by Eric Riley

When a white person coming to the city is unilaterally and unquestioningly held as the best thing for Detroit then we have a problem. It’s a problem because it heralds the young millennial white professionals and hipsters as heroes on the urban frontier, and the only people that have ever mattered for Detroit’s success. This romanticization of Detroit’s past almost always focuses on the near two million population figure and the abundance of jobs and businesses in the city. What’s left out is the part of the past filled with the murder of black and brown bodies, razing of historic communities, and the intense racial segregation.