# Whining "alternatives" and a very weird form of NINMBYsm



## Rev Stickleback (Jun 23, 2009)

Suburbanist said:


> Fighting crime and aiming to bring it to zero should be a sensible policy anywhere in the developed where. This is what bothers me most about people advocating "alternative" neighborhoods: they accept and sometimes (not saying it is your case) even enjoy crime and lawlessness as part of the fabric of the place. Usually, in the sense that violence keep "dull and boring" people out of "their" place.


You are aware all those brightly lit canyons of neon that people associate with Tokyo are actually red-light districts?










Japan has a massive sex industry, but it doesn't cater to western tourists so it's less known about.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

^^ If it is so, shut it down.


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## Skyrazer (Sep 9, 2009)

Suburbanist said:


> ^^ In that sense, you must love Somalia. It's a place without any law, rules. You find the uutermost Hobbesian paradise. Raw habits, pure people behaving like unchecked, unorganized human being.
> 
> Cracking down in a law-and-order way is just cleaning a place of what the society doesn't like: criminals, drug dealers, soggy business.


There's a difference between a place that has developed naturally and a place like Somalia where people do what they have to to survive because the place is on the brink of societal breakdown.

What I and others have been referring to does not necessarily contain crime, drugs and general urban decay.


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## Rev Stickleback (Jun 23, 2009)

Suburbanist said:


> ^^ If it is so, shut it down.


But the area isn't full of pimps, muggers and street walkers. In fact if you didn't know, you could walk round completely safely with your kids, and not be troubled in the slightest. 

Nor is it covered in graffiti or look run-down in any way.

You complaint was that areas without a sanitised nightlife are dangerous and unpleasant areas to visit. Areas like Shinjuku aren't sanitised, but feel safer than probably any American city centre.

The key there isn't about police adopting a zero-tolerance approach. It's just more cultural. There are no pimps or streetwalkers as it's all legal and takes place indoors. There are no muggers as the areas are very popular with all, and too busy as a result. There's also the issue of respect, which is much more ingrained than in the west. Japan has poorer areas, but has no obvious urban blight. People seem to have pride in the appearence of their cities.


Closer to home, Soho, and the theatre district of London, has historically been known as a red-light district, yet it's also the centre of nightlife in the city. Fashionable bars can be right next door to edgier establishments, but you are probably more likely to have your pocket picked shopping on Oxford Street than in Soho.


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## Taller Better (Aug 27, 2005)

Suburbanist said:


> ^^ In that sense, you must love Somalia. It's a place without any law, rules. You find the uutermost Hobbesian paradise. Raw habits, pure people behaving like unchecked, unorganized human being.
> 
> Cracking down in a law-and-order way is just cleaning a place of what the society doesn't like: criminals, drug dealers, soggy business.


You seem to be just lumping all "gritty" areas in the world together in one big pot, with the most war-torn poverty struck areas thrown in. I think that is over-simplifying if you compare Somalia to areas like Times Square. 

A side note. The "Cleaning Up" of Times Square by Giuliani, in my opinion, simply displaced whoever lived and worked there to another neighbourhood. I think it did not magically enable or employ poor people, nor halt criminals from their criminal activity; but rather just kicked them into another area. I would say all North American cities have been following a downward trend of serious criminal behaviour the past decade or so, but I do not personally attribute that to Giuliani's bulldozing of Times Square. Btw, it struck me that he rather selectively got rid of almost all of the gay establishments in the area while he was at it.


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## hammersklavier (Jan 29, 2010)

Suburbanist said:


> ^^ If it is so, shut it down.


You really don't get out much, do you? :bash:

That area is as safe as central Amsterdam. I am _sure_ you know what goes on in central Amsterdam...there is, after all, a reason why it's _La chute_'s setting.


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## eklips (Mar 29, 2005)

I think many people are putting different significations behind the word "grit". One key element not really discussed here is social classes. 

There isn't really much in common between the "grit" that is maintained, kept in shape and valued by alternative upper and middle class people (such as what it seems Taller Better showed in Toronto), and the "grit" of struggling and dominated working class populations, which shows how these populations lack economic capital (and which is the "grit" suburbanist hates).

Frankly, I don't think there is a huge difference between yuppies valuing sterilized urban environments and hipsters valuing "grit". Both groups are 'powerful' enough to make their conception valuable and desirable, they are just debating which is best. A bit like Disney land and six flags arguing which makes the best theme parks, same shit in the end.



Btw: Shiny houses, polished buildings and sterilized streets don't make for a "good" quality of life. They don't prevent people from being exploitated, lacking both basic goods and valued goods, they don't give equality, fulfilling educations, or dignified lives.

Actually, the only element in which sterilized urban environments might come into play is health, but it plays a small part in the whole issue compared to other variables such as industrially constructed food toxicity, expensive or inefficient health-care systems and so on. There is an obvious question of priorities.


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## Taller Better (Aug 27, 2005)

^^ +1


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

^^ I see a major difference: well-off people allowing/contracting someone to paint graffiti in their walls and travelling to exotic destinations in summer don't break down the social order or breed a particularly high share of social dysfunctional kids. However, "grit" produced in poor areas is not a choice as it is a desperate manifestation of folks who gave up on life as it should be to live amidst drug dealing, petty crime or more serious unlawful activities.

As so the first type of "grit", the one shown in the pictures above, is just an aesthetic choice of some residents/business owners that clustered in one place. As long as they are not disrespecting the rights of newcomers who decide not to abide to these preferences (as I doubt mandatory graffiti or mandatory not-so-well-caring-of-façades would ever make it into building codes...), they are fine. Those folks pay taxes, respect the law like the average person, don't commit more crimes etc. It's just a matter of aesthetics.

Grit on poorest areas, OTOH, is undesirable most of the times, because it is known to harbor and incentive phenomenons like taggers, drug dealing, kids dropping off school and hovering streets listening terrible music etc. Therefore, it is important to send a message that such environments are not tolerated because of their social representations and as so must be cleaned up.


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## Taller Better (Aug 27, 2005)

Perhaps you would be well suited for a city like Singapore, where they are very strict on everything.


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## ThatDarnSacramentan (Oct 26, 2008)

Taller said:


> Perhaps you would be well suited for a city like Singapore, where they are very strict on everything.


I think Singapore is too urban for his liking. At least, from what I've seen, the majority of people live in housing complexes (nice ones, mind you, but they're still apartments) with none of that American Dream crap like a front and back yard with a white picket fence and a four car garage so you can park all your cars in there. After all, driving's the only way to get anywhere so you don't have to actually walk someplace and potentially run into people you know.


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## mhays (Sep 12, 2002)

This suburbanist guy is quite a control freak. Pretty funny for someone who loves the free market.

Those Tokyo canyons aren't just red light areas. Lots of retail districts have signage like that. Unless you mean that most busy retail areas double as red light districts.


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## eklips (Mar 29, 2005)

ThatDarnSacramentan said:


> I think Singapore is too urban for his liking. At least, from what I've seen, the majority of people live in housing complexes (nice ones, mind you, but they're still apartments) with none of that American Dream crap like a front and back yard with a white picket fence and a four car garage so you can park all your cars in there. After all, driving's the only way to get anywhere so you don't have to actually walk someplace and potentially run into people you know.


I think Australia would probably be the best for him from what I heard about the place. Clean, sprawled, wealthy, right wing, white people


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## ukiyo (Aug 5, 2008)

Rev Stickleback said:


> You are aware all those brightly lit canyons of neon that people associate with Tokyo are actually red-light districts?


The red light districts in Tokyo are mainly in the low income areas or in the backstreets of these large shopping areas. The only red-light areas in Tokyo that come with the flashing lights are kabuchiko and some parts of Roppongi. The rest of Shinjuku where all the TV's and lights are only for shopping and the entire young-middle aged population goes there..same thing for Ginza and Shibuya is basically dominated by Gyaru and Gyaruo not prostitutes.

This is what a red light district looks like in Tokyo (exactly like what you expect it to look like, dirty and ghetto):
http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/static.panoramio.com/photos/original/15152054.jpg

The picture you used is just a retail shopping area lol.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

^^ I am no control-freak. Not at all. I just don't like lawlessness in the streets. For my sake but, especially, for the sake of people like unaccompanied female teenagers that should be able to drive and go anywhere in the city without fear of harassment. 

A typical "red light district" will be a place very hostile for females (non-prostitutes) walking alone, and as so I cannot accept them as "part of the urban fabric".


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## Skyrazer (Sep 9, 2009)

eklips said:


> I think Australia would probably be the best for him from what I heard about the place. Clean, sprawled, wealthy, right wing, white people


What?

Clean - yes and no. Some cities are clean like Canberra and Perth, but others definitely not, like Sydney which quite dirty.

Sprawled - Ok I'll concede that.

Wealthy - Australia may be a wealthy country, but its cities, like any other city, have richer and poorer areas.

Right wing - I'll say we're more centrist. Our governments may be right-leaning, but the people are not. This likely explains the hung parliament result of the last election. Also keep in mind, the Greens, who are the most left-wing party got a big surge in popularity.

White people - Err, now this is just a WTF one. Don't tell me you still think we have the "White Australia" policy or something...


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## intensivecarebear (Feb 2, 2006)

Suburbanist said:


> ^^ I am no control-freak. Not at all. I just don't like lawlessness in the streets. For my sake but, especially, for the sake of people like unaccompanied female teenagers that should be able to drive and go anywhere in the city without fear of harassment.
> 
> A typical "red light district" will be a place very hostile for females (non-prostitutes) walking alone, and as so I cannot accept them as "part of the urban fabric".


Define 'lawlessness'. You keep throwing this apocalyptic term around every two sentences. From you posts, you seem to have a very classist idea of what is lawless, i.e any place that isn't squeaky clean and gentrified. 
By the way, female teenagers are a lot safer in busy pedestrian oriented environments than they are in a deserted parking lot after 6pm. Cities are generally more unsafe because human interests and needs are placed behind car-centric culture and policies that you constantly advocate. Any female will tell you they'll feel more intimated walking down a street deserted of pedestrians. But that's what you want isn't it? Cars, cars, cars everywhere so we can cocoon ourselves from the bad boogeyman stranger on the street. Only problem is suburbanist, you have to get out of your car sometime


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## intensivecarebear (Feb 2, 2006)

Skyrazer said:


> What?
> 
> Clean - yes and no. Some cities are clean like Canberra and Perth, but others definitely not, like Sydney which quite dirty.
> 
> ...


I think eklips meant to say Orange County in California, as opposed to Australia Generally speaking, it's the epitome of wealthy white suburban right-wing values, where everyone's hero is Ronald Reagan. Although these days the stereotypes are less true as the county is much more racially diverse and less conservative than it used to be


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## Skyrazer (Sep 9, 2009)

intensivecarebear said:


> I think eklips meant to say Orange County in California, as opposed to Australia Generally speaking, it's the epitome of wealthy white suburban right-wing values, where everyone's hero is Ronald Reagan. Although these days the stereotypes are less true as the county is much more racially diverse and less conservative than it used to be


Yes I was going to say some rich areas in California or Texas would fit eklips' criteria more than any Aussie city.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

intensivecarebear said:


> Define 'lawlessness'. You keep throwing this apocalyptic term around every two sentences. From you posts, you seem to have a very classist idea of what is lawless, i.e any place that isn't squeaky clean and gentrified.


Lawlessness, in the context of this thread, means the tolerance for activities deemed illegal by society (as defined by the legislators society has chosen) in a given area, as if it was a sort of "free territory" for certain activities to proliferate and happen there.

The question is not about social class, although people with money can usually do business in a legal way. For instance, some cities ban skateboarding in sidewalks for the sake of preventing injuries in frail people (young kids, elderly) who might be hit by people skating fast on a given sidewalk. Regardless of whether such legislation is good or bad, if it is there, middle-class and wealthier kids will likely be driven by their parents or some friends to an enclosed skate-park with monitors (as many cities ban unattended skate-parks now after some high-profile neck injuries worsened by incorrect first-aid actions taken by fellow teenagers). This parks can sometimes charge a fee and rent protective materials. Parents drop their "offspring" there, go dine/shop and kids will be there, safely observed by a trained adult able to minimize risks of the sport. However, poor folks don't have money to pay for such entertainment, and they will just assemble a makeshift rail in an abandoned lot nearby. That rail will likely be of a rust pipe, prone to tetanus infection if somebody is hurt. Smoking and underage drinking is more likely to happen because there will be no one to enforce minor drinking and smoking bans. 

However, there are far more serious lawlessness aspects of what I write about. Health norms were devised for restaurants, grocery stores and ice-cream parlors for one reason: avoid food poisoning, a leading death cause. It is now more important than never because in the developed World we managed to get basic stuff like sanitation and drinking water available for everyone (or almost), so people get less infections and thus lower resistance for food pathogens. In many "alternative" neighborhoods, DIY and "funky" bars do not respect such regulations. I don't care if the façade is well painted or not, of if the music played there is of an acceptable taste (for me) or not. However, if the alternative bar doesn't respect smoking bans, if it is "cool" because it is underground (literally) with no escape route (a fire disaster waiting to happen), if it they don't control temperatures on fridges used to store critical food, if they don't clean its floor and dished, if they leave humid spots prone to mold proliferation - than we have a problem.

Again, there is the money issue: people with money can afford the price an alternative - but law-abiding - place charges for having a dark green, yellow and pink wall painted with lead-free paint, sprinklers on the cover, two signaled escape routes with emergency alarms, and expensive fridges for frozen food that get regularly disinfected. A bar meant for cash-strapped students can't afford such items that make life safer and, if so, it should be shut down for the sake of public health.

Many old crumbling buildings do not offer a safe environment for anyone to live, work or eat according to standards deemed acceptable in 2010. To restore and rehabilitate them, it will cost a hell of a lot of money, and that money will only show up if the building is restored aiming a higher-income related use. Any rational investor will not spend millions to renovate, update and restore a building and keep charging US$ 400/month rent of the old bankrupt landlord charged for a US$ 2.000/month worth space.

So, even when activities are lawful, in many (though not all, not even the majority maybe) "alternative" areas it is impossible to make any money on the real estate market out of the (limited) economic capacity of the alternative crowd of the place.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

eklips said:


> I think Australia would probably be the best for him from what I heard about the place. Clean, sprawled, wealthy, right wing, white people


That description could also apply to Austria.


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## Rev Stickleback (Jun 23, 2009)

NihonKitty said:


> The red light districts in Tokyo are mainly in the low income areas or in the backstreets of these large shopping areas. The only red-light areas in Tokyo that come with the flashing lights are kabuchiko and some parts of Roppongi. The rest of Shinjuku where all the TV's and lights are only for shopping and the entire young-middle aged population goes there..same thing for Ginza and Shibuya is basically dominated by Gyaru and Gyaruo not prostitutes.
> 
> This is what a red light district looks like in Tokyo (exactly like what you expect it to look like, dirty and ghetto):
> http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/static.panoramio.com/photos/original/15152054.jpg
> ...


Oh, for sure, they are entertainment districts with a whole variety of stuff going on. Not much at all, if anything on the main streets, but other questionable looking places down the side streets. I just didn't take any photos of those!

The only place I saw a working girl in the street was in Osaka, in a street next to dotonbori, and even then she was very polite.


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## zaphod (Dec 8, 2005)

I think its obvious that someone has recognized that these artists and squatter groups carry a romantic mystique, one that if directed into the proper channels could be marketable. So Berlin is cool and trendy because there are artists living in cool old abandoned factories. Maybe someone wants to shoot a movie in that part of the city now. Maybe these artists go commercial and are successful. And the tourism and film bureau are successful too...get it now?

I only make this assumption on the premise that the fact that for anyone to defend these artist squatters, they must have made a name for themselves or found a place in the collective soul of the city. In the real world there are always plenty of starving artists who legitimately suck and no shortage of losers and junkies who consider themselves to be self-styled bohemians or living an alternative lifestyle, yet nobody would call them "cool".


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## mhays (Sep 12, 2002)

In some cases they're also damaging the building, making it much harder to renovate later.


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## zaphod (Dec 8, 2005)

I guess I shouldn't defend the ones who do that, or the situations where the property owner actually would treat the building like an asset and would not want to lose it. As opposed to a company whose burdened by a toxic, polluted old factory they can't afford to tear down and thus lets it sit to rot-that's when this sort of thing is justifiable IMO.

In any case I don't disagree with the OP's premise that we shouldn't make special exceptions for people doing unlawful things.

Nevertheless, if the city condemned some old industrial space, allowing various groups to use that space in an informal way or allowing free-for-all graffiti or something might not be so horrible if it could be exploited as a kind of edgy attraction.


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## Justme (Sep 11, 2002)

eklips said:


> I think Australia would probably be the best for him from what I heard about the place. Clean, sprawled, wealthy, right wing, white people


Australian cities have plenty of grit and run down areas like anywhere else in the developed world.


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## pesto (Jun 29, 2009)

zaphod said:


> I think its obvious that someone has recognized that these artists and squatter groups carry a romantic mystique, one that if directed into the proper channels could be marketable. So Berlin is cool and trendy because there are artists living in cool old abandoned factories. Maybe someone wants to shoot a movie in that part of the city now. Maybe these artists go commercial and are successful. And the tourism and film bureau are successful too...get it now?
> 
> I only make this assumption on the premise that the fact that for anyone to defend these artist squatters, they must have made a name for themselves or found a place in the collective soul of the city. In the real world there are always plenty of starving artists who legitimately suck and no shortage of losers and junkies who consider themselves to be self-styled bohemians or living an alternative lifestyle, yet nobody would call them "cool".


I can't say you're wrong but this sounds more like a romanticized or Hollywood version of what happens.

I think that what happens is that low-income neighborhoods become attractive because, say, commutes become longer or other neighborhoods get very expensive. Poor artists and other young people are the first that can afford the area and move in quickly with their subculture. As prices increase, normal working people move in and the artists are forced out. Some of the bars, clubs, galleries remain to serve the middle class. In a few situations the demand continues and prices become quite high; these grab the headlines but are not the common pattern.


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