This is Good-Bye - For Now
1 month ago
Saturday, August 27, 2011
The Naked City Infytune
When shameless boardroom greedheads misappropriate civic institutions and dodge taxes, someone -- usually at the margin -- gets short-sticked. A well-placed beam of light can be an appropriate and effective response.
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FYI to Jasri X. Poor whites in this city don't have it any better. If you think that it is tough to be a poor black living in the ghettos of Pittsburgh trying being a poor white living in the ghettos of this city.
I've been there and done that.
What's this about, "the Bishop won't pray for ya if your family is so poor they can't afford a crate for ya?"
Bram: Play it a few more times.
Anonymous: We recommend a couple of Chris Rock clips, especially the 'trade places with me?' one.
Infy,
It is tough to be a white person living a a poor predominately black neighborhood in this city.
In the East End, poor blacks with thug tendencies don't normally go after the whites unless the white person is "part of the game."
Go to the Hilltop of the South Side and survey the few white kids that you can find, almost all of them have had guns held on them. Most of them have been victims of violence because of the color of their skin (white).
There is a virtual pogrom to rid the place of white folks.
I have a mixed-race, white and Asian, young male relative who used to live in Knoxville. He has been treated for Post Traumatic Stress type symptoms due to the incessant violence against young, non-blacks in that community.
If you are not-black and you live in certain city neighborhoods, you might as well walk around with a bulls-eye on your back -- you are a target.
If you are poor and black there are a myriad of agencies working to advance your cause. If you are poor and white (should read: "not-black") and you live in the inner city -- you are f--ked.
You are obviously an East End/suburban elitist who doesn't have a clue how poor non-black folks in this town are forced to live.
Far too many Pittsburgh residents lack choices, security, resources, opportunities, and many other things a worthwhile society would better deliver. Whites are not immune to the problems associated with InsolvenCity's decline. Although many of the "invisibles" at the margin are white, it is difficult to conclude whites residents are disproportionately afflicted.
Anonymous, you obviously do not know Jasiri if you think he doesn't have empathy for poor whites. Frankly, he is one of the better humans I've ever known. The issues of race and class are extraordinarily complex. But as Infy pointed out, Pittsburgh is NUMBER ONE City for black poverty in the country. That is a shameful fact. And if we want to be the most livable city, or any claim any other number one mantle, we need to own up to our problems and try to address them. Yes we have other problem, yes there are plenty of poor whites, yes violence plagues our neighborhoods, but the fact of it is we have a serious,race based discrepancy in Pittsburgh. However please note that Jasiri isn't just complaining and, as you seem to be suggesting, ignoring the class issues whites face. He spends his working life and his musical life trying to make overall positive change. Since you are so critical, I do hope you are working to affect positive change in every way you can as well.
We know,
It's only a song,
But we like it
We know,
It's only Jasiri X
But we like him
We like him, like him, yes we do!
I wonder if the stats that show that Pgh is the #1 city for black poverty include only the area within the political boundaries of the City of Pgh or if they include the metro area.
If only the political confines of that are included, that would explain much.
Middle class blacks have been forced into the suburbs as well as middle class whites.
If you are middle class and black there is no way in Gehenna that you are going to let your kids attend most of the broken-beyond-repair Pittsburgh Public Schools.
We also have the anomaly of Penn Hills that used to have a high concentration of middle class blacks.
Most of the middle and upper class African Americans that I know live in suburbia. There is a dearth of middle class whites in the city but that is off-set by the many upper-middle class and upper class whites that reside in the East End. I am not aware of there being an neighborhood in the city with a concentration of upper class blacks other than, perhaps, Highland Park.
Infy, I liked your use of the term "greedhead", and FYI I just came across it again in this Slate article: "Depression Fear: How Butterfield8 Describes the Current Moment" by John Rosenbaum.
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
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