Thank you for the comment and geography lesson. I opened Google Earth to better grasp your Portland divisions. I think the underlying fear you mention is happening on a much larger scale and part of thinks that years down the road people may look back at these times as Americans failed experiment of a melting pot/tossed salad of varying cultures and subcultures being forced to live amongst and tolerate each other.

It's easy for the majority to talk about having tolerance until they start to slip from the majority. Then their way of life isn't the main way of life and being tolerant is not just a matter of not saying anything or giving off a smile, but possibly living a different life. Possibly having neighbors with a different way of life or different idea of what is neighborly and what is not.

I think the race and ethnicity argument sometimes gets in the way of culture and the comfort culture provides people, and how that can lead to happier people. If someone else's culture is forced upon you, it can be culture shock and your lifestyle might suffer. Most people don't want that. They want to visit other cultures, not have them become the main way of life in their neighborhoods.

I think the distinction is important because you can take the quiet, single family neighborhood that is predominantly white and throw in some non-white families and while there may be some flat out racists, chances are if those non-white families share the same values and way of life as the culture of that neighborhood, they will fit in, be welcomed, and most people would care less about their skin color. Flip that around, and not even for non-white families, but any skin color people that might move in and not share the culture. Maybe they are shitty neighbors. Maybe they park in the lawn because they come from a neighborhood where that isn't a big deal. Maybe they have a family of 10 with a constant stream of other family coming and going. Maybe that's acceptable in other neighborhood cultures but it makes the existing residents uneasy.

Now, many of those things are born from racial and ethnic stereotypes, but I believe more so from social-economic stereotypes. I believe many middle class white folks believe if minorities move in and they aren't also middle class that they will bring that "poor neighborhood" element with them. It's a legitimate and logical deduction but it doesn't make it fair or right to cast into any individual.

So, now that I've written way more than I anticipated, Portland sounds like every other decent sized city. It is experiencing growing pains caused by racial, ethnical, socio-economical, and cultural musical chairs. And it scares people not because they don't want to live next to someone that looks different, but because they don't want their way of life jeopardized and they are fighting every stereotype that has been entrained into their psyche since they were born.