Murders, Binge Drinking Up in Park Slope Last Year
While overall crime was down in Brooklyn South last year, murders were up more than 35 percent to 92 from 68 a year earlier. Such was the case in Park Slope where the number of homicides rose from one in 2007 to three in 2008. Meanwhile, says The Post, binge drinking was higher than other…
While overall crime was down in Brooklyn South last year, murders were up more than 35 percent to 92 from 68 a year earlier. Such was the case in Park Slope where the number of homicides rose from one in 2007 to three in 2008. Meanwhile, says The Post, binge drinking was higher than other neighborhoods around the city: 20 percent of Slopers ranked binge drinking as their favorite activity. “It’s the real people, and you feel like you are on ‘Cheers,'” said Samantha Stewart. “I can just go to the bar and see 10 people that I know.” The preference ties in with another borough-wide stat for 2008: Drunk driving violations were up 1.6 percent in Brooklyn last year, reports The Daily News, while they were down 3.4 percent around the city as a whole.
Murder Rate Skyrockets in 2008 [NY Post]
Home Is Where the Health Is [NY Post]
Increase in Brooklyn Drunk Driving [NYDN]
NOP;
I appreciate your thoughts.
I didn’t realize that Brownstoner’s search function doesn’t work on the dialogue in the threads. So, just to show you that I wasn’t BS’ing, here are two links I quickly found by doing a brief neighborhood search under Dyker Heights and Brighton Beach:
http://bstoner.wpengine.com/brownstoner/archives/2008/06/how_the_other_h.php#comments
http://bstoner.wpengine.com/brownstoner/archives/2008/07/dyker_heights_m.php#comments
You read through these comments, and then tell me if there isn’t a hint of class and ethnic superiority in them.
Normally, I let these go, as I am pretty thin-skinned and I realize that most folks are just having a few laughs. As you can see, however, some of these folks ARE serious in their comments. Where was Denton and the other self-appointed moralists when these comments were being made?
Let me cool off, and maybe I’ll be back.
Well, Benson, I searched for “guido” on Brownstoner’s search engine, and “mafia” and “Russian+Mafia” and “Russian Mafia,” too.
For guido I came on an article about neighborhood house tours, scrolled through the thread, and didn’t come on the word.
For “mafia” I hit several pieces referring to Park Slope’s stroller mafia (amusing!). Blanks for Russian+Mafia and Russian Mafia.
(As a former Brooklynite, I’m fascinated by the Mafia. For one reason: my Park-Slope grandmother, who was considered quite a beauty in her time, was pursued by a gangster during the 20’s! What a scandal that was!)
By bringing up Dinkins’ crime effort earlier in this thread I didn’t intend to open a conversation that would so alienate you.
I recall during a Thanksgiving exchange about Fulton Street you remembered catching a cat fish in Prospect Park as part of the “A ‘n S” kids’ rod and reel competition.
I was pretty jealous. (Still am, as a matter of fact.)
Good luck.
NOP
Denton and all;
I’m not going to let your statement be the end of this issue, as it is so highly disingenuous that it deserves comment.
I am not sure what it means to be on the “left” or “right” in this day and age when it comes to race. I take it that you believe that you are enlightened on these matters. Well, let me be the first to inform you that you are full of it.
I make a comment about the fact that Dinkins was negligent about an official mayoral duty (visiting the family of a murdered tourist), and you and your cohorts are ready to play the race card on me. I made no reference to race, but you can look into my heart and know my criticsm is really anger at seeing a black man playing tennis.
At the same time you would have me believe this, I would suggest to all the readers that they take a look at some of your discussions in this forum with The What (some of which I’ve been involved in). Here is a person who spews out the most vulgar, racist, misogynist, homophobic tirades on any ocassion possible, yet you talk to the guy like he’s just some poor mis-understood soul who’s really a good guy at heart.
Moreover, not a week goes by in this forum without some article and accompanying thread to the effect of “How can those stupid guineas and new-mafia Russians get so much money for those tacky homes in Mill Basin and Dyker Heights”? Funny, but I don’t see you and the other enlightened ones speak up on those occassions. Don’t believe me? Do a search with the word “guido” on Brownstoner.
I’ll let you talk amongst yourselves. You are the enlightened ones – you don’t need some racist like me around. Who needs a different voice around when you are the enlightened ones?
B,
This was my fault. I hope you come back. I enjoy the sparks that different opinions bring to the fold here, and while I disagree with you most of the time (big shock there! I’m an avowed lefty), it is a good thing, because you always get me thinking.
I also understand how it is that you read the remark to mean you. I don’t think it was intended as such, but I see how you perceived it as meaning you. And while I do not see you as remotely racist, I also do not see how race, and the importance of race, can be removed from a discussion about Dinkins and the mayor he tried to be, the changes he so badly wanted to see made, and the ways in which he hoped they could be. It wasn’t time yet.
Anyway. I appreciate you and hope you’ll come back.
benson, no need to get so hot under the collar. I have agreed with you on many discussions we have had in the past. I wasn’t accusing you of being a racist; in fact there’s nothing I find funnier than a bunch of white guys debating who’s the biggest racist.
What Goldie said, it was a racial comment, but it wasn’t accusatory to you in particular.
You may have forgotten but this accusation of Dinkins playing tennis (or watching tennis) while he should (allegedly) have been at the funeral was taken by the African American community to be racist at the time. I happen to agree with that. In the same way that Rev. Sharpton still hears about Tawana Brawley, and Jesse Jackson still hears about Hymietown, we still hear about Dinkins and the funeral, as if we’re taking attendance of how many funerals he went to and which funerals.
The statistics you have used are fine and dandy and correct; nevertheless, imo, and that of others, the crime wave began to abate under Dinkins and part of that was due to his community police policies as well as his hiring of more cops; a law-and-order attitude if there ever was one. Some of the decrease in crime can also be traced to social factors. We can agree to disagree on that one.
You complain about statistics but much of your post is a collection of anecdotes.
Dinkins had to navigate between several constituencies and after Koch and Howard Beach he was elected as a healer. Because of this, he probably pleased no one. I suspect Obama will find himself trapped in the same web of expectations.
When it comes to race, I freely admit I’m far to the left of many posters on this site. I grew up in the ghetto and saw too much, and continue to see too much, to be otherwise. So write me off as a off the charts leftist.
Yeah, Biff…can we do it on your stoop??
So, if 10 people are drinking on a stoop, do they each get a fine or just one fine for the homeowner?
Attention, excuse me please, could everyone please gather their soapboxes and reconvene 4 threads up in the open thread. Single file, no shoving.
Thank you!
I think all future racially charged debates should take place in person, after a long night of binge drinking. That would make things interesting!
by the way dirty hipster..welcome aboard.
You wouldn’t happen to be ‘PittbullNYC’ aka *Rob*, our very own real life dirty hipster?