grudlian. 4725 Posted December 27, 2018 7 hours ago, sycasey 2.0 said: This little detail inadvertently comments upon the racism inherent in American home ownership during the post-war period. Long story short, while the US government subsidized housing for a lot of veterans after WWII, other policies (both formal and informal) refused home loans to African-American buyers. So perhaps it's not surprising that in Potter's version of the town there are more black residents. Everyone rents there; Potter owns everything. That's not to suggest that George Bailey or his company are deliberately trying to keep black people out of town (given the Baileys' fondness for Annie it seems unlikely they would be), but they specialize in home ownership, and those scales were heavily tilted against blacks during that time. I just skimmed the interview. So, maybe they cover it but veterans coming home from WWII were also segregated into different jobs. White people were significantly more likely to get money for college. Black people, and presumably all people of color but I've never seen proof of it, were more likely to pushed to trade schools if they got education money at all. Share this post Link to post
sycasey 2.0 2301 Posted December 27, 2018 3 hours ago, grudlian. said: I just skimmed the interview. So, maybe they cover it but veterans coming home from WWII were also segregated into different jobs. White people were significantly more likely to get money for college. Black people, and presumably all people of color but I've never seen proof of it, were more likely to pushed to trade schools if they got education money at all. I think they cover that too, yeah. Share this post Link to post