Hotel Handout, Few Affordable Phase 1 Units at AY

Sterling Silver you never waste time, or words, thank you…
Reality Bites thank you for coming forward and speaking from your mind and heart…
and I do have a better understanding of why the development at AY appears to be a positive force with community benefits for lots of folks… I just fear that none of us better hold our breath for the jobs, affordable housing, and community benefits that have been promised… it seems by the time AY reaches its final reincarnation it will be quite different than anything any of us had in mind, and won’t be of any benefit for any of the hard working folks of Brooklyn.
I hope that I am wrong.

Sterling Silver, you wrote:

“For every ignorant numbnod who thinks getting an education and speaking correct English is “white”, there is a child who wants to learn, who wants to get out of the ghetto mindset.”

You should really spend a little time in the public school system. Your statement isn’t true. What’s more you are determined to ignore the tragedy staring you in the face.

High school graduation rates of blacks and hispanics are much lower than the rates for whites and asians. Worse are the college statistics. And even worse than college statistics for blacks and hispanics are those for graduate school. These are facts. But you want to argue from some goofy emotional base that it stems from some unfairness that was brought about by non-blacks. Really, you need to grow up.

You wrote:

“For every unwed teenager with kids watching tv all day, there is the single mother who has 2 dead end jobs, one just to pay for babysitting while she goes to night school to learn a skill. You may only see that she is an unwed ghetto mother, and pass her by.”

You seem to have overlooked the fact that your hypothetical teen mother is receiving state assistance already. And you show no objective sense about the situation. The illegitimacy rate among blacks is stunningly high. This one factor accounts for more lousy outcomes in black America than probably any other. It all starts here. Not that you seem to care about changing things for the better.

You wrote:

“City Boy only sees the numbers, Since there are so few blacks at Stuyvesant HS, then blacks don’t care about education?”

Why then, are there so few blacks at Stuyvesant, when blacks account for a huge percentage of the public school population? Your refusal to acknowledge the factual explanation for this shows that your head is in the sand.

You wrote:

“You can only draw that conclusion if you somehow believe that everyone is starting from the same, equal beginning, and we know that our schools are neither equal or the same.”

Like I said, 50% of the students at Stuyvesant are asian. Some did not speak English when they arrived in the US. Some of the asian parents of Stuyvesant students do not speak English. The same statements can be made for the Russian students at our top city schools. Yet the kids are there. How did they do it?

Nevertheless, your response suggests that a conspiracy against blacks has kept them from achieving and attending the city’s best schools. You claim blacks must cross more hurdles than whites to reach the academic promised land. What you don’t understand is the subtext of your own claims. You don’t understand that you are stating the reason for black educational underachievement is black inferiority.

However, this is bizarre. If growing up in deprived circumstances is such a defeating experience, why are the vast majority of hugely talented, massively paid, black athletes from the same neighborhoods as the underachieving students? Why are the NBA and the NFL populated mostly by blacks up from youths spent in poverty? Does this success originate in some force outside the black community?

You wrote:

“That is the problem with his entire argument on all points, whether here, Africa, or anywhere else. History has made the starting points all very, very, unequal.”

Now you are showing even more contempt for blacks. You are attempting AGAIN to explain black underachievement by claiming that since the dawn of man, blacks have had higher mountains to climb — and were never able to catch up. You are the spokesperson for black inferiority.

By the way, you said:

“History has made the starting points all very, very, unequal.”

You have made “History” into a noun with physical power. Despite your claim, “History” didn’t make anything. History is just the record of the past. Nevertheless, you make History sound as though it is a relay race in which blacks were positioned far at the back of the pack and prohibited by the rules from catching up. Your devotion to the idea of black inferiority is shocking.

You wrote:

“He can pull out an item here, a failing there, but seems to know no history to tell him the back story, or help him understand why we are where we are.”

Look, black history is brief. Sorry to tell you, but black contributions to the advancement of the world are close to zero.

You wrote:

“It is not excusing wrongs or injustices to know how they came about.”

That may be true. But analyzing the past is only a step toward solving problems and changing a self-defeating culture.

You wrote:

“I come from educators. I know the power of knowledge and education in making people better in every way.”

Your statements reveal only that blacks have troubles they can’t overcome. You should reconsider your views.

This is about AY and the promotion of economic growth and development east of Flatbush Avenue. It’s also about the further gentrification of those communities east of Flatbush in an effort to produce greater diversity, better schools, lower crime rates and the offering of better goods and services.

I for one, and there are many out there like me, support AY and massive gentrification east of Flatbush Avenue because I’m sick and tired of spending countless hours doing community service in the black community only to see nothing improve. As a result, I’ve capitulated; if blacks can’t fix or refuse to fix their own problems then I rather have hundreds of thousands of whites move into the nabe to assist those of us who are already committed to improving our neighborhoods, making sure it lives up to its potential and is indeed a good place to raise a family.

Monday’s thread on Park Slope was great because as much as we hate to say it Park Slope is the model that most communities strive to emulate, e.g., family oriented, good schools, well kept quiet blocks, beautiful homes and great economic activity. As a black person I want the same for my community too and I’m not moving to Park Slope when I can have the same damn thing in my own hood. I love living in a culturally rich black community. I love living among the black middle class because we share the same values; we’re respectful to each other, we keep our neighborhood clean, we don’t commit crimes against each other, we value family; we value education and we all work hard at improving our communities. However, most of us can’t stand living among the black underclass because they are the exact opposite of us and seek to make (and the work extremely hard at this) our community a reflection of them rather than us. If our children don’t dress, act and talk like them then they are not “black enough”. If our children are not cursing in the streets, drinking 40 ounces on the street corner, fighting or shooting at one another, then they are not “black enough”. If our children excel academically and talk in proper English then they are not “black enough”.

WTF happened to us?!?! How could we allow the despicable and morally bankrupt black underclass hijack black culture and turn it on its head? How could we allow the black underclass to define us to ourselves and to the rest of the world and then we wonder why we are subject to racial profiling and discrimination? Are we that blind to the destruction of our people and community or simply indifferent? Are we not our brother’s keeper?

Well I had enough of the bullshit. I’m tired of fighting the good fight and seeing no results! And no I’m not moving out of my neighborhood because I love my house, I raised my family here and I love my “middle class” neighbors! So I’m not going anywhere. All I can do now is support projects like AY and virtually all other high end, high density development east of Flatbush because that appears the quickest way to bring about greater diversity and improvement in our nabes.

Trying to change the black underclass without widespread support in the black community is an exercise in futility. The black middle class cares but we’re outnumbered by the underclass. As the result, many of us have fled the neighborhoods east of Flatbush to the “other side” or the city entirely for the suburbs. This is sad. Rather than leave I think we should stay, like we’ve done in Fort Greene and Clinton Hill and simply allow gentrification to slowly put surely push our all of the undesirables out of our community. In the end, we’ll have a diverse community that shows the world how whites and “REAL” blacks can live together peacefully in a thriving environment; a model for everyone else. Poor blacks don’t want gentrification but middle class blacks and above welcome it with open arms! AY can’t be built fast enough….

Reality Bites, I knew you were black from something you said in one of your earlier posts, so your coming out, as it were, didn’t make any nevermind to me. For what it’s worth, I actually agree with much of what you said, but I disagree with some of your conclusions. Oh, and Uncle Tom, like the N word, is not in my vocabulary.

There is a black underclass. One would have to be stupid to deny it. The culture of that underclass, unfortunately, has been projected on the entire black population, and that population has not done enough to reject those parts which are injurious to all of us. I agree with Bill Cosby on most of what he said, as I agree with you that the gangsta, ghetto fabulous life is not, first of all, indicative of the way most of us live, and more importantly, is a materialistic, dead end lifestyle to those who live it. I don’t like the glorification of violence, the absolutely stupid don’t snitch lifestyle, or the glorification of inanely inappropriate consumer goods over education, saving, or entrepreneurial spirit. I despair for stable family lives, and am terrified by the I don’t give a f@%k distain for life. I don’t like most rap music, and find the thug gangsta rappers to be bad role models, and misogynist pigs.

BUT – unlike what you have written, I can’t write the entire mass of people off that easily. I have to make the distinction between those who are too far gone, from those who just need a helping hand and an opportunity to be better than the world thinks they are. Because there, but for the grace of God, go I. I was adopted as an infant here in NYC. My parents were educated, proud and good people who taught their children the value of education, a love of learning, gave us a stable nuclear family life, a religious upbringing, and loved and cherished us, encouraging us to be the best we could be. We were brought up learning that black people had to be twice as good in order to be just as good, and as a child growing up during the Civil Rights Movement, we could see everyday that there were those who did not respect our personhood, and who would only judge us by the color of our skin. I could have just as easily been adopted by someone else, and my life would have been completely different.

That is why your tone, and some of what you said, especially in earlier posts, disturbs me. For every ignorant numbnod who thinks getting an education and speaking correct English is “white”, there is a child who wants to learn, who wants to get out of the ghetto mindset. From what you have written, you would not seek them out. For every unwed teenager with kids watching tv all day, there is the single mother who has 2 dead end jobs, one just to pay for babysitting while she goes to night school to learn a skill. You may only see that she is an unwed ghetto mother, and pass her by.

City Boy only sees the numbers, Since there are so few blacks at Stuyvesant HS, then blacks don’t care about education? You can only draw that conclusion if you somehow believe that everyone is starting from the same, equal beginning, and we know that our schools are neither equal or the same. That is the problem with his entire argument on all points, whether here, Africa, or anywhere else. History has made the starting points all very, very, unequal. He can pull out an item here, a failing there, but seems to know no history to tell him the back story, or help him understand why we are where we are. It is not excusing wrongs or injustices to know how they came about. I come from educators. I know the power of knowledge and education in making people better in every way.

I agree, Reality Bites,that black people need to wake up and take more responsibility for our culture, and our place in the world, and our own futures. You can’t blame the Man any more, we are who we make ourselves to be. Some of us got the good breaks, and we are successful, educated, and accomplished. Some of us never got a damn thing, and are born to a world that doesn’t value us or expect much from us, except failure. I was raised to believe that it is my responsibility, to the best of my ability, to do something to change that. That’s why I can’t write off the underclass, no matter much you may feel they are keeping the race down. You don’t have to like them, or their culture, but they are still part of Us.

This long winded speech is it for me. It will do no good to go point to point, especially with City Boy, as much as I would like to. No one is going to change their minds here. I only hope some kind of understanding can come of all of these exchanges, or we’ve all wasted an awful lot of time.