Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Racial Diversity in Cohousing

[carol collier (doctor5622no]

 As a life long African-American, I really take offense to whomever described 
us this way. I say shame on them for stereotyping their own people in such an 
ignorant way.  We come in all flavors. No one in my family talks that way. 
Actually, no one I associate with talks that way , except people of all ilk 
that I see in the criminal justice system, and very few of them would dare to 
do this around me. The majority of my African-American children are 
vegan/vegetarian. I can well afford to live in cohousing. Yeah, I have Boulder 
income. We can talk about the biases that have been ingrained in ALL of us 
about African-Americans. There is some testing from Harvard University, The 
Implicit Association Test, that one can do for free. For me, I don’t need a 
certain percentage of POC around me. I just want to feel welcomed, not an 
outsider. There are things, sometimes subtle, that suggest to me that I will 
likely or unlikely be welcomed. 
    On Saturday, February 18, 2023, 04:46:18 AM HST, Zev Paiss <zevpaiss [at] 
gmail.com> wrote:  
 
 Friends,
While I applaud the desire to have racial diversity in our Cohousing 
communities, what is required for this to happen is typically far beyond the 
ability (or comfort level) of most current residents or development 
professionals. I do not say this lightly as diversity is something I have 
worked to achieve for the past 30 years.

Racial diversity appears to be a desire of the mostly white upper middle class 
college educated residents. Why is that?

I worked on a Denver Cohousing project many years ago where low income 
residents were the primary demographic. A comment from a black pastor 
highlighted the challenge. When white folks think of diversity, they imagine 
having at least one black, Hispanic, and Asian household in their community to 
help satisfy their desire for racial diversity. From the perspective of the 
black community they would begin with 50% black households and go from there. I 
am curious how us lilly white residents would feel living in a cohousing 
neighborhood where 50% of your neighbors are black, use language you might 
consider offensive. (Yo nigga wass up?) and sharing meals where vegan and 
vegetarian options are nowhere to be seen?

As much as we would like to add this kind of diversity I do not see existing 
coho residents being up for the task. My opinion only.

Zev Paiss
Nomad Cohousing, Founding Member
Boulder, CO
720-232-3826
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