I live in the Bay Area, and there are folks who won’t go near Oakland. There are parts of Oakland that are truly dangerous, and walking around there late at night by myself would and has made me nervous and feel unsafe. I for sure wouldn’t want my wife doing the same. That said, Oakland has - like many large cities - true charm, unique history and culture and great people, all over the place.
I think the concerns here are that when people say a “city” is unsafe, it’s painting by definition a very large place with an even larger brush. Chicago is unsafe. It’s also wealthy and poor, with neighborhoods of largely black, white, gay, Polish, Irish and other ethnicities and attributes. Some of them are not safe. Some of them are exceptionally safe. So saying “Chicago is super unsafe” is true but it’s not an intelligent way to think about it. Walk around Lincoln Park at 3:00 AM by yourself and the biggest trouble you’ll get into is that a fraternity pledge might puke near you. Walk around Cabrini Green or parts of Hyde Park at midnight by yourself and something bad might happen to you. Or it might not. You of course could also get mugged in Lincoln Park, but hopefully my point is clear.
I suspect Baltimore is much like Chicago, and obviously it has many problems as does Chicago and other cities. If my wife wanted to go to Hamsterdam in Baltimore by herself, I’d be worried. If she wanted to go to Camden Yards in Baltimore by herself, I would be less so.
Every major city has its problem areas. You don’t travel to California and head over to Compton right? To call someone “complacent” because they aren’t taking “drastic measures” to improve their city is pretty silly.
Baltimore doesn’t have as much wealth as Chicago but yes, as I originally stated, there are tourist spots where you will probably be just fine.
But, do you think it’s fair to criticize anyone’s fear of taking their family to Baltimore (The country’s most dangerous city) as bullshit? Is that the right way to tackle this issue? Doesn’t boycotting visiting Baltimore until it’s safer encourage and incentivize local government to take appropriate actions? When there are so many other alternatives, why take a risk?
You need to watch Billions. Dave C’s role as Wags is hands down the best in the show. You can get Showtime Anytime added on to Amazon Prime for a pretty reasonable rate, I believe, and binge it there.
What would you say then? Those are the only somewhat rational spin zones that I could think of.
Honestly, I think it’s reasonable to say that you categorizing anyone’s fear of visiting Baltimore (the most dangerous city in the US) as “bullshit”, is unfair and ridiculous.
To you I would say piss off, because you’ve proven time and time again that you don’t deserve my time or respect on this website. Like, it’s remarkable. My thoughts on the subject are actually a lot more complicated and nuanced that you presume, and you’d probably enjoy hearing many of them and agree with some of them, but again, you’d rather presume to guess what I think and presume it’s some liberal caricature, so again, piss off.
I don’t understand what set you off. The presumption was in good faith, it’s what I imagine many on your side would say. Again, I think those are somewhat fair points. I didn’t presume you would say something that was completely ludicrous, right?
I think that is the sad thing about the interview, the time restriction. I hope DJ posts the full interview so we can get the proper context. I do agree, there is hesitancy to visit Baltimore because of the stigma and the fact they have high crime rates. There is a lot of nuance that needs to be explained about how there is a lot more to the city, how it’s a great place to live in areas, how the culture has developed etc.
Chicago has been able to overcome this, after seeing strapped I hope Baltimore does too. Stereotypes exist and take efforts to change, I enjoy strapped because it adds nuance and adds efforts to that change.
I’m not here to say Baltimore is or isn’t safe, or who’s right about anything. The flame wars aren’t worth it.
The simple reality is that most cities of any size in the U.S. have at least one high-crime-rate neighborhood, and most people who live elsewhere are naturally hesitant to enter those neighborhoods. Back in the 80’s, Boston had the Square Mile and Atlanta had East Lake. Today, Boston has the Methodone Mile and Atlanta has downtown/South ATL/Home Park. Times change, places change, whoopdeedoo.
I’ve lived in and/or traveled to some legitimately dangerous places overseas in Central Asia, as a language guy for the US state department. I’ve also lived in a relatively rough-and-tumble part of DC where I once couldn’t get home after work because a triple homicide happened about 100 feet from my front door. Do homicides happen in the US? Yeah, but very rarely to out-of-town visitors passing through en route to a tourist attraction. It’s the locals in those neighborhoods who are most likely to harbor legitimate fears. In contrast, in a lot of places overseas, being the out-of-towner is what makes you a bullet magnet. So, personally, I don’t think anyone should hesitate to visit places in the US if you want to do so. The odds of you having a problem are low, unless you’re staring mouth-agape at the height of skyscrapers in Times Square, NYC. That’s just asking for Elmo to pick your pocket.
The extent to which people in modern society pass judgment on a person, topic, etc. without direct knowledge of said person or topic is astounding. Without sounding hypocritical, my guess is that many of the people commenting negatively about Baltimore have never been there. My brother lives 2 blocks from Paterson Park and I visit him a few times each year and I have never once felt unsafe. That being said, I don’t pretend to be an expert on the city. However, @KVV has lived and worked there for 20 years so his opinion is worth something to me. I fully believe it was more nuanced than presented, because @djpie had to edit a 40 minute interview down to a few minutes. That’s not an easy thing to do and I don’t blame him or KVV if some of the nuance is missing. KVV’s larger point of it being bullshit to judge a city just by the negative (or conversely the positive) that one hears about it is spot on. Experience the place yourself before you pass judgment. Or, at the very least hear more directly from the people that live there. If you still decide it’s not for you, so be it - that’s life. But, be open-minded. Take the golf away and Strapped is a show about being open-minded and experiencing new places and people.
I work in the middle of downtown Atlanta and everything is always more complicated than you think. I never feel unsafe walking around work. I do feel unsafe at night and especially at night on weekends near my office. It’s situation-dependent.
