Okay, But Why Were The Suburbs Shaped By Racism?

For nearly a century, the suburbs have been a cornerstone of the American Dream. But for almost as long, some people have criticized the suburbs for being too conformist, too dependent on cars, and to be blunt, too… white. We know that the suburbs have been diversifying over the past few decades, and today “suburban woman” isn’t just code for “white woman” — no matter how much the media tries to simplify us. But there’s no denying that the suburbs have excluded families who weren’t white for most of their history, and if we’re not careful, they will again in the future.President Trump has long tried to win over suburban women by scaring us, telling us that low-income housing (or immigrants, or Black people, or whoever is on his mind that day) will plunge the suburbs into crime and chaos. But not only is there no evidence for his claims, suburban women love their neighbors. We know that our diversity is our strength.Trump wants to take us back in time to the days of “whites-only” suburbs by ending fair housing rules and investigations of discrimination. It’s up to us to say no way.