By 2050 — possibly sooner — the nation's combined populations of "racial and ethnic Americans" (blacks, Latinos, Asian-Pacific Islanders and Native Americans) will outnumber white Americans.
That's a pretty big deal. But according to a recent study conducted by the Applied Research Center, "the majority of people have no feelings one way or the other about the changing face of the U.S."
When asked if they're "concerned, hopeful or indifferent" about the changing demographics of the nation, 54.8 percent of the respondents said they're neither concerned nor hopeful or have no opinion.
Guess who does care? Conservative Americans. And they're not happy about the numbers. Specifically, the ARC researchers said, 36.6 percent of the conservative respondents said they were concerned about the demographic changes, compared with 18.5 percent of moderate respondents and 11.9 percent of liberal respondents. Similarly, 36.6 percent of the liberal respondents were hopeful, compared with 20.5 percent of moderates and 11.1 percent of conservatives.
In a post challenging people who believe that America's diversity is its strength to speak out, American Progress' Sam Fullwood III says that those who don't see the country's demographic changes as negative have to stop the shoulder shrugging. He writes, "Failure to do so will concede too much of the public debate to the reactionary right and its futile fight to stop the forward march of progress." In other words, a conversation about what kind of country we will become is inevitable — the only question is, whose voices will it include?
Read more at American Progress.
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