I've Lived in Bushwick for Just About Fifteen Years

Chris Erb: 1st Jun 2006 - 18:18 GMT

I imagine a lot of people are moving there beause they like the diversity and the vibe that comes with it. I wonder how many will realize it was because of them that it's gone when everyone is priced out of the neighbourhood.

Peter: 1st Jun 2006 - 19:00 GMT

a quick look at the wiki entry for bushwick shows that the displaced people youre talking about are far from the first to be displaced, whether from gentrification, changing demographics, modernization, urbanization, etc. i mean, i completely get your point (and empathize with some of its implications, especially when i think about whats going on in the demographics of williamsburg, and how it must be spreading to bushwick like wildfire), but as a fellow brooklyner, ive grown so tired of this sort of knee-jerk gentrification/antigentrification argument. i must hear people say things like this ten times a week. its inevitable, especially since the "bushwick we used to know" probably changes about every 20 years or so, or at least every generation. think about it. the land used to be forests. then dutch farmland. if you ask me, bushwick (as well as every other neighborhood in the city, really) is changing at its own pace, as it has been for a few hundred years, you know? should this process stop simply because it effects some individuals' sense of status-quo and nostalgia for the past, or is it that its generally only the immediate here-and-now that matters when someone complains...? i mean, youve only lived there 15 years, and youre already talking about the good ole days...

...and i say this as someone who's been priced out of three very amazing "up-and-coming" neighborhoods in the past, eh, ten years or so.

oh, and also: why do you think the "blacks or hispanics" are moving? whats causing them to move? in a city this dense, people are going to fill vacancies, no matter what neighborhood youre in, and no matter what race you are... and lately, rents are skyrocketing in all 5 boros. so people go to bushwick to find large, cheap housing. thats how i ended up relocating to prospect heights from hell's kitchen. people tend to like to make it sound like people are being forced out (or forced to sell, somehow?) because white folks are showing up. i sure cant speak for the rest, but i know that when i showed up in the first wave of gentrification in my neighborhood, i had to scrimp, stress and call in favors in order to get the cash i needed for my deposit, affordable and roomy as my apartment was. its not like i came in waving money around and personally uprooted a minority family from their home. and the extensive presence of rent-controlled/stabilized residents (especially in older outer-borough neighborhoods such as bushwick) would indicate that people *cant* be forced/priced out... so whats causing the efflux? maybe people are moving cause, frankly, parts of bushwick are still really shitty. odds are, because the housing market is booming citywide, landlords are willing to offer premium incentives to get rent-controlled residents to vacate, so they do... and take the money and buy a house in another area that isnt "brooklyn's poorest neighborhood". i know thats what happened to my neighbor. after being born and raised in his apartment, he sold out for a pretty penny, moved out to a pastoral town on long island and bought a house- his lifetime dream. so is he to blame, because some vaguely yuppie-ish person showd up, who was willing to pay the higher rent on his now-renovated old apartment?

thanks to rent stabilization, ill probably be in my place forever, as would have the previous tennant, if they had have been shrewd. it amazes me that anyone would *ever* move from a stabilized/controlled apartment, no matter what neighborhood it was in.

but yeah, theres a fine balance. perhaps some of the old-timers will choose to stick around, and some of the newcomers will bring new flavors. inasmuch as bushwick is concerned, i say right on to whatever is going on that can change its image from "brooklyn's poorest neighborhood" to something a tad nicer. thats good for everyone that lives there, no matter what race or age they are, or what income-bracket they fall within.

Penpusher: 1st Jun 2006 - 21:22 GMT

Here's the thing about the geography of NYC. Everything radiates from Midtown. During the late 90s, the Giuliani era, NY developed a reputation as being a safe city, a clean city and as Rudy claimed, "The Capital Of The World." There were even banners hanging around town with that phrase printed on them! People were moving in and the rich and famous wanted to have a base here, whether or not they actually lived here for any extended time. As such, demand for "luxury apartments" skyrocketed. Imagine: $1,000,000.00 for a one bedroom condo in a "decent" (i.e. not the best) neighborhood? And that's before maintenence fees.

Aside: there are many "vacant" and fantastic apartments here, but they're being held by people who want to come to town for a month or two as they jet around the world to do whatever it is they do. They can afford to pay to keep these places empty for themselves. That's a space problem. I don't know how many places are like that, but even a few help to cause a crunch in the market. I'm sure it's more than a few.

When the $1M pricetag becomes the "standard" in one area of town, you have a ripple effect, so that people who used to be able to afford to live in or near that area are "forced" to move to the next closest affordable place for them, which, if it is not rent controlled/rent stabilized, would have its rents ratcheted up as the new tenants arrived. This continues outward to all boroughs of the city, and beyond. The movement of people away from where they were into these outer neighborhoods permits landlords in these outer areas the opportunity to make more money from the better off tenants, and the cycle forces those that used to be able to live where they were to move again. It also give that "gentrification" effect, where stores appear, blocks are cleaned up, there's more money available, more taxes paid from the people who have better jobs and who earn more and that can be put into the coffers of the area for more police, making it safer, etc.

That brings us to the Real Estate Agents. An agent doesn't make any money if everyone remains where they are. It's up to the agent to convince people to sell/buy/rent so that they can earn their commissions for their agencies and themselves. And Real Estate is doing an incredible job. More Trump high-rises, more 2 Mil (and higher!) apartments, more celebs, more glamour and that leads to these changes for those that aren't as well off. And because of how the law is written, some apartments rely on people moving out so the landlord can get those rent increases, so, the agents have some leverage in coaxing the landlord to change tenants.

But I think deep down, everyone knows that "Gentrification" might as well be called "Manifest Destiny," as people with the power come in and take what they want from an area, leaving the natives to scramble to get whatever they can before they are completely forced out. What techniques are used to get people to leave? Whatever is available. A person is late with the rent for whatever reason. Maybe they didn't get paid on time. Maybe they had to choose between feeding their kids and paying a week later. I don't want to overdramatize this, but this sort of thing does happen. The landlord has an excuse to evict.

Also, landlords are constantly crying cash poor, but a lot of that is because there are a lot of apartments that are not at market value and the families in those places are there for, literally, generations. If the laws changed and rent stabilization went away, who would be living there? Those tenants would be in the same boat as everybody else, trying to afford to stay where they wanted, but unable to because they are paying the price anyone had to pay.

Back in 2000, I suggested that Manhattan would eventually become a "gated community," and I still don't know that it won't happen. Really, with the wacky real estate rules and people handing down their apartments from generation to generation, without the expected rent increases, it's hard not to ignore the moneygrab mentality for Real Estate agents and landlords that want to do a little better. With so many seven figure apartments here, only the above average people will be able to stay.

The question is if no new "affordable" housing is provided within the city limits, what will happen to the people who are working minimum wage jobs... or even ten dollar an hour jobs? Where will they live? They'll have a two hour commute, each way, to get to work, and will have to pay for that on top of their rent. Either the pay rates will need to go up or we might be in a worker shortage situation, eventually.

I think if you are looking to place blame, it all goes back to the Agents. They were the "blockbusters," long ago, when "minority" people needed a place to live... that "there goes the neighborhood" mentality that caused many people to leave an area... and really that was perpetrated by the agents to get those people to sell, so they could make more money from those sales. Similarly, they are also the "blockers" when minorities wanted to move to the suburbs and they were prevented from getting a home in Levittown in the 1950s and 60s. To see what's happening here and to not know what it's about is naive.

I suppose there will be people who say, ah well, that's just business and people are permitted to do what they want in our "free society." But until you are in the position of those forced to move, for no other reason than the metaphorical 100 year storm came and forced you out, because you were doing ok but couldn't afford to protect your home from the surge that came in and ruined everything, you don't really know or understand what the other side of "gentrification" is all about.

Jack: 1st Jun 2006 - 21:48 GMT

I just have one thing to say to Penpusher: Word.

I used to live in Bushwick and have many thoughts on the gentrification that's going on there, a lot of which I've written about here. I really don't mean for that to just be a shameless plug; I want to share my thoughts on this (and the thoughts of other folks who have commented on my posts on gentrification) but just can't write it all out again here. Hopefully it'll still be a useful contribution to the conversation.

Jack: 1st Jun 2006 - 21:53 GMT

Heh, didn't realize HTML was disabled. So here's just some of what I wrote at http://www.angrybrownbutch.com/2006/04/28/62

I lived in Bushwick for two years before moving to my current neighborhood in Brooklyn. And while living there, I agonized about the gentrification that I could see happening around me. Over those two years, I saw more and more white hipsters getting off the L train alongside me and scurrying to and from their lofts. Let me tell you, I saw far more white people within a one block radius of the subway stop than I ever did just a couple more blocks into the neighborhood, as if they were afraid to venture any deeper. And you almost never saw them in the local supermarket right across the street from the lofts, either; most often, they were toting their Whole Foods bags from Manhattan. The more of them I saw getting off at Dekalb over time, the madder I got.

Now, don’t get me wrong: I don’t absolve myself, either. Sure, I’m Latina, as was my roommate at the time. But we were both also college-educated U.S. citizens with white-collar jobs, and no matter what our race or class backgrounds or how little extra money we had, those things made us decidedly more privileged than many of the people in the neighborhood. Our privilege was ultimately most evident in our move out of the neighborhood, both of us to more expensive apartments in “nicer” (read: less poor, lower crime rates, prettier) areas. That’s an option that most of our neighbors didn’t have. Despite the obstacles we face because of our race, our genders, our sexualities, we were both upwardly-mobile in a way that most of our neighbors were not. We left Bushwick for greener pastures; if these folks move out of Bushwick, many of them will have been forced out by rising rents, and many of their destinations will not be any greener.

My roommate and I spent a whole lot of time seething over the very visible evidence of gentrification in our neighborhood. When it’s white folks moving into a primarily POC neighborhood, it can look and feel very much like an invasion, all these white faces popping up where you used to only see brown ones. But we also spent possibly an equal amount of time thinking and talking about our own participation in the gentrification of Bushwick, and how to be more accountable for that culpability. I was as guilty of shopping at Whole Foods as those white hipsters, but I also knew that supporting local businesses was important and tried to shop in the local supermarkets as much as possible. When my white girlfriend moved in with me for a while, I felt intense guilt and inner conflict about basically bringing yet another white person into the neighborhood.

And you know what pissed me off the most? My roommate and I, neither of us being white, neither of us being rich, thought about this all the time, and did what little we could about it. But how many of those young white hipsters we saw moving in spent even a second worrying about what negative impact they might be having on the community? Did they even have a moment’s hesitation before signing those leases on those “amazingly cheap” lofts they were moving into? Did they try to find out more about their darker-skinned, poorer neighbors, about what they were facing in the neighborhood, about what they could do to somehow help and somehow try to lessen the impact of their own presence? Probably not. That was the kicker. But that’s always the case, isn’t it - people who have less privilege, who experience more oppression on a first-hand basis, are always going to think more, care more, and do more about the oppression of others than folks who don’t experience very much oppression at all.

I know that there are no easy answers here. I know that gentrification seems to sweep across the city like an unstoppable wave. I know that rents in NYC are fucking insane, and that many of those young white folks I saw moving into Bushwick probably don’t have a whole bunch of extra money to spend on rent. But it’s this attitude of entitlement, of selfishness, of ignorance and blindness to what’s happening to people around you, of making up excuses to save a little money - that’s what really pisses me off. I know it can be hard to find affordable housing in NYC. But can you at least try to move somewhere where you won’t be pushing people of color and poor folks out, instead of jumping at the next hot deal? And if you absolutely have to move there, can you at least try to do something to lessen the blow or to work for the people living in the neighborhood? At the very least, can you acknoweldge that you and your ilk are probably screwing a whole lot of people over? Is that too much to ask?

native tonguez: 2nd Jun 2006 - 00:44 GMT

any of you native americans who lived in brooklyn 500 years ago? no? then you really dont have much right to talk.

gentrification is a touchy subject. but whether youre white, black or latino, you were not the first here. so keep that in mind when you mention manifest destiny and "taking" land from others. whether youre the dutch back in the 1600s or white hipsters today....... its really not too different, is it now?? ask yourselves that.

none of us are innocent, and anything any of us says (myself included) smacks with so much irony and insincerity that it renders this discussion absurd.

humankind are, as a whole, such short-term thinkers. geez.

shandy: 2nd Jun 2006 - 04:57 GMT

I'm white and my place in Bushwick was the first I moved to when I came to New York. I had no idea what neighborhood meang what, I moved there firstly because my friend lived there and needed a roommate, and secondly it didn't hurt that it was cheap...because I was poor. Because yes, white people are poor too. And there are non-whites with money, too who contribute. I don't say this to poo-poo your excellent points on the large number of white people who do contribute to gentrification, but all these arguments blaming white people for it solely aren't really fair.

I agree with all your guys' points about the detriments of gentrification, but there are so many levels upon which various groups have contributed to the phenomenon, that you can't just go and point the finger at one group and say it wasn't for them this problem wouldn't exist. And a lot of you have done a great job bringing up those points up too, in terms of demand for cheap rent, landlords allowing it to happen, brokers pursuing it, etc.

First, I think it's bullshit for anyone to say those neighborhoods are great because of their diversity, and that white people coming in takes away from that. I would argue in that case that it's not the diversity you so respect, but the homogenity. I understand the great value of keping ethnic neighborhoods ethnic, but does it really keep any of you up at night that people of various races are moving into and diversifying, say, Chinatown? Maybe because it's in Manhattan and you assume everyone who lives there has some dough, but it's the same principle of homogenity; Don't Chinese people have the same right, by your arguments, to have the faces they're familiar with stay in the area? Maybe I disagre with how you argued it, Jack, but when you say things like: "When it’s white folks moving into a primarily POC neighborhood, it can look and feel very much like an invasion, all these white faces popping up where you used to only see brown ones," I'm sorry, but I think that's a horrible argument. I undrstand where you're coming from in terms of comfort levels, but no one ever has control over who moves into their neghborhood, it's not a race thing. If white Polish people started saying that about Greenpoint, no one would take that as a valid point.

Second, no one seems to have mentioned that some of the burden of neighborhoods becoming ghettos and unpleasant places to live has a lot to do with how the city/government has chosen to support them (or not) over time. When yuppies move in to neighborhoods and they become better neighborhoods, it's not just beause the "bad" people move out, or the yuppies have magical powers of crime-stopping, but because the city ends up putting more resources into those parts of town, probably as an investment. Why is Park Slope so nice and fancy and expensive? Is it because yuppies live there and demand goo dliving? It's mostly because they have their beautiful park the government takes care of (a piece of real estate that is in their monetary benefit to take care of), not to mention their nicely paved streets, their even sidewalks, and their graffiti-free bus stops. So is it the yuppies who go patch holes in the roads and plant grass on the sidewalks? Of course not, that's the city's job. And the city neglects a lot of bad parts of town simply because it's not lucrative for them to keep them up. Either there's no big business there contributing big tax dollars, or they see it as an investment that won't last, or whatever the case may be. My point is, I think they look at city improvement mostly as a monetary investment, and not an investment in people. If the city gave everyone a fair shot, and believed that all kids should have safe parks to play in and that every subway station, regardless of the neighbrhood, should feel safe, then maybe also everyone would have better neighborhoods overall, and there wouldn't be such a dicotomy between the "unsafe, cheap" parts of town and the "safe, expensive" parts.

City fixes aren't magical solutions to poverty or crime, or the harhsips that people face all over the city, but I would like think living in a cleaner, safer neighborhood would be something everyone should be entitled to, especially if it's the city that's meant to help provide it anyways. This is all just another theory, and I'm not even mentioning a lot of other things I think contribute to the ugliness of gentrification. I just think it's a lot of different things all together that come down to the almighty dollar at work.

And P.S. When I lived in Bushwick, I only shopped in the neighborhood, and extravegancies like Whole Foods would have meant I could afford no more food that month. In a way, it's not fair to them either, as people should be free to shop wherever they please, but I think you brought up a really good point about the importance of keeping money in the neighborhood and how that too contributes to the overall effects of gentrification.

Tenda: 2nd Jun 2006 - 15:11 GMT

I call for open revolution in the streets. Bloomberg can suck my balls. I hope he reads this. It makes me happy that that white kid got killed in Harlem.

Fa11en: 2nd Jun 2006 - 20:58 GMT

What a bunch of bullshit. Especially that last entry by Tenda. Just because someone is white means they're not "allowed" to live or exist in a specific area? Ever heard of reverse discrimination? You don't like being treated differently when you move somewhere or frequent a place, but it's okay to treat others that way because they're not like you??

Gentrification is a bunch of bullshit. Why does everyone assume that because "whitey" moves in that that means that the rent prices, etc. are automatically going to skyrocket. Excuse me, but I'm not a trust fund baby or some snotty rich bitch whose daddy pays for everything. My entire family is blue collar and I know the meaning of an honest day's work. I've busted my ass for everything I have my entire life, and this is no different. I moved to Bushwick for the same reasons I anticipate that others have moved here: I like the cheap rent and large space, I can't afford to live in Manhattan, I like the feeling of a "neighborhood". What the majority of you people here are saying is tantamount to "whites don't deserve to live in affordable places or apartments because they're all rich". If that's really what you all think, your view is distorted to say the least and you are just as racist as you accuse others of being toward you.

White individuals have as little impact on your rents going up as you do on keeping them low. Trying to attribute this "gentrification" boom to specific ethnicities or individuals is ridiculous. I'm so sick of hearing about this and being looked down upon or hated because I am NOT wealthy and can't afford to live in the affluent neighborhoods where certain minorities apparently think I "belong". By shunning other ethnicities you are basically segregating YOURSELVES. Something that you all complain about and fight against. It makes absolutely no sense to me at all. And yet, it seems that most of you don't even see it that way. How can that be?

Keis: 3rd Jun 2006 - 20:54 GMT

I wish some affluent people would move into my neighborhood of East New York and change the way things look. You know, just for kicks.

Mauvis: 4th Jun 2006 - 21:49 GMT

I'm half white and half Korean and I moved to Bushwick a couple of months ago from East Harlem because these are the closest places to the city that I can afford. I have a college education and a job in Manhattan and I still can't afford a really nice place, so what do you want me to do? Not "invade" your area? Bitch please. I'm human, too.

How can people like this "angrybrownbutch.com" lady, who identifies as "queer" and has probably suffered the hardships of prejudice, be so intolerant of other people just because the color of their skin?

The truth is, gentrification is a logical and natural process. As the center of the City grows, so do property values, population, and most importantly: rent. Streets are safer, stores spring up, less theft and crime occur, and the general quality of life improve. You can complain and blame “whitey” but it's not just white people that are causing it. It's city growth. It's an upgrading process. You want cheap rent? Move to the new outskirts. This isn’t it anymore, and in 10 years time you’ll just have to move again. Because that's what cities do. My suggestion is to try to compete. Get or use that higher education, find a better job, do anything to make more money and better yourself, because it’s all part of living in the city. If you don’t like it or can’t handle it, I’d suggest moving out to a town or city that’s smaller, where gentrification moves much more slowly.

Jack: 5th Jun 2006 - 14:36 GMT

I'm not really planning on engaging with most of the comments here, except to say to Mauvis: I'm not a "lady," so please, keep your fucking assumptions to yourself, thanks. And also, yes, I am extremely and unapologetically intolerant to white folks' racist and entitled attitudes. Gentrification is not a natural process; it is a capitalist, racist, politically-driven process, and if you choose to be willfully ignorant to that because it doesn't suit you to examine how, yes, people are getting screwed over and for very definite reasons, well, screw you.

ian: 5th Jun 2006 - 16:11 GMT

Jack, then suggest an alternative that doesnt fuck anyone up, where each person is treated fairly regardless of the color of their skin, their education level, their sexuality, their language, their intelligence, their looks, their luck, their astrological sign, their childhood hero, or the last name of their godmother. Any ideas? Thanks for your time, goodbye.

albino monkee: 7th Jun 2006 - 23:23 GMT

i would like to see pictures of my old hood harmen st. off of knickerbocker & irving do you have?

"Entitled" hipster: 8th Jun 2006 - 02:50 GMT

I understand the anger against the white people moving in. It does drive up the rent and price out the poorer families. While some are the entitled hipsters you so despise, some are like me. I am educated but I paid for college and grad school myself and dont have a fancy high paying job. That means a lot of loan debt that does not leave much for rent, bills, food, or anything else. My parents dont support me and have not since high school. So I may look the "hipster" part as a white girl invading your neighborhood, but I honestly cant afford the neighborhoods you want me to stay in. And I may stay near the subway, because maybe I am a little scared. I know you hate me in your neighborhood but it is all I can afford - just like you. The difference is I am looked at as the demise of your neighborhood and you make it pretty obvious....

hipster: 9th Jun 2006 - 15:22 GMT

oh please why everybody think white people are rich.

hipster: 9th Jun 2006 - 15:22 GMT

oh please why everybody think white people are rich.

hipster: 9th Jun 2006 - 17:58 GMT

its true white people are poor too it doesnt matter what race you are there are rich and poor in every race it's how and what you do in life that makes you wealthy or not. and rent doesnt go up because there are white people moving into bushwick. rent is going up no matter and not only rent but everything gas food clothing electricity and for what its the white peoples fault no.

Jersey City Capital of World: 12th Jun 2006 - 17:20 GMT

Jersey City is much nicer, cleaner, closer to manhattan, and cheaper that Brooklyn!

Peter: 12th Jun 2006 - 18:26 GMT

yeah, but its in... new jersey.

white boy: 13th Jun 2006 - 05:29 GMT

I live in bushwick. I'm a "white boy" and I'm reminded dayly by my neighbors on my way to work, the grocery store, the laundromat... pretty much every time i leave the house. I have a shit job and it has barely gotten me by in the past. I'm a nice guy, friendly, dont cause trouble. Anyway, to all those "you're kicking people out of our housing" heads- I dont understand that argument. What you are saying is that you cant afford the rent. Why is that? OK... it's going up... rent goes up. Why is it that a bum like me can afford it? Isnt it perpetuating the stigma of poverty by taking that victimized stance... oh we just cant afford it (insert sad face)... bullshit. I have a job that pays eleven miserable dollars an hour to be sonned by rich assholes. I spend 45 hours a week there to pay my bills and when i get off work i still have to hear "fucking white boy..." There is just no need to knock someone down like that. People who subscribe to that type of racism deserve what may or may not be coming to them. I know it's an unpopular thing to ask locals to walk a mile in this "whiteboy's" shoes and just the notion of saying such a thing might piss people off i feel like it needs to be said. Life ain't all peaches and cream for every whiteboy you pass on the street. Everyone needs to live somewhere.

Scott Sargent: 19th Jun 2006 - 18:16 GMT

At least you don't live in Belleville, Kansas.

non-hipster: 19th Jun 2006 - 21:30 GMT

re: Bushwick. I'm dissapointed in several things I have read here. The fact that blame has been assigned to an entire part of the community (i.e. the whites) for driving out ethnic minorities. First off, no one racial group "owns" a neighborhood; I pushed out no one in my apartment as I pay the same rent they paid (or as they failed to pay, as they were evicted). Many of the claims boil down to "we don't like white people and we don't want to live in their presence" -- it has an eery histrionic ring to it.
Secondly (drawing from my personal experience), I frequent the same hispanic-owned local establishments as everyone else and spend a good deal of money there.
Thirdly, racism/prejudice (as evidenced above by Shandy) is wrong no matter whom spreads it.

The folly of a lot of the anti-gentrification arguments is that the blame is invariably assigned to the newbie (in this case, whites). It is the same outmoded, simplistic and prejudiced argument that whites made years ago. It was wrong then, and it's wrong now.

Sylvia: 26th Jun 2006 - 21:54 GMT

I am a hispanic who lived in Bushwick from 1971 to 1993, moving there from the Bronx where I was raised. The irony of what I have been reading here is that when I first came to Bushwick in the early seventies, this area was in the height of gentrification that makes what is happening now pale by comparison. A predominately white Bushwick(mostly Italian) was dramatically changing. We were the invaders then and the whites were fleeing in droves. In fact, most of you will find it hard to believe that in 1971 it was near impossible to find spanish food products or a bodega until you crossed to the south side of Bushwick Ave. But almost overnight things changed as three and four story low income subsidized housing cropped up along Evergreen, Wilson, and Central Avenues. Crime soon grew completely out of control, not only in that immediate area, but everywhere else in Bushwick. The last straw was that blackout in which there was total lawlessness and the remaining white holdouts fled leaving the entire community to us. We had a firm hold of Bushwick for almost thirty years but I will conclude this brief history lesson with a most approprate quote, "What goes around comes around".

TheTruth: 3rd Jul 2006 - 09:18 GMT

Nice try at history, Sylvia, but you've missed some huge factors. My family was part of that 1st wave of nonwhites to integrate Bushwick in the 1950s. They weren't Gentry -- sorry--even though they were just as ambitious. The "Gentry" -as in gentrification-almost always generate positive bank, real-estate and government investment, and oh, by definition they are almost always white. How is that?

Bushwick is a text book case...As others have mentioned in this thread, Bushwick was a stable, working-class hood in the late '50s, early '60s--bad news for real-estate speculators who need activity to make that PHAT money! Hispanics (mostly Puerto Rican), and blacks migrating from the South and Caribbean hungry for housing, like my folks, were STEERED into Bushwick by the agents. Brooklyn Heights and other desirable hoods were OFF LIMITS for these folks regardless of ability to pay. (The Heights were actually affordable then.)

So it became the perfect storm.

Real Estate made a KILLING scaring the Italian, German and Irish-American population out of Bushwick, then selling to the "newbies" at a 50%-100% markup. I remember how the retreat went--year by year the color line advanced towards Ridgewood from Broadway in linear fashion sweeping and erasing old neighborhood faces, stories, knowledge & connection to local politics and powerbrokers. Flipping houses? Damn, the WHOLE neighborhood was flipped in 15 years! MacDaddy blockbusting. And all they had to say to whites was "Sell now, THEY'RE coming." That was the wind, then came the rain...

DISINVESTMENT, wholesale economic pullout. To Sylvia and all the whites ("Whiteboy", "Fa11en", "Shandy", etc) on this thread who say: 'Same game; whites integrate, "minorities" integrate--same outcome.' ...Y'all need to go to Starr St. and buy some crack if you believe that shit! Here's where being white makes a crucial difference in the mix: By the time Koch became mayor in 1977, the city had established an official policy of economic neglect of the worst kind, but exclusively for those "blighted" areas that just happened to be black and brown. It was called Planned Shrinkage, devised by Housing Commissioner Roger Starr, and I suggest you Google it. The idea was to cut off these areas from all but the barest of City services to save money during a financial crisis. Public hospitals were closed, and services to parks, police, fire, housing and all other basics were slashed. The desired result was that these neighborhoods would actually die so they could be reborn again. During the same years, the suburbs were being built up at breakneck speed. And, surprise--there was plenty of money for that--FHA &VA loans, backed by the Federal Government at generous rates. Nearly all these areas had either official "restrictive covenants" or wink-and-nod policies excluding nonwhites. If you lived in Bushwick or likewise area and qualified for one of these Home Loans to fix things up--Sorry, urban areas were zoned out of the program. Meanwhile, banks and long-established businesses were dashing out of the neighborhood along with the white residents. I remember how Broadway used to be alive with people and aglow with neon on any evening in the early sixties. Lerner Shops, Buster Brown &Thom McAnn Shoes, A&P, Key Food, Bohack Supermarkets, national and local chains and countless indie markets and shops with local ethnic flavor. By 1977 when the blackout struck, they'd nearly all evaporated, as if a plague had descended. And one had...

The newbies of yesteryear were blindsided by a tidal flush of heroin that seemed to arrive on the same waves that brought them and their dreams in the 1960s. Then came the crack tsunami of the '80s & '90s. Troutman, Jefferson, Starr and especially Putnam near Knickerbocker had open-air drug marts so thick with activity, you had to literally step off the curb into the street to pass. Every day. For decades. But what about the police? Whoops, back then the cops would routinely say, "If the community doesn't tell us where the drugs are, what can we do?" Maria Hernandez did that, now there's a park named after her across the street from where she was assassinated in her home.

Can you say "by design"? The dynamics of extreme disparity I've just described are what created the great middle-class (white, suburban) and modern ghetto culture (black, Latino and urban) that's largely defined America from after WW2 to this day. Sure there are exceptions. Latinos and black folks have been living in and near Hemstead and Teaneck for some time. And now we have whites moving into the 'hood. But there are rules, and here they are:

White migration=Good news! Time to invest. Build up! Black and Latino migration=Uh oh, downhill trend. Cut your losses. Contain this event!

The color line holds true regardless of income. This thread is full of whites crying about how broke and low income they are. Yet Corcoran, Fillmore, The New York Times, Village Voice and others have made a huge deal of their very modest arrival in Bushwick. Sanitation and police have coincidentally now taken great interest here.

I'm sorry some of you whites have suffered racial remarks, I truly am. But if that was all we had to endure as people of color, this would be heaven on earth. Fact is, we are still getting our heads bashed in for trespassing into all-white areas (Howard Beach, Bensonhurst, Marine Park), forget about renting or buying. And just this week a case of racial steering has been brought against real estate agents in Long Island for discriminating against nonwhites. Apparently these minorities were foolish enough to seek housing beyond the established boundaries.

So if you are white--don't complain, cheer up. You are still privileged by skin color. You can expect to live, work and patronize anywhere you please in significant numbers without major, orchestrated resistance. Just own up to this, please. We could all save so much energy if you stop fantasizing that this is not true. As you traipse through Bushwick speculating, dreaming and pioneering, just be conscious that an entire system is backing you up, cheering you on, as has always been. This is simply the latest link in the chain. Great blog.

The Truth: 3rd Jul 2006 - 13:11 GMT

You wanna see a real ghetto with black,white and brown people go to brazil

Then maybe you will stop bitching....Even the ghettos in new york are rich compared to the rest of the world

All americans have to hate somebody....remember dark skinned blacks hate on light skinned blacks all day.......

Hate is hate....Love IS love

The Truth: 3rd Jul 2006 - 13:17 GMT

Remember Brownsville was nearly all white less than 40 years ago....

Should we blame black people for this...How dare they take white homes.....

Italians were drivin out by black people from east new york........

So there we have it we are all wrong.....Oh dear

The Truth: 3rd Jul 2006 - 13:19 GMT

By the way as a Jamiacan i have been abused many times by ignorant american black men.

Who do i complain to ?????????

Just A Thought

Dave (a Bushwick native): 11th Jul 2006 - 00:45 GMT

I see it more as a class war than a race war. I'm from the last generation (born mid-1960s) of German-Americans from the Ridgewood/Bushwick area before the Great Exodus of the 1970s. If I claimed that the blacks and Ricans drove "my people" out, that would be just as moronic as... well, as most of what Jack has written. (Sorry, dude).

As someone pointed out earlier, every population that has lived on that land since colonial times has been "driven out" in one way or another. We left Ridgewood in the mid '70s because the crime was spilling over from Bushwick (which was a dump back then and still is now, I'm sorry to say) and the neighborhood just didn't feel as safe as it used to. My mom was mugged a couple of times--once right in front of me, on Myrtle Avenue in the middle of the day. I don't doubt for one minute that New York real estate agents (who are scum) wouldn't hesitate to capitalize on people's fears and racial prejudice. But the fears were not baseless; it really was becoming a dangerous place to live in the '60s and '70s.

Hmmm... Maybe I AM saying that "they" drove us out, after all. Oh well, if that makes me a racist, so be it. But that doesn't explain why, poor or not, the residents of Bushwick didn't have enough self-respect to take care of their neighborhood. I'm blue-collar, work for a living and hate hipsters and yuppies "like poison." But gentrification seems almost preferable to the shell of a neighborhood that, since the '77 blackout, has looked like Dresden after Allied bombing raids--a perfectly preserved diorama of urban blight, apathy and nihilism.

The "class war" part of the equation comes into play when the money people start taking notice of where the little hipsters--white, black, asian, whatever--are starting to rent. Then they move in and profit off the buzz, the same buzz (e.g., Real Estate pieces written by the bootlicking shitheads at _New York_ magazine, etc). Eventually, the neighborhood becomes unaffordable for working people--of ANY race.

Ridgewood is still a pretty nice working-class neighborhood, a basic character that hasn't changed much even as the names have changed from German and Italian to Slavic, Polish and Puerto Rican. But I fear its days as such may be numbered. I hope I'm wrong about that, but I figure that eventually the hipsters and yuppies will figure out how to transfer from the L-train to the M (and the notion of living in Queens will lose its anti-cachet as Brooklyn becomes "the new Manhattan", i.e., unaffordable). And people like me will be driven even further north, out of state, and so on. Money rules the town--always has, always will. So be it.

Dave, again: 11th Jul 2006 - 01:14 GMT

PS: Starr St. is where one buys crack nowadays? In my father's time, it's where kids would buy freshly-baked soft pretzels to resell on the street for comic book/eggcream/Spaldeen money. What a revoltin' development!

TheTruth: 12th Jul 2006 - 10:12 GMT

"I see it more as a class war than a race war."

"...But that doesn't explain why, poor or not, the residents of Bushwick didn't have enough self-respect to take care of their neighborhood."

Dave, did you ever wonder how Ridgewood stayed lilly white and drug free for so many years while Bushwick was so inundated? Was it just that you guys had more "self-respect"?

Black and brown Bushwick people started their own private schools in the 60s and 70s (Junior Academy, St. Thomas, Pilgrim Church, etc). Block Associations conducted monthly street sweeps, installed uniform extra lighting and yard signs with encouraging sayings. They lined their streets with flower pots while competing for "Best Block" and "Greenest Block" status. Boy/Girl Scout troops were formed in church basements. We proudly marched behind American Flags down tree-lined Bushwick Avenue on Brooklyn Day.

Bushwick bashers always oversimplify the neighborhood as backwards, poor, uncaring and uneducated. Plenty of newbie/hipsters also play this game.

To maintain the negativity, the haters, including Dave, have to stay ignorant of all the community organizing and direct action in Bushwick: East Brooklyn Churches and the Brooklyn Ecumenical Council built houses on vacant lots in the worst arson-ravaged areas. Along with groups like Make The Road By Walking they made headlines with massive, orderly meetings and demonstrations, followed by some of the most pointed and assertive demands the City Council has seen. Block watches were formed, with regular police petitioning.

"...A perfectly preserved diorama of urban blight, apathy and nihilism."

Dave's beautiful phrase describes Bushwick like the blind man describes the elephant after only feeling its tail. No doubt there's been blight, apathy and nihilism. But if you'd seen the heart of Bushwick like I have, up close and for decades, you'd know better.

Bushwick never lacked positive residents. Bushwick was bombed. City policy overloaded the community with poverty, concentrating homeless relocation programs into absentee-landlord tenements while imposing severe service cutbacks designed to shrink that very same population. Realtors and outsider-landlords colluded in the severest slumlord schemes with these buildings, transferring titles like cards, then milking every last rent dollar before setting them ablaze for insurance money. They made us #1...in arson! Meanwhile the banks (illegally) cut the place out of the lending market, then closed their branches and left.

Then The Mob targeted the area for massive heroin and crack waves. Ridgewood, right next door, was spared all of this. I'm not saying we were all a bunch of do-good innocents just lacking self-control. But if you simultaneously cut opportunity then submit any community to such a barrage of cheap narcotics it will find the weakest links. Things unravel as a drug/crime culture takes over the fringes. Small-town America is now experiencing this with crystal meth.

Oh, and coincidental to the crack scourge and burning of Bushwick, Ridgewood received a special gift. In '83 Congress declared most of it a historic landmark district, the largest ever in the nation. From there millions in restoration funding flowed. A tale of two neighborhoods.

Dave: 12th Jul 2006 - 16:23 GMT

You know, it occurred to me not long after I posted that some of what I wrote would seem offensive to positive Bushwick residents who had been working for a better neighborhood. (Such guiding lights can be found even in the worst 'hoods). That was certainly not my intention and I apologize. Such people deserve to be encouraged, not lumped in with the forces of destruction, apathy and hopelessness.

We can certainly agree on one thing: Bushwick has been getting raped for many years. And it's about to be raped again... Except this time, the rapist bothered to shave and splash on a little cologne. (Have I totally strained the metaphor yet? ;) ).

If it makes you feel any better, I'm sure the hipsters and yuppies will ruin Ridgewood eventually, too. Then we can BOTH mourn the loss of the neighborhoods we used to know and love.

TheTruth: 13th Jul 2006 - 12:35 GMT

Yeah, Bushwick was raped. Your metaphor is better, Dave. Bushwick was hustled, pimped, beaten, raped, and left for dead.

Now Bushwick is getting the bum-rush. The predatory loan-sharks are stealing houses out from under many old-timers. It's high crime, man, and there's no cops on duty to check it. Then you got landlords using all kinds of vicious tactics to force out tenants 'cause they smell dollars.

People were just catching their breath. Only a couple of years since major drug dealing's been squashed, and the last of the vast vacant lots have been built upon. The businesses have just begun to return to Broadway -- ground zero of the '77 riots.

So hipsters are getting the hots for Bushwick. I don't think it's the same for Ridgewood, though. The housing is too modestly sized, quaint, and family oriented. Not enough of an edge. And you can't get around the transportation issue. Bushwick is an easier lay.

And no hard feelings, Dave. We're sort of contemporaries -- my mom shopped at Karl Ehmer and Trunz. I bet you played sewer-to-sewer stickball and ringolivio and skelly just like us. No doubt you remember how sweet the Bushwick/Ridgewood morning air was from all those bakeries. I miss that.

I can accept change, and community integration. It's all the exploitation and injustice I have to reject.

dT: 20th Jul 2006 - 23:28 GMT

Blaming white people for gentrification is pointless; capitalism is the real problem. Exploitation will continue to exist as long as our corporatist economy exists.

Also, if you are white, stop complaining about being harassed.
Even if you are white and poor, you should thank god every morning that you are white. I don't care if you get called "white boy" every fucking secon, the police actually protect you, and you can get a loan if you want.

Race and class distinction will always be an issue until we dismantle this corporatist nightmare we live in. Black people were denied wages for 400 years and will always suffer as a result, and white people will always have an advantage as they have a precedent of wealth.

Seriously, everyone should focus on the real problem. I love you all.

dT

Susannah: 21st Jul 2006 - 02:01 GMT

Before Park Slope (yes - Park Slope) became gentrified we had what were known as block busters, landlords who made the neighborhood unbearable to live in through various means, crime and social tension would escalate, family's who could get out, would, selling their homes at relatively depressed prices to these landlords. The landlords would then evict the tenants who were responsible for alot of the crime, the neighborhood would experience a "revitalization" and lo and behold the landlords would become millionaires. After being robbed numerous times, having my sister and brother assaulted in our own home, witnessing two suicides, and a homicide (in broad daylight) on my street, my family sold our Park Slope brownstone for $90,000 and moved to NJ - now it is probably worth close to $3 million. Honestly, I wouldn't change anything - you can't put a price on the peace I've found now that I've left the city.

carlos mario: 24th Jul 2006 - 07:36 GMT

Since I'm writing about gentrification in Bushwick, this all is so interesting, especially the part of the story that The Truth mentions, as it relates to what I'm writing. Roger Starr, planned shrinkage, arson, disinvestment, crime, drugs, TB--all part of the plan to kill the 'sick' neighborhoods in order to make money off their 'recovery' by sending the young people to the prison because there are no jobs or schools for them. Capitalism produces the poverty like in a factory when they start the neoliberalism and cut the services in 1970s, then capitalism is threatened by all the poor people it makes, the surplus people, so the war on drugs and the prisons for Puerto Ricans and blacks in the 1980s and 90s.

But guess what? The capitalism in New York also need the Latin American people for cheap labor to exploit. The manufacurers in the neighborhood use Mexican and Ecuadorian laborers, like the businesses across the city, and they still are moving in faster than the white people, according to US Census, which undercounts us. This is also true in Spanish Harlem. People live together with their families, so they can pay the rent even if it goes up more. And new businesses in Bushwick are Mexican and Ecuadorian. Hipsters have to go to Bedford or 1st Ave. to find what they want.

I don't like hipsters. Bad music, bad clothes, bad hair, bad breath. But they are not taking over because they are still only 4% of the people. The banks and mortgage companies are taking over. Other white people own them, and rich people of all colors run them. This is about how city and state government, Bloomberg and Vito Lopez, work with developers to lend money for home mortgages and re-zone the industrial space into the residential space, where the most of the money is made. In the US, housing and land markets, city and state government, always come dow to race and class. But also the free trade imperialism is why there are so many people coming from Mexico and Ecuador, because neoliberalism kills the rural areas there in the 1990s.

So for the white people I say you must learn to speak Spanish under your breath so you feel better when people say things to you, because the ones who speak Spanish we think differently because we know the poor neighborhoods in our countries where the people are all colors and our neighborhoods are much more dangerous and poor than Bushwick is. We don't have so much the segregation, just more poverty, crime, and violence. You Americans forget this I think.

I like very much the discussion.

carlos mario: 24th Jul 2006 - 08:20 GMT

To The Truth: maybe you could share so many things you know about the history of Bushwick at Se Hace Camino porque Youth Power is studying gentrification right now, you know? For the people who don't study the history of the neoliberalism that begin with September 11, 1973, when General Pinochet kill the people in Chile with US support so the US economic advisors from the University of Chicago can make the free market economy to blow up the free society the Chilean people try to make by the democratic way, The Truth understand how they bombed Bushwick as part of the history.

Genaro: 24th Jul 2006 - 10:15 GMT

During the late 1940's and 50's, many of The Manhattan Elite thought it proper in calling the less popular working or the poor social White under class, WHITE TRASH! This would also include Whites who lived in Harlem, The Lower East Side, Hells Kitchen, and all of the outer Borough's, putting those people within a status quo. This would include at that time The Bushwick Section of Brooklyn. Those so called White Trash families living in that section of Brooklyn, along with other areas of the Five Boroughs during that time, many who had fought in WW2 and the Korean Conflit under the G.I. Bill, along with those who worked hard and saved their money, purchased houses in suburbia, outside of the city,to escape the deteriorating housing and quality of life conditions already prevelent. Adding to this, their was a large influx of African Americans coming from The South, seeking a better life here than The South at that time would have allow them, Along with Puerto Ricans whom, Rich White Americans, endorsed by our Government exploited their land, in the building of Posh Hotels and Beach Resorts for their own financial interests, buying many of the Natives a plane ticket to New York City and other cities in America, addressing many to the Public Assistance Programs!
With Whites now leaving those old deteriorating neighborhoods, they were left to a new poor class of people in this city, Blacks, Hispanics and still some poor or working class Whites who didn't have the funds to leave.
Most Whites who lived in Brooklyn moved to Queens, Richmond County and Long Island. From the early 1960's to the late 1980's, many White families flourished in those areas with nice homes, with better employment opportunities, and schools. With all that, many parents of those families were able to send their children to college, giving them the advantage of a prestiges education, something their parents couldn't dream of in their time, before the turn of the Century up until the early 1960's, most Immigrant White parents didn't finish Gramma School, and their children followed in their parents footsteps, not knowing the importance of an education and were expected to work, helping their parents out if they weren't married.
Since the late 1980's to this present time, with Rising Property Taxes, Rising Home Buying Costs, along with The High Cost of Living, what African American people call, PRIVILEGED WHITE, most cannot any longer afford to live and commute from these suburban areas of New York, along with their siblings, many Who are professionals out of college, cannot find Low Cost Housing in Suburbia, let alone live in Manhattan! As a Result of all this, many Whites are returning to BUSHWICK and many parts of the 5 Boroughs their Parents, Grandparents, and even Great Grandparents, had once lived. They are now turning the neighborhoods around for SAFETY, CONVIENCE, along with AFFORDABLE BETTER LIVING CONDITIONS, that our families didn't have, who had to struggle just to live in their lifetime! I was POOR, WHITE, and UNDERPRIVILEGED reared, and STILL LIVE in THE BRONX, CO-OP CITY to be exact, and live in an African American Community, which was once a mostly Jewish Community. I have seen the urban decay that was brought along to this once thriving community! As the Jewish people moved out, a sizeable majority of unstable African Americans moved in with their GHETTO MENTALITY, DRUGS, GANGS, KNIVES and GUNS! I find also an EDUCATED CLASS and a GOOD DECENT WORKING CLASS of African Americans who want to keep this place THRIVING along with myself!
I am an Italian American, a working class Construction Worker, who was raised by my Mother, SINGLE PARENTED, was taught to respect an individual of any race, say NO TO DRUGS, and had gotten beatings along with punishment if I didn't listen. I am now married, and living, though I am not perfect, a decent lifestyle. What I mean to say, people shouldn't look down on a person because of CLASS, or RACE STATUS? I think those in BUSHWICK should look for the DECENCY in an individual whether they are POOR, MODERATE, or RICH of ANY RACE. Let's try getting rid of the GHETTO TRASH, and those who think they are EDUCATED, who have writen on this site, believing he or she's got all the answers (THAT GOES FOR ANY RACE) that doesn't BUILD UP, but DESTROYS!

Genaro: 24th Jul 2006 - 13:40 GMT

To add to my input above, reguardless of how, why, and what bad experiences we've all have been through, past, present or future, it is okay to be angry, but when it consumes us to no end, and brings violence into play, it wouldn't make the wrong right! I believe an individual can make a difference within his or herself. Those who are ravaged with so much hate, need to find reasoning in their hearts, to learn or perhaps be shown some sense of LOVE, CONSIDERATION, and SELF WORTH of THEMSELVES along with CORRECTING OTHERS with COMPASSION, not with HATE! Without SELF WORTH of a HUMAN BEING we defeat the purpose of living for and belonging to a HOLY GOD, who see's the TRUE WORKINGS of HUMAN BEINGS not judging the COLOR of our skin, but looks to THE SOUL for upholding HIS RIGHTIOUSNESS with GENUINE LOVE, TRUTH, along with DECENT HUMAN MORAL BEHAVIOR. I feel WE will ALL be judged someday for the STANDARDS we judge by, RIGHT OR WRONG Whether living in BUSHWICK or TIM-BUK-TU?

Susannah : 26th Jul 2006 - 18:54 GMT

All this stuff about "whites" is very hypocritical, whites are human beings just like every one else - who want to see their children grow up safe and happy and have some hope in their lives. Its not always about the economy and haves and have nots, sometimes its just about being decent to one another.

Genaro: 27th Jul 2006 - 09:58 GMT

Susannah, I have to give you, half-a-ditto on this one!
You have to understand that their were many Whites who and are still really racsists, especially the ones of the establishment, along with most of their ancestors! These are the kind that wouldn't live side by side with another race, because their ancestors were the ones who had all the clout, greed, along with their own selfish interests that were politically involved with those of THE WHITE HOUSE ESTABLISHMENT! Political men of the North endorsed the African slave trade with the Southern Plantation Business owners, while the North needed their resources and to keep the finances both among themselves! Most Southerners had an outright hatred for the Black Race as with many other races, including Whites, who didn't fit in with their educational, langauital, and their own hypocritical interpretive Christian culture? Some of this hatred also did spill over in the poorer cultures of society of every race, especially, the European immigrants, for they were not acustomed to living among other races and cultures? This is more or less prevelent today. I feel a lot of this comes from fear of what is unknown about one another, the differences in our cultures and It starts in the home? Enviornment, the haves and have nots, experiences of how a certain race is depicted or treated, with just plain stupidity, in judging by skin color, along with how one speaks, dresses and looks! Yes, their are many Whites that have more privilege as far as getting finacial loans than Blacks, but it also happens to the lesser societal Whites, who are also not privileged. I feel the people of Bushwick can learn to live together with one another, by genuinely getting involved with one another, sharing their interests, instead of pointing fingers at each other and propergande hate? HATE BREEDS HATE, LOVE FOR NEIGHBOOR OF ANY RACE would someday drown out all those OUT-MODED RICH WHITE ESTABLISHMENT HYPOCRITES, who believe they are SUPERIOR to us, saying in all pretense, they care, but couldn't care about the lesser person of of a different class, race or culture!
Keep in mind, their are more of us altogether than they, White, Black, Brown, Tan, Red and Yellow!
There is plenty of Bushwick to live in, so as all should live in peace, and God willing this would prevail.

Susannah : 28th Jul 2006 - 11:23 GMT

I know - I'm just as guilty as anyone - I want to avoid anyone with whom I have a conflict with and would rather live amongst people who understand my "boundaries". I think the subculture we grow up in defines our "boundaries" and thats why people tend to want to live amongst people "just like them". I've also been burned by being too trusting and too open minded, my parents were really open minded, and alot of blacks were very abusive to us, even people we befriended and did alot for. The kids who put my sister in the hospital were her friends who we used to take with us to Jones Beach whenever we went, they ate dinner and played at our house all of the time. People don't like to believe that reverse racism exists, or that its even possible but it does, and a white person walking through Bedford-Stuy at night is in as much danger as a black person walking through Howard Beach. When I was in college, if a black person did something to me and I reported it, I was challenged for potentially being a racist - it was ridiculous.

Susannah : 28th Jul 2006 - 11:27 GMT

I also have to say that people who want to look to the past all of the time are just looking for excuses and someone to blame for their dissatisfaction with themselves. I grew up in a half french protestant, half irish catholic family - many people don't know what that means but I grew up hearing about what this one did to that one and so on and so forth. At the end of the day it was just noise, and I realize that if you're not part of the solution, then you're part of the problem.

peacefrog: 26th Aug 2006 - 23:22 GMT

As an American who has lived in Canada most of his life, visiting the US and especially NYC is a harsh reality check, and a reminder that the ravages of racism are still alive and well in America - even in its most progressive city.

Let me explain. As a rubio who also happens to be Puerto Rican, I've always spent most of my time in NYC in the South Bronx, in Spanish Harlem, and in other (usually poor) neighborhoods where the Puerto Rican culture thrives. Having grown up in Toronto where there are hardly any Puerto Ricans, I didn't get to experience my own culture outside my family, and it was an amazing feeling to come to a city where Puerto Ricans were everywhere. It truly felt like coming home, and I immediately wanted to move there.

But then something happened....I was walking around with my darks-skinned girlfriend (who isn't hispanic, but looks it) when a couple Puerto Rican guys approached her and started asking her, in Spanish, what a beautiful latina girl like her wanted with a white boy like me. Since she didn't understand or speak Spanish, I replied, in Spanish, that she wasn't Latina, and that I was actually Puerto Rican despite my light complexion. Let me tell you, you could hear the laughter all across the Tri-state. Within a few moments other Puerto Ricans hanging out came over to join the discussion, and I was berated by all of them, told there was no way I could be Puerto Rican because of my skin color, and essentially laughed right out of the neighborhood.

The more time I spent in NYC, the more this kind of thing happened to me. Turns out, in NYC only olive-skinned people can be considered Puerto Rican. Of course, I understand their point: if you don't LOOK Puerto Rican you can't possibly understand what it is to be Puerto Rican in America. That's all good and whatnot, but I certainly didn't appreciate these people, who would no doubt decry any form of white racism against them based on their nationality, tell me who I was and where I was from and what I was and what I was not. Unfortunately, America's racist history has become a phenomena no longer isolated to the white race.

I still want to move to NYC, but do you think I want to move to PR neighborhood anymore, so I can laughed at, ostracized, and ultimately seen as nothing more than a "white invader" in a neighborhood where the culture I grew up with thrives? Hell naw!
Apparently, in NYC, you are what you look like. Since I don't meet the standards of most Nuevoriquenos as to what a Puerto Rica should look like, I'll never be more than a silly wannabe white boy to them.

Racism is alive and well in America, but it ain't just confined to the suburbs, the Upper East Side and Brooklyn Heights. Y'all better check yourselves. Shit is getting out of control.

peacefrog

"harpo" from middle village: 27th Aug 2006 - 20:39 GMT

My old church and school St. Brigids looks like some Guatemalan refuge camp . All the freaken phony whites from the 70 and 80' s moved out
and ruined the neighborhood - they were mostly Germans and Italians who really didn't love where they lived since if they did they would not have run away !
I still attend mass a few times a year at St Brigids - the Mexian people are friendly and shake your hand during the handshake of peace part of the mass
I have been mistaken for an Immigration office or a coyote by some of the parishoners during mass - I still see a few old-time elderly white people attending church but places like Miss Stewarts is long-gone

Recc: 15th Oct 2006 - 14:02 GMT

I live in bushwick because the city has decided to pay its cops shit...i cant afford to live ANYWHERE else in nyc...sometimes white people are poor too guys...

crlsgll: 13th Nov 2006 - 19:49 GMT

This conversation about Bushwick is great. I love reading the personal narratives that fuel each story and shed light in our differences; which is a blessing in disguise, for if we all agreed then this would be a single lonesome post.
I lived there for five years, (316 Linden st) I went to Bushwick High, loved gawking at the stores on Myrtle ave but shopped in Knickerbocker, avoided both the gangs and the evangelicals because, to me, fanatcism is death. I left NYC in 99, when the L Bedford ave. station was still a polish stop.
I grew up around Puertoricans and Dominicans. Southbound on Linden, it was mostly African American (No black dominican would ever let me compare him to an A.A.). Northbound, it was all white and light skinned PRs (such was my impression of things). I missed the whole artsy gentrification movement but i don't mind them, I'm all for the arts and I rather have Bushwick be known for the birthplace of Nilsson than for being #1 in arson.
But, when visiting my mom, I've been also known to act thuggish in the L and murmur "fucking white girls" while moving out of their way as they come out of the train, and this all done for the amusement of my Wyoming county, NY born and bred girlfriend. She loves my acting thug but also wants me to get my M.A. soon.
Though my experience of Bushwick is not of the "Bronx Tale" or the heroin -crack -ghetto fabulous type, it is story of wanting to get out of there as soon as possible to now finding myself immersed in blog after blog about Bushwick.

KAYO: 13th Nov 2006 - 20:59 GMT

I REMEMBER BUSHWICK OF THE '50S. RIDING THE TROLLEY THEN BUS DOWN TO GATES AVE TO SHOP AND BANK WITH MY MOTHER. SHOPPING ON BWAY IN THE CANDY STORE,BAKERY AND MR. LAST'S DELI THEN THE BUTCHER,GROCERY AND DRUG STORES ALL ON ONE BLOCK. I REMEMBER WHEN YOU COULD WALK DOWN ANY STREET AT ANY TIME OF THE NIGHT AND NOT WORRY. GRIMM'S BAR AND SCOTTY'S ON THE CORNER OF BROADWAY AND FURMAN. LOURDES BEFORE IT WAS BURNED DOWN. GOT MARRIED THERE IN 1960. KEARNS FUNERAL ON FURMAN AND BUSHWICK. THE PARK UP ON ABERDEEN STREET AND HANGING OUT IN NIEHR'S ICE CREAM PARLOR ALL NIGHT.LEFT WHEN I GOT MARRIED BUT MY PARENTS HAD TO LEAVE A SHORT TIME LATER BECAUSE OF PROBLEMS IN THE AREA. THEN THEIR HOUSE WAS BURNED DOWN. I ALSO REMEMBER THE FIRST HOUSE THAT WAS BOUGHT BY A NON WHITE PERSON, THE BASEMENT WAS MADE IN TO AN AFTER HR. JOINT.HAVE FRIEND WHO IS NYPD GOT SHOT ON GRANIT STREET. SOMETIMES THINGS CHANGE FOR THE BETTER BUT BOY THINGS SURE CHANGED AND NOT FOR THE BETTERMENT OF THE NEIGHBORHOOD.

Scott: 6th Dec 2006 - 19:14 GMT

Just moved to Bushwick 2 years ago, very white, and a supposed part of this so-called "gentrification." I, and the other "white people" that live in my building all moved here for two reasons. 1) We need cheap rent because we are either students, artists, and/or don't make a lot of money. And 2) because we're open minded not to care about being surrounded by all white people all the time.

Am I aware that I could be "forcing" families out? Nope. I'm not forcing anyone anywhere, anymore than I being forced by my employer to choose Bushwick instead of the Upper East Side. It's just a fact of life. I'm a nice person, and I'll try to make the area I live in better. If the cultural groups of people who were in Bushwick before me (from the puerto ricans, to dominicans, to african americans, to the polish, to the british, to the dutch, or even the native americans) only cared about getting out of Bushwick, renting and not buying in Bushwick, and/or not bringing the neighborhood up (safer, better looking, greener), then why should they care if I do?

Live and let live. There's plenty of room for all to live in Bushwick.

Scott - hit me up on Broadway and Malcolm X some time

Jeremy Jones: 15th Dec 2006 - 09:51 GMT

As a rubio who also happens to be Puerto Rican, I've always spent most of my time in NYC in the South Bronx, in Spanish Harlem, and in other neighborhoods where the Puerto Rican culture thrives. Having grown up in Toronto where there are hardly any Puerto Ricans, I didn't get to experience my own culture outside my family, and it was an amazing feeling to come to a city where Puerto Ricans were everywhere.

upfromflames: 15th Jan 2007 - 22:01 GMT

I am teacher in Bushwick, who is working on a history of the last 30 years in Bushwick. I'd appreciate hearing from anyone who lived through that time in the neighborhood. You could be a part of a show this summer at the brooklyn historical society.
Adam
contact at upfromflames@gmail.com

P.Y,T: 29th Jan 2007 - 08:00 GMT

Hey Look I Live In Bushwick All My Life Im 22 And Bushwick has changed now there used to be alot of people here and chillin but things change during the years yea but i also been seeing White people comin and the owners of the houses see money quick when they see white people lol im not tryin to be racist or anything but yea white people look like money lol but bushwick has changed its more boring,less ghetto,less drugs,less hustlers,less everything now it looks like a white neighborhood , lol but thats why P.Y.T Do wat they do

upfromflames: 9th Feb 2007 - 00:11 GMT

If its history does that mean it's over?

we'll find out this summer, when a Bushwick exhbition hits the Brooklyn Historical Society. We are a group of teachers working with the Academy of Urban PLanning at Bushwick High. The exhibition focuses on the vast changes that have occurred in the community over the last 30 years. Its entitles Up From Flames: Mapping the Recovery of Bushwick 1977-2007.

In this thread, you have touched on so many of those issues. I am just sorry that I am came late to the table, as I see much of this writing was from last summer. But if you are still out there, I'd love to continue and inform the conversation here, in preparation for the exhibition. For more info, you can check us out at our very rudimentary and formative upfromflames.com

dimeadozen: 27th Feb 2007 - 18:06 GMT

Thank you to everyone for this discussion especially The Truth and those following who elevated the discussion.

I moved to Bushwick very recently and completely randomly. Although I work hard, support myself and am forced to share my loft with too many other people to make rent I was immediately aware that I am the specter of gentrification. Even worse I’m an artist so, although our fucked up society affords me greater upwardly mobility as a white kid, I’m choosing not to exploit it. I’m choosing to follow my passion and except the poverty that comes with it.
It is something that I think about almost everyday and, although there are a significant number of obnoxious hipsters who don’t give a fuck, I can’t be the only thoughtful white kid in Bushwick. I frequent local establishments and am dusting off my high school Spanish hoping to eventually feel like part of the community. I try not to get riled up when teenagers call me a white bitch because I don't know there lives and I believe meeting anger with anger gets us nowhere. I do stand my ground and watch my back when I come home at night because I know where I am living.
I appreciated the feelings behind everyone’s initial desire to argue with the previous poster but I would like to see more about what people think could be done. If anything productive can be accomplished I feel like this is the time to start, in the beginning of the current transformation. Also I think there is unique opportunity now because of the different housing the two communities choose. I’m sure rent prices are still being pushed up by the mere presence of white kids but it appears to me that many of them are not taking over residential space, rather converting old industrial buildings. This probably has its own ill effects on industry, I’m not sure it’s just a thought.

It is crazy idealism to think maybe we could happily live together? Change is inevitable but maybe the tide could be held back for a few years if we talked more.

There are ignorant people on all sides of all races and income brackets but at least we can try not to be. We can try to be aware of what we are where we are and how society has instructed us to react to each other.

Maybe I am ignorant too, maybe I am the problem but my point is I’m trying to figure it out. So don’t assume every new white kid in the neighborhood is a thoughtless douche bag with tunnel vision. (Those kids piss me off just as much, maybe more.)
And fellow white kids don't assume you are not at least part of the problem.
I feel I may have lost my point in all this. Now that I find myself in Bushwick I don’t think the best thing I could do for the community would be to just leave? There are plenty of other kids spilling out of college with meaningless undergraduate degrees waiting to take my place.
Can anyone recommend a course of action? Or reading materials for me to disseminate? What would wake a hipster up to there surroundings?

dimeadozen: 27th Feb 2007 - 21:02 GMT

ps Dave, Starr st now smells like fresh tortillas and they are very tasty.

upfromflames: 27th Feb 2007 - 22:57 GMT

Dimeadozen: That's one thing I am working on in our Museum Exhibition at the Brooklyn Historical Society.

I am of the inclination that if people in Bushwick--whether they be older leavers, young folks growing up there, or recent arrivals to be aware of what they have in common: the process of destruction and rebirth that binds their separate concepts of what Bushwick was, what it is, and what it might be.

Its a bit like the 4 blind men and the elephant; Its hard to relate to what someone might say about the Italian "good old days" as it is to relate to the territorial sensitivity of blacks and Latinos who feel trouble relating to the white "artists" are moving in their turf. But we are all the faces of Bushwick, in space, and in time.

More on this soon...

j.walthers@timesnewsweekly.com: 4th Mar 2007 - 18:46 GMT

This interaction regarding Bushwick, while interesting, is lacking in an understanding of the history of the community, specifically its course and development in Kings County (not Brooklyn) from its chartering in the 1600s, its emergence as a political powerhouse in Brooklyn in the late 1800s and early 1900s, its connection with its sister neighborhood, Ridgewood, and its devastation after World War II. If anybody is interested, the twists and turns of the Brooklyn portion of Ridgewood and Bushwick will be posted here to review. Any takers?

upfromflames: 5th Mar 2007 - 02:30 GMT

Word. If there is any place for it, its here! The Ridgewood Times has been a voice of Ridgewood-Bushwick for so long, you should continue the tradition now...

j.walthers@timesnewsweekly.com: 5th Mar 2007 - 19:21 GMT

Thank you for your interest.

I would like to start with a very brief history of Bushwick to establish both philosophy and development for use as foundation to buttress the argument that the communities of Bushwick and the Brooklyn side of Ridgewood are petri dishes of true American urbanism in all its cycles, from Birth, to Growth and Expansion, to Grit and Glory, to Decay and Despair, and now, hopefully, Rebirth. Today, Part IA - Birth.

Part IA - Birth - Bushwick, Cutting Edge From The Jump:

Three counties were chartered on Long Island - Kings (NOT Brooklyn), Queens and Suffolk. Bushwick was one of the six original patented Towns of Kings County - Bushwick, Flatbush, Brooklyn, New Utrecht, Gravesend and Flatlands. Time frame: 1600s.

Bushwick, established by the Dutch in 1638 as 'Boswijk' was, from the onset, a progressive-minded settlement. The Dutch, unlike the English, would both mingle and do business with anyone; the English were far more exclusionary and intolerant, both in their business interests and social interactions.

This mind-set fostered a common ground for Dutch Reformed, Presbyterian, Episcopal, Catholic, Methodist, Baptist and Universalist to connect and exchange - a condition not present in a rigid, caste-entrenched Europe, where definitions and separations were determined by both religion and class. Bushwick was, so to speak, Cutting Edge. With this foundation, Bushwick began to flourish.

j.walthers@timesnewsweekly.com: 5th Mar 2007 - 23:33 GMT

Part IB - Birth - Billyburg's First Hipsters Came From.....Bushwick:

Bushwick was mainly pastoral in pre- and post-Revolutionary War Kings County; salt meadows offered excellent grazing. Farming was central to the local economy.

However, by the early 1800s many owners of Bushwick's western tracts sought conversion to more profitable city lots; Queens County farms were more expansive and productive. There was dissention among older Bushwick farmers and the younger generation.

Legislation set off Williamsburgh from Bushwick in 1840 as Williamsburgh's density allowed its chartering to City status and the municipality was in need of, and paid handsomely for, additional lots.

The young and upwardly mobile left Bushwick and migrated to the City of Williamsburgh. And now Williamsburgh, not Bushwick, was Manhattan's favorite neighbor. The original 'Hipsters' sought to protect this location status. A provision was enacted limiting what remained of Bushwick to remain as Bushwick, preventing enjoinment to Williamsburgh. Its citizens could only meet at a Bushwick location to discuss civic matters.

Does all this sound vaguely familiar? How much have people changed?

In 1855, the City of Williamsburg and the Town of Bushwick annexed to the City of Brooklyn and became Brooklyn's Eastern District. The objective was rivalry with massive New York City across the river. It was ill-advised.

upfromflames: 6th Mar 2007 - 00:01 GMT

Ms. Walthers: One question I have about this long and interesting history is how the process by which Bushwick grew from Bushwick Corners (Metropolitan and Bushwick) into its current grid stretching far to the SE. I would suppose that it was connected to this divorce with Williamsburg, but what is the story?

upfromflames: 6th Mar 2007 - 03:29 GMT

Bushwick Corners, 1946
from the Brooklyn Eagle
300 years of Bushwick @
www.bklyn-genealogy-info.com/Town/Bushwick/index.html

j.walthers@timesnewsweekly.com: 10th Mar 2007 - 12:52 GMT

In response to upfromflames regarding Bushwick Corners:

This response requires both historical perspective and adjustment of mind set to the Colonial New World.

The 17th Century was a fundamentally agrarian society dedicated and tied to land ownership, farming and the horse, of course.

The earliest of settlements - Breukelen, Cripplebush, Gowanus, Green Point, Werpos (Werpot) - were essentially 'Little Houses On The Kings County's Prairie' for generations until New York City (only Manhattan at this time) began to percolate.

New York City grew north from Wall Street rapidly, reducing available farmland. Citizens, as well as their horses, had to be fed. Existing farms on Long Island needed routes to deliver goods into New York City.

Breukelen, then Brooklyn Village (vicinity of present day Downtown Brooklyn) developed in Kings County at the point where water routes, initially established by Indians, departed Brooklyn Village and navigated into New York City.

From Brooklyn Village farmers from Long Island shipped their goods across the river - which included the precious commodity of HAY! A collection of stables, lodgings, stores and taverns opened to service farmers and customers into New York City at Brooklyn Village.

Enterprising individuals established Turnpike Companies which built and maintained Toll Roads and Weighing Stations leading to the Long Island Ferry Service - as it was called at Brooklyn Village. Fulton Street is so named - for both its Ferry and Robert Fulton. Farmers paid for both the use of the road as well as the weight of the goods on those roads drawn by horses.

Bushwick Corners (Bushwick Village) parallels the establishment and development of Brooklyn Village.

The establishment of Ferry Service to deliver goods from from Brooklyn Village into New York City was duplicated, now from Newtown Creek, reportedly by individuals of French origin. Turnpike Companies also developed, but the advantage was that service from this point cut both travel time and tolls.

The vicinity of present day Bushwick and Metropolitan Avenues was the convergence of Toll Roads, Weighing Stations and Ferry Wagons. As in Brooklyn Village, stables, lodgings, stores and taverns opened. The settlement was called Williamsburgh, the 'confluence' - Bushwick Corners.

Use of Metropolitan Avenue through Newtown Township saw the establishment of Middle Village. Routes from farms in Jamaica Township through East New York (New Lots) used what is today called Bushwick Avenue.

This tract along Bushwick Avenue saw development running NW and SE to and from Bushwick Corners, similar to Metropolitan Avenue. However, development on the actual grids - though these grids, or Lots were already parceled - did not kick-in until the mid- to late-19th Century with the dramatic expansion of the Eastern District of the City of Brooklyn.

belis: 21st Jun 2007 - 21:01 GMT

I am 17 years old and I was born and raised in Bushwick Brooklyn New York. To begin bushwick is not East Williamsburg. Thats just what it is being called to get white people to move to the area. I dont have anything against change. But there is no need to change its name. the one thing i ask the white people is to not be srangers talk to the people in your neighborhood, get to know them.

upfromflames: 10th Aug 2007 - 12:23 GMT

This is just a notice that the third walking tour associated with the "Up From Frames" exhibit will occur this Saturday - August 11 - at 1 PM. We will gather at the NE corner Maria Hernandez Park. This tour will include visits of North Bushwick and East Williamsburg. Among many other things, we will visit Joe and Mary's - where mob boss Carmen Galente was gunned down - the old 83rd Precinct, the area included in the Bushwick Initiative project, the site of the former St. Leonard's Church, the beautiful English Kills and several of the trendy places in East Williamsburg. The trip should last about 2 plus hours and end up at a Life 983 on Flushing Ave.

I hope both the new and long time residents of Bushwick will come out and make this tour a real - and very interactive - success.

JKS: 29th Aug 2007 - 03:58 GMT

Hello. I'm a white, college-educated newcomer to Bushwick. I've always been poor, but by comparison white people are much wealthier than ethnic minorities. I'm white, and I have no trouble admitting that Bushwick is far from culturally-enhanced by my presence here. Frankly, the frustration against whites is supported by virtually every accessible socioeconomic statistic available. The reason I'm posting: I have never voted for a capitalist. Gentrification is a natural subprocess of capitalism. If you don't like gentrification, perhaps you should look to whom you are voting. If the information I just consulted is correct, whites constitute less than 50% of the total city population. Even with perfect voter turnout, whites should not be deciding the social-political-economic health of your neighborhood.

landlord: 31st Aug 2007 - 04:11 GMT

I'm a landlord and I have to say that from my point of view it all comes down to who is going to be a good tenant.
The tenant that is going to pay on time and respect the place where they live, that to me is what I'm looking for. At the end of the day it all comes down to $$$

MaGoo: 20th Oct 2007 - 18:16 GMT

I grew up on Lawn Guyland in the 70's; most of my neighbors were "caucasian-Americans" who were from Bushwick and East New York. They had been displaced by the "diversity"- when the city used THEIR tax money to build housing projects, (and rent-subsidy programs) which resulted in these neighborhoods being "diversified", which resulted in the areas being flooded with crime and drugs. Many of my neighbors who tried to hold their ground, finally had to flee Brooklyn after they became victims of numerous crimes (the ones that were lucky enough to live- a fate which my then downstairs neighbors' elderly brother would not experience- he died after being knocked down on Evergreen Ave. by a mugger).

The ones who didn't have the foresight or ability to flee early on, not only became veritable prisoners in their own homes, as the neighborhood around them became filled with violence and vice, -but they often lost everything they had- as their modest homes were now worthless- and many residents who owned their own homes in Bushwick, ended up just having to walk away- abandonning the dwellings, as they were impossible to sell at any price. A few of the more enterprising homeowners who couldnt sell the houses they once lived in, became landlords...but that didn't last long, as the tenants ruined the buildings and it was virtually impossible (and dangerous) to collect the rent...while property tax, maintenance, repairs, insurance and heating bills continued to roll in.

Unfortunately, the ivory-tower leftists who seem to predominate in NYC, act as though this "diversity" was just great...and portray the real victims (the caucasian-Americans) as the villians! (Oh, you know, these "evil rich white people"...the ones who had to abandon their often paid-for homes, and live in cheap apartments over stores in downtown areas of Suffolk county on their $80 a month social security checks).

In my late teens, I had an opportunity to see, first-hand, Bushwick in the late 70's when it looked like a war-zone. I guarantee you that no one who is moving into the neighborhood now would want any of the residents from that day living nextdoor to them!
Where were all the people laudiong "diversity" when the neighborhood was a German/Irish/Polish area? Oh, that kind of diversity they dont care for...but when the government floods the neighborhood with primarily one ethnic group, they think it's just great (entire blocks of burnt-out buildings and garbage-strewn streets to the contrary).

I will not now shed any tears for anyone who is now displaced from these neighborhoods..for
they displaced earlier residents...and they weren't very nice about it..and they didn't "celebrate diversity". I feel sorry for anyone who chooses to move their even now- paying millionaire prices to live in a rowhouse in a ghetto...when the crime is still quite high, and half of the housing units are still subsidized. (Quite frankly, I liked the area better when it looked like the South Bronx)

UpFromFlames: 21st Oct 2007 - 13:53 GMT

As I am fond of saying, Memory is the surest antidote to history.

That is the main issue I have with your perspective. While I have done a lot of documentary research [[www.upfromflames.com]] I could not have walked those streets in the 1970's. I was not old enough or NY enough, having grown up with parents who escaped NY in the 1950's to the South--from which I escaped back to NYC.

But if I had grown up here, it might have impaired my ability to do this research, to see Bushwick with fresh eyes and recognize it as a subject worthy of study and rememberance. NY depends on a steady flow of such fresh eyes to keeps its historical narrative developing.

That said, my main disagreement with you is on

1)your closing statement that you prefer Bushwick back in the fiery 70's--while this might be romantic, it neglects the bigger issues that brought the community to its knees and took 30 years (and counting) to get beyond-- global economic transitions and local urban planning strategies, for example

2)your lack of sympathy with today's Black and Latino residents being pushed out by gentrification. They may look the same to someone who has been pushed out, but there are many historical and economic differences that are important to understand for the bigger picture of what is now happening in our city. Its about much more than Bushwick. And its about much more than a zero-sum game of "see, that's how it feels".

and, no, I don't live in Bushwick. I study it, I teach it. Thats my job. And I am just doing it here.

UpFromFlames: 21st Oct 2007 - 21:46 GMT

MaGoo: I'm really sorry to see that some knucklehead is deleting your comments here. This is sad, as it makes an informed dialogue impossible. Could whoever is doing this worry more about gangsters and profanity than a range of opinion???

CartLegger: 22nd Oct 2007 - 15:40 GMT

What the hell has gone on here? Another comment deleted, again??? This one, commenting on the censorship...

Is someone hacking in that hates diversity? Is there a secret editorial board? Come on, citynoise. You are losing respectabilty at a precipitous rate.

MaGoo: 22nd Oct 2007 - 20:00 GMT

If anyone would like to continue a dialogue, contact me through my UNCENSORED forum www.aitftalk.proboards2.com/index.cgi -Rich

Editor:: 22nd Oct 2007 - 20:35 GMT

Rich/CartLegger: The editorial issues have been addressed, and this entry will see no additional editing/"censorship", I assure you...

It seems that two comments were accidentally deleted amidst a glut of other spam (which happens sometimes, as much as i hate to admit it... youd be surprised what a task despamming this site can be at times, and sometimes a big batch of spam gets deleted with an innocuous comment in it due to sloppy/tired/preoccupied oversight).

Regardless, I will keep an eye on this entry personally, to ensure that this doesn't happen again, so feel free to post here unhindered; and do feel free to repost anything that was accidentally deleted.

Thanks for understanding...

UpFromFlames: 22nd Oct 2007 - 23:16 GMT

understood. I see the crap that gets posted here, and it takes a godlike eye to be able to see it all and seperate the wheat from the chaff. I know that it means many a squinty eyed hour. Thanks for making peace on the matter.

PS: Rich, I can't link to your page. what's up man? Hope you'll come back to CityNoise soon. You words are safe here.

MaGoo: 23rd Oct 2007 - 15:40 GMT

Thank you, Editor, and UFF and Cartlegger.

I won't go hog-wild here- as I realize that there are so many other areas of human endeavor that come into play when discussing this topic, that it would be very easy for it to go wildly off-topic, and detract from the basic message of this thread.

One thing I would like to address, is the issue of displacement. Others have said that the residents who were displaced in the 60's/70's were essentially no different than those who were displaced to make room for them...who in turn had displaced farmers...who in turn....well...you get the idea.

One thing does have to be realized though: When the previous groups were displaced- it was under different circumstances- I don't think any other group had to flee because of crime and violence and arson. For example, when the area started changing from farms to suburban residences...it wasn't as though the farmers were being driven out because of the violence of the new residents, and abandonning their properties. Quite the contrary- the farmers were selling their land for handsome profits or even developing the land themselves. They didn't flee...they rather converted their assetts to cash (at quite a profit) and then moved upward and onward.

In the late 19th century, people were building mansions in Bushwick. That seems to have been the pinnacle of Bushwicks' residential incarnation. Woodland-->isolated large farms-->farmland-->upper-class suburbs-->middle-class suburb-->middle class urban-->working class urban-->lower working class urban-->slum-->gentrification.

The cycle is a common one which is played out in virtually all urban areas, sooner or later. Of all the changes though, it is only the group (usually poor working class) which inhabits the neighborhood just before it makes the transition from lower working class to slum, which end up leaving not by choice, but rather because of fear- and it is only the property owners in this group which not only fail to recoop the investment they have in their properties (much less reap a profit) but which usually end up moving "downward" rather upward or even horizontally. (Going from being homeowners to renters- since often their only source of equity was their home...and because of the degradation of the area, they were forced to sell it for a loss..or simply had to abandon it).

Also coming into play in the transition from working-class to slum, is the fact that in all previous "migrations", whatever happened was merely a result of the residents actions and the free-market- while the transition to "slum" occurred because of the actions of government- using the very residents tax-money to essentially destroy their neighborhood by building huge housing projects and un-naturally changing the demographics of the neighborhoods by infusing them huge masses of the poor and indigent, and concurrently changing the ethnic make-up of the neighborhoods virtually overnight. (Lets face it, it wasn't the former residents [the ones driven from their homes] who sealed the areas' fate as a slum by burning and looting what was left of it during the '77 blackout).

UpFromFlames:

Please try copying and pasting this URL into your browsers address bar:

http://www.aitftalk.proboards2.com/index.cgi

That way, we can discuss this more in detail without clogging up this site un-necessarily. (Plus I think you'd enjoy the "diversity" there!)

MaGoo: 23rd Oct 2007 - 16:00 GMT

PS: Just for context- so that you realize that my observations are quite balanced and unbiased:

I was raised by a single parent on welfare- we were abjectly poor. Most of our neighbors who were Bushwick "displacees" weren't much better off.

As a middle-aged man now, my home consists of 27 acres of land in rural Kentucky- and I see the same thing happening here as happened in Brooklyn in the 19th century. People divide big farms into smaller farms, and people like myself purchase them. People start selling smaller parts of those small farms and people who work in the cities and towns move in and build suburban-style houses on small plots....then the last remaining large farms sell to those who build subdivisions (or develope them themselves)....and most of the last-remaining small farms end up selling because the character of the area ends up becoming just like the places they had originally come from, and which had prompted them to move from their original homes. (I made the move from Long Island to KY in 2001).

So you see, not only have I observed every side of these scenarios...but I have experienced them!

I'll probably be selling my place well before the over-all large-scale suburbanization takes place- as it is already getting too suburbanized for me now. While I may not reap the profits of those who wait, at least I have built some equity in my property, and can move onward and upward (or at the very least maintain my position)- unlike the residents of Bushwick, who essentially just had to walk away from everything, and by government decree, were reduced to the same socio-economic level of those who were displacing them. (Imagine in my case, if they suddenly were to build a housing project next-door to me. The value of my land would go down instead of up, and since that is my only real assett, I'd be forced to either stay and endure the new neighbors...or flee and lower my socio-economic position)

riiiiiight: 25th Dec 2007 - 00:41 GMT

i was born and raised in bk. i just checked out a new "luxury condo" developement out there a whim (when i was told my rent was being jacked up another 300 bucks). the building is sick, the apartments are insanely nice, the l is directly on the corner... but i cant front the brooklynite in me is more than a little conflicted about the idea of chilling on my private roofdeck overlooking motherfuckin popeyes chicken. there is a harsh contrast of realities being manufactured here and its not easy to navigate. anyone whos actually from bk knows this.

do i feel entitled to a degree? yes. but my sense of entitlement comes from being an actual brooklyn resident who, finally, at 32 years of age has saved up enough cake to cop a little spot for myself as opposed to being at the mercy of some land baron who bought up 10 blocks of ghetto real estate 10 years ago and turned the hood into what is now damn near unaffordable by anyones standards. but im a bit of a conflicted and rare breed. i spent all my life here. i made my money myself and i have seen every neighborhood i ever lived in go through this process. hoods me and my fam lived in because they were cheap and ultimately priced us out of.

and since im from brooklyn and im also not the type of cat to foster the type of crippling and condescending white guilt that seems to plague so many of the posters on here. i have no problem stating that one of the reasons im conflicted about bushwick is that its FUCKIN UGLY. if i buy out there its cause i wanted to own a crib on the cheap. period.

so many white kids move in to ny and immediately fetishize poverty. it connects them somehow to a struggle and personal developement they never touched on before. but its just tourism. you move in and after 2 months you think youve earned the right to complain about the the "charm" of the hood being "ruined" by those damn gentrifiers (of which you arent). blow me. real poverty isnt cute. " oooh i looove this neigborhood!" fuck outa here. people who live in bushwick know that shit isnt hot. but they live there cause they live there. " im different! im not one of the bad white people! i love diversity!"... riiiggght. look cop your little crib and shut the fuck up. stop trying to justify shit. you all know god damned well what the deal is. if i cop one of the "luxury condos" i will do it knowing full well i did that shit for no other reason than im trying to get over. im a grown ass man though and im more worried about my future than yours. thats just real talk. i guess im just an asshole.

and heres more real talk: as painful as it may be to be a part of the gentrifying force, try being an actual resident who has had to watch for 32 years as every neighborhood you RENTED in and never bought in blew up and brought in literally millions to the lucky fuckers who had the means to cop a spot before the boom. i mean jesus fucking christ if i see one more out of town cat get rich like that and im stuck here renting i will shoot someone.

this is ny. if you are some goofy white kid who just moved here than dont complain that you are poor and can only live in bushwick. no one asked you to leave vermont. im sure you could take that 1250 you drop in bushwick and live like a god in whatever little rural town you come from. but this is ny. if you look like a vic you will get checked at the bodega. thats on you. people dont fuck with me cause i look like (and will) knock someone the fuck out. you cant fake the type of swagger that is earned by living in ny all your life. and you cant get respect because you mean well and "arent racist". if you want to be comfortable and understood move to williams burg. if you want a cheap crib move to bushwick. just stop deluding yourselves. you DONT care. you ARE NOT ONE OF THE GOOD WHITE PEOPLE. and heres the kicker...
'
THE SECOND YOU CAN AFFORD TO YOU WILL LEAVE BUSHWICK FOR A NICER HOOD AND NEVER LOOK BACK. THE ONLY WAY YOU WILL STAY IS IF ENOUGH PEOPLE WHO LOOK LIKE YOU MOVE IN QUICK ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU FEEL SAFE.

cry me a river.

the in: 25th Feb 2008 - 03:02 GMT

wow this is a hot issue with many different sides to it. First I'm white and poor and a hipster. My first choice was to live in Williamburg. But the prices there have gone up so much, I can't aford that. Even east williamsburg has expensive prices so I move to Bushwick, cuz its like a pre-gentrified williamsburg. Iknow you don't like it. and I know that the ones in Bushwick are moving out cuz they can;t afford it and they move to East New York and Brownsville witch btw makes those areas even worse. Did you know that as Bushwick and Bed-Sty are slowely gentifying and becoming safer, that East New York and Brownsville are becoming worse and worse and are now those two neighborhoods are some of the most horrible

Questioning: 28th Feb 2008 - 16:27 GMT

I have a question...I am a white non hipster brought up by a single parent working 2 jobs in brooklyn so i know what its like not to been the one looking for rent stabilization or lower rent...but why is it that when white individuals move into a certain neighborhood and the residents of that neighborhood complain its gentrification but when non white people move into a white neighborhood and the residents of that neighborhood complain its considered racism and discrimination????

Roger: 1st Mar 2008 - 06:45 GMT

I'm an artist who is not a hipster. I am moving further east in Bushwick because the rent is cheaper for what you can get, as I'm saddled in debt. I'm half Peruvian (my mother's side) and half Russo-Jewish - I can pass for white, Jewish, Latino, even Russian, Italian, or middle eastern. I guess that puts me at an advantage because I have rarely been the victim of racism in the flavor of minority-towards-whites because I think that most aren't quite sure what I am .. except that I'm probably "white" because I get my clothes at H&M, A.A., and "trendy" consignment shops. But honestly I'm really frugal with my clothes, I just make an effort to look as awesome as I want to feel.

If you are going to move into a neighborhood, I feel that it is your duty to your own sense of comfort to do the very least and try to integrate yourself a little bit into its culture. I have been brushing up on my Spanish since I moved here. It's not like it's hard to say gracias or donde esta el tren. To see the hipsters doing their thing and not looking at anyone or talking to anyone, even a few words in Spanish just to be courteous, makes me roll my eyes inside. Who are they fooling? They're the ones who moved into a "bad" neighborhood so doesn't that kind of make them a little more "low-class"? In conclusion, I think that it is those kinds of people that have the destructive attitude because they don't want to find out about the culture they have chosen to live in nor do they want to bring their own into it. They're just using it.

In terms of integration, I wonder if it can work the other way around for Latinos? I have met some Latino people that seem to be "gentrifying" themselves; I met a Puerto Rican girl who worked in a real estate agency renting expensive lofts.

Could it be that with everyone running around being so scared of each other that there isn't a chance at all to get some backbone and help a mother of a different race carry a pram up the stairs and leave with a smile? In the scheme of things racism is really as tiny as a dot in my mind. Total nonsense. Forget about it and live like we're all humans already ...

Julian: 8th Sep 2008 - 16:52 GMT

Hey roger, I liked that a lot. Gives me something to think about...

yoyo: 29th Dec 2008 - 06:59 GMT

Okay, I'm giving my opinion. Everybody here is trying to sound so smart, but in reality it's your opinion and not reality. This planet first of all is not ours, it has been lended to us...I mean haven't you seen "the day the earth stood still"? Is understandable for sheep minds to feel attachment to what you believe is home, as human calculations of brain stimulation is equivalent to manifestation of self destruction, the elites are moving us like chess pieces. Who cares if your white because not long ago Italians, polish, Irish etc. were referred to as ethnic white not "white" they as well were heavily discriminated. fuck this im tired good night. 2012----....Well see if you "white" folks will be discriminating or will be running along side us as brothers. Judement day mofo hahahah controllo di brainwash di illuminati

yoyo: 29th Dec 2008 - 07:03 GMT

by the way we are way too ethnocentric. Look up the kayapo in Brazil.

tommy: 20th Dec 2009 - 01:57 GMT

even though working class and immigrant are suffer , this is reality first landlord have the right to gentify their neighborhood , caused they own , if you turn from working class to landlord you would do the same thing , i mean when you possess something you want the best of it , renting to whites mean higher rent , who does not want money , working class work to make money , landlord rent to working class to make money , landlord rent to whites to make money , people asking for affordable housing who benefit the tenant so what does that mean to landlord , they have to pay property taxes and other fee esp for six family. life always unfair , what about the people in the world how many people in this world suffer way more than working class , and so if you end up in shelter at least you are better than the undeveloped countries they have no money , no job , no food and no clean water to survive.if bushwick is working class , why there are so dog feces in the ground , if working class are poor what make them able to afford a dog who cost more than what you can offer your family , people asking about local businesses what about the chinese food , hispanic and black always mock chinese delivery man and black even kill at least more than 10 delivery man , i am not being racism but this is the true , if the resident of bushwick is good why there are so many shit and nasty rice on the floor , they blame the landlord asking the amount of member lived within one unit and amount of food they eat , if they respect they should not produce some many garbage on the street.

Franny Wentzel: 20th Dec 2009 - 03:23 GMT

If you're really sick of 'capitalist' gentrification you should follow the Soviet example and require internal passports so that people can't just move into a big city without the government's permission. Of course in the socialist countries the kind of predatory people who give capitalism a bad name simply adapted to the new way of governance.

quinn: 18th Mar 2010 - 15:33 GMT

i don't know if i commented on this blog before but i definitely have read it. I'm a landlord in Bushwick. We have 4 bldgs here on the corners of Starr and St Nich. My g/p stared with the store in 1 of our bldgs in 1965 and went through hell with the racism projected at him for being "hispanic". I put this in qoutations because he was not hispanic he was Spanish. Born in spain. That would be the same continent that Italy, Germany, and Ireland occupy. Anybody who lives here has a right to live here! There are scum. Always have been and there have always been gang and ethnic issues. The Italians used to rove this neighb in the 40's and the 50's looking for problems or turf. I would imagine that even the original Dutch settlers probably had their own brand of hoodlums and the indigenous people before them had their own conflicts with each other. The sense of entitlement due to race, age,longevity or anything else really baffles me and on bad days annoys me. I welcome anything that will better the neighb and especially my specific blocks. I have done an incredible amount of work to beautify and secure our area for the betterment of all who live @ here and I am still amazed at the complaints or insults I endure from either a few of my older(tenure) tenants or other lanlords(2). I lived on Troutman between Knockerbocker and Irving in 1992-93 when the 83rd pct had a huge light right on my bedroom window and we had to use our utility bills for proof to enter the block. I left after that episode. I came back here 6 years ago to help out my parents and the changes that have occurred for the better in my bldgs and the neighb i truly applaud. Other than 2 I have 23 wonderful tenants. I see a lot of the griping about gentrification as simply what I refer to as reverse racism. It's not really reverse just thought of as so since those who are the targets usually belong to the ethnic majority of this country. If these accusations and complaints were aimed at a minority there'd be heel to pay and Ridgewoodbushwick services would be all over the incident!

Bklyn Pete: 4th Apr 2011 - 05:54 GMT

I just read a book called "THE JUSTICE GARDEN" written by a cop from Bushwick. It was very interesting and mentioned a lot of things about the area in the 1970s. The incidents are real-life with some fiction thrown in for fun read. Brought back a lot of memories. I recommend it for those who lived in Bushwick.