. Philippe Rushton. Rushton is a professor of psychology at the University of Western Ontario, Canada. This book demolishes the pseudo-scientific ramblings of Stephen Gould, Jared Diamond, Leon Kamin, Franz Boas, and Ashley Montague.
Race: The Reality of Human Differences by Vincent Sarich and Frank Miele. Sarich is an professor emeritus of anthropology at Berkeley. Miele is editor of Skeptic magazine.
A Race Against Time: Racial Heresies for the 21st Century edited by Jared Taylor.
Some right-wing religious fanatics disbelieve the theory of evolution; some left-wing fanatics think that evolution stopped 100K yrs ago.
Jim Sachsen
8 Feb 08 at 12:59 pm
Jim,
Recall that Watson is quoted as saying that he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really”.
The difficulty with claims like Watson’s is that the population of “Africa” does not correspond to a population that is genetically distinct in interesting ways from other large human populations. Insofar as it makes sense to measure between and within group differences, “Africa” is simply *way* too big a group for the differences between it and other groups not to be swamped by within group differences. Folk racial categories simply don’t have (much or any) biological reality — they are too big, too coarse-grained, to work.
That isn’t to say that humans can’t be broken down into interesting genetically differentiated populations; rather, those populations are very likely *much* smaller than “folk” racial categories, and hence of little or no policy use. With respect to cognitive ability, I actually agree with you that there is no good evidence for Gould’s claim that we *know* that there are no populations of humans with different cognitive abilities associated with their different genetic profiles. But neither is there good evidence for the opposite claims, and given how difficult it is to work with human populations, I doubt we will ever be in a position to aggressively test cognitive and behavioral hypotheses about possible small sub-populations within the human species.
What has become clear as we find out more about the genetic heritage of humans is that gene flow has been, broadly speaking, ubiquitous. There was more gene-flow within small geographic areas than over long distances to be sure, but there was substantial gene-flow across most — if not all — the major areas in which humans evolved and lived. This is not a reason to deny the possible existence of local adaptations — local adaptations can be maintained in the face of gene flow — but it is a reason to doubt that in the *absence* of particular local conditions, differentiation would be maintained.
While I think that Gould is too quick to dismiss as impossible hypotheses that are merely untestable, Ruston (et al) are no better. Note for example that Rushton, unlike Gould, isn’t actually an evolutionary biologist, and his claims about evolution should be approached with caution. There are simply no plausible evolutionary pressures on cognition that would have been present in, say, all of Europe but not anywhere in Africa. And on most hypotheses about the evolution of human cognition (hypotheses about which I am quite skeptical, simply because there is no way to adequately test them), the main drivers of increased cognitive skills (Machiavellian social networking, sexual selection, etc) would seem to apply equal to most environments humans have found themselves in.
The idea of “testing” cognitive skills in these contexts is deeply problematic, and I urge you to look up, for example, Steele and Aronson’s work on testing and “stereotype threat” — see perhaps especially Steele, Aronson, “Stereotype threat does not live by Steele and Aronson (1995) alone.” American Psychologist, p. 47, vol. 59, (2004) which provides an overview of some of their work and how it has been criticized both appropriately and inappropriately. And, not to toot my own horn too much, but the chapter on “IQ and Social Policy” from my 2000 book “The Limits and Lies of Human Genetic Research” provides a good primer on these issues.
Best,
jk
Jonathan Kaplan
8 Feb 08 at 3:30 pm
> The difficulty with claims like Watson’s is that the population of “Africa” does not correspond to a population that is genetically distinct in interesting ways from other large human populations. Insofar as it makes sense to measure between and within group differences, “Africa” is simply *way* too big a group for the differences between it and other groups not to be swamped by within group differences. Folk racial categories simply don’t have (much or any) biological reality — they are too big, too coarse-grained, to work.
Dr. Kaplan,
First, thank you for discussing this in a mature respectful manner. I have found that race is the last taboo in America, and its discussion is akin to discussing publicly sex in Victorian England.
What did Dr. Watson mean by “Africa”? Did he mean “sub-Saharan Africa”? Did he mean “Africans wherever they might be located”? To find out we’d have to ask him, and after the modern-day equivalent of the Inquisition forced him Galilaeo-style to recant, I doubt he will speak publicly on the subject of racial differences anytime soon.
Do you think that Watson was treated fairly for speaking his mind? Do you think that it was right and just for the Canadian government to open a criminal investigation of Rushton for writing Race, Evolution and Behaviour? Are some scientific question just beyond the pale?
>That isn’t to say that humans can’t be broken down into interesting genetically differentiated populations; rather, those populations are very likely *much* smaller than “folk” racial categories, and hence of little or no policy use.
I disagree. We could go out on the street and pick 20 white people at random for team A, and 20 black people at random for team B. If they play basketball, I’m betting on Team A. If we have them compete in a swim match, I’ll bet on Team B. And I would win those bets, perhaps not each and every time, but enough to establish a clear pattern. Is there a genetic component to this differential? Of course. This wouldn’t be controversial in a society in which honest discussion of race and racial difference weren’t taboo.
Yes, we could break it down even further. Take team A and genetically test them to sort out whether their ancestors came primarily from East Africa or West Africa. Put EA on one team, and WA on the other. If you have the two teams compete in sprints, the WA team will win more often than not. Have them compete in distance running, and the EA team will dominate. Again, this is due to the physiological differences resulting from the slightly different genes of the two groups.
These between-groups differences exists regardless of the existence or magnitude of within-group differences
Race exists, and racial differences exist. It’s not just a “social construction” or a figment of our imagination. Pointing out these difference – whether different different athletic abilities or cognitive abilities – should not garner one the badge “hater,” “white supremacist,” or “neo-Nazi.” The same studies I rely also indicate that East Asians have slightly higher average IQs than whites. Does that make me an “Asian supremacist?”
And it’s not the result of different socio-economic factors. When you hold socio-economic levels equal, the black-white IQ differential becomes even more pronounced. Racial egalitarians are perplexed by this; racial realists not at all as it’s completely predicted.
Here’s why I think that the so many are threatened by the data and seek to vilify and/or censor the messengers. Liberal social policy rests on the notion that race is only skin-deep. Africans are just Anglo-Saxons with dark skin, as it were. Were it not for racism/colonialism/legacy of Apartheid/etc., so the thinking goes, blacks and whites would on average have equal incomes, equal wealth, equal scholastic performance, etc. The more we uncover the science of DNA, the more untenable the liberal social policies become.
How many races are there? 3? 4? 8? I don’t know. How many different breeds of dogs are there? Maybe we shouldn’t call them “races.” Call them “breeds” or “sub-species.”
>With respect to cognitive ability, I actually agree with you that there is no good evidence for Gould’s claim that we *know* that there are no populations of humans with different cognitive abilities associated with their different genetic profiles. But neither is there good evidence for the opposite claims, and given how difficult it is to work with human populations, I doubt we will ever be in a position to aggressively test cognitive and behavioral hypotheses about possible small sub-populations within the human species.
We can, and we have. I cited works on the subject that analyzed hundreds of studies. Racial egalitarians – such as the late Gould – do not like what IQ tests have to say, so they like to pretend that intelligence can’t really be measured.
>What has become clear as we find out more about the genetic heritage of humans is that gene flow has been, broadly speaking, ubiquitous. There was more gene-flow within small geographic areas than over long distances to be sure, but there was substantial gene-flow across most — if not all — the major areas in which humans evolved and lived. This is not a reason to deny the possible existence of local adaptations — local adaptations can be maintained in the face of gene flow — but it is a reason to doubt that in the *absence* of particular local conditions, differentiation would be maintained.
Well, maybe, depending on what you mean by “substantial gene-flow.” There are mixtures, to be sure, just as there are with dogs, and yet different breeds exist, and they have different temperaments. All other things being equal, Beagles on average are friendlier than Rottweilers.
Watson: “There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so.” No truer words have ever been spoken.
> There are simply no plausible evolutionary pressures on cognition that would have been present in, say, all of Europe but not anywhere in Africa.
Sure there are! Something caused Europeans to evolve in such a way as to have 140 square cc more cranial capacity than Negroas, with the concomitant substantial differential in average intelligence. Do you have an explanation? A rough hypothesis even?
>And on most hypotheses about the evolution of human cognition (hypotheses about which I am quite skeptical, simply because there is no way to adequately test them), the main drivers of increased cognitive skills (Machiavellian social networking, sexual selection, etc) would seem to apply equal to most environments humans have found themselves in.
What makes you assume that the main drivers of cognitive skills are purely environmental?
>The idea of “testing” cognitive skills in these contexts is deeply problematic, and I urge you to look up, for example, Steele and Aronson’s work on testing and “stereotype threat” — see perhaps especially Steele, Aronson, “Stereotype threat does not live by Steele and Aronson (1995) alone.” American Psychologist, p. 47, vol. 59, (2004) which provides an overview of some of their work and how it has been criticized both appropriately and inappropriately.
I will.
> And, not to toot my own horn too much, but the chapter on “IQ and Social Policy” from my 2000 book “The Limits and Lies of Human Genetic Research” provides a good primer on these issues.
OK, but since you are a philosopher and not an evolutionary biologist, I should follow a wise man’s advice and approach the claims with caution.
Regards,
Jim
Jim Sachsen
8 Feb 08 at 9:17 pm
Jim,
As far as I know, IQ is not actually a reliable indicator of genetic intelligence. It changes much too fast for that – i.e. within a few generations in a population whose social circumstances have changed radically.
I’m not claiming that genetics has nothing to do with intelligence; rather, I’m claiming that IQ is not an accurate measure in this case.
In any case, however, I’m not sure I think genetic intelligence matters, because I think we should be caring for each other regardless of perceived intelligence, not leaving people in the dust because they are supposedly inferior. The connection between the hypothetical fact of someone’s intelligence and the ethical claims regarding how a society should treat them is one made by value judgments, and those are definitely subjective and open to debate.
Dennis
9 Feb 08 at 12:26 am
Dennis,
When Shuey published his The Testing of Negro Intelligence in 1966, he found that the average black-white difference was always close to one standard deviation. It remains so today. It confirms the everyday perception of those who have contact with blacks and have eyes to see.
I don’t know know what you mean when you write that “IQ is not actually a reliable indicator of genetic intelligence.” Do you mean that IQ is not a reliable indicator of intelligence? Isaac Asimov was a genius and had an IQ of 160. Just coincidence? Think about the ten smartest people you know. Do you think any of them have an IQ lower than 90?
IQ measures intelligence, and intelligence is undoubtedly a product of nature (genes) and nurture (nutrition,environmental factors). This isn’t (or at least shouldn’t be) controversial. The real question is conceptualizing the these two influences. Jensen, Levin, and Lynn think that the genetic component accounts for about 70%. Others may honestly disagree, but I think it is safe to say that only a fool would attribute 100% to environmental factors.
Does intelligence matter? To me it does. In terms of explaining differences in income, professional and academic achievement, it most certainly does. See The Bell Curve by Hernnstein and Murray. It explains why even if there were no racial discrimination of any kind, whites on average would still be predicted to have greater wealth and income than blacks.
It doesn’t mean that less intelligent people forfeit their rights in any way.
Subjective value judgments should be formed on the basis of the world as it really is and not on how one wishes it were.
Again, I’d recommend Why Race Matters by Levine.
Regards,
Jim
Jim Sachsen
14 Feb 08 at 9:41 pm
@ Jim,
I have perused several of your 800+ postings on Stormfront and I have to come to the conclusion that you are doing an amazing job of thinly veiling your normal overtly racist web garbage. Please do me a favor. Do not comment on my site. I have made the decision to not block your comments as I try to not limit discourse on my site. However, I feel that you are being disingenuous. Jonathan Kaplan’s comments have met and debunked every single racist trope that you have flung and yet, you continue to work your way through the white supremacist blog comment handbook. I am made ill by your covertly racist comments on my site and the overtly racist comments that you have consistently made as a member of a white supremacist/neo-nazi internet forum.
Eric Stoller
14 Feb 08 at 10:11 pm
[...] June 11, 2008 @ 9:39 pm Sergeant Dave Hendrie said: “I think the thing that was shocking to me and gave me a better understanding when people talk about white privilege, it’s offensive to me, it feels like a judgment term to me but having watched this specifically as it relates to housing practice and how that works, we talk about white suburbia and here it is, it was a policy that these were the only people allowed to move out there, was whites. So I have a better understanding of white privilege. If I was a G.I and I’d come out here I’d have been able to get a loan for a home, wheras that same advantage would not have been given to Chuck. And to see that as part of the government instituted process of giving loans was disturbing to me.” [...]
Portland Police discuss white privilege » Eric Stoller’s Blog
11 Jun 08 at 9:40 pm