Privileges 2 and 3

If you recall, I promised to share contemporary examples of Peggy McIntosh’s 1980s article on White Privilege over the next year.  It is time now for the second installment: privileges two and three.
2. If I should need to move, I can be pretty sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area, which I can afford and in which I would want to live.
3. I can be pretty sure that my neighbors in such a location will be neutral or pleasant to me.
As mentioned, people of color have been systematically denied residence in certain neighborhoods throughout the history of the United States.  Current patterns of segregation were really founded in the 1950s with the creation of suburbs following WWII.  Returning white soldiers were given money to finance homes outside of cities in the form of the GI Bill, something denied to black soldiers.  This has led to an amassing of white wealth inthe form of home ownership.

Currently many cities still discriminate against people of color moving into certain neighborhoods.  Towns such as Jesop, IA have a history of raising property taxes in order to keep people of color (who, due to historical systematic discrimination tend to have less money) out.
This MPR story highlights a bit of the housing inequity in Minnesota. Minnesota has the 7^th largest racial gap in homeownership in the nation.  As mentioned, such gaps are due largely to institutional discrimination – sky rocking property taxes, subprime mortgages for people of color, etc.
Other resources of import include the PBS special Race: The Power of an Illusion.  The third video outlines housing inequity in detail.  And The Color Of Wealth, by Meizhu Lui et al.
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Now, it is important to note that once people of color enter a historically white neighborhood the fight is far from over.  Such intrepid souls often are the victims of overt discrimination, discouraging them from such residence.  One of my faculty members in undergraduate school was frequently the victim of property-destructive hate crimes.   (The SPLC documents many of these on their hate map.)
Or, consider this story by Resist Racism or this by RaceWire.