When my family moved to Naperville, there were no African-Americans here, and the attitude regarding them was, to put it mildly, uninviting. Black people weren’t allowed in the pool, and if a black family drove into town, the police followed them until they left.
Coming from the South Side of Chicago, I thought this was kind of odd. We had been living in the upstairs apartment of my grandparents’ home in a neighborhood I loved. Ethnically, it had one of everything. However, it was cramped, so when our neighbor told us about Naperville’s cheap land and building materials, we took a chance.
Nothing is cheap here anymore, of course. The price of housing is commonly given as the reason there are still very few African-Americans and Hispanics in town. Those who do live here tend to live in single-minority-rich areas, one for blacks on the northwest side and one for Hispanics that’s more south central.
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I believe ethnically diverse neighborhoods are better because I personally enjoy them. It’s one of the reasons I like science. The only thing that matters about people is what’s on their minds. I happen to like all the different backgrounds, experiences, points of view and languages.
I think it’s healthy when the rich and poor can mingle and discuss the many parts of community life that have nothing to do with money. I have to confess, though, that over the years I have come to favor people of modest means. To paraphrase Alexander Pope: We may see the small regard God has for money by the kinds of people he gives it to.
I think it helps both groups when old and young can be around each other. Many of the political and social problems we have today are due to the almost complete segregation of the generations. If it were biologically possible, they would evolve into separate species unrecognizable to each other.
So while I think a community that is racially and economically diverse, with affordable housing for low-income families and the disabled, is vastly superior, that’s just my opinion. I can’t objectively argue it’s a better way to live. What I can argue, however, is it’s fair, and to me that’s incredibly important. Life in Naperville should be fair because fairness cannot exist anywhere if it doesn’t exist everywhere.
I realize nobody is ever going to jail for displaying an unwelcoming attitude, making some kids feel uncomfortable in school, leaving certain races out of housing ads, awarding mortgages unevenly or steering certain races to certain neighborhoods and away from others. But what I do know is that it’s not fair, it’s just wrong and it shouldn’t happen here.