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If the Clippers won the NBA title I would be very happy.
Unfortunately the odds of it happening are very low.
There have been some good things that have happened in L.A. and I wish more good things come through (in particular the very belated planned improvements in public transport are the only hope for L.A.'s future), unfortunately when you have idiots of every race and ethnicity in charge and a systematic destruction of the economy it's hard to be optimistic. L.A. has smart and together people of every racial and ethnic group, it's too bad they're not running the show.
I witnessed the rise and fall of the Silver Lake/Echo Park rock scene first hand. And I also witnessed the rise and fall of hip hop although more from a distance. I hope all the best for L.A., it is where I was born and raised, lived most of my life, and i'd love to come back. I don't think it'll ever be "THE PLACE" again, that's not to say that good things won't come out of L.A. in the future. When there are that many people something good is bound to come out of nowhere. There probably are some people right now creating something that nobody knows about. L.A.'s just become a culturally second rate city. It will continue to have some importance, and people will continue to do creative things, but it'll never be in the front rank again. This is NOT saying it has no future...just a different kind of future, IF it can be saved (which I think is well within the realm of possibility). I'm not Fastfilm.
And I'm 100 percent in favor of ANY ethnic group in L.A. rebuilding the cultural infrastructure felled by the double whammy of the RE bubble and economic crisis.
but i think it will always be first rate. its such an important city.
i look at the newest schools going up and marvel at their design. its quite a site to see.
LA is definitely moving in the right direction, some of its residents are not, but as a whole, its getting better.
Quote:
Originally Posted by majoun
If the Clippers won the NBA title I would be very happy.
Unfortunately the odds of it happening are very low.
There have been some good things that have happened in L.A. and I wish more good things come through (in particular the very belated planned improvements in public transport are the only hope for L.A.'s future), unfortunately when you have idiots of every race and ethnicity in charge and a systematic destruction of the economy it's hard to be optimistic. L.A. has smart and together people of every racial and ethnic group, it's too bad they're not running the show.
I witnessed the rise and fall of the Silver Lake/Echo Park rock scene first hand. And I also witnessed the rise and fall of hip hop although more from a distance. I hope all the best for L.A., it is where I was born and raised, lived most of my life, and i'd love to come back. I don't think it'll ever be "THE PLACE" again, that's not to say that good things won't come out of L.A. in the future. When there are that many people something good is bound to come out of nowhere. There probably are some people right now creating something that nobody knows about. L.A.'s just become a culturally second rate city. It will continue to have some importance, and people will continue to do creative things, but it'll never be in the front rank again. This is NOT saying it has no future...just a different kind of future, IF it can be saved (which I think is well within the realm of possibility). I'm not Fastfilm.
And I'm 100 percent in favor of ANY ethnic group in L.A. rebuilding the cultural infrastructure felled by the double whammy of the RE bubble and economic crisis.
I have family in LA, and visit every so often. I notice the changes in many parts of LA, places that used to be ghetto's crime ridden neighborhoods, have cleaned up a lot. Echo Park for instance was a bad place, even East LA, but the most recent time I have visited those 2 area's, I was shocked on how clean and new looking they have become. Whittier Blvd in the 90's looked pretty junky, it still does in certain spots, but the city has really done a good job on making it look better. Sure, you can't fix all of LA, and you will always have mass poverty which leads to violence, and various crimes, but the city is not nearly as bad, or as dangerous as it was in the 80's and 90's.
I think LA is having a sort of a revival, just like the way NYC is having. Now it's cool to buy property, and live in places like Brooklyn, and downtown LA. Nobody would have ever thought about moving to downtown LA 15 years ago, same with Brooklyn. Gentrification is how these places have changed. Cities start with redevelopment, developers buy into the whole "Hipster" scene, and how cool it would be to turn a an old shoe factory into lofts in a run down neighborhood. This process plays itself out and takes time, even though they are many positives to gentrification, you have issues with displacement of the poor, higher home prices and changes culturally which can lead to a artificial feel of older neighborhoods that once had character and meaning because most of these new yuppies that buy the property usually remove a lot of what used to make these older neighborhoods cool and gritty.
I live in San Diego, and appreciate what LA has to offer which is A LOT! You could never get bored in LA, I don't care what anyone says. Come to San Diego, and you will be done with the place in about a week, there is simply not enough excitement down here compared to LA. We do have the Gaslamp in Downtown SD which is a cool place to party and have a good time, but that's all we really have going on besides the party beaches like Pacific Beach and Mission Beach which in my opinion cannot compare to Venice beach and even the awesome Santa Monica.
I think the San Diego mentality is more family friendly, which leads to boringness and a sense that we don't have to grow up. Since I have been living in SD for so long, the only real changes I have noticed in this city, is the changes in downtown SD. The city has really focused hard on making downtown a cool trendy place to live. But sadly since more families have move downtown, people tend to complain more about the littlest of things, like homeless people of all things, well duh! what do you expect? They were there before your uppidy snobby self decided to move into a half a million dollar condo in the heart of homeless central.
But anyways, San Diego doesn't have a whole lot of influence on California it seems like. LA just devours our hopes on becoming an important city. Even nationally, you never hear the media talking about SD, I mean shoot ever watch CNN and notice how when they show the weather in California, you only see LA and SF temps not SD?? That's exactly what I'm talking about. Honestly if it wasn't for the military, San Diego would be devastated economically. They're are our main source of income, outside of tourism. The job market sucks out here, and too many consist of low paying service wage work in the hotel industry or companies like Walmart that don't pay enough for people to survive in such a high cost of living of a city. SD is basically know for great weather, high home prices, nice beaches, Sea World, and what else??? Hmmmmmm can't think of anything else.
But yeah SD is like the red headed step child of California, nobody really cares about her, or even bothers to notice her since the bigger brothers like LA and SF get all the attention. Some people love San Diego which is fine we do have our pluses, but this place is too suburban and lacks significant cultural to even be compared to bigger or even mid size cities in America. Dallas is a mid to large size city, but it outdoes San Diego in many ways. They have one of the largest concentration of corporate headquarters in the nation. The city is bustling, offers great shopping and dining, the cost of living is much lower, and the job opportunities are greater and more diversified.
I think SD relied heavily on the real estate market to make money, people got greedy and lost money. If this place doesn't change the way it does business, then it will suffer badly. I believe LA has an upper edge, and can handle itself better in economic collapse, because LA has a much diversified economy that it can hold it's own. Even if you took Hollywood out of the picture, the city wouldn't probably be effected much, unlike SD, if you took out the military, were finished.
LA has lost some influence, mainly because the music industry sucks so bad right now. There's nothing good on the radio anymore, Hip Hop has gotten so Pop now days, that they honestly should change the genre from Hip Hop to Pop and get it over with already. I miss the days of 2 Pac, Ice Cube, Bone Thugs N Harmony, the days when LA was on the map and Hip Hop music was at it's finest. It was real, raw, and hardcore and people loved it. I don't think gangster rap or even real Hip Hop is tolerated anymore on the radio, it's look down upon today because it's seen as too aggressive, too hard for the soft youth culture of today.
Even Rock sucks, what the hell happened people? Where has all the great music gone? I miss the days of Nirvana, or even POD. I think that's why LA is probably suffering in the music biz, because all the music coming from LA is soft and lacks any form of edginess. You can thank the big music producers for that one, and you can also blame MTV and VH1 that are mostly playing stupid reality TV shows rather than music video's that allow artist to grow and gain fan fare.
Anyways the more lame crap that Hollywood puts out, it will continue to hurt LA's image. NYC will always be appreciated and loved from people all over the world, because it is a much more worldly city. NYC's image can never be hurt, I mean the city has breeded amazing people from great film actors to extremely talented music artist I believe more so than LA. They do tie in popularity and coolness I feel, but overall I don't think any city in the US can compete with NYC, it's just too big and it has everything you could ever imagine.
You can't really blame LA for the pop-ness of hip hop since LA has sort of been out of the mainstream hip hop spotlight since 2Pac died. Sure their has been brief instances like when Dr. Dre made 2001 and when The Game first debuted, but thats pretty much it. I'd say LA is one of the few places where 90s style gangsta-rap still exist. You know where its more about the intellegent gangster, like when Ice Cube and 2Pac made straight gangsta rap, but also had socio-political messages in their music (ex: Amerikkka's Most Wanted, Me Against the World). Here it definatly wasnt all about money, hoes, and diamonds
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, well duh! what do you expect? They were there before your uppidy snobby self decided to move into a half a million dollar condo in the heart of homeless central.
can't think of anything else. 
