Re: [Mpls] Put your kids where your mouth is...

[Brobson34]

The extreme defensiveness and hurtful language (white middle-class parents
who send their kids to public schools in the belief that it benefits their
children and society at large are called "arrogant") of Ms. Smith's post
indicate that someone struck a nerve with this issue.
And maybe I am arrogant, because her comments certainly struck a nerve with
me. But I know it to be true that taking care of one's own--usually described
as "Providing for my family"--is the ultimate rationale of every person I've
encountered who has done nasty things in their lives to preserve the racist,
classist status quo that Ms. Smith decries. Her position is no different than
theirs.
I regret that her kids and grandkids are being denied the opportunity to go
to school with my kid--a special ed student who has profited from and enjoys
the advantages of what has been a very responsive Mpls. public school system.
If she thinks her African American offspring are any less at risk going to
private school, where the mommies and daddies are just as racist and classist
as anywhere else and have more of a stake in keeping it that way, then yeah,
I'd say she is a classic "liberal," as in, "let's do right for the
downtrodden, but keep me and my family out of the equation." Spare me that
"community activism" road, ever paved with good intentions.

Britt Robson
Lyndale