#whiteopia

Dear Reader,

Between 2007 and 2009, I packed my bags and embarked on a 26,909-mile journey throughout the heart of white America — some of the fastest-growing and whitest locales in our nation.

A prediction that made headlines across the United States ten years ago is fast becoming a reality: By 2042, whites will no longer be the American majority. A related, less reported trend is that as people of color, especially immigrant populations, increase in cities and suburbs, more and more whites are living in small towns and exurban areas that are predominately, even extremely, white. Call these places White Meccas. Or White Wonderlands. Or Caucasian Arcadias. Or Blanched Bunker Communities. Or White Archipelagos.

I call them Whitopia.

My journey to unlock the mysteries of Whitopia took me from a three-day white separatist retreat with links to Aryan Nations (North Idaho) to the inner sanctum of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue — and many points in between. To learn what makes the Whitopias tick, and why and how they are growing, I lived in three of them for more than three months apiece — in Utah, Idaho, and Georgia. On this improbable journey, I show you what Whitopias are like and the urgent social and political implications of this startling phenomenon.

As ever,