A couple of weeks ago, some dingbat (or dingbats) burned three crosses here in Durham, N.C., with the usual reactions: Outrage from elected officials, weepy vigils attended by white people who think that the best thing to do about racism is stand with a candle and cry, plenty of anger from some black leaders and a general puzzlement from the rest of us who live in this absurdly diverse city. Indeed, few cities market their diversity so much as Durham. We've got nearly equal numbers of white and black people, with rapidly increasing Hispanic and Asian populations as well. Add in the fact that Durham is considered one of the most gay-friendly cities in the nation (with the numbers to prove it), and you might begin to understand just how diverse this city is.

And the vast majority of us get along. Which is why the recent cross burnings are puzzling. Years ago, a cross would be burned as some sort of warning, an overt act of specific intimidation. The last cross burned in Durham County (back in 1983 in a small crossroads called Bahama, which lies a few miles north of the city) was set in the yard of an interracial couple. No question about intent there.

But these three crosses were burned at an Episcopal Church, across the street from a television station and near a Kroger grocery store parking lot. The TV station I can understand; cross burning is all about publicity. But the other two are completely mystifying. So far, neither the police and FBI--or anyone else--have publicly stated any connection between the three locations.

As I said, Durham is a diverse community, and part of that means we have our fair share of bigoted Klan sympathizers, though we generally don't hear from them very often. They seem to have figured out that no one really shares their opinions.

But that's not to say there aren't tensions. A bunch of old white people have formed the Concerned Citizens of Durham, whose apparent--but unspoken--mission seems to be to get all the black elected officials arrested or otherwise removed from power. That's no small thing: Four of the seven city council members (including the mayor), two of the five county commissioners and three of the seven school board members are black. Do these "concerned citizens" really think that any white folks would do better? Probably. Like I said, a diverse community by definition must include a healthy number of self-righteous morons.

Old white folks aren't the only ones with skewed perspectives. There are many black leaders in the city who simply love to fight. And that means claiming racism and discrimination where they don't necessarily exist.

Is there official, sanctioned discrimination in Durham? No. But it is a lot easier to do business and get your way if you've got connections and money. And that's where the divide comes. The white people in Durham are largely middle to upper-class. The black population has a significant working-class and poor component, though since Durham has been a center of black wealth since the early 1900s, there are an awful lot of middle and upper-class black people in town--more in absolute numbers than any city in the south other than Atlanta. The Hispanic population is almost entirely composed of immigrants, many of them illegal. They're helping to fuel the development boom, but they aren't represented at all in the political process. That leaves an awful lot of poor black and brown people outside of the power structure of the city.

We're speaking in racial terms, when we ought to be using the language of class. Poor people don't a fair shake in Durham. That doesn't make our city unique. Poor people are ignored by (at best) or outright shut out of political and cultural life most everywhere. It's a problem that seems to be getting worse, with the express (and possibly intentional) help of people like the Prez.

The county school board has been voting along racial lines since the county (which was mostly white) and the city (which is racially split) merged school districts nearly 15 years ago. The black members of the school board aren't afraid to drop the race card at any time, feeling free to denounce even black school officials as racists. But these black members are voicing the concerns and fears of the poor population of Durham, not necessarily the black population. Recent polls show that most middle and upper-class black families with kids in Durham schools are happy with their children's education. Kids from poorer families fare much worse. Poor kids (and in Durham, that is almost synonymous with "black" or "Hispanic") are suspended much more frequently than kids from families with means. Poor kids are more likely to be unprepared for school at kindergarten and are much more likely to become discouraged and drop out. We are not serving those kids very well. But as long as the school board keeps focusing on race, we won't be able to address the real problems.

As many "man on the street" interviewees have expressed in the last week or so, an awful lot of people choose to live in Durham (rather than Raleigh or Chapel Hill or Cary or some other city in the area) because of its exceptional diversity. Because the act of walking around a corner just might mean discovering something you've never seen or even thought about before. Diverse cities are vibrant, exciting and, yes, beautiful. They're also fractious and funky. Those of us who love Durham appreciate the good and try to work on the bad. The cross burnings have ignited discussion (some of it exceptionally heated), and that's good, too. We need to hear what all of our neighbors are thinking. And once we've done that, what we need to do as a community is make sure that all of our neighbors feel like they're a part of this thing called Durham that we love so much. If some of our neighbors can't see the beauty because of something ugly in their lives, then we cannot look away and say, "Not my problem." That ugliness is a blight on our city. We are all responsible, and we all must work to eliminate it.

Perfection is impossible to achieve. Consensus is difficult enough in a place like Durham, where you'll get seven different answers to what you thought was a "yes or no" question. But that's cool. That's why I love living here. And that's why I work to make Durham even better than I think it is.

Jon Worley didn't attend any vigils. But he wouldn't mind finding the cross burners and dipping them in creosote.