Ingrid Illustrated

  This podcast left me shocked, sad, and very angry. I was appalled by the comments the parents at the board meeting were making. Things like: “So I'm hoping that their discipline records come with them, like their health records come with them.” And even “We are talking about violent behavior that is coming in with my first-grader, my third-grader, and my middle schooler that I'm very worried about.” And the fact that after these comments were made, huge waves of applause followed?! Absolutely horrifying. The worst part is, parents and children from Normandy like Nedra and Mah’Ria had to sit in terrifying silence as these blatantly racist comments were being made about them. At one point, Mah’Ria said she wanted to say something to defend herself, but the overwhelmingly negative responses made her feel scared to even voice her opinion. Something else that shocked me was the color blindness from these events that took place not even 10 years ago. A woman proudly declares, “This...

  In “A Raisin in the Sun”, Mama wants to buy a house in the Clybourne Park neighborhood with the money she received from her deceased husband’s insurance. She wants to achieve the American Dream of living in an actual house with rooms for each family member, she wants bathrooms she doesn’t have to share with her pesky neighbors, and she wants an open yard where children can play. However, this dream may not be achievable for her. One reason is the price of the homes in this neighborhood. Houses were expensive and everyone in her family wanted a piece of the $10,000 Mama received. Another main problem would be that this neighborhood was probably primarily white, since the wealth gap for whites and blacks was huge during this time. Housing discrimination was a prominent issue in “A Rasin in the Sun” and, appallingly, still is in real life today. Despite efforts to eliminate it with laws prohibiting the refusal to sell a home to a person based on race, we can clearly see the effects ...