From: jhalat@csfb1.fir.fbc.com (James Halat)
Subject: Re: Moral Activity (was Re: Asylum)
Reply-To: uunet!csfb1!jhalat
Organization: First Boston Corporation
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 23:10:02 GMT

|> >In article <1992Dec15.231223.4531@erenj.com>, bdboyle@erenj.com (Bryan D. Boyle) writes:
|> I am glad you are intrigued.  Any real time in the city, huh?  Yeah.  
|> Moved there during Abe Beame's tenure in the 1970's, lived on Webster
|> Avenue in the Bronx (at the corner of Fordham Road, where I was
|> attending college.).  Watched the "fire line" move upward from the 175th
|> street area in the 70's to the Fordham road area in the 78-79 timeframe
|> (btw, that is the NYCFD designation, not mine) and thence up to the
|> Bedford Park Blvd. (200th st) by 1985.  I watched increasing numbers
|> of buildings catch on fire and burn to the ground, as well as watching 
|> more of my friends get mugged, first at 11PM while strolling back after
|> knocking back a couple to the first time it happened to me in 1979 at 
|> 3pm on a saturday afternoon.
|> 
|> I watched DeWitt Clinton HS (Mosholu Pkwy & Jerome Ave) have to put 
|> bars on the windows in 1981, not to keep people from throwing things in,
|> 
|> but to prevent the students from ripping the lavatory fixtures out of
|> the
|> walls and throwing them out the windows at passers-by.
|> 
|> When I moved to NY in 1973, the subway cost 35 cents.  It ran regularly,
|> there was trash, but it was picked up.  When I moved in 1985, the fare
|> was $1.00, trash was never picked up, and I had witnessed 3 stabbings, 
|> innumerable junkies mainlining, and countless accidents, such as Renee
|> Katz, who was shoved off a platform because, as the scum that did it
|> said: "I wanted to see what would happen when she got runned over..."
|> 
|> YOu want more?  I have memories that would shock even the most jaded 
|> wall-street yuppie whose only view of the city is the street, the South
|> Street Seaport, and Broadway.  Being a cameraman on a remote truck
|> for a net gave me a kind of birds-eye view on how screwed up NY city,
|> its people, and its lifestyle is.  Haven't been back there since I
|> escaped, but from all the noise I hear, I pray for something to 
|> rescue the good people left there.
|> 
|> 

I'm surprised you think there are any good people left in New York City.
What I was asking, though, is not about whether these crimes happen ( of 
course they do ) but more about what areas had _enough_ people who would not be
bothered should murder, rape, etc., be decriminalized?  

Also, I find it interesting that you note such a harsh downward trend in the
city from 1973 to 1985, yet don't consider how the city might have improved 
since 1985.  What you hear since you left _is_ noise.  While certainly not
the easiest place to live, it's been by far the best place for me.

How do you defend lumping 8 million New Yorkers into a single lifestyle?  That's
absurd.  Just as absurd as your parting paragraph.  This "wall street yuppie" has
lived on Avenue B and remain in the East Village off 1st Avenue.  I have never been
to the South Street Seaport on purpose and I don't go to Broadway.  I have been
mugged.  I've been the victim of police misconduct. I've walked in a neighborhood 
patrol, I give money to the alternative schools that try to make a difference.
The city is not nearly as screwed up as your view of it.  I hope you found
comfort and happiness where you landed, as so many of us have in this great city
of myriad lifestyles.

Happy holidays

-- 
James Halat                    e-mail:  uunet!csfb1!jhalat          
The First Boston Corporation   -- I speak only for myself --
New York City                     


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