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So, your overall question is a good one, but #2 is a howler. The reported statistic I've seen is that 40% of Americans say they don't have a close friend of a different race. But I'm confident that 99% of white Americans have spoken to a black person.

Except for a few states like Vermont, most states and most cities have significant black populations. See, for instance: http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-most-diverse-cities-.... Even in spite of that segregation, people do talk to each other (they may not live on the same block, but they do eventually meet each other).

Do you live in the US? If you don't, please do try to get basic facts about us right. Our country has a lot of problems, but you can't understand them without having a basic factual grasp of our demographics.

"The reported statistic I've seen is that 40% of Americans say they don't have a close friend of a different race."

Firstly that says of another race, could be arab,persian, Italian, asian, etc... Secondly, no way in hell 60% of america can have a friend from a pool of 14% of America. This is impossible looking at how race groups tend to cluster.

More evidence you're confused about the US. In the United States, white people don't consider Italians a different race. They're white.

You're right about the precise claim of what I said. But people who've never talked to a black person are disproportionately likely to have not talked to an Asian, Arab, etc. States that have high proportions of non-Black racial minorities tend to have higher proportions of Blacks.

Bullshit, I've heard white ppl talk shit about Jersey Shore and use racial slurs against Italians. Secondly look at the Silicon Valley numbers for diversity, how many Asian vs Black? So your point no black interaction == no asian interaction is incorrect.

Regarding minority populations: it's not equivalent. But it is often the case. Think Texas, New York City, Los Angeles, or Chicago.

People talk shit or joke about the French, Italians, Germans too, but French and German people are considered white. Same with Poles and Italians.

Those stats you gave did not consider people of Italian or German descent as non-White.

Hm. My wife (Italian descent) reports differently. During her southwest upbringing she was treated as anything but white. I guess it depends upon your environment.

Perhaps I'm too quick to assume my experience is universal on this point. At school growing up, the white people were fairly mixed in actual ethnic background. Statistically, though, any researcher would consider Italian white if they used "white" as a category.

Would it be too personal to ask what she meant? Was she taken for Hispanic, or did people use anti-Italian stereotypes?

The 2nd. She was not welcome everywhere in town; she was viewed with suspicion in stores; her family's social circle was several notches lower than expected from her fathers' position (scientist at Los Alamos Natl Labs).

I'd have supposed Los Alamos, what with the laboratories, to be more cosmopolitan than Denver; yet so far as I know, that didn't happen in Denver. To be sure, I didn't have a particularly elevated social circle, and maybe the people at the Denver Country Club had some issues. But as far as I know, most people in Denver sorted ethnicities into Black/Chicano/Anglo.

Strangely, once Hispanic folks 'from the valley' were allowed on base (to clean and drive etc), Italians moved up. The Hispanics were the new bottom of the heap.

I'm sorry to hear that.

At the moment, throughout the U.S., Italians are considered "white". In the recent past, in certain areas of the country, they (Southern Italians, at least) were considered "black". They were lynched and not allowed to marry "whites". Racial categories are ever-shifting social constructs that serve temporary political and social purposes.

http://www.africaresource.com/rasta/sesostris-the-great-the-...

You're absolutely right, and I'm am only meaning to talk about the present.

> But I'm confident that 99% of white Americans have spoken to a black person.

I'm no more confident of that than in the 90% haven't made up statistic that this was offered in response to.

The truth is probably somewhere in between (and may be closer to the 90% haven't side, especially if, as suggested in another comment, one excludes the minimal interactions around things like retail commercial transactions and the like, and only includes substantive conversations.)

> Except for a few states like Vermont, most states and most cities have significant black populations.

That doesn't mean that the black population interacts with the White population all that much.

Eh, OP made a damn extreme claim. If you exclude extremely glancing interactions, I'd walk back the claim about 99%.

But I will say that any place I've ever lived or visited, the majority of White people would have had conversations with Black people. I just can't imagine someone in Pittsburgh, New York City or Raleigh not having done that.

No I did not!

"In fact, PRRI's data show that a full 75 percent of whites have "entirely white social networks without any minority presence." The same holds true for slightly less than two-thirds of black Americans." Now isolate the 14% black population from all minorities, take into account how minorities cluster and the 75% number is for black friendship is probably even higher than 90%

Look at it another way 66% of black people say they do not have a white person in their social network. So roughly 34% of 14% of the population have a person in their social network from the white population. So how the hell can all these white people claim to have all these black friends?

Your stats are wrong, read below and thats covering all minority groups. now isolate the 14% black group from those minorities. White ppl just don't have black friends, deal with it.

""In fact, PRRI's data show that a full 75 percent of whites have "entirely white social networks without any minority presence." The same holds true for slightly less than two-thirds of black Americans.""

Source?

I'm asking because I find it hard to believe (almost impossible) that 90% of white people have never spoken to a black person.

How many white people do you know that have spoken to a black person, not the lady at Mcdonalds but an actual interaction?

Every single person I worked with in Rocky Mount had spoken with Black people and worked with Black people. They lived on the same streets and their kids went to the same schools. And many of those white people who interacted with Black people every day were stunningly racist (and I should say many weren't). Maybe they categorized "different types" of black people. But they could hold a civil conversation, then turn around and stereotype, or drop the n-word repeatedly.

Your vision of what people have been exposed to is a cartoon.

"In fact, PRRI's data show that a full 75 percent of whites have "entirely white social networks without any minority presence." The same holds true for slightly less than two-thirds of black Americans." Now isolate the 14% black population from all minorities, take into account how minorities cluster and the 75% number is for black friendship is probably even higher than 90%

This is the number I've seen: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/08/us-usa-poll-race-i....

Since i cannot respong to you below here is the updated numbers: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/08/25/t...

I think those are not updated, but using a more restrictive methodology. And while it's not invalid, I think the statistic I cite is more relevant. For your initial question, who have you talked to, the acquaintances at work are more important than confidants.

Like I said in my original post, you're asking a good question. As far as I understand it, most people's stereotypes are not based on significant interaction with other people. They're picked up from other people who held those stereotypes.

It's just that I think you made a major exaggeration going along with it.

The sad truth I've heard people who were racist as hell say "they're just blaming that boy because he's black." They were capable of seeing someone as human in a particular instant, then turning around and uttering the most hateful things imaginable. They could talk to a black man civilly then turn around and talk about what "the brothers" do. Not having talked to black people wasn't their problem.

All of them.

This has to be a troll.

All of them. Seriously, where do you live?

At a guess, 80% of the white people I know. I live in Washington, DC, where you would have to go out of your way not to have black co-workers. Yet I had black teachers and classmates in high school in Denver long ago.

All the white people I know (since knowing people takes "actual interaction") have spoken to a black (or, at least, a multiracial person with black enough features to be generally considered "black" by observers) person enough to meet that standard, pretty much by definition.

But, while I think your 90% number is a substantial exaggeration, you do make a good point that this is probably far less common than most people think it is.

>90% of white America have never spoken to a black person let alone have a black friend.

Are you being serious? Citation needed.

Please source statistic #2.

You have, seemingly without irony, just stereotyped "white america"... as someone that stereotypes "black america".

You deserve to be voted down. But not for the reason you think you do.

>> 90% of white America have never spoken to a black person let alone have a black friend.

Where in the world did this statistic come from?