Dozens of U.S. cities to raze themselves

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Well part of it is that we aren't the richest on a per-person basis. Depending on which metric you use the nominal GDP perperson in the US ranks either 10th, 15th, or 17th in the world. At the same time median household income is rising slower than GDP to the point that current Medians are at or below where they were at the start of the decade, which means increasingly the wealthy get REAL wealthy and the poor get REAL poor.

Is it also to do with the fact that the state authorities do not spread funds around enough to maintain areas or deliberately cater to the areas that would get them the votes?

Granted state taxes are quite paltry as a whole and probably not enough to spread things around? Some states I note have their populations slowly declining. Lots of people have moved out of Michigan over the last decade or so. Some heading south and east and west, and I would imagine that is doing wonder to state coffers which had its major industry collapse over the last decade.

[PeZook]

Well part of it is that we aren't the richest on a per-person basis. Depending on which metric you use the nominal GDP perperson in the US ranks either 10th, 15th, or 17th in the world. At the same time median household income is rising slower than GDP to the point that current Medians are at or below where they were at the start of the decade, which means increasingly the wealthy get REAL wealthy and the poor get REAL poor.

You're 8th when adjusted for PPP, but second amongst countries which actually have an industrial economy. Comparing the US to freakin' Brunei is misleading

Well, yeah...income inequality is probably a good factor in the whole mess, but there are recovering Second World countries which don't have brutal warzones in their cities, despite also having a huge poor underclass.

Is it also to do with the fact that the state authorities do not spread funds around enough to maintain areas or deliberately cater to the areas that would get them the votes?

Granted state taxes are quite paltry as a whole and probably not enough to spread things around?

There's plenty of democracies that somehow manage to avoid street warfare. I don't think it's catering to the voters which brought this travesty about.

[Broomstick]

How come you fine American folks allowed some of your biggest cities to become urban gang warzones, anyway?

It's the free market taken to an extreme. There is no social safety net, or at least the most minimal of one. A meme of all government intervention is bad will lead to this sort of thing. There is zero central planning, if there's a problem it's supposed to be solved on a local level by independent, self-reliant people whether or not they have any resources to do so! It's also anti-socialism taken to an extreme, where any government run program or initiative is viewed with deep, abiding suspicion. The US culture can achieve some pretty amazing things (man on the moon, for exampel) but it can also let people fall into abject misery, too.

The very idea that places like that exist in the richest country in the world is utterly surreal.

Yes, I agree.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

There's plenty of democracies that somehow manage to avoid street warfare. I don't think it's catering to the voters which brought this travesty about.

There are rich neighbourhoods and towns that manage themselves OK with very little crime whatsoever, while there are horrible towns and neighbourhoods out there where the average population is poorer and the police impotent. I would think that there is some degree of correlation we are talking about.

[ExarKun]

To answer Phongn, I'm not from US, but I'm here now, and being poor I have lived next to two bad neighborhoods, near-abandoned towns that have shootings almost every night, but in the day, it's ok. I'm not denying that there are horrific places, but RedImperator made it sound like whenever there is an abandoned building, big bad crime magically appears there overnight,

I said nothing of the sort, you fucking dipshit. I responded to your retarded claim that the ghetto is "paradise" for little kids because of all the abandoned buildings to explore--the same abandoned buildings which are already in use as crackhouses and impromptu homeless shelters. At no point was this thread about all abandoned buildings, just the ones in horrible decaying wastelands like Flint, Detroit, and parts of Philadelphia.

and people, especially little 8 year olds who wanted to explore, either die or become criminals themselves and go playing run from the cops or whatever he said to that effect. Ridiculous.

These are neighborhoods where eight year olds aren't allowed to go outside, period, because their mothers are afraid they'll catch a bullet--and justifiably so. These neighborhoods are the worst places in the entire first world, and the abandoned buildings are where the worst scumfucks go to avoid public scrutiny. Why do you think the cities want to tear them down in the first place? The teenaged ghetto kids I've known are tough and fearless (to the point of reckless stupidity for too many of them, frankly), and they would laugh in your retarded face if you suggested going exploring abandoned houses in an American slum. You have no fucking idea what you're talking about.

Of course you did, read your post, it refer to "dying cities", nothing specific, I never mentioned it would be fun in the worst of the worst neighborhoods of Philadelphia or the country. You're the one who brought that up yourself. Now you're backpedaling furiously while building a cute straw man.

Kun, there are bad neighborhoods and then there are bad neighborhoods. America is a widely diverse country with very very diverse cities. Case in point: I've been to most bad neighborhoods in Manhattan, and while I wouldn't like living there they aren't bad to be in. I've skirted bad Neighborhoods in D.C. and was genuinely terrified. I couldn't imagine going out to Philadelphia or Detroit. (Detroit, for instance, was a more violent city than Baghdad post-invasion.) While other cities, Seattle springs to mind (but I might be wrong), don't have any real bad areas. Sure there might be poorer areas, but they aren't bad. Keep this in mind, because unless you've seen some of those shitholes in person you have no idea just how terrifying, and deadly, they can be.

I wholeheartedly agree. You can't pin down one label on every dying neighborhood in this massive country.

Yeah, when you're a kid, this stuff is incredible, it's like some people on here missed out on a good portion of their childhood. I had it like you, but I grew up in a war zone as a "bonus". There is nothing like it, scavenging around, exploring little areas and hideouts, going into gardens up in the hills around the city and stealing fruit, looking for stuff, hanging out with friends, making martial arts weapons out of random crap, playing all kinds of games, when you get little older may be banging a girl or two . Today's electronic generation is too soft and devoid of any real substance. I remember once when my friends and I went into a building under construction that was abandoned when the war started. The guy that was a guard there started chasing us half way up the stairs, threatening to kill us, and yelling all kinds of curses our way. When we got to the top floor (may be 6th?), there was nowhere else to go, so some of us were about to jump down the side of the building from one scaffolding to the other, but the other guys couldn't so we decided to stay and fight together. Now I realize the stupidity of both decisions, but luckily, he ended up letting us go, but the sheer fear and excitement of the moment and others like it is unmatched by anything kids have nowadays. They are locked up in their little pretty neighborhoods, with pretty malls, with fully equipped rooms, and have no clue on what compass side the Sun comes up, nor what a real friendship is.

what the fuck? Trespass + assault = fun? Yeah the kids of Detroit are really missing out on that. It's why they're so soft! Damn them for being so locked up in their own pretty neighbourhoods!

Anyone want to imagine what would gave happen if this idiot did his stunt in one of the American cities mentioned in this thread?

BTW better go break the law or you'll be soft and electronic and never have true friends.

I don't expect you to understand.

[Kamakazie Sith]

How come you fine American folks allowed some of your biggest cities to become urban gang warzones, anyway? I mean...christ, reading some of these descriptions, I'm utterly terrified. I mean...I wouldn't like to go to a bad Gdansk neighborhood at night, but I don't have to worry about getting shot while walking/driving through it in broad daylight!

The very idea that places like that exist in the richest country in the world is utterly surreal.

It's a combination of many things. Poor education, poverty, and zero opportunity are perfect for ensuring a significant portion of your population will resort to crime. Then you have the fucked up approach to crime fighting. Hard on crimes such as drug possession but soft on violent crimes, relatively speaking.

[phongn]

Of course you did, read your post, it refer to "dying cities", nothing specific, I never mentioned it would be fun in the worst of the worst neighborhoods of Philadelphia or the country. You're the one who brought that up yourself. Now you're backpedaling furiously while building a cute straw man.

The news article referenced in the OP referred to "Flint" and "Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Baltimore and Memphis". You were making an highly general statement in response: are you surprised that people called you on it?

what the fuck? Trespass + assault = fun? Yeah the kids of Detroit are really missing out on that. It's why they're so soft! Damn them for being so locked up in their own pretty neighbourhoods!

Anyone want to imagine what would gave happen if this idiot did his stunt in one of the American cities mentioned in this thread?

BTW better go break the law or you'll be soft and electronic and never have true friends.

I don't expect you to understand.

You are, however, expected to defend your assertion.

[Stark]

I don't expect you to understand.

Who's backpedalling now, fuckwit? You just not only encouraged illegal activities (which may result in gangbashing a security guard for DOING HIS JOB while you are your shithead mates commit a crime) but claimed that a) people in urban shitholes 'miss out' on this because they're so 'electronic', and b) that you'll never have true friends otherwise (ie, unless someone is a fucking retard like you).

Your attitude isn't just ignorant with regards these cities; it's fucking odious. Must break law to have friends! If you disagree you're SOFT AND ELECTRONIC! The best part is that in some of these places in America, you'd probably just get shot by whatever gang was using the abandoned building you were in. Let's take a girl there for sex - HOW ROMANTIC! Otherwise you'll never have true friends.

[Straha]

Of course you did, read your post, it refer to "dying cities", nothing specific, I never mentioned it would be fun in the worst of the worst neighborhoods of Philadelphia or the country. You're the one who brought that up yourself. Now you're backpedaling furiously while building a cute straw man.

It's in the OP, dumbass. Go back and read it.

I wholeheartedly agree. You can't pin down one label on every dying neighborhood in this massive country.

Yet, A. You are with your "This would be great for kids!" crap, and B. You're missing that all that's being dealt with here is one kind of neighborhood. THE REALLY FUCKING BAD WHERE YOU GET YOUR ASS SHOT IF YOU GO INTO IT BAD KINDS. Detroit was a more dangerous city than BAGHDAD! Philadelphia is a festering rotting mess in the bad parts of it. To burn down the areas we're talking about here is a service to humanity.

There's plenty of democracies that somehow manage to avoid street warfare. I don't think it's catering to the voters which brought this travesty about.

You're doing the same thing Exar did with his "The U.S. gets so many hurricanes you'd think they'd build better houses" line, only far less bad. The United States is a truly massive place and these cities are outliers and not indicative of the country as a whole. To put it in perspective, if Poland suddenly became a state in the U.S. the entire country would be the sixth largest states. Those five states, put together, are over eleven times bigger than Poland. If you exclude Alaska (which is mostly wilderness) they're still five times bigger. The country is Friggin huge. Most Americans don't realize how big it is because they've never really been anywhere else, and most foreigners don't comprehend how big America is because they've never been to America and only look at it on a globe.

That being said, there's a shit ton of diversity across America, and in most cities Crime has plummeted over the past twenty years. New York City is incredibly safe, as are places like Boston, Houston, San Fransisco, Chicago, etc. Places like Detroit, Philadelphia and their ilk (no offense Broomy, Red) are hell-holes for a variety of reasons some internal, some external. It's not good, but it doesn't represent the United States as a whole in anyway.

[phongn]

While a lot of Chicago is safe, there are seriously dangerous parts of the city (some very close to very safe parts).

There are a lot of reasons for the most dangerous neighborhoods of cities, often related to the loss of jobs, the corresponding loss of taxpayer income, drugs and all sorts of things. I doubt that Detroit, for example, could hope to afford the resources needed to really tackle the problem.

[FSTargetDrone]

According to Forbes magazine, Detroit is at the top of the country's 15 most dangerous cities (with Philadelphia at number 15).

There were 333 homicides in Philadelphia in 2008 (names, ages dates, times and the weapon used to kill all conveniently listed).

And yet, most people won't experience any kind of crime. There are places I wouldn't drive through at a high rate of speed during the day in Philadelphia, but that doesn't mean the city is generally unsafe. Like others have said, it all depends where you happen to be in the city. Detroit is kind of a weird situation--there are entire high-rises and large buildings that are empty and closed.

[Broomstick]

Places like Detroit, Philadelphia and their ilk (no offense Broomy, Red) are hell-holes

No offense taken - there's a reason I moved to Chicago when I turned 18.

And yet, most people won't experience any kind of crime. There are places I wouldn't drive through at a high rate of speed during the day in Philadelphia, but that doesn't mean the city is generally unsafe. Like others have said, it all depends where you happen to be in the city. Detroit is kind of a weird situation--there are entire high-rises and large buildings that are empty and closed.

There are also entire blocks in Detroit entirely reverted to nature - the city doesn't have the resources to take down most of the worst damage/deteriorated properties, and the city council is full of fuckwits.

But yes, even a bad city like Detroit or Gary it isn't sudden death to enter the city limits. There are definitely some extremely hazardous areas, but even the worst city has some nice parts to it.

[The Yosemite Bear]

nice to see that Stockton outranked Baltimore as a really scary place to live, well yeah my dad still lives there, but fortunatly most of the crime is down town, still it's a scary place....

[Myrmidon]

Lets hear it for moral cowardice and political correctness. The reason Detroit and other old eastern cities are in such sad shape is black migration followed by white flight. Large black populations mean intolerable crime, which causes the white population to leave, which means eventual regional economic failure, which further stresses the black population, which brings on more crime and so on until life in Detroit is just as cheap as it is in Haiti or Rwanda.

[Patrick Degan]

Lets hear it for moral cowardice and political correctness. The reason Detroit and other old eastern cities are in such sad shape is black migration followed by white flight. Large black populations mean intolerable crime, which causes the white population to leave, which means eventual regional economic failure, which further stresses the black population, which brings on more crime and so on until life in Detroit is just as cheap as it is in Haiti or Rwanda.

Wow... Let's hear it for the Hasty Generalisation Fallacy.

I now leave you to your inevitable curb-stomping.

[CmdrWilkens]

Well part of it is that we aren't the richest on a per-person basis. Depending on which metric you use the nominal GDP perperson in the US ranks either 10th, 15th, or 17th in the world. At the same time median household income is rising slower than GDP to the point that current Medians are at or below where they were at the start of the decade, which means increasingly the wealthy get REAL wealthy and the poor get REAL poor.

You're 8th when adjusted for PPP, but second amongst countries which actually have an industrial economy. Comparing the US to freakin' Brunei is misleading

Well, yeah...income inequality is probably a good factor in the whole mess, but there are recovering Second World countries which don't have brutal warzones in their cities, despite also having a huge poor underclass.

The PPP adjustment benefits the US a shitton just in tems of the continuing use of the dollar as a reserve currency so that is why I prefer the nominal GDP but that's preference rather than any paticular statistical reason.

Anyway that aside the second point about rising GDP not mirroring a rise in median income correlates to the point that income is being hogged by those who already had it to begin with since the per capita GDP has risen from around 34,000 to the current ~47,000. The other factor that digs into this is the population dispersion. I don't think anyone would argue that its harder to provide modern services to a dispersed population as there are a host of barriers distance brings up that begin with transportation infrastructure and work their way through time, supply sourcing and a host of administrative challenges. The US is the 177th, let mesay that again 177th most dense nation on Earth. It has 1/4th the population density of Poland, 1/8th the population density of the UK, 1/12th the density of the Netherlands.

[rhoenix]

Lets hear it for moral cowardice and political correctness. The reason Detroit and other old eastern cities are in such sad shape is black migration followed by white flight. Large black populations mean intolerable crime, which causes the white population to leave, which means eventual regional economic failure, which further stresses the black population, which brings on more crime and so on until life in Detroit is just as cheap as it is in Haiti or Rwanda.

You forgot to blame liberals, Jews, and athiests. Dumbass.


You know, your signature really does say hilarious things about you:

myrmidon \MUR-muh-don; -dun\, noun:
1. [Capitalized] A member of a warlike Thessalian people who followed Achilles on the expedition against Troy.
2. A loyal follower, especially one who executes orders without question, protest, or pity.

So basically you're happy about being a useful idiot. Awesome.

[PeZook]

You're doing the same thing Exar did with his "The U.S. gets so many hurricanes you'd think they'd build better houses" line, only far less bad. The United States is a truly massive place and these cities are outliers and not indicative of the country as a whole. To put it in perspective, if Poland suddenly became a state in the U.S. the entire country would be the sixth largest states. Those five states, put together, are over eleven times bigger than Poland. If you exclude Alaska (which is mostly wilderness) they're still five times bigger. The country is Friggin huge. Most Americans don't realize how big it is because they've never really been anywhere else, and most foreigners don't comprehend how big America is because they've never been to America and only look at it on a globe.

I was shocked and awed at the very existence of places described in this very thread, where kids miss school because they were shot and you can get killed for walking in the wrong place. How is that a hasty generalization? We are talking about some of America's biggest cities here, which should naturally benefit from vast wealth at the disposal of the United States. There is no reason places like these should exist, or be remotely as bad as described, what with being located right in the middle of urban concentration.

That being said, there's a shit ton of diversity across America, and in most cities Crime has plummeted over the past twenty years. New York City is incredibly safe, as are places like Boston, Houston, San Fransisco, Chicago, etc. Places like Detroit, Philadelphia and their ilk (no offense Broomy, Red) are hell-holes for a variety of reasons some internal, some external. It's not good, but it doesn't represent the United States as a whole in anyway.

It does reflect on it, though, since apparently, the country's government was unable to stop the decline of these cities, for whatever reason.

Lets hear it for moral cowardice and political correctness. The reason Detroit and other old eastern cities are in such sad shape is black migration followed by white flight. Large black populations mean intolerable crime, which causes the white population to leave, which means eventual regional economic failure, which further stresses the black population, which brings on more crime and so on until life in Detroit is just as cheap as it is in Haiti or Rwanda.

Because, as we all know, all blacks are criminals and murderers. Why, there is no white gang violence at all!

[Broomstick]

Lets hear it for moral cowardice and political correctness. The reason Detroit and other old eastern cities are in such sad shape is black migration followed by white flight. Large black populations mean intolerable crime, which causes the white population to leave, which means eventual regional economic failure, which further stresses the black population, which brings on more crime and so on until life in Detroit is just as cheap as it is in Haiti or Rwanda.

I'd almost believe that, except the black people fled Detroit in large numbers, too, and where they went was the ring suburbs - which are now quite well integrated compared to most other suburban areas of the nation. Your statement also ignores the fact that the "black migration" took place in the 1940's, during WWII, but "white flight" didn't occur until the civil unrest of the 1960's. Twenty years to trigger white flight? A whole fucking generation?

No, asshat, what brought down Detroit was the economic shit in the 1970's, which is when the US car industry started to slide downhill. THAT is what killed Detroit, not "black migration", not "white flight". Yes, there was some of that, but it is an unsatisfactory explanation as cities such as Chicago also experienced the same yet are still quite viable.

Your "large black population brings on intolerable crime" hypothesis also fails miserably in states such as Alabama and Mississippi which have had substantial, at times even majority, black populations yet do not contain the hell hole variety of city.

In other words, you're a racist jackass vomiting badly aged bigotry.

[Broomstick]

I was shocked and awed at the very existence of places described in this very thread, where kids miss school because they were shot and you can get killed for walking in the wrong place. How is that a hasty generalization? We are talking about some of America's biggest cities here, which should naturally benefit from vast wealth at the disposal of the United States. There is no reason places like these should exist, or be remotely as bad as described, what with being located right in the middle of urban concentration.

One of the reasons the US has such wealth is that we don't spend it on a social safety net. The conservative jackasses keep spouting the line that a social safety net will cost money, result in higher taxes, and make us less competitive - which, actually, is true. European countries with better social safety nets DO have higher taxes, spend money on the social programs, and by some measures aren't as competitive. As I said, the US system is based on ideology taken to some extremes. You are correct - such cesspits don't have to exist. We don't have to have 50 million people without health insurance, either. Personally, I find it appalling but there is a good chunk of the American population who think it is the proper way to run things.

[Elfdart]

No, asshat, what brought down Detroit was the economic shit in the 1970's, which is when the US car industry started to slide downhill. THAT is what killed Detroit, not "black migration", not "white flight". Yes, there was some of that, but it is an unsatisfactory explanation as cities such as Chicago also experienced the same yet are still quite viable.

I'd like to add that if for some reason the oil companies went out of business, Houston would be just as much of a shithole as Detroit -and probably worse.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I was shocked and awed at the very existence of places described in this very thread, where kids miss school because they were shot and you can get killed for walking in the wrong place. How is that a hasty generalization? We are talking about some of America's biggest cities here, which should naturally benefit from vast wealth at the disposal of the United States. There is no reason places like these should exist, or be remotely as bad as described, what with being located right in the middle of urban concentration.

I think you ought to factor in that the Federal Government's responsibility does not include maintaining cities. Rather it is the state government. People tend to forget that there are technically 51 tax collection systems + 1 federal tax collection system. Each state does collect its own taxes and use its own money to spend it on their own state. By no means do states bother about what happens outside their state, and there are diehards about separation of state and federal government right. I can tell you that there are lots of poor states out there which are only getting poorer as people leave the state for nicer pastures.

And to add a qualifier, Detriot and Philadelphia aren't exactly considered the largest relative to say NY, Los Angeles (which is another problem in itself) or Chicago.

[Fire Fly]

To those who don't realize just how dilapidated some of the ghettos are in these cities, just take a look at these videos:

Detroit ghetto 1
Detroit ghetto 2

I've driven through the bad parts of Milwaukee and that alone was scary enough; I wouldn't even want to drive through the bad parts of Detroit. No one beyond those who are already living there or are just too poor to move away would live in such down trodden areas.

[ray245]

I was shocked and awed at the very existence of places described in this very thread, where kids miss school because they were shot and you can get killed for walking in the wrong place. How is that a hasty generalization? We are talking about some of America's biggest cities here, which should naturally benefit from vast wealth at the disposal of the United States. There is no reason places like these should exist, or be remotely as bad as described, what with being located right in the middle of urban concentration.

One of the reasons the US has such wealth is that we don't spend it on a social safety net. The conservative jackasses keep spouting the line that a social safety net will cost money, result in higher taxes, and make us less competitive - which, actually, is true. European countries with better social safety nets DO have higher taxes, spend money on the social programs, and by some measures aren't as competitive. As I said, the US system is based on ideology taken to some extremes. You are correct - such cesspits don't have to exist. We don't have to have 50 million people without health insurance, either. Personally, I find it appalling but there is a good chunk of the American population who think it is the proper way to run things.

Maybe it might be due to the fact that most Americans never really bothered to learn about the living conditions in other nations and thinks that America is the best place to live simply because people tell them so?

I think you ought to factor in that the Federal Government's responsibility does not include maintaining cities. Rather it is the state government. People tend to forget that there are technically 51 tax collection systems + 1 federal tax collection system. Each state does collect its own taxes and use its own money to spend it on their own state. By no means do states bother about what happens outside their state, and there are diehards about separation of state and federal government right. I can tell you that there are lots of poor states out there which are only getting poorer as people leave the state for nicer pastures.

Couldn't the state government appeal to the federal government for some sort of aid?

[Broomstick]

Maybe it might be due to the fact that most Americans never really bothered to learn about the living conditions in other nations and thinks that America is the best place to live simply because people tell them so?

That might well be a factor as well, especially when it comes to fatalistic attitudes of "well, that's the way it's always been, that the way it will always be." - some people aren't aware that it really is different elsewhere.

Couldn't the state government appeal to the federal government for some sort of aid?

It could, but it's unlikely to get it. The Federal government's role does not involve city planning. The only city over which the Federal government has any authority is Washington, D.C. - which has had the distinction of being declared "murder capital" along with such showplaces as Detroit and East St. Louis so it's not like they're going to do the job any better.

There's also no way for the Feds to fix some of the underlying problems - the auto industry declined for various reasons, and the Feds can't force people to buy cars they don't want. The government has been impotent to stop companies moving their jobs overseas, which gutted entire sectors of the work force that used to live in and help maintain the cities. Even when the Feds do offer help, such as more funding for extended unemployment benefits recently, some state reject the offer even at the cost of more suffering for their citizens due to ideology and bitterly resent the Federal "interference" in their affairs. American government is powerful, but also limited.