It’s Monday. How a racist Instagram account turned a Bay Area neighborhood towards itself. Plus, California is rethinking its future as its inhabitants stagnates.
A personal Instagram account with simply over a dozen followers won’t seem to be one thing that might trigger a lot bother.
But the invention in 2017 of such an account, run by college students, with racist posts shattered a Bay Area highschool and its city. Friendships had been destroyed, lawsuits had been filed and the trajectories of lives had been modified without end.
In a gripping account in The New York Times Magazine, Dashka Slater chronicled what occurred at that college within the Alameda County neighborhood of Albany. The years of fallout from the Instagram account — together with sit-ins, households fleeing city and a courtroom case that was appealed all the way in which to the Supreme Court — illuminate how Americans take into consideration race, social media and punishment. I extremely suggest studying the total article.
I spoke to Dashka, who relies within the Bay Area, about her reporting and what it reveals about younger folks and hate incidents. This isn’t her first foray into this world: In 2017, Dashka printed “The 57 Bus,” a nonfiction e-book about an adolescent who identifies as agender — neither male nor feminine — and was set on hearth by one other teenager whereas driving a bus in Oakland. That e-book started as a New York Times Magazine article.
Here’s my dialog with Dashka, calmly edited for size and readability:
How did you come to this story? Why did it attraction to you?
I had simply completed writing “The 57 Bus,” and I had no intention of getting youngsters and hate be my beat. But I used to be at an advance signing occasion for that e-book, and somebody within the signing line talked about what had simply occurred in Albany with the invention of the racist Instagram account. As I started to analyze, I discovered that very same sense of disturbed attraction, the place I assumed each: “I don’t want to spend any time at all on this very disturbing, upsetting story” and “I want to know everything about this, and I want to understand all the issues that are kind of lurking beneath the surface about race and gender and justice and social media and shame and accountability.”
This story takes place at Albany High School. Does it really feel to be particular to the Bay Area? Or do you assume such racial tensions might explode anyplace?
Well, it does occur in every single place. In 2019, the Southern Poverty Law Center despatched a survey to highschool districts asking about hate incidents on campus for Okay-12 colleges. And within the fall of 2018 alone, there have been virtually 3,300 separate incidents.
While I used to be reporting this story, one of many first issues I did was arrange a Google Alert for any time the phrases “school” and “hate” appeared collectively on-line. I get a Google Alert daily that has about eight issues in it. Usually one or two of them are one thing much like what occurred in Albany.
What I heard quite a bit from folks in Albany was, in fact this occurred in Albany, with its historical past of redlining and restrictive covenants and Ku Klux Klan exercise within the Twenties. And, as I say to folks, that’s true throughout. That’s true in my metropolis of Oakland, which is far more numerous than Albany, but in addition has that historical past of racially restrictive covenants and redlining and Ku Klux Klan exercise. So that is very a lot an American story.
And, in fact, there have been all of the particulars: it being a small city, it being within the liberal Bay Area the place no person thought this might occur, it having occurred three months after Donald Trump was elected, when all people was nonetheless type of in a state of shock and questioning about the way forward for this nation. All of these had been contributing elements to the way in which it performed out. But this does occur in every single place.
It has been six years since this occurred, and, in some methods, Americans are most likely fascinated by race now greater than they ever have. So I’m questioning in case you assume the hate incidents amongst younger individuals are on the decline. Is that Google Alert nonetheless frequently pulling up these tales?
I at all times get slightly lull through the summer season, however final week I bought my first alert of a hate incident because the spring. One of the issues which have occurred is that white nationalist teams have change into emboldened, and they’re excellent at utilizing social media to radicalize, indoctrinate and entice younger folks, notably boys, notably white and Asian boys. And so I don’t see this, sadly, stopping this week or subsequent week.
Where we’re touring
Today’s tip comes from Susan Weikel Morrison, who lives in Fresno. Susan recommends Rosie the Riveter World War II Home Front National Historical Park in Richmond:
“The park commemorates the legacy of the U.S. home front effort to rapidly and abundantly supply the military during World War II and highlights especially the contribution of the Rosies, women who filled equipment construction jobs so that men could fight in the Pacific and Europe.
The attractive bayside park includes an informative visitors center; a preserved World War II Victory ship, the Red Oak Victory; and a restored Ford assembly plant that helped build combat vehicles during the war.”
Tell us about your favourite locations to go to in California. Email your ideas to CAtoday@nytimes.com. We’ll be sharing extra in upcoming editions of the publication.
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And earlier than you go, some good news
A matchmaking effort introduced Emily Dobies and Sal Steiner collectively — and but they weren’t the couple being arrange.
Dobies was attempting to orchestrate a match between Steiner and a mutual buddy. “I was like, ‘Sal’s perfect — for everyone,’” Dobies advised The Times.
She and Steiner met in 2012 at a restaurant in San Francisco, Coffee Bar, the place they each labored. Dobies had lengthy harbored a crush on her co-worker, although she by no means thought Steiner would share her emotions.
But in 2016, after the matchmaking try had taken place, one thing shifted. “You’re the most attractive, magical person I’ve ever met,” she advised Steiner.
Source: www.nytimes.com