While not wise, the state of Arizona has always marched to its own tune, including being--IIRC--the only state to refuse federal highway funds in the 80's just so it could set its own agenda and speed limits (just look at all the state routes that exist around Phoenix, for example).
Louisiana held out until 1998, which is why they were the last state in the Union to raise the drinking age to 21.
And I'd note that Arizona's agenda on speed limits has, in my experience, been to set markedly lower ones than surrounding states, coupled with aggressive use of speed traps near the borders, in order to extract tribute from the fact that most users of the interstate highways in Arizona want nothing more than to get out of the state as quickly as possible. So I'm puzzled that their agenda would conflict with Federal standards - perhaps you have a source that describes the history of this issue?
Yep. But Arizona was referring to his legal effect on the USA.
A preposterous hair to split, for any reasonable person.
But exactly the sort of cheap evasion we'd expect from racists.
Also, you don't seem to realize that the reason that Arizona didn't have
de jure segregation by the time that Brown v Board rolled around was that a previous Supreme Court decision struck down Arizona's segregated school system about 3 years prior. And so, the entire narrative about Arizona resisting MLK Day because "they didn't have segregation" is itself a canard intended to conceal Arizona's actual history of racist policy and conduct.
Sociologically, we're still a segregated society. So. . . then he ultimately failed nationwide.
All the more reason to memorialize the man and his ideas, then.
You just described the entire USA if not the entire world.
In the first place, I'm not really concerned with the entire world here.
In the second place, a difference in degree becomes a difference in kind, when the segregation reaches a certain critical mass with respect to political representation and power more generally. That any given major city has a few suburbs (or exurbs) full of reactionaries is not the point - that Arizona has no real political counterweight to such groups is.
California, for example, has no shortage of white-flight gated communities - and plenty of people that openly admire Arizona's new laws. But they aren't able to dominate state politics.
Phoenix is, like most American cities, very liberal which may run contrary to the rest of the state.
In the first place, Phoenix is not "very liberal." It is, charitably, "Democratic-leaning."
But more to the point, describing the political orientation of Phoenix itself is a distraction - the relevant population has all moved outside of the actual city limits of Phoenix - Maricopa county has 4 million residents, only 1.5 million of which are Phoenicians. And Maricopa county is a reliable Republican stronghold, and long has been, regardless of what Phoenix thinks.
That's how "white flight" works: the whites keep all the power, avoid funding any services in the city where the minorities live, and generally pretend that they don't even exist.
If the city did, then it's in keeping with every single American city thath as a MLK Jr. Drive/Street/Boulevard/Highway.
Err, methinks you misunderstand. I wasn't talking about Phoenix naming a street after MLK. I was talking about them later
renaming the street. That has not happened in most American cities with an MLK street - and in the few where it has, it's been part of an overt white supremacist push.
"Severely" meaning about 4.5 percent, as opposed to about 12 for the rest of the nation.
Yes. In my book, having only 1/3 as many black people as would be expected is "severe."
Either way, I don't quote my own experience as indicative of the state, but there was a certain pride amongst most people I met there in their casual integration of whites, blacks and Asians.
I'll note that such is a frequent feature of white supremacist societies, particularly ones where whites form an overbearing majority and monopolize political power. In situations where whites do not feel threatened, and feel that the "pecking order" is well-established, then interaction with the "lower castes" is desirable - every interaction instantiates the hierarchy, which the dominant party approves of. And so they take some "pride" in how "charitable" they are about interacting with their lessers.
Not that every individual thinks that (even implicity) - but you'll see the exact same sort of "pride" coming from overt Southern racists, cited as evidence of how superior their white-supremacist framework is. This same point has been thrown around since before the Civil War, when the higher level of black-white interaction in the Slave Power was cited in response to Northern criticism of slavery, in order to demonstrate the putative supremacy of Confederate society.
I somewhat agree and somewhat disagree. As I stated, Arizona isn't a bastion of racial integration, it's just that Blacks and Asians--on the whole, especially the middle class ones--tend to hang with white people more.
They have little choice - in Maricopa country, for example, white people are like 80% of the population. You refuse to hang out with them, it's slim pickings.
Imagine an elementary school class with exactly 1 non-white student - he'll hang out with white kids, or else be ostracized. But that sort of "integration" doesn't translate into enlightenment amongst the white kids - it occurs in an environment where they monopolize all social power and norms, and so is entirely on their terms. That they end up comfortable with that situation is often
regressive - they mature into the sorts of adults we see here who don't think that they're racist ("I have black friends!") but go around insisting that any display of non-whitewashed minority identity or agency is an attack on society that must be repressed.
"Heavily underrepresented" is a matter of perspective, though. Phoenix metro has about 4.3 million and many people of many racial backgrounds, including a large population of black people (certainly more black people than Cleveland has Asians or Mexicans).
And, as I just mentioned, 80% of that 4.3 Million are white people.
It is no different than other American cities except in its proportions.
In its proportions of white people, you mean? I don't think you'll find another major mtero area in the southwestern US that is that white.
Having more of one and less of another is not specifically indicative of a racial trend.
Err... that
is a racial trend, to begin with. It may not indicate a
racist trend, but it certainly isn't evidence against such.
Likewise, Ohio must be really anti-Asian for being severely underrepresented by their population.
That would be the case if Ohio weren't being depopulated in the first place - the fact that no Asians are moving there doesn't tell us anything, since nobody else is moving there, either.
But people are moving into Arizona, from all over. So if certain classes of people aren't showing up in that population inflow, that raises questions.
And to that point: ever ask a black person from elsewhere in the country what they think of Arizona? The state does not have a good reputation in the black community - just ask Chuck D.
If having few blacks makes AZ racist, then what does that say about Mississippi for having so many blacks?
It says that they imported millions of them as slaves for centuries and so ended up with a huge poplation of black people.
I have no problem with having English as the official language.
We've gotten along fine without an official language so far, and so I see no reason to throw away our pragmatic, convenient current system (wherein whatever languages are needed are used) in favor of some ideological favor for English - which, in the context of Spanish being the only possible challenger, by virtue of Hispanic immigration, I find impossible to dissociate from anti-Mexican animus.
It's no more racist to make English our national language than it is for Canada to make English and French theirs or for Brazil to make Portuguese their national language.
In other words, highly racist. You're talking about colonial empires that wiped out other races and imposed their cultures amongst the ruins.
Each nation is an immigrant nation, and nobody cries fowl for them adopting official languages and require it as a cornerstone of business and learning.
I know plenty of Americans who consider official languages to be an offensive ethnocentrist practice, and who cite the longstanding success of the United States without an official language as conclusive evidence that the arguments in favor of them are hollow.
You'll have to educate me as to how AZ is at the forefront of white supremacy
I've tried to, but you don't seem to want to hear it. Instead you keep repeating bits of the fantasy history that racists like to impose on Arizona (no segregation, opposing MLK day to pretend that Arizona didn't have segregation, "touchy-feely" law enforcement, etc.).
As to the racial profiling, the "profiling" is a term added by those hating the new law that was just passed.
Hating it for valid reasons, and adding the term as a legitimate description.
There is, in fact, no demand for profiling,
Riiiiiiight
How about we wait and see if it happens
No need - we've seen this show before, and know how it ends. You can extend credulity to Arizona all you like, but reasonable people have no reason to do so, especially when it comes to a state with such a reprehensible track record.
before we complain about as state that is finally doing something about disaster that is illegal immigration.
I'm still waiting for someone to articulate exactly what the "disaster" here is, or how it would be improved by this sort of crack-down. Which is why I continue to assume that this is simply culture war fodder to lock up the votes of the Maricopa county country club set.
So, the side issue is also that Arizona has suburban (aka "cancerous") sprawl filled with white people?
That's a side-issue, yes.
Is that not every major metropolitan area in the USA except San Francisco
(excluding the rest of the bay area), Portland and New Orleans (all of whom, oddly enough, are boxed in by physical restrictions).
Not to the extent of Phoenix. There are plenty of other sprawl cities, to be sure, but the level observed in Phoenix is not the norm. And when you consider the numbers of pools and lawns installed in the middle of the desert, it becomes a real facepalm.
Seriously, quad? You've resorted to pointless ad homs to describe an entire state?
You spend your entire life living in states that border Arizona, you end up with a pretty dim view of them. They are the single most reviled group where I currently live ("Go back to Arizona, douchebag!" can frequently be heard at the beach or in traffic during the tourist season), and ran a close second to the Texans in my previous location. It makes sense, if you think about it: what kind of person would choose to live in Arizona, when every single state that it borders is far preferable?
I think you are well aware of the fact that "prisoners and weirdo polygamist cults" are. . . well. . . the fringe sub-minority living out beyond reach in the desert or mountains.
Right, like I said: the rest of the state except for Phoenix (I did already give Flagstaff and Tuscon passes didn't I? And the Navajo Nation gets one too - so who am I missing?).