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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951&sectionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.[/quote]

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.[/quote]

Your take on gentrification makes sense to me.  Related question, do you think the messaging about "white privilege" has an impact?  I worry that "all white people have it so much easier than you do" messaging adds to the hopelessness these kids might feel and makes success seem even further out of reach.  [/quote]

I am not PP but have experience working with poor black youth and I don’t think white privilege was something they thought about at all.  They didn’t consume the same media as older people.  One of the main issues I found was a lack of opportunity and examples of success in their very small community (think a few blocks). And since they saw so many young mostly black males die from violence they felt like they wouldn’t live past 25, so why act any differently?[/quote]

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