City People Are Authentic Americans, Too

Posted by Carol Coletta on September 20, 2008

Karrie Jacobs, who writes for Metropolis, has a great photo on her blog with this caption:  In front of the WWII Memorial in downtown Brooklyn, city dwellers play with their children just like suburbanites and exurbanites. Those of us who live in cities are authentic Americans, too.

I can empathize with Karrie's point.  As a city dweller who raised a daughter in the heart of downtown Memphis (and she turned out just fine, thank you very much), it has always upset me when people paint the city as unfit for children.  And the idea that those of us who live in cities are not "real" Americans and without "real" American values makes me crazy. 

In her P.S. Jacobs adds, "Roughly 80 percent of us live in cities and suburbs. We are not a nation of caribou hunters. We need an powerful, iconographic political language that reflects who we truly are."  Setting the politics aside, I couldn't agree more.