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I know this is an old thread, but watching movies like LA Confidential or Gangster Squad makes me wonder if people would like to go back to a 1950s LA, or like it is today, or maybe somewhere in between like the 70s and 80s.
I've been to LA, and I like visiting the area, but I wouldn't want to live there. I feel like it's too sprawled out, and surpringsly how segregated it is. I know every city has neighborhoods that are mostly one race, but it felt more segregated as you'll be in a neighborhood that is mostly Asian, then 2 miles down the road it is all Hispanic. I was amazed how there isn't the typical mix areas, but it's cool how you have a so many different culture neighborhoods like Korea town.
Also when I see the old pictures and videos it seems like LA was a perfect size. It was big, but it didn't seem like you needed a car everywhere. That is my biggest complaint is getting around LA. Then back then it seem like you had proper downtown or squares with your neighborhoods where you'll run into people you know. Now, and most American suburbs, it's all spread out with these big plazas and how everyone has to drive everywhere. Even central LA feels like most cities now in which people head down for work, but leave when 5pm rolls around.
Anyway, it's just interesting reading how things have changed so much in the last 50 years.
Aren't most cities segregated? Tell me one that isn't. I lived in several big cities and visited many and LA isn't any different than most.
Also mamy do work downtowm but many live and play dowmtown too. The days of dowmtown being deserted after 5pm are long gone.
One thing to keep in mind about Fastfilm and certain other posters: they not only blame immigrants, especially illegal immigrants, for every single problem L.A. has, but they act like the native born white population during the last several decades was as disenfranchised as South Africa's black population under apartheid...
You couldn't be more clueless and WRONG. It's about legality not race.
Illegal aliens have negatively impacted a large aspect of quality of life issues here from straining social services, infrastructure, overcrowding, crime and guess what???
This affects ALL races of LEGAL immigrants and ALL Americans.
Next time try doing a little research and think before you post.
Not segregated?? You're making a joke, right? In the 50's blacks could not go south of Slauson or west of Vermont. I mean literally. If you did you ran a very high risk of being attacked or threatened by local whites, or jammed up by the police - meaning possibly roughed up, certainly threatened, absolutely interrogated. When my father was looking to buy a home in 1959, the realtor refused to show him any homes for sale south of Slauson, telling him "I'm not going to show you anything in that area. We really don't want people like you over there. It's a nice neighborhood". He fired her a$$ on the spot. He bought a home on Hobart Blvd., near Manchester and Western. We were the third black family on the block and the prejudice and racism toward all of us was running rampant from a lot of the residents and some of the local small business mechants.
I remember my first encounter with blatant racism in the 5-and-10-cent Store. I was 5 years old and the cashier absolutely refused to wait on me for my purchase. After she took several customers ahead of me who got in line after I did, I went to the cashier at the rear of the store and got the same treatment. I remember going to the local liquor store with my father when I was 4 to purchase a newspaper and a pack of cigarettes (for him, of course). The newspaper rack was outside the door. In the course of removing the newspaper he dropped it. The owner of the dry cleaners next door was out on the sidewalk talking to the owner of the liquor store. Knowing we were well within earshot, the dry cleaners owner says to the liquor store owner, "Look at that clumsy ni66er. I don't know why he's buying a paper, he probably can't even read". Mind you, we had been doing business with this cleaners for a couple of years. Immediately after leaving the store, we stopped at the dry cleaners to pick up everything we had in there. My father made it perfectly clear that he would no longer be doing business there and that all of the other black families we knew would be advised of her being a racist.
Within 4 years white flight was in full swing from the immediate and surrounding neighborhoods.
Well into the 60's, Inglewood was very hostile to black people. The police were beyond ridiculous with their agression and prejudice toward black people. I experienced this first hand as well.
I don't know what leads you to believe that "they all got along until the early 60's". I was living in Los Angeles, California. Which Los Angeles were you in?
An older Mex-American friend (about 80 years old) told me that she and her husband were refused when they put in an offer on a home in Woodland Hills in 1957 because they would not allow a Mex-American couple to buy the home. They ended up in Hermosa Beach. I think that they got the better end of the deal since Woodland Hills basically sucks.
I won't give the area but know the facts being the truth as the person involved on the street in a certain area was an employee of mine at the time.
The area was all white and a house went up for sale listed by a Realter.
The house sold and then a black family moved in while there was no sign of a black family viewing the home during the listing.
Anyway short time late a couple of other homes went on the mkt and were subsequently purchased by black familys thru a similiar purchase procedure.
People with the 4 sale signs panicked and dropped their asking price for a quick sale.
Now comes the finale. My employee got together with some of the 4 sale owners on his street and they decided to raise the asking price above mkt value for the homes in the neighborhood.
A prospective buyers realter would say that the asking price was too high whereupon the sellers said that if they wanted the house the asking price would have to be the full price and no offers excepted.
At the end the black families sold out and the street returned to all white.
You couldn't be more clueless and WRONG. It's about legality not race.
Illegal aliens have negatively impacted a large aspect of quality of life issues here from straining social services, infrastructure, overcrowding, crime and guess what???
This affects ALL races of LEGAL immigrants and ALL Americans.
Next time try doing a little research and think before you post.
To imply that the native born white population had absolutely no culpability whatsoever and that these problems were entirely caused by external forces is implying that they were as powerless as South African blacks were pre-1990s.
It's always easier to blame some sort of outside force because it means avoiding any responsibility for one's actions.
Someone encouraged the illegals to come, someone hired them, etc.
Aren't most cities segregated? Tell me one that isn't. I lived in several big cities and visited many and LA isn't any different than most.
Also mamy do work downtowm but many live and play dowmtown too. The days of dowmtown being deserted after 5pm are long gone.
By segerated I mean more then black and white, but every race is in their own bubbles. In Chicago I live in an area with a good mix of White, Indian, Asians, and Hispanics. In LA it felt like a neighborhood was 99% Asian, 99% Mexican, 99% Brazilian, etc. There was no true melting pot neighborhoods.
By segerated I mean more then black and white, but every race is in their own bubbles. In Chicago I live in an area with a good mix of White, Indian, Asians, and Hispanics. In LA it felt like a neighborhood was 99% Asian, 99% Mexican, 99% Brazilian, etc. There was no true melting pot neighborhoods.
I know what you mean, and sometimes the census number don't seem accurate.
Also within zipcodes themselves there could be pretty big changes.
I think the 99% of one ethnicity/race neighborhoods in L.A are more the exception though.
Boyle Heights is like 95% Hispanic...with gentrification i could see this changing pretty significantly.
Areas like Watts and Compton were always viewed as being mostly Black ,but now they are mixed and actually are majority Hispanic.
It's kind of interesting as both Watts and Compton are mostly Black and Hispanic , but both have very few (less than 1%) whites or asians.
Of course these are just examples .
L.A is diverse in the sense that you can find pretty much any culture here, but specific neighborhoods can still be segregated. It's not like it's all one big ole melting pot.
I know what you mean, and sometimes the census number don't seem accurate.
Also within zipcodes themselves there could be pretty big changes.
I think the 99% of one ethnicity/race neighborhoods in L.A are more the exception though.
Boyle Heights is like 95% Hispanic...with gentrification i could see this changing pretty significantly.
Areas like Watts and Compton were always viewed as being mostly Black ,but now they are mixed and actually are majority Hispanic.
It's kind of interesting as both Watts and Compton are mostly Black and Hispanic , but both have very few (less than 1%) whites or asians.
Of course these are just examples .
L.A is diverse in the sense that you can find pretty much any culture here, but specific neighborhoods can still be segregated. It's not like it's all one big ole melting pot.
I agree LA is diverse, just like other massive cities and areas like Chicago and New York. It just always feels more segregated besides white and black like most American cities nowadays. It definitely feels like there are less neighborhoods with whites and Asians living together, but in their own communities. I always felt that the sprawl of southern California caused that which is my biggest complaint about the area.
That and the smug from George Clooney's acceptance speech
By segerated I mean more then black and white, but every race is in their own bubbles. In Chicago I live in an area with a good mix of White, Indian, Asians, and Hispanics. In LA it felt like a neighborhood was 99% Asian, 99% Mexican, 99% Brazilian, etc. There was no true melting pot neighborhoods.
I grew up here, and have always felt LA wasn't nearly as segregated you make it out to be. I want to ask what neighborhood you lived in? I live in Mid City, and it is a mixed neighborhood. I can think of many other neighborhoods in the basin that are mixed (Palms, Mar Vista, Koreatown, DTLA, Miracle Mile, WeHo, Culver City,etc...). Plus, When you live in LA, you deal with different types of people constantly. I don't think most people who live here have a problem with segregation unless you live in the Burbank or Glendale or some place like that.
To imply that the native born white population had absolutely no culpability whatsoever and that these problems were entirely caused by external forces is implying that they were as powerless as South African blacks were pre-1990s.
It's always easier to blame some sort of outside force because it means avoiding any responsibility for one's actions.
Someone encouraged the illegals to come, someone hired them, etc.
Once again S-L-O-W-L-Y, this IS about Los Angeles AND all races , not just your hang up about "Whites".
BTW I'm not exactly "White" so you're going to come up with a plan B for a response. And yes this is a HUGE reason why the quality of life in LA in general has worsened.
Illegals bring with them the very thing they are trying to get away from, as evidenced by where they settle in large numbers. An underground economy, no permits, all cash sales, no taxes paid, fraud to collect social services for their kids, a general disregard for rules, laws and regulations, increased crime, overcrowding, etc, etc..
BTW I was in LA Unified School Dist. from 1st-10th grade and have seen the demographic changes.
It is a travesty to have some schools with the majority of students that have English as a 2nd language due to their parents being a huge part of an Illegal invasion into the USA causing MASSIVE tax dollars to be dealt with also impacting LEGAL immigrants and native born Americans.
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