And so four boys from the Bronx arrived in September 2010 and a fifth a few months later, moving in with host families in this faded city of 16,500 and enrolling at a school that, with only 95 students, was barely afloat.
Quickly, the basketball team was transformed, notching a record of 16-7 for the 2010-11 season, a stunning turnaround from the previous year’s 2-18. This season, the Mounties, as the team is known, are 15-1 and sailing toward the state playoffs.
But the story of the Bronx boys in Rutland is not a uniformly happy one. Some students and parents are livid about their presence on the team, saying it deprives local players of court time and is an underhanded tactic by Mount St. Joseph to improve its team.
Forget the feel-good story of some kids from the Bronx getting a good high school education. Little Ethan isn't getting enough court time. If a star player grew up in the Bronx, then that's cheating. You need four generations to count as a real Vermonter, ayup.
Thinking, acting, and buying local isn't sustainable. We fear the foreign and somehow that's okay. It's more environmentally friendly. We justify our exclusion of outsiders in bizarre ways. People develop, not places.
13 comments:
Of course, xenophobia doesn't do anyone any good, and it is good to not be to protectionist... but how do most people develop if it is not done locally? If we rely on talent (i.e. businesses, entrepreneurs, etc.) coming and going for economic development, as is implied by "local isn't sustainable," then we are never going to get away from the imported factory town model that has devestated communities all across the rust belt. If nothing (or no one) is developed locally, I have a hard time believing that anything (or anyone) has really developed at all.
In this case, outsiders from the Bronx are being developed locally in Rutland. What should matter is the development of those students. Instead, we focus on Rutland. What matters is the development of Rutland. That kind of thinking is what devastated the Rust Belt.
So, are we better off just letting Rutland and other communities continue to develop those from the Bronx who are able to get out, and do nothing to help the Bronx develop its own endogenous advantages? Isn't this the exact opposite strategy Pittsburgh used to become more attractive again? And if one region is gaining in skills as a result of the loss of another region, then can we really say that economic development, as a whole, is occuring?
And if one region is gaining in skills as a result of the loss of another region, then can we really say that economic development, as a whole, is occuring?
One region isn't gaining skills. People are gaining skills. The latter, not the former, is the definition of economic development.
Point taken, but I think we are playing semantics here, because it was obvious that I was talking about the people of the region; so I'll word it differently:
And if one region's people are gaining in skills as a result of the loss of skills among people from another region (or the loss of those skilled people from one region to another), then can we really say that economic development, as a whole, is occuring?
Or are we just basically shifting already-skilled people around to where the jobs are?
P.S. By the way, I enjoy reading your blog.
First, thanks for the kind words about my blog. I appreciate your comments and the opportunity to sharpen my own line of thinking.
And if one region's people are gaining in skills as a result of the loss of skills among people from another region (or the loss of those skilled people from one region to another), then can we really say that economic development, as a whole, is occuring?
Yes. The very act of migration is economic development. Skilled people who move somewhere else are more developed than skilled people who stay. In place-centric terms, better to import skilled people than to develop locally skilled people who stay in the regional workforce.
I'm a big a fan of migration and such as anyone. But I don't think you can write off every concern as xenophobia. Every human society has always recognized a hierarchy of obligation: family, town, tribe, state, college, religion, nation, political party, etc.
You seem to be positing a world of two atomic entities: places and individuals. Individuals enter or leave places exclusively for their own personal advantage. Conversely, places are obligated to provide whatever they can for whatever people decide to arrive there, or else those who object are xenophobes (as opposed to merely being equally self-interested). I don't think any real community works this way or ever will. (It would be interesting to do a psychological/political study of people's reactions to two stories: the one you posted of people from the Bronx facing hostility as they go to Rutland, Vermont, and one where the residents of Rutland, Vermont face hostility from locals when they colonize ^h^h^h^h^h^h gentrify ^h^h^h^h^h move to and invest in the Bronx).
FYI: Complaints of "recruiting" by private schools is endemic in high school athletics, regardless of the origin of students.
You seem to be positing a world of two atomic entities: places and individuals.
I am and I don't think that's just a rhetorical polemic. As a geographer, I'm sensitive to the relationship between people and territory. "Places are obligated ..." suggests agency. Places are not agents. People are.
I'm not writing off every concern as xenophobia. I'm highlighting the fact that territoriality is the dominant narrative. Migration merely illuminates the tension between place-centrism and people-centrism.
Though we've lived in a post-Fair Housing Act America more than four decades, that doesn't mean there aren't still ways for communities to be discriminatory. The way Brooklyn-based architecture firm Interboro Partners sees it, a housing discrimination exists still, through what they call the "Arsenal of Exclusion and Inclusion," legal policies that may keep some people in, and keep others out.
I'm just trying to tease out what I see as some of the underlying assumptions of "xenophobia" by exaggerating the notion.
To me, to be xenophobia, there has to be an element of prima facie irrationality, not merely self-interest. Wanting more playing time for your own kids, etc. is simply garden variety self-interest.
Wanting more playing time for your own kids, etc. is simply garden variety self-interest.
Would you complain as loudly if it was the kid of your neighbor for the last 20 years eating into your kid's playing time?
The rationale for the complaint isn't rational. That's xenophobic.
I know from my experience in Indiana that any time a private school recruits people from outside the area, there are similar arguments. This is both from the standpoint of those who don't attend private schools, and thus aren't advantaged by being able to recruit (which is strictly forbidden) and from those who live inside the regular service area of the school. This a Catholic school I believe, which normally serves a local market. I don't think either of these has to do with xenophobia per se.
I'm familiar with the complaints about private high schools having an unfair competitive advantage in sports given the disparity in talent recruitment geography. For example, a private school may poach players from multiple school districts within the same city. The griping may not concern any "outsiders".
Post a Comment