Richard Benjamin

I hope we have

I hope we have American-topias. Richard Benjamin

I was surprised by how forces in the community could mobilize against a community changing. There were many examples of this. In St. George, members of the Latino community proposed having a Dixie Fiesta. The resistance to that surprised me. Richard Benjamin

I don’t want to

I don’t want to live in a monoculture of any kind. I don’t want to live in a wealthy monoculture, a black monoculture. I don’t want to live in an elitist, progressive monoculture. Richard Benjamin

People would say, You

People would say, You know, Rich, it’s nature. Birds of a feather flock together. I have to point out to them that, no, that’s not the case. Richard Benjamin

The reason our country

The reason our country looks the way it does is through social engineering that distinctly benefits suburban communities, exurban communities, and often white residents. And we are socially engineered in such a way as to, often unconsciously and unintentionally, but sometimes intentionally, perpetuate this divisive inequality. Richard Benjamin

In the pioneer West

In the pioneer West Whitopias, immigration tended to be the dominant social and racial issue. In Forsyth County, Georgia, immigration is still an issue, but because you have that complicated history of the Trail of Tears and slavery and Jim Crow, the Whitopia has a different flavor. Richard Benjamin

Of course, there isn’t

Of course, there isn’t really a black population in Idaho or Utah. Richard Benjamin

If I were an

If I were an immigrant Latino not born in the US, I could not have written Searching for Whitopia: An Improbably Journey to the Heart of America book. And that is because many of the Whitopians would not have been comfortable talking about their views on immigration, talking about their views on taxes. And they … Read more

There is tremendous long-term

There is tremendous long-term harm when Americans accept ethnic and class balkanization as a de facto fixture of American life. I think that impoverishes our understanding of each other. Richard Benjamin