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You don't scare easy? You're the main one on here complaining about how bad the crime is.
No, I'm complaining about the crime because I'm sick of all the people who go on about what a dream this place is. Do you all work for the Houston CVB or something? I mean I get the civic pride - but things are changing for the worse here. People need to open their eyes.
No, I'm complaining about the crime because I'm sick of all the people who go on about what a dream this place is. Do you all work for the Houston CVB or something? I mean I get the civic pride - but things are changing for the worse here. People need to open their eyes.
Houston is not ideal - the traffic is bad and I hate all the billboards. However, crime centers more around apartments and in bad areas of town. If you live in a house in a regular area - you don't stand much of a chance of being a victim. It's not civic pride - it's their reality.
Houston is not some lawless city where you have to watch over you're back 24/7. Houston is safer then alot of big cities or metropolitan areas in the United States. And I grew up down the street from crackhouses, hookers,drug dealers,gang bangers you name it I witnessed it. I've seen a man die at the age of 13. Houston in it's "random" areas are as safe as a mouse kitten. You're more likely to get killed by a idiot driver then you are in getting stuck up/held up or shot at.
Given where you've grown up and what you've seen, I don't think your safety approval stamp of Houston is really going to sway the majority of Houstonians. What is a not a big deal to you, may be a big deal to others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jek74
....... I swear if I hear another person say that "crime is so random" here. WTF. Of course crime is random! How is crime not random? Crime in Compton, CA is random. Crime on the south side of Chicago is Random. Crime in 8 mile in Detroit is random. Is crime suppose to happen on a schedule? I honestly am befuddled here....... .
Random as in not concentrated in specific areas, so you can't easily find "good areas" to live in because they're ALL pretty much targets of crime. I thought I lived in a nice area (where I've lived for several years)...then I looked at crime stats from the police department and was surprised how many burglaries and incidents of theft have occurred within the last year on my street.
Houston is not ideal - the traffic is bad and I hate all the billboards. However, crime centers more around apartments and in bad areas of town. If you live in a house in a regular area - you don't stand much of a chance of being a victim. It's not civic pride - it's their reality.
My point is that Houstonians should care very much about the "apartments and in bad areas of town" before they become all that is left of the city. That's how it starts. Chicago is a DMZ almost everywhere from 3 miles west of downtown and even some suburbs are turning bad - and plenty of people there are whistling past the graveyard too.
Grew up in Beirut on the Lake aka Chicago, 1980s-1990s. Beat you guys in 1992 with 943 murders in one year. Sorry, I don't scare too easy.
I grew up in Caracas
and my dad grew up in one of the worst places .... we had to go there many times to visit some of his childhood friends.
Let's just say, that I'm always watching my back and always lock my doors.
The most violent cities for 2011, concluded the report, were as follows:
1. San Pedro, Sula Honduras
2. Juarez, Mexico
3. Maceio, Brazil
4. Acapulco, Mexico
5. Distrito Central, Honduras 6. Caracas, Venezuela
7. Torreon, Mexico
8. Chihuahua, Mexico
9. Durango, Mexico
10. Belem, Brazil
I grew up in Caracas
and my dad grew up in one of the worst places .... we had to go there many times to visit some of his childhood friends.
Let's just say, that I'm always watching my back and always lock my doors.
Crime is random here because unlike other cities we are far less segregated, less densely populated, more spread out, and almost exclusively dependent on the car for travel. This allows for crime patterns to appear more amorphous, thus the theory that crime more randomly occurs citywide here, than in other cities. Most cities have that one "bad part of town". Here, we have pockets scattered across the city. Five minutes from any hood in this town by car and you have a high probability of being in an affluent area.
The example to give is to take any of those cities you cited, plug their crime data into a mapping program and you'll see tighter concentrations of where crime occurs. Here, you will see the same concentrations, just not as tight, and with lots of "floater" crimes in those above mentioned affluent areas where in any other city, you would not expect to find crime.
The only true exception in Houston would be the area inside the southwest quadrant of the 610 loop. There, and along the Memorial drive corridor are the only places you see a true "low crime rate".
I might have spent five minutes in the hood too. We should trade notes sometime.
Don't pull the segregation card. I came from Chicago, probably the most segregated city in the US. Sure, the south side is bad. But guess what? That's not grandma getting robbed or shot, that is gang on gang violence. On the north side where all the pretty trixies live dating their chad's from Depaul (those of you from Chicago will know what a trixie and chad is), they are getting mugged and robbed left and right in their all white super safe neighborhoods. True, most of the "violent" crime is south. Again, that is gang on gang violence. Let's make sure we are comparing apples to apples here. Most of you who are complaining about crime are not complaining about murders and rape, but rather "petty" crime ie. burglaries, break ins, etc. Most of that type of crime has nothing to do with segregation or Houston's lack of zoning. Do you people really think thieves are so stupid as to not know where the dumb rich white people live? Come on. They knew where they lived in Chicago and NY and LA and they certainly don't need to live across the street from them to rob them. They can get in a car and drive to wherever you are.
The fact is, petty crime, in fact all crime, is random in terms of location and timing. Most crimes are crimes of opportunity. And the fact that most of Houston drives, you sure are a lot safer then in Chicago, NY, Boston, DC, etc where you will get mugged in person since you are walking everywhere.
Right before I left Chicago this past fall we had a serial rapist on the loose in Lincoln Park (where all the pretty white people live). The rapist was black and from the south side ( we found out when he was caught), and everyone was like, what is he doing up here? LOL. He raped about 12 women all over the park area in very expensive areas.
In NY you get the random subway pushers. We just had a pretty gruesome one about a moth ago where a homeless woman pushed a business man right into a train during a crowded rush hour. When I lived in NY 10 years ago we had an epidemic with subways pushers. Seemed like there was one a week. It got so bad nobody would go anywhere near the tracks and everyone would be staring everyone else down.
Trust me, Houston has nothing on the rest of the country. Crime is random. It happens everywhere. It has nothing to do with civic pride, it has to do with facts. I've looked over the data seven ways from sunday and on a per capita basis, Houston is one of the lowest in the country and our violent crime doesn't even show up on the map.
BTW, here is my zip code where I lived in Chicago. I lived with all the pretty white yuppies too. Here is the crime report. Keep in mind, this is almost all white, very affluent area.
Don't pull the segregation card. I came from Chicago, probably the most segregated city in the US. Sure, the south side is bad. But guess what? That's not grandma getting robbed or shoot, that is gang on gang violence. On the north side where all the pretty trixies live dating their chad's from Depaul (those of you from Chicago will know what a trixie and chad is), they are getting mugged and robbed left and right in their all white super safe neighborhoods. True, most of the "violent" crime is south. Again, that is gang on gang violence. Let's make sure we are comparing apples to apples here. Most of you who are complaining about crime are not complaining about murders and rape, but rather "petty" crime ie. burglaries, break ins, etc. Most of that type of crime has nothing to do with segregation or Houston's lack of zoning. Do you people really think thieves are so stupid as to not know where the dumb rich white people live? Come on. They knew where they lived in Chicago and NY and LA and they certainly don't need to live across the street from them to rob them. They can get in a car and drive to wherever you are.
The fact is, petty crime, in fact all crime, is random in terms of location and timing. Most crimes are crimes of opportunity. And the fact that most of Houston drives, you sure are a lot safer then in Chicago, NY, Boston, DC, etc where you will get mugged in person since you are walking everywhere.
Right before I left Chicago this past fall we had a serial rapist on the loose in Lincoln Park (where all the pretty white people live). The rapist was black and from the south side ( we found out when he was caught), and everyone was like, what is he doing up here? LOL. He raped about 12 women all over the park area in very expensive areas.
In NY you get the random subway pushers. We just had a pretty gruesome one about a moth ago where a homeless woman pushed a business man right into a train during a crowded rush hour. When I lived in NY 10 years ago we had an epidemic with subways pushers. Seemed like there was one a week. It got so bad nobody would go anywhere near the tracks and everyone would be staring everyone else down.
Trust me, Houston has nothing on the rest of the country. Crime is random. It happens everywhere. It has nothing to do with civic pride, it has to do with facts. I've looked over the data seven ways from sunday and on a per capita basis, Houston is one of the lowest in the country and our violent crime doesn't even show up on the map.
I'm a fifth generation Chicagoan and I've never heard of "Trixies" and "Chad's". Huh?
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