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Ok but again I'd bet that the overwhelming majority of your Parkchester neighbors will interpret "civilized" as an insult (meaning people like you normally aren't). It's like "well spoken" but exponentially worse.
Do you have any statistics about educational attainment and political orientation relating to NYC? The highest income areas tend to be some of the most liberal in New York. In the Bronx anyway, the more conservative areas were historically white working class/middle class.
The overwhelming majority of my Parkchester neighbors know and enjoy the fact that Parkchester is better than most of the Bronx, are proud of it, and would be offended by YOUR suggestion of a possible interpretation of "civilized". My neighbors are equally or more as concerned about safety and quality of life as I am, evidenced by the fact that half of our condo fees goes on the security (the 24 hour security crew, cameras etc), and another substantial part on landscaping.
I am sure your statistics will show overall correlation between higher education and liberalism (although even that might be changing), but a subset of highly educated people (from my personal acquaintance with hundreds of them) tend to be predominantly conservative, and I already told you what this subset is.
Hearing the responses I'd think that people just don't care who their neighbors are (but I don't believe that). So all of a sudden I find it really odd that no one ever asks about ideology or political leanings. -- people ask about plenty of other things all the time. If no one cares about having things in common with their neighbors, this wouldn't be such a segregated city, right?
I don't understand why that's hard to believe. I do not engage in political and/or religious discussions with most people. If someone starts up, I change the topic. That being said, I've lived where I live now for five years and I probably have very little in common with my neighbors---I've never had ANYONE ask me about my ideology or leanings and I have no idea what anyone thinks. The few things I might know about my neighbors would be related to building complaints, professions, their pets, etc.
Where I have had people bring up politics and religion would be at work, which I hate. I do not live near anyone I work with, so that doesn't relate to this.
Like I said, I just want to be where you do your thing and I do mine. I also think there are a lot of wealthier people in NYC who might align with a more of a libertarian outlook but don't actually use that word.
I am a South American immigrant, brown and indigenous looking, who has been in NYC almost 3 decades. I immigrated by gaining admission and a stipend from a PhD program in Computer Science. I have been making well into 6 figures for quite a while.
Though I don’t live in Parkchester –I live in Brooklyn Heights- it seems like I would be one of those considered by elnrgby as a civilized minority. In my experience when you *qualify* some group with a positive adjective it does indicate, like yodel said somewhere before, that it insinuates the usual status for that group is something negative. When you talk about ‘civilized minorities’, the insinuation is that minorities are usually uncivilized. That is certainly what it sounds like to me, and throughout this topic, elnrgby’s discourse *has* sounded condescending towards minorities. Just thought it would be useful to have input from one of those ‘civilized minority’ individuals.
Hi elnrgby. Fair enough. I hope it works out for you. I don't know maybe it's the language - civilized. It pricks my ears up. I think you mean it as a complement, but I'm sure it wouldn't be taken that way.
I'm in Bedford Park since 2004, and couldn't help noticing that of all the people I've met over the years of higher than average income and education (compared to the rest of the neighborhood) have seemed to be very liberal. I'm sure there's people who aren't, but overall, that has been my experience. Not that there aren't conservatives in the Bronx, but they tend to concentrate in other neighborhoods. I don't think itit's a conscious decision, but that tends to be what happens.
Very few conservatives would want to live in an urban Bronx neighborhood. NYC as a city is barely conservative in general, the only neighborhoods that are conservative are Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods, Italian-American neighborhoods, and to some extent Russian neighborhoods . I doubt any of these would be appealing to your friend.
I am a South American immigrant, brown and indigenous looking, who has been in NYC almost 3 decades. I immigrated by gaining admission and a stipend from a PhD program in Computer Science. I have been making well into 6 figures for quite a while.
Though I don’t live in Parkchester –I live in Brooklyn Heights- it seems like I would be one of those considered by elnrgby as a civilized minority. In my experience when you *qualify* some group with a positive adjective it does indicate, like yodel said somewhere before, that it insinuates the usual status for that group is something negative. When you talk about ‘civilized minorities’, the insinuation is that minorities are usually uncivilized. That is certainly what it sounds like to me, and throughout this topic, elnrgby’s discourse *has* sounded condescending towards minorities. Just thought it would be useful to have input from one of those ‘civilized minority’ individuals.
Considering that I am a female immigrant from South-Eastern Europe (ie, basically a minority myself), does that mean I have been condescending of myself?
Sure but in that case, it was a lot of talk about what's wrong with poor people or minorities and how to get them civilized and to accept more personal resoonsibility...She sees a lot of her potential neighbors as takers-I'm not sayingthat's correct but it's obviously her view. Even if she keeps her views to herself (which I was doubting that she could) how can she be happy in that environment?
Well yeah, that language is pretty racist. Why move to anywhere in The Bronx (besides the fringe white neighborhoods) with that mentality?
Considering that I am a female immigrant from South-Eastern Europe (ie, basically a minority myself), does that mean I have been condescending of myself?
Nobody looks down on European immigrants, so you can't lump yourself in with actual minorities
And gender doesn't matter either, to most people race comes first.
Considering that I am a female immigrant from South-Eastern Europe (ie, basically a minority myself), does that mean I have been condescending of myself?
Don't pull that I'm Eastern European crap to try to lessen what you've been doing. I doubt you say that when asked. You probably just say I'm white... Putting your Eastern European roots aside, yes your comments come across as condescending.
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I'm a civilized minority
