I’ve found it fascinating to read here and there that some Civil Rights leaders are fearing a decrease rather than an increase in focus on civil rights and affirmative action issues should the first African American President assume office come January 2009.
Call it the Bill Cosby Effect?
The thinking goes like this: With a black man in office, Americans will be lulled into thinking that all our racial issues have now been solved. With the election just days away and (dare I say it without jinxing?!) the possibility of a President Obama very real, just thought I’d share these two cheery tidbits about racial and other disparities, just in via the Council on Contemporary Families Briefing, cause I’m feeling all chipper like that today:
Income Gap Between Whites, Latinos Has Grown at Universities
Over the past three decades, the income disparity between Latino and non-Hispanic white students entering four-year colleges and universities has increased fourfold, with the difference in median household income growing from $7,986 in 1975 to $32,965 in 2006.
Declining Black Enrollments at Many of the Nation’s Highest Ranked Law Schools
Over the past eight years black enrollments have declined at a majority of the top-ranked law schools. At nine high-ranking law schools black enrollments are down by 19 percent or more. Three prestigious law schools in the nation show declines of more than 40 percent.
Hmm. Just sayin is all.
Comments
J. K. Gayle — October 27, 2008
Thanks for keeping us informed! I've heard some of the right-wing media outlets proclaim that an Obama presidency is just going to make race relations, and by implication these gaps, worse. Let's not get "lulled" into anything. Thank you again for getting us looking at these issues.
Bob Lamm — October 27, 2008
Many thanks for sharing this disturbing data.
There's a related aspect of what may be ahead that has ugly possibilities. Within a few decades, non-Hispanic Whites will become a minority of the U.S. population, while people from Latino, African American, Asian, Arabic, and Native American heritage will together constitute a majority. Couple that with the possible (likely?) election of a president of the U.S. who had an African father and whose name is Barack Hussein Obama... all this is rather jarring for those who insist that "we" (they inevitably mean White Christians) are losing control of "our" country. I fear that some of these people will not accept the loss of their historic dominance so graciously.