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Something lost in the Martha’s Vineyard story is that the island is the vacation destination of the wealthy Democrat elite. Its architecture, town planning, and aesthetic preference are relics of a bygone era, Massachusetts’ original European American history. If you’re unfamiliar with the island I urge you to have some fun in google street view; I’m familiar with it because I vacationed there with a cousin who was doing an opera program, if that doesn’t explain enough. It calls to mind an earlier America of fabulously wealthy well-bred Europeans living in Federalist-styled homes over generations, exerting control over the planning of towns and showcasing their wealth with opulence and beauty.
The demographics of Martha’s Vineyard are also a relic of the past. It is 2% Latino and .3% Asian, 88% white with some parts 100% white. Its 0-9 age group is 94% White, 0% black, 0% Asian, and 0% hispanic, with the rest “mixed”.
The symbolism of Martha’s Vineyard is strong. Here is a place for wealthy white democrats to live in a Disneyland of traditional White America. They may claim that they stand with immigrants, when the Hebrew Center goes door to door handing out posters, but they have consciously chose to live in a White American paradise, where the demographics, aesthetics, and political influence are direct ancestors of 19th century Massachusetts. I suppose it’s easy to advocate for Democrat policies when you inherit a mansion on Martha’s Vineyard, and the Floridian governor is highlighting this dissonance by sending as few as 50 Hispanics to the island, enough to cause a national controversy.
https://www.mvcommission.org/sites/default/files/docs/web01_MVSP%20FINAL%20PRINT%202019-03-21-3.pdf
https://statisticalatlas.com/school-district/Massachusetts/Marthas-Vineyard-School-District/Race-and-Ethnicity#figure/ethno-racial-composition-per-year
While I agree that it's a preserve for the elite, I don't think it's so much white America as rich America. See this line from the link about the posters:
Have enough money, and nice enough manners to show that you were raised in the appropriate class and/or background, and your skin colour doesn't matter. The controversy isn't so much about being Hispanic, it's about being the 'wrong type' - the poor and needy. They support immigrants - so long as they know their place. Work in the service industries or come around to landscape the gardens and clean the houses as required, and that's lovely. Land in a bunch to look for equal treatment as the wealthy residents claim they want to treat them, and that's an imposition. The Martha's Vineyarders are prepared to be welcoming, on their terms.
And? By the logic of disparate impact, the residents of Martha's Vineyard (which includes the Obamas) are "openly white supremacist". It's a community founded in, steeped in, and projecting outwards colonial Whiteness. The residents should welcome their town of stolen land being aggressively decolonized by Latinx folx with indigenous ancestry.
Less schadenfreudenly, has anyone ever been happy with the claim of "I'm not racist, just classist"?
Almost everyone trying to exercise control over their own neighborhood has been basically happy to hear that from their neighbors, as near as I can tell.
Fair enough. It appears to me to be the sort of claim that people are happy to share off the record, in person. I was thinking more about public, on the record claims.
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