Bigotry and fear were used to promote and justify the suburban life, but they were only tools, not the founding principles. I think the real driver was simply the energy gradient created by the discovery and development of fossil fuel. Here, suddenly, was all this potential energy-- locked up in the ground-- that could be turned into money if people could be harnessed to that purpose.

The achievements of the media and advertising industry have been absolutely remarkable in convincing us of the absolute necessity of the stupidest things-- all to the purpose of moving electrons in a giant redox scheme that piles up money in the bank by oxidizing all the reduced carbon formed by hundreds of millions of years of plant life on Earth in a just a few decades.

The gradient is decreasing, and themodynamic equilibrium is approaching. Things will work out (though possibly not in a nice way.)

Alan,
The bigotry and fear are primarily class bigotry rather than race bigotry, and I think I've decided the root of most of the craziness in America is television. Because its such a passive media and people can't affect the outcomes of the shows, they carry this attitude into their lives.

Fear and sex are the two main methods of manipulating people, they speak to primal instincts. If a person spend the majority of their free time watching cop shows, they seem more prone to a fearful attitude than people who go outside and take walks in theit neighborhood.. People are taught by advertisers to immitate the actor's on TV, so they want a solution that works in 40 miutes max. The villains are portraed as lower class people, so the ignore the villians who are looting their 401K'S.
Bob Ebersole

One book that explores that thesis is Behind the Gates: Life, Security and the Pursuit of Happiness in Fortress America by Setha Low.

Book Description

In 2002 it was estimated that one in eight Americans will live in gated communities. What has sparked this alarming trend?

Behind the Gates is Setha Low's revealing account of what life is like inside these suburban fortresses. After years researching and interviewing families in Long Island, New York and San Antonio, Texas, Low provides an inside view of gated communities to help explain why people flee to these enclaves. Parents with children, young married couples, "empty-nesters," and retirees express their need for safety, their secret fears of a more ethnically diverse America, and their desire to recapture the close-knit, picket-fenced communities of their childhood. Ironically, she shows, gated neighborhoods are in fact no safer than other suburbs, and many who move there are disheartened by the insularity and restrictive rules of the community.

But I am becoming more convinced that the founding principles of Suburbia were bigotry and fear (certainly white flight was a major force in their founding) and some of that lingers.

That seems blindingly obvious to me. PO is not going to change that. Lets face it, humans are not evolved to be comfortable living close to people that do not look or act like they do. Individuals may be able, but there is zero chance that the future of america will be a multicultural country all packed together in cities like a bunch of mixed nuts.

I think you are making things more complicated than they are.

IMO people chose suburbs simply because they are more convenient to live in. They are also much cheaper and spacious than crowded downtowns.

I have lived in both environments, actually both extremes - from an overcrowded Sofia quarter moving to a typical Atlanta suburb. Cultural shock aside, I find living here much more easier, but, maybe strange to many people this does not mean I like it more. Quite the opposite actually. I think that American culture has evolved to embrace easiness and convenience as the definition of high quality of life, and maybe this is the root of its tragedy.