I reallyyyyy hate Gentrification. Gentrification is like the plague, it spreads until there is nothing left. "Once this process of ‘gentrification’ starts in a district it goes on rapidly until all or most of the working class occupiers are displaced and the whole social character of the district is changed.”- Ruth Glass, circa 1964.
There are two definitions for Gentrification.
- "the process of changing the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and businesses."
- "the process of making a person or activity more refined or polite."
I find the second one ironic because what they're actually doing is removing the culture, heart, and spirit of a neighborhood to bring in more "millennial" white kids who grew up in freaking Connecticut and wanna be edgy by living out their twenties in New York. That's what f-ing Manhattan is for!
Seven cities accounted for nearly half of the gentrification nationally: New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Baltimore, San Diego and Chicago. What do all those places have in common? A high population of minorities.
Gentrification is also detrimental to the residents who already reside in a neighborhood. Throughout history, it has been used to push out black people from their own neighborhoods. Raising the property value, raises the rent, which makes it unaffordable for previous residents. That or businesses buy out homeowners. For example, we all know the beautiful Brooklyn brownstones. In areas like Park Slope and Fort Greene they were owned by many black residents, but some were bought out by business for let's say $100,000. Those brownstones are currently valued at $1 million.
Shows like "She's Gotta Have It" demonstrate the, dare I say, "whitewashing" of Fort Greene. The white neighbor who calls the police on the homeless man who pushes a cart for sitting on her stoop, when he has been there for years. It emphasizes how white people see the culture and connectedness of black communities and they want it for themselves, however with the exclusion of black people.
What happened to the block parties? Sitting on the stoop? That may have faded with the introduction of technology, but I feel that Gentrification has played its role as well.
As much as the ghetto can get annoying, I love it. I want the lobby door that doesn't lock because the crackheads on the first floor keep breaking it. I want the corner store door that jingles when I walk in, spanish music playing in the background, and the corner store cats that scare the crap outta me. I wanna ride my bike through the fire hydrant during the block party and smell meat on the grill and hear everybody laughing.
Instead, I see more white people walking around, new white businesses, just change change change. I am not opposed to change but Gentrification doesn't even look right. There's no reason a large square with big windows, paneling, and weird sliding should be around the corner to a cute nice little home. More and more it seems like Brooklyn is the New Manhattan. gross.
The only reason I am against this change is because it completely disregards my people. It's modern day colonization. Over and over again, they strip away our culture and leave us with nothing. So it is up to my generation to recognize it and continue the fight against it.
Here is another source if you would like to read more about Gentrification .
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