The Pros And Cons Of Black Ghettos

Anderson makes a strong case for the inevitability of ghetto life--in other words, once "ghettoization" begins, it continues its course without regard to a neighborhood's tentative and transitory movement toward gentrification. The middle class and well-heeled whites and minority cultures who move into regenerating urban communities are attracted to city life for its vibrancy and "charm," yet they ultimately are playing with fire when it comes to sharing the same neighborhood which was formerly the turf of gangs, prostitutes, drug dealers, and other societal deviants. Such areas are frequently called "colorful," when they are, in fact, dangerous. Charm and color quickly turn to fear and suspicion after more than enough reports of car break-ins, gang retaliations, and drug deals gone bad fill the local news. As Anderson (1990) points out in his conclusion:

In the article The Construction of the Ghetto by Massey and Denton, there are several policies and practices that still has its effect on racial structure today. Among the several practices and policies are the Government Issue (GI) Bill for veterans and housing loans. At a political view, the GI Bill for veterans helped them buy houses at a lower price due to their contribution in the war. Since White veterans have the GI Bill, they moved out to the suburbs during 1940-1970, which was during the time of suburbanization. Because Black veterans did not receive the GI Bill, they were unable to move out and buy houses. This effect is still present today, considering that in the statistics, Blacks are less likely than Whites to own houses.

Mostly ghettos are places or sections of a city, that are a thickly populated slum area inhabited predominantly by members of an ethnic, or other minority groups, as a result of social or economic restrictions, pressures or hardships. Ghettos also are places that do not have career oriented jobs but in most cases, they only offer trade jobs like sewing, hairdressing and carpentry. We can tell from

Although the minority, pregnant, uneducated people of the world could get all the free help they applied for. Like I said, I do agree with helping those in true need of assistance. However, there are too many people who are cradle to grave welfare recipients, and that just isn’t right. Somewhere in the system there needs to be a program in assisting those to get off of the system.

​According to dicitonaity.com, a ghetto is “a section of a city, especially a thickly populated slum area, inhabited predominantly by members of an ethnic or other minority group, often as a result of social or economic restrictions, pressures, or hardships” (“Ghetto”). The five major ghettos were established in Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow, Lublin, and Lvov (“Holocaust Timeline: The Ghettos”). The Nazi Party used three different types of ghettos to isolate Jews from society. The three types were closed, open, and reconstruction ghettos (“Types of Ghettos”). Closed ghettos were the most common and often had high mortality rates as they were closed off with stone or brick walls, wooden fences, and barbed wire. The largest ghetto, Warsaw, was a closed ghetto and had over 400,000 people in an area of 1.3 squared miles (“Holocaust Timeline: The Ghettos”). Open ghettos had no physical barriers, but restrictions on entering and were often only in small towns used for temporary housing before relocating to a larger, often closed, ghetto. The majority of open ghettos were located in small towns, and in the countries of Poland, the occupied Soviet Union, and Transnistria. Lastly, deconstruction ghettos were tightly sealed off and only

In the 1990s, they were changes that were important in the gentrification of cities in the United States. Corporate developers of the restructuring of the real estate industry initiated the process. Since the

Emily Badger said in The Washington Post “The reality, though, is that a tremendous share of people who rely on government programs designed for the poor in fact work — they just don't make enough at it to cover their basic living expenses (Badger).” To even go a little further, according to the UC Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education seventy-three percent of individuals who benefit from assistant programs in the U.S, live in a household where at least one individual is earning/bringing in an income. Even with that income they just cant afford the tedious things such as medial bills, paying for childcare/daycare services, or buying groceries after they receive their paycheck or get done paying all of the other bills that factor into everyday life (Badger). If there was a crack down on the requirements for welfare, yes it may be a little harder to receive but for people who TRULY need it would get it. As long as one can prove that they cannot make all of their bills and provide their family with all of the necessities with the income they have, they should absolutely receive welfare. If you do not have a job you should be given the option to either find a job by a certain deadline, or participate in community service. If half of the individuals who abuse welfare we caught, and forced to

Throughout history, the poor and undesirable classes of societies were always placed in separate living areas. For the undesirable poor and African Americans of America, the ghetto was created to keep them out of certain settlements. In his book, Dark Ghetto: Dilemmas of Social Power, Kenneth B. Clark describes the ghetto as having an "invisible wall" that surrounded it. People who live in ghettos have their social dynamics, behaviorism, and overall health negatively impacted by racism and segregation. Life in the ghettos is considered to be both harsh and dangerous due to the high crime rates and violence.

Welfare gives individuals the opportunity to get back on track and receive financial aid for their families and themselves. Welfare comes in many forms such as: monetary payments, subsidies and vouchers, or housing assistance. By receiving welfare each individual is responsible for meeting certain criteria. The criteria required to meet is made so that it is made “fair” to everyone. For welfare to be fair though the rules must be forced upon to all of the individuals that are requesting the extra help. Many people abuse the welfare system, but someone has to put their foot down and say that enough is enough.

There will always be negative stereotypes of low-income African Americans, but white police officers and officers of color tend to have slightly different views on the “ghetto.” Caucasian police officers often tend to think that black communities are entirely atrocious, but African American officers can see that there are both good and bad elements to this group of people. African American officers seem to moralize the class struggle between African American workers who are much like themselves, they do not let the negative views define them as a person. They have risen above their poor community and refuse to let it own them. Thus, African American officers often think that they are solely protecting the good people of the ghetto from the

Welfare requirements should be stricter. To help eliminate the people on welfare who don’t actually need help, drug testing should be required for welfare recipients. 20% of people on welfare have used drugs in the past year and 5% admit to having a drug addiction. Drug testing will help in two ways. The first way is by getting addicts help and the second way is to help the government stop wasting money on people who don’t need it. Welfare should not be a lifelong dependency because America cannot afford spending money on people who don’t need help (Vitter 1). Drug testing would help the economy because it would help get drug abusers and low income families help. If we limit who gets what in society we will get better results. If you added certain requirements that had to be passed it would push people to contribute in society. In order to do this, people should be required to work while on welfare.

In Race and the Liberal Agenda: The Loss of the Integrationist Dream, Gary Orfield explores the history of white prejudice and the crucial need for change in the “ghetto system” (Orfield, 2011, p. 315). Orfield challenges the idea that the ghetto is “natural” and proposes a plan to change the “ghetto system” for the better (Orfield, 2011, p. 352). Orfield believes that the “ghetto system” could be changed, if there was a “…measurement of conditions within ghettos to show the direction of change in social and economic conditions and in educational opportunities” (Orfield, 2011, p. 353). I believe this is the most important aspect of this chapter because this society would be better if the conditions of life in the ghettos were changed completely.

Without clearly describing the beginning of the ghetto, one cannot fully understand the true history and meaning. I believe that Duneier put together an empowering piece of work that does just that. He thoroughly brings you back to the beginning and gives you a true sense of the concept. He not only uses social scientists and their work, but he brings you in in a way that feels like you are actually there. His descriptive nature and feeling behind his work allows one to truly feel the emotions he put into it. I now feel that I have a more in tuned sense of history and understanding of the meaning behind something that was and still is such a big part of us as Americans.

May 10, 1933 emboldened by the momentum of the movement, Goebbels organized and staged the first, infamous public book burning. German university students were incited to burn books with “un-German" ideas. A century before, German-Jewish poet, Heinrich Hein seems to have predicted the coming events when he wrote, "That was but a prelude; where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people."

Searching for the word “Ghetto” in Longman’s Dictionary of Contemporary English, it can be read the following definition: