Rant: Tired of people asking if it's safe in Oakland (San Jose: living, pit bulls)

[etoile_filante]

For apples to apples, here's just robbery. SF last 6 months, SF since 1/1, and Oakland/Berkeley/SF since 1/1. The distribution of crime looks pretty comparable.

[ZhugeLiang]

Originally Posted by |Incognito|

Software shows what is on the screen, so Alameda was included not by choice, but the way software displays. Use it first, then talk $hit.

You're a ******* idiot. You're going off of numbers only without taking any factors into account. Maybe you should back to school and take a critical thinking class, because you come off as really, really dumb.

[|Incognito|]

Well why dont you start talking about those "factors"? Id love to hear your rebuttal instead of cliche ad hominem attacks. Intelligent people use data to support their rationale, not personal opinions.

^^look at the number of crimes on upper left. Go back one week (easier to see because if you go back more map will flood) and see how many more crimes occur in Oakland.

[Nineties Flava]

Originally Posted by |Incognito|

Well why dont you start talking about those "factors"? Id love to hear your rebuttal instead of cliche ad hominem attacks. Intelligent people use data to support their rationale, not personal opinions.

^^look at the number of crimes on upper left. Go back one week (easier to see because if you go back more map will flood) and see how many more crimes occur in Oakland.

No one disputed that Oakland has more crime, they disputed your outlandish claim that 70% of Oakland is a crime hot-bed.

[18Montclair]

Originally Posted by |Incognito|

Problem with your argument is that it is not backed up with any data whatsoever.

Relying solely on raw data without putting it into context is a recipe for ignorance.

And for the sake of you being made aware, I dont know why you think its acceptable to dismiss anything people who live in Oakland have to say-they above all outsiders know exactly what's going on here.

Not you.

Not even the data can tell the whole story.

Its a statistical fact that parts of Oakland have very high crime rates, but that doesnt mean that people in those areas live in fear(the vast majority dont live in fear btw), it doesnt mean that even in many high crime areas there isnt a feeling of community or that its impossible to show pride of ownership for one's home.

I get the feeling that people think that East Oakland's flatlands are a bombed out war zone and that isnt even close to the reality of things.

This is the Bay Area, and as the nation's 3rd largest concentration of immigrants after New York and Los Angeles, our less educated migrants, poor legal and illegal foreign born population needs somewhere to live and this group, along with upwardly mobile Blacks who CHOSE to stay in the flatlands even after they came financially able to leave, together they have kept the East a pretty vibrant place.

There are not miles of abandoned storefronts in East Oakland-on the contrary Ive seen a total resurgence of retail all over the East(almost all mom-n-pop stores), there are not miles of boarded up housing tenements in East Oakland-on the contrary the city doesnt have a lot of public housing to begin with relative to its poor population and its not boarded up(LOL).

I mean really, people can't ride BART and think what they see from the window gives them authority to lecture Oaklanders on Oakland and they do it all the time. LOL.

[migol84]

Well, I've thought of moving to Oakland but a few factors have stopped me from doing so. 1. I don't want to pay over $100 a month to commute to San Francisco for work 2. I don't know my way around Oakland that well even though I've been there quite a few times 3. Not knowing my way around also means I'm a little scared of the idea of not knowing what neighborhoods are cheap and safe enough for me to move to.

Oakland to me, feels like a small town. But it also feels like a pretty hip town and a great place for artists to live in. That's my stereotype of the city. So yeah, sorry that I don't see Oakland as a "big city" that others here have mentioned. But when I hear about the "crime in Oakland" I always figure that there are some very concentrated neighborhoods filled with crime rather than being spread out all over the city. I kinda feel that it's a little bit the same way in San Francisco. So that means, to me, that there are neighborhoods safe enough that if you lived there you wouldn't see any crime occur for years.

The whole race issue is true. I was working as a PA for a short being filmed in Oakland. I don't even know which neighborhood it was... all I know is that it was near the port and downtown. We were using some art studio and the owner was a black man. Another girl that was working with me as a PA held the owner up when he tried to go in, since we were checking people in. The girl I was working with, a white girl, meant well and didn't mean to seem "offensive" or "racist". She was just doing what she was asked to do. The owner got really upset when she asked him to wait. But for good reason. He was the owner after all. Anyways, after a very awkward exchange, he looked at her and told her that its difficult for "white people" to accept that a black man could own a beautiful art gallery like that.

In all that exchange I kinda figured what the owner was saying and I figured he's probably gone through that a lot because anyone could understand being held up at the front of your own place when you've rented it out to a film crew and no one knows who you are. That to me said, clearly there's no other reason he's overreacting other than that he must face racism a lot even in a "liberal" region, such as the Bay Area.

If there is anything that I can stereotype about the Bay Area in general is that it's not always the liberal-mindedness that people make it out to be, not when it comes to race at least. There certainly is a veiled racial divide amongst groups here in this region.

When it comes to crime, yeah, I'm a bit scared but I don't put a face to it, or a color. As a hispanic myself, I can honestly say that I've faced hispanics as well as whites, blacks and even asians and once a native american, who were a bit frightening and up to no good citizens. I was frightened not because of their color but because they were just frightening people.
And out of the number of frightening people these people were from, one of them was only in Oakland and the rest in San Francisco. So it doesn't make sense if people put a name of a city to crime, or even worse a color.

But in my honest opinion people who ask "is it safe in Oakland?" is more to do with their lack of knowledge more so than it does with them simply stereotyping. But I can understand the nuisance. It's like when people say that Texas is filled with ignorant bigots riding on horses with their guns. grrrrr so annoying.

[mstnghu2]

Originally Posted by migol84

Well, I've thought of moving to Oakland but a few factors have stopped me from doing so. 1. I don't want to pay over $100 a month to commute to San Francisco for work 2. I don't know my way around Oakland that well even though I've been there quite a few times 3. Not knowing my way around also means I'm a little scared of the idea of not knowing what neighborhoods are cheap and safe enough for me to move to.

Oakland to me, feels like a small town. But it also feels like a pretty hip town and a great place for artists to live in. That's my stereotype of the city. So yeah, sorry that I don't see Oakland as a "big city" that others here have mentioned. But when I hear about the "crime in Oakland" I always figure that there are some very concentrated neighborhoods filled with crime rather than being spread out all over the city. I kinda feel that it's a little bit the same way in San Francisco. So that means, to me, that there are neighborhoods safe enough that if you lived there you wouldn't see any crime occur for years.

The whole race issue is true. I was working as a PA for a short being filmed in Oakland. I don't even know which neighborhood it was... all I know is that it was near the port and downtown. We were using some art studio and the owner was a black man. Another girl that was working with me as a PA held the owner up when he tried to go in, since we were checking people in. The girl I was working with, a white girl, meant well and didn't mean to seem "offensive" or "racist". She was just doing what she was asked to do. The owner got really upset when she asked him to wait. But for good reason. He was the owner after all. Anyways, after a very awkward exchange, he looked at her and told her that its difficult for "white people" to accept that a black man could own a beautiful art gallery like that.

In all that exchange I kinda figured what the owner was saying and I figured he's probably gone through that a lot because anyone could understand being held up at the front of your own place when you've rented it out to a film crew and no one knows who you are. That to me said, clearly there's no other reason he's overreacting other than that he must face racism a lot even in a "liberal" region, such as the Bay Area.

If there is anything that I can stereotype about the Bay Area in general is that it's not always the liberal-mindedness that people make it out to be, not when it comes to race at least. There certainly is a veiled racial divide amongst groups here in this region.

When it comes to crime, yeah, I'm a bit scared but I don't put a face to it, or a color. As a hispanic myself, I can honestly say that I've faced hispanics as well as whites, blacks and even asians and once a native american, who were a bit frightening and up to no good citizens. I was frightened not because of their color but because they were just frightening people.
And out of the number of frightening people these people were from, one of them was only in Oakland and the rest in San Francisco. So it doesn't make sense if people put a name of a city to crime, or even worse a color.

But in my honest opinion people who ask "is it safe in Oakland?" is more to do with their lack of knowledge more so than it does with them simply stereotyping. But I can understand the nuisance. It's like when people say that Texas is filled with ignorant bigots riding on horses with their guns. grrrrr so annoying.

This is probably one of the best posts I've read on this board in awhile!

[Tallysmom]

Originally Posted by Nineties Flava

No one disputed that Oakland has more crime, they disputed your outlandish claim that 70% of Oakland is a crime hot-bed.

Worse than that -- the fact that I live in one of those crime ridden areas and NOTHING has happened to me, or my neighbors (except theft of our car tags) means NOTHING...

Mr. Incognito Fantastic is once again trying to save us from ourselves.

I really shouldn't read threads like this... it's all so old and rehashed and meaningless....

[Nineties Flava]

Originally Posted by mstnghu2

This is probably one of the best posts I've read on this board in awhile!

Agreed. It's rare to see a lot of honesty about Bay Area race politics on any board, so when you do it's refreshing.

[Nineties Flava]

Originally Posted by Tallysmom

Worse than that -- the fact that I live in one of those crime ridden areas and NOTHING has happened to me, or my neighbors (except theft of our car tags) means NOTHING...

Mr. Incognito Fantastic is once again trying to save us from ourselves.

I really shouldn't read threads like this... it's all so old and rehashed and meaningless....

That sentence sums it up.