Segregated high school proms divide Georgia's students

[quixotecoyote]

It then goes on to say

Which suggests it supports (funds) a segregated prom how, exactly?

 

[a_unique_person]

Which suggests it supports (funds) a segregated prom how, exactly?

It suggests there was an attempt to set up a non segregated Prom which was ignored by those who want a segregated Prom, which seems to have been enough people to make it pointless putting on the non segregated Prom.

 

[Skeptic]

If it was school-supported, that would indeed be illegal. But what seems to be the case is that there is a school-supported prom for all students (perfectly legitimate), and white jerks prefer not to go there, and instead to a private party they call "their" prom.

It's perfectly legal. If it's a private party, they have a right to associate only with those they wish and call it what they wish. They can invite only white people and call it a "prom". They can invite only people named "George" who speak fluent Esperanto and call it an "orgy", too. But just because it's legal to be a racist jerk hardly means one should act that way.

Let us hope the exposition of this thing will lead to its embarrased cancellation.

Jerks.

 

[Travis]

They held our Prom on a horse ranch. I don't know how it worked because I didn't go to it.

 

[themusicteacher]

They are indeed a bunch of racist douchebags disguising their bigotry and hatred behind "tradition" but, since they are private parties (a less than clever way of endorsing tacit racism), they are in every way legal. It's disgusting, it's terrible, it's lame, it's anachronistic, it's deplorable, etc. but they do, unfortunately, have a right to raise their children to be hateful, self-righteous, backwards troglodytes. Fear wins the day again!

 

[ToddH]

I live in a small town in Georgia and, yes, the proms here are still segregated. Of course, like the article stated, the school doesn't sponsor them. Still, it saddens me that this continues.

 

[quixotecoyote]

It suggests there was an attempt to set up a non segregated Prom which was ignored by those who want a segregated Prom, which seems to have been enough people to make it pointless putting on the non segregated Prom.

I think you got a little lost. The post of mine you objected to was objecting to this post by Safe-Keeper:

Unbelievable, but ultimately little different from how the Boy Scout Alliance won't even admit 'confessed' atheists and homosexuals.

Simple solution - make it so that public funding means you can't discriminate or segregate.

As I pointed out that it wouldn't have any effect as the segregated proms don't receive public funding.

I'm not sure you thought I was saying what I actually said.

 

[Ladewig]

Let us hope the exposition of this thing will lead to its embarrased cancellation.

Jerks.

I share your hope, but I have found embarrassment to not be very effective at reducing the bigotry of racists.

 

[I Ratant]

The school hosted non segregated ones and there was not enough support, but the segregated ones are supported.

.
Ethnic dislike cuts both ways.
Three ways, when there's Whites, Blacks and Hispanics.

 

[666]

Thanks for all the replies to my OP; I'm glad that it's not a widespread feature.

I just Googled segregated prom and got loads of hits, mostly disapproving, so perhaps the situation is becoming more widely known. I think most people - outside the South at any rate - are surprised that it still exists.

 

[godless dave]

I share your hope, but I have found embarrassment to not be very effective at reducing the bigotry of racists.

I agree. Some of them even relish the negative attention - it feeds their persecution complex.

 

[dudalb]

They held our Prom on a horse ranch. I don't know how it worked because I didn't go to it.

The Sierra Foothills: California's answer to the Ozarks.

 

[dudalb]

this is one of the many reasons why I HATE the South.

I cannot believe that any school in the USA would still have segregated proms. Makes me want to puke.

This is 2009 right? Not 1909? Unbelievable.

Let's see somebody complains about bigotry then says he hates a whole section of the country.Nice.
And I am sure I could find plenty of bigotry In the Northeast or any other section of the country.
I understand the South's has a special tradition of bigotry, but still...

 

[Skeptic]

I share your hope, but I have found embarrassment to not be very effective at reducing the bigotry of racists.

I disagree. Once it became embarrasing to be a racist in public, it becomes harder to hold such beliefs even in private. Here are two ways, off the top of my head (there are surely many more) this happens:

First, if one no longer hears constant reassurances of one's racist beliefs from other people in public, one no longer reinforces one's beliefs about the darkies with your drinking buddies in the pub (or your favorite columnist in the paper, or whatever), naturally becomes weaker in time.

Second, when dealing with Blacks in public because one is forced to after segregation is ended, one is likely to discover that "they" are human beings, too; close association notoriously makes stereotypes weaker.

Of course some will refuse all evidence and retain their views no matter what, but the average American white was by today's standards a deep racist only 50 years ago, and he isn't now. Why? Because of the effect of the public sphere on private beliefs.

 

[Skeptic]

Let's see somebody complains about bigotry then says he hates a whole section of the country.Nice.
And I am sure I could find plenty of bigotry In the Northeast or any other section of the country.
I understand the South's has a special tradition of bigotry, but still...

The "I hate all of those dirty [insert group here] because they're racist" way of thinking is not at all uncommon in some "enlightened" circles, I have found.

 

[I Ratant]

...
Second, when dealing with Blacks in public because one is forced to after segregation is ended, one is likely to discover that "they" are human beings, too; close association notoriously makes stereotypes weaker.

...

.
A friend, an expatriot from Iran was eager to meet all manner of Americans when he opened his coffee kiosk at the Mall.
He became disenchanted with blacks as he said they tended to give him the most grief when purchasing the coffee, and some of them departing (rapidly) with the jar for the tips.
He got upset with me because I like black women. (And brown, yellow, pink, orange, purple... whatever).
I've been ignoring color as a reason for disparagement for as long as I can remember. although I can't say the same for the rest of my family.

 

[Nogbad]

Oh! That sort of segregation.

I thought the boys and girls going to different proms was kind of strange.

 

[Ladewig]

Of course some will refuse all evidence and retain their views no matter what, but the average American white was by today's standards a deep racist only 50 years ago, and he isn't now. Why? Because of the effect of the public sphere on private beliefs.

Either that or the racists have been dying off for the past 50 years.

 

[Praktik]

This doesn't actually surprise me. I remember reading ( in the early 1990s) about a school in Toronto, of all places, where the black kids were organizing their own prom because they felt that the school-supported prom would insufficiently reflect their "black culture". There are still groups in Toronto agitating for "blacks-only" schools.

Indeed. On the local dance culture board, tribe.ca, the thread for the "black only schools" jumped to 12 pages in a matter of hours.

 

[pchams]

This doesn't actually surprise me. I remember reading ( in the early 1990s) about a school in Toronto, of all places, where the black kids were organizing their own prom because they felt that the school-supported prom would insufficiently reflect their "black culture". There are still groups in Toronto agitating for "blacks-only" schools.

Agitating? They have it:
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=272389

I personally think this is wrong. Just as I think separate Catholic schools are wrong. There should be one public school system funded by all.
However, I guess we will see how this goes.

As far as the OP is concerned, I think there should be an integrated prom for the whole school.
If white or black racists want to hold their own proms separately, go ahead, but
the goal, I think today, should be to work together to reach common solutions to worldly problems.