While there is some racism among blue collared whites, the most racism I experienced were with black people. It is amazing growing up in a black neighborhood and going to black schools how they constantly talked about the white man not giving them chances and easily claim racism, but being an Asian, I remember being treated pretty badly by blacks because of my race. While I was in a magnet vanguard program from grades 6-12, this was at a public school that had to coexist with regular school program. I had to attend the regular program classes for electives and physical education. While in the magnet program, I was treated fairly well and got along fine, every time I went to the regular classes, which were primarily black, they would find a reason to pick on my because of my race. I had to take martial arts at an early age for fear of my physical safety. Even then, when a black kid attacked me and I started to win, the other black kids would step in and stop the fight. However in the first minute of the fight, when I was losing, no one bothered to step in. Amazing.
When I worked in high school at Wendy's. The laziest people were the black people, they constantly complained about every little thing, and did the least work. It is amazing to see.
When I went to basic training in the Army, we had to wake up in the middle of the night to do security duty. After my turn was up, I had to wake up the next person to be on duty. Whenever it was a black person, they would not want to wake up and make excuses. I've never had this problem with anyone else. I wasn't allowed to be off duty until they woke up. They took their sweet time and were the slowest.
My parents still live in the same black neighborhood that I grew up in. Usually when I go there, there would be some black people driving next to me and making fun of me for my race. These were more often females than males.
I had to get this off my chest, as this was the environment I grew up in. If black people want to be respected, they need to treat others with respect. They also need to develop a good work ethic. They are the first to make claims of racism, and they are also the first to perpetuate racism when given the opportunity.
While I had good experiences with college educated blacks, when I had joined a small growing black church, the blue collar blacks are the most racist I have ever met. Even when I worked in the states with predominant blue collar whites, I wasn't treated poorly.
As far as maturity and development goes, the blue collared white people have matured much further.
Oh I forgot one of the reasons why I wanted to post, people ask for more money for the poor schools but my experience has been that when attending classes in the regular school, the students are very unruly and the teacher often has problems controlling the class. More books, and more money, won't make much difference, as these students are determined in class to jack around. They are not there for learning. They don't care about an education. In my experience, teachers can't control the students in the poor schools. Until that is resolved, and the students actually want to study, more money is a waste of resources.
I took 2 years of high school Spanish in the regular school. One of the black students was constantly goofing around in class and would not study during study time. At the end of the 2 years, the teacher asked him if he had learned anything, he responded, "Si". She asked if that is all he learned, he responded, "Si". While the guy was trying to be funny, and I actually liked him, he learned very little. I don't consider him to be unruly. I thought he was more of the class comedian. Very funny, but did little school work. He may even be a very successful comedian now. Who knows. Quite charismatic. The point is, under the same teacher, textbooks, and conditions, I had managed to learn quite a bit of Spanish while some didn't. It is really up to the student during study time, to study. The teacher constantly threatened to fail students who didn't study and got low grades, as a result, but she had a kind heart underneath and didn't fail anyone. She now teaches at a prestigious private school. I guess she had enough of students who weren't interested.
Students now graduate without learning to read because they don't want to. You can't blame the teachers for that. They actually try to teach, but it is up to the student if he wants to learn.
I support more money for the public magnet schools, which exist in poor neighborhoods too. I went to them. I should know. In the magnet schools, students are serious about their education and they deserve good materials. Students who are interested in a better education should apply for the magnet program. Learning to read is something that is up to the student and more money will not help.
And yes, even in the magnet program, a number of teachers were asses. Though there were some good teachers, I will always remember, who sparked my imagination and creativity.
