motherhood, politics, faith & whatnot

I heard a piece on NPR this morning about the Duke Lacrosse case, and even they have fallen into the trap of trying to pigeon-hole this case into a black v. white thing.

They had a quote from Mayor Bill Bell commenting on how Durham has been mischaracterized by the national media when it’s portrayed as a city divided by race. The NPR commentator dismissed this comment with a “Well, there is a divide between black and white in Durham.”

Yes, we have a higher than average percentage of people who are poor here, but they aren’t all black. We also have many high income people here, and you know what, they aren’t all white, either. And what isn’t seen by people who want to describe Durham in the black v. white terms is that there is a large middle class here, too, of all races. Our neighborhood for example is a mixture of people.

That’s not to say that there aren’t issues, as there are anywhere. But this case isn’t about some racial divide. The accused aren’t even from Durham. The lacrosse team largely hails from the Northeast. I don’t really want to start something, but I observed a lot more division and intolerance among groups while living in Boston for five years than I have here.

This case has more to do with college culture and maybe the culture among elite athletes and group psychology than it does about the state of things in Durham.