Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
Yes, there are always exceptions to every generalized statement. But "full of people busting their ass"? You can't be serious. This statement certainly didn't describe the people inhabiting the pre-Katrina projects in New Orleans. Maybe your projects are the lone exception in the universe--chalked-full of industrious, hard-working people. For all of our relative backwardness in Louisiana, at least the whole state here knows and acknowledges the human degreadation caused by these things.And guess what? As New Oreleans recovers, the projects are not being rebuilt. Good riddance.
I might be thinking of different projects... when I was over there a few years back, I encountered some - sure there was a reasonable percentage of people who seemed to be unemployed and happy that way, but there seemed to be a higher percentage employed in two or more low paying jobs supporting large, often extended families (grandparents, parents, children) all living in low grade, mass produced housing.
Originally posted by Afro Cheese
What do you mean by that anyway?Slums "develope." Public housing projects are built.
Nope. Public housing is built. But "da projects" aren't planned, they happen. I don't think city planners have in mind where the poor blacks will live when they're developing a city.
Originally posted by Capt_Fantastic
Nope. Public housing is built. But "da projects" aren't planned, they happen. I don't think city planners have in mind where the poor blacks will live when they're developing a city.
Just because they're not on the original architectural blueprints, doesn't mean that projects aren't planned. The erection of project housing always elicits some of the most ferocious poltical in-fighting within municiple governments. These Stalin-esque monuments to human misery don't just pop up by accident. Federal HUD dollars and community input dictate how and where these things get put up.
Why should city planners and civic leaders care about where "poor blacks" live? Isn't this type of thinking, however benevolent in intention, already presupposing the inability of minorities to succeed on their own. Why would we intentionally want to set out and designate poor, blighted areas for blacks to live in? Is this really the humane course of action? I say this, also issuing bromides against rich, gated communities, which are also an abomination. Wouldn't it be better to assume and expect everyone to act responsibly and set aside no public housing?
Personally, my ideal for city design is new urbanist and would involve mixed used architecture with commercial shops and personal residences existing side-by-side. For some crazy reason, zoning laws since the '50's have favored the radical separation of the two things, resulting in the rise of souless, uniform suburbs and longer, and longer communtes to work via the interstate. Mixed use is great because 1. It's aesthetically pleasing--everyone likes to walk around areas like Manhatten, the New Orleans French Quarter, and most town centers in western Europe. 2. It eliminates the need to drive everywhere, which removes a huge financial burden from lower-income earners. 3. It promotes the relative integration of high and low-end residential properties, allowing for more admixture between socio-economic groups. 4. It fosters the growth of intimacy within the community because mixed use fosters pedestrian traffic and allows for the creation of shared public amenities such as parks, town squares, and the like.
Death to the nuclear, car-driven desparation of isolated suburban life!
Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
I say this, also issuing bromides against rich, gated communities, which are also an abomination. Wouldn't it be better to assume and expect everyone to act responsibly and set aside no public housing?
quite a change in tone. next thing you'll be promoting universal heath care. there are many wingnuts who would label you a communist....or simply a liberal for even mentioning the notion of equality and a genuine effort to pump revenue into underclass communities...true 'reparations' imho.
Originally posted by PVS
quite a change in tone. next thing you'll be promoting universal heath care. there are many wingnuts who would label you a communist....or simply a liberal for even mentioning the notion of equality and a genuine effort to pump revenue into underclass communities...true 'reparations' imho.
I never said I loved the rich. I just don't think their property should be confiscated. I think you'd be surprised at some of the stuff I believe in. We probably have more in common than you think.
Originally posted by Capt_FantasticHm, so i guess it's a coincedince that all the black neighborhoods in New Orleans are the first to flood?
Nope. Public housing is built. But "da projects" aren't planned, they happen. I don't think city planners have in mind where the poor blacks will live when they're developing a city.
Where exactly do you think they got the name "the projects?" Because they were erected by the government as a project to try to replace slums with sufficient, sanitary housing. They knew eactly what kind of people were going to live in the projects before they even built them.
Originally posted by Afro Cheese
Hm, so i guess it's a coincedince that all the black neighborhoods in New Orleans are the first to flood?Where exactly do you think they got the name "the projects?" Because they were erected by the government as a project to try to replace slums with sufficient, sanitary housing. They knew eactly what kind of people were going to live in the projects before they even built them.
Read what I said.
And it's a little distrubing to me that you and so many others are buying in to this notion that everyone who lives in low income areas are there because they're just content to live off the government. "Exactly what kind of people" are you referring to?
Originally posted by Capt_Fantastic
Read what I said.And it's a little distrubing to me that you and so many others are buying in to this notion that everyone who lives in low income areas are there because they're just content to live off the government. "Exactly what kind of people" are you referring to?
Not "low income areas", PROJECTS! I don't think I've seen anyone on this board denigrating the working lower middle classes who are actually employed and pay taxes, but the people who live year-in and year-out in government-erected housing projects--exempt from all taxes and financial responsibility. What other explanation can you offer for anyone's continued existence in one of these things other than complete, suicidal apathy?
No one should just be able to permanently duck out of responsible society and face no consequences for it. Why as a people do we continue to subsidize these kinds of bad decisions?
If you discovered that your friend was addicted to crack and had quit his job and taken to a life of crime to fuel his habit, would you sit back, pat him on the back, and continually dish out loans to him? Hell no! After you'd been the "understanding" friend for a week or two, you'd kick him in the ass, and give him an ultimatum--"Ship up or ship out!" The reason you'd say this would not be because you hated your friend but because you thought that his dependence on you was only a crutch and, ultimately, an obstacle to realising his own eventual recovery.
Tough love might be tough, but it's still love. Demanding that someone live up to high expectations is not cruel but an act of optimism. Telling someone to do something difficult implies that you believe they can accomplish it.
Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
No one should just be able to permanently duck out of responsible society and face no consequences for it. Why as a people do we continue to subsidize these kinds of bad decisions?
now the smell of horseshit gets stronger. so you imply that they are somehow at an advantage? can you walk out your front door without the constant fear that someone somewhere will put a bullet through your face for the $5 you have in your pocket?
Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
Not "low income areas", PROJECTS! I don't think I've seen anyone on this board denigrating the working lower middle classes who are actually employed and pay taxes, but the people who live year-in and year-out in government-erected housing projects--exempt from all taxes and financial responsibility. What other explanation can you offer for anyone's continued existence in one of these things other than complete, suicidal apathy?No one should just be able to permanently duck out of responsible society and face no consequences for it. Why as a people do we continue to subsidize these kinds of bad decisions?
If you discovered that your friend was addicted to crack and had quit his job and taken to a life of crime to fuel his habit, would you sit back, pat him on the back, and continually dish out loans to him? Hell no! After you'd been the "understanding" friend for a week or two, you'd kick him in the ass, and give him an ultimatum--"Ship up or ship out!" The reason you'd say this would not be because you hated your friend but because you thought that his dependence on you was only a crutch and, ultimately, an obstacle to realising his own eventual recovery.
Tough love might be tough, but it's still love. Demanding that someone live up to high expectations is not cruel but an act of optimism. Telling someone to do something difficult implies that you believe they can accomplish it.
I hope the point didn't mess up your hair when it went flying over your head.
Originally posted by PVS
now the smell of horseshit gets stronger. so you imply that they are somehow at an advantage? can you walk out your front door without the constant fear that someone somewhere will put a bullet through your face for the $5 you have in your pocket?
No. But many's the time when people slip into patterns of self-destructive behavior and never find the strength to get out because, in it's own peculiar way, the dysfunction and its consequences get comfortable.
If individuals ultimately choose to be self-destructive, then no one can force them to stop. But, as a society, we don't have to subsidize the problem.
Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
No. But many's the time when people slip into patterns of self-destructive behavior and never find the strength to get out because, in it's own peculiar way, the dysfunction and its consequences get comfortable.If individuals ultimately choose to be self-destructive, then no one can force them to stop. But, as a society, we don't have to subsidize the problem.
As a society we don't. But we also don't have to ignore it and pretend that it's the fault of the person suffering the affliction. My entire point is that you believe that people on welfare want to be there and do nothing to change that situation. And that is entirely selfish and ignorant. And what's more, you believe that it's black people who choose to be dependant on the white government, and white people don't face the same issues...becuase they're poor....rather than in spite of it. Life happens to all of us....and I hope it happens to you with a vengence. I hope you can take the place of a lower middle class individual for a day, then you might understand teh difficulties.
Originally posted by Capt_Fantastic
As a society we don't. But we also don't have to ignore it and pretend that it's the fault of the person suffering the affliction. My entire point is that you believe that people on welfare want to be there and do nothing to change that situation. And that is entirely selfish and ignorant. And what's more, you believe that it's black people who choose to be dependant on the white government, and white people don't face the same issues...becuase they're poor....rather than in spite of it. Life happens to all of us....and I hope it happens to you with a vengence. I hope you can take the place of a lower middle class individual for a day, then you might understand teh difficulties.
Of course white people go through the same problems. There's nothing inherently different about whites and blacks. However, that being said, whites don't generally find themselves entangled in the same dysfunctional sub-culture of reciprocal violence, out-of-wedlock births, fatherless homes, and indifference to personal responsibility. Blacks shoulder these problems at a disproportionate rate. And, make no mistake, these are the problems they face. The spectre of white racsim is mostly that--a spectre, not because it and prejudice don't exist, but because their influence on the lives of daily african-americans living in projects is marginal. That is, of course, unless you don't count the existence and perpetuation of projects as a racist act in itself--which, I do. If every bad feeling that existed about black people disappeared tomorrow, these problems would still exist for them to overcome.
You say that I blame the poor for their poverty and that I'm unfair for saying so because it's not their fault. In one sense, you're right. The problem is larger than any one individual's choices. Blacks are surrounded and trapped by a culture of failure. However, this doesn't mean that individuals don't eventually buy into this culture of failure and make it their own. Nor does it mean that the government has the power to do anything about it other than to fund its continuance. The salvation of the black community can only come from within the community itself and from the actions of concerned individuals. The government is worthless.
Finally, "life has already happened to me", Capt. Fantastic--in spades. I grew up poor, in a fatherless home, and with abusive guardians. I just happened to be reached out to by an adult that cared and gave me books and a model to succeed. This is why I don't buy this whole pity party. If I had been coddled instead of challenged, if I had bought into the whole notion that my life would never be anything more than victimhood, things would have turned out much differently.
Life indeed "happens to us all." And we all have the responsibility to live it, not duck and cover.
Originally posted by Dr. Zaius
No. But many's the time when people slip into patterns of self-destructive behavior and never find the strength to get out because, in it's own peculiar way, the dysfunction and its consequences get comfortable.If individuals ultimately choose to be self-destructive, then no one can force them to stop. But, as a society, we don't have to subsidize the problem.
so now you dont feel that the underclass are just taking advantage of us and "duck out" of responsibility? now they have it shitty again?
masterful backpedaling