Jersey is so racist...... (Sayreville, Millville: crime rate, house, to buy)
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I can appreciate your sentiment here (anti-stereotyping)...but if you really believe that the vast majority of Newark's residents are hardworking people with legit jobs...I'm not sure I'd sign up for agreement on that one. If you drive through many of Newark's neighborhoods during a summer weekday, you'll see lots of folks sitting outside drinking or just hanging out. I wouldn't put my money on the fact that they all have night shifts at their places of employment.
Dude.....I LIVED in Newark for many years. Not drove through or past it but actually lived there. I hung out in various parts of the city. The average person in Newark is going through the daily struggle of working, going to school, and trying to keep their heads above water. I also lived in Montclair and hung out in Upper Montclair, Bloomfield, and West Orange. Guess what people do there during the summer? That's right, sitting outside hanging out and drinking. The only difference is one area is majority black and the others majority white. Mod cut
Last edited by Viralmd; 12-16-2009 at 05:57 AM..
Reason: Personal attack
Dude.....I LIVED in Newark for many years. Not drove through or past it but actually lived there. I hung out in various parts of the city. The average person in Newark is going through the daily struggle of working, going to school, and trying to keep their heads above water. I also lived in Montclair and hung out in Upper Montclair, Bloomfield, and West Orange. Guess what people do there during the summer? That's right, sitting outside hanging out and drinking. The only difference is one area is majority black and the others majority white. Mod cut
The only difference is not that one area is black and one area is white. It stems down to the manners and how they act as well.
There is no doubt racism is alive and well right here in NJ. I have never in my life seen such open discrimination against anyone more than I have against Central American Guadamalens. Example: I hired a real estate agent to rent one of my apartments. After he looks at the house he says to me "Don't worry, I'll get you all good people no Guadamalens." A week later a someone knocks on my doors and tells me that they heard I had an apartment for rent, I said yes, they said they have to get out of where their living now because they have "Guads living on both sides of them". Now keep in mind I never met either of these people.
In the past most people that came to this country came here with nothing. I'm sure the Italians that came here 100 years ago went through the same thing that the Guadamalens are going through today. When they arrive here not knowing the language and therefore bring the school districts test scores down. They also bring down the property values because of it. So it is a touchy situation. Can you blame the people of an established area of resenting a specific group of people that have caused them to suffer financially?
I don't think this is racism, but more of an economic thing. If a black man who worked for Goldman Sachs and drove a new BMW was buying a home in Summit, etc, I don't think anyone would care.
I know for a fact that I would not want to live in certain towns such as Summit, Livingston or Springfield because of the way people act around there.
My lousy $0.02: I've never had a problem in Summit. Both of my kids were born there. I find that western Union County tends to be OK, as long as you're not in one of those towns that the white social climbers tend to gravitate to as a social credential - the ones with the 0.01% black population like Short Hills (you know, Millburn) where people rate how nice their town is by how unlike Newark they are (meaning how few blacks you see - anywhere).
I do know what you mean, though. Even in Summit you can come across white folk so unaccustomed to carrying on a decent conversation with a black person that they are visibly uncomfortable with any encounter. I feel sorry for them (typically those are the men who wear sweaters draped around their shoulders tied around their neks *ugh* I've seen entire families of them in Summit!).
Springfield's problem, like a lot of towns in the general vicinity of Millburn, is that they never quite measure up to the adjoining towns in cache and their schools never measure up to those in western Essex so they view each and every black face as a barrier to their school's ever reaching that level of 100% lily white demographic that will elevate their schools (and property values and cache) to that of some western Essex towns. I'm happy to be free of the whole mindset. I, of course, had to move to achieve that level of happiness. NJ's sordid and painful civil rights past means that race will always be an issue because of its painful historical legacy. The "ill at ease" with race is a NJ tradiation that has obviously been handed down generation after generation.
Livingston is quite huge. I'm not sure I've ever had a memorable experience there. I'm sure they wish they were Chatham... or even Summit, for that matter.
The more unlike Newark a town is perceived, the better its reputation is with a certain demographic. That's the way it is. Let it go or leave.
That's the way I see it.
-EJS
Last edited by Eric S; 12-16-2009 at 06:40 PM..
Reason: clarity
I don't think this is racism, but more of an economic thing. If a black man who worked for Goldman Sachs and drove a new BMW was buying a home in Summit, etc, I don't think anyone would care.
I went through hell trying to buy a house in two allegedly upscale areas of Mercer County. I had just as much money, or economic viability, as anyone else there.
Keep in mind you are posting from Texas where they were still lynching people after the turn of the last century. I don't know about generational but definitely a painful legacy.
NJ probably has some racist people like every state does, but I'm pretty damn sure it's less racist than any other eastern state.
Many people seem to think that New Jersey is one of the more progressive northeastern states but nothing could be further from the truth. It is an illusion created by people who place too much emphasis on statistics concerning demographics. On paper NJ looks like a wonderful diverse melting pot of cultures. But a more fitting description would be: NJ is a diverse but segregated melting pot of cultures. New Jersey is in the top four states with the most segregated school districts. Now one would say that people tend to stay together and this is not unique to NJ. There is some truth in that statement but it is more prevelant in Jersey. NJ realtors are famous for practicing a phenomena known as racial steering. Not only is socio-economics a great divider here in NJ but race seems to trump being affluent also. There are a large number of upper-middle class black families in NJ. You would not know that if you only looked at the affluent towns in Somerset county. What about the exclusive towns in Essex? You would think you would see more affluent blacks there. You don't because of the scourge of racial steering that is practiced by a majority of real estate agents in NJ. It is an unwritten rule in NJ about where even the majority of well-to-do blacks can live.
New Jersey has a long history of segregation and racism. Even today there are organized and functioning chapters of the Ku Klux Klan in Millville, Manville, and Sayreville. Also, Butler, NJ is where the headquarters of the League of American Patriots is located. They are the group that holds the distinction of circulating the first racist anti-Obama literature, which occured in Roxbury, NJ.
To suggest that NJ is less racist than any other state in the vicinity is either to be ignorant of the facts or it is a vain attempt to paint a rosy picture where it does not exist. The racism here on City-Data's NJ forums is even nonchalant and par-for-the-course. Recently I was reading a thread about someone asking for advice on a town in north Jersey. Someone replied by saying that the crime rate was low and it was a nice town but there where just a few too many hispanics there so they might want to look elsewhere. Now, just so you know, the OP didn't ask about race but the advice giver just assumed they would want to know, and assumed that they would also find hispanics undesirable. That is an example of the ingrained systemic racism that is present in the majority of real estate offices in NJ.
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