Is it just me or do poor neighborhoods of the US have a safer vibe now and the suburbs like a distinctly threatening vibe? I live in a poor neighborhood and these days being somewhere like this and seeing like a gangbanger-ish car roll down the street doesn’t make me nervous but a cop car definitely does kind of like how those same types of gangbanger-ish cars made me nervous when I was a middle class kid growing up in a nice neighborhood in the 2000s but police cars made me feel safe and protected. Like it’s all switched for me. A few days ago I stayed a few nights at my dad’s huge house in nice neighborhood and I was alone one night and felt extremely unsafe. I was so relieved to get back to my apartment alone in a poor neighborhood. Has anyone else had this experience of such a transition over the last twenty years or so?
My inner-city neighborhood is way more neighborly and has more social cohesion than the suburbs I grew up in ever did. We also have neighborhood festivals and stuff, so that’s pretty cool. Although we do have some drug houses and some homeless people who hang out near the commercial area and the crime rate might technically be higher than the suburbs (I haven’t actually checked), it feels safer because of the camaraderie.
When I lived in a poorer neighborhood it was more neighborly, but there was four shootings within a block of my house leading to three deaths, my garbage can was used as target practice, there were needles constantly found in the park on the corner, someone got mad and blew up their apartment building and muggings nearby were frequent.
I’ll take the nicer neighborhoods where interactions are less frequent thank you very much.
I didn’t say my neighborhood is poor; I said it’s inner-city. In actuality, it’s rapidly gentrifying. It’s still got some poor-neighborhood characteristics left (or perhaps just characteristics endemic to any place dense enough for good panhandling opportunities), but I wouldn’t be able to afford to live here if I had to buy in today.
When I lived in that nice middle class neighborhood growing up there was a drive-by shooting (which we all completely panicked about and made a huge deal), a meth lab that was discovered one day three doors down (the police came with hazmat suits and everything), my drug-addicted uncle was often wandering into the house drugged up on heroin, and there was this longstanding story about a guy a few houses down the other street who killed his wife then went up to a nearby mountain and shot himself. People had been warning me about poor neighborhoods all my life up until I was 21 saying they were even worse. But since winding up constantly in poor neighborhoods I’ve never been mugged, developed a generally thick skin, basic street smarts, learned who not to look in the eye, what not to do, how to react, how not to react, stay out of people’s business, what situations lead to what other situations, don’t be such a stickler about every little crime or suspicion of crime, listen to some gansta rap, know the greats, vibe, and everything is gravy. Seems simple to me now. Now I just enjoy the neighborhood. Birds chirping. Trees swaying. Haven’t heard about any murders, meth labs, and I can afford a place of my own, or at least a room of my own. It’s better than being a thin-skinned suburbanite who finds themselves walking on eggshells the minute a wild crime-ish energy appears.
Mugging? Drive by shooting? Gang banger cars? Can’t look strangers in the eye? Geez where do you guys live? Where I live, the only issue is some dude getting mad with a neighbor for feeding stray cats because the cats shit on his yard.