Echoes of 1991 in Crown Heights?
The Times and Sun have articles this morning about the escalating tensions between Crown Heights’ black and Hasidic communities. The stories talk about how the NYPD has stepped up its presence on the area’s streets and politicians have been holding press conferences to decry the violence, all to try to prevent the neighborhood from once…
The Times and Sun have articles this morning about the escalating tensions between Crown Heights’ black and Hasidic communities. The stories talk about how the NYPD has stepped up its presence on the area’s streets and politicians have been holding press conferences to decry the violence, all to try to prevent the neighborhood from once again becoming the war zone that produced the 1991 riots. The latest problems in Crown Heights began in April, when a black 20-year-old was attacked by Hasidic men in what the police have deemed a bias crime. Since then, black children have pelted a bus carrying Hasidic toddlers with stones and last week black youths beat and robbed a Jewish teen. The police believe the first attack against the black 20-year-old was done by someone with ties to a Jewish civilian patrol group called the Shmira. Bias crimes in the neighborhood are up this year; there have been nine so far, compared to seven at this time in 2007. Some Crown Heights residents say the city and politicians are overreacting to the spate of violence, according to the Sun, since “most of the culprits — both black and Jewish — are too young to remember the riots, and some community leaders say they are concerned that it’s actually the grown-ups who are stoking a conflict between the groups.”
Neighborhood Simmers With Tension Again [NY Times]
Threat of Another Riot in Crown Heights [NY Sun]
Photo by Frank Lynch.
I’m from the area and Blacks and Jews do co-exist in relative peace. Over the past 40 years there hasn’t been a ongoing WAR. That’s why events like the ’91 uprising and the current headlines standout. There’s always been a slight tension. The Black people feel that the Jews receive special privileges from the police and government agencies. I’m not sure what the Jews think, but I’m sure some of it aint good.
Here’s a great article about the Shmira’s role in the community: http://newvoices.org/features/rolling-with-the-shmira.html
“…but a 75-year-old Jewish voter looks at Obama and sees a black man whom they automatically assume is a secret Farrakhan.”
9:43, sadly, I’m pretty sure there are many non-Jews who think the same thing – I don’t know how one could imply Jews have a greater distrust or dislike of African Americans than others. There are lots of Jews who support Obama.
9:43- and yet there are literally thousands of Jewish people supporting Obama, and Jewish groups that have gone to bat for him. I don’t see you mentioning those.
I don’t deny it exists- but the issue is the wholesale labelling of groups, not individuals. there are Blacks who hate whites- but the whole issue is presented lopsidedly and frankly polemecist is not trying to enlighten anyone. He is venting. He also makes no mention of the Black and Jewish groups and individuals who have been working since 1991 to make things better, and despite incidents, they are better. Not perfect, but better. Yes, tensions exist- and so does a lot of cooperation and communication. that’s what polemicist and plenty of other posters like him won’t tell you. they have too much fun being web nazis.
bxgrl
[looks at watch]
Hey, shouldn’t Montrose Morris have come by to tell us that everything’s fine in Crown Heights by now?
bxgrl–
Whatever you think of Polemicist’s in general, I don’t see you saying anything to dispute the tensions between black and Jewish Americans historically. Take a look at the front page of the NY Times today, which reports on elderly Jewish voters in Florida and their knee-jerk distrust of Obama. You can write it off as coincidence, but it comes from a history of conflicts, particularly in cities like NYC where one group has moved into a neighborhood inhabited by the other. People can sugarcoat it however they want, but a 75-year-old Jewish voter looks at Obama and sees a black man whom they automatically assume is a secret Farrakhan. There is no point pretending these kind of attitudes don’t exist, awful as they are.
Yeah, 9:19, and crime doesn’t go up on really hot Saturday’s in August either. Maybe 9:16 identified a false corallary, but the comment is hardly “too stupid.” Frankly, the much of the discourse on the blogosphere is just displaced aggression. If we couldn’t insult each other anonymously from the comfort of our homes/offices, we’d all have to throw stones at buses too.
Ah, armchairwarrior- another poster who probably has sheets with eye holes folded in his dresser and a lovely picture of himself in a WW II army uniform. German army that is.
It sure doesn’t take much to let the vermin crawl all over the blog. Good work gabbie- yet another racist, antisemitic day on brownstoner about to start.