Gentrification and the White Left
By Umar ben-Ivan Lee
Yesterday before work I read a copy of Metro which is a new yuppie oriented publication aimed at the Sex in the City/I waste my daddy’s money in Manhattan crowd.
It is one of those publications you only read when you are bored on the subway or like me bored waiting for the workday to begin. As I flipped the pages I realized this was a publication not meant for me or the majority of New Yorkers. This is a publication like many others of its kind that is meant for the young and wanna-be young so-called hipsters who populate the city’s endless coffee shops, trendy eateries, m clubs and other odd and/or overpriced places.
What struck my eye was en editorial written in an opinion section that defended gentrification. The article was written by a young man who lived in Crown Heights and stated gentrification was a natural and good thing and that it was too bad some people would be displaced. One thing I did appreciate was the fact the writer was honest and that he told his fellow yuppies and trust-fund babies they should not think they are not part of gentrification — rather they should accept it and that is a very important point.
If you are moving into a predominantly minority area that has been made “safe” by a few earlier white faces and your parents or family money is helping pay your rent you are a gentrifier.
If you are seeking to change the culture of that area like we are seeing in Red Hook, Crown Heights and Bushwick you are a gentrifier and cultural imperialist.
It does not matter if you are a liberal or a leftist; a gentrifier is a gentrifier. Let the white left take responsibility because gentrification has belonged almost exclusively to them.
Gentrifies are a section of the white left that fancy themselves as liberal or even further to the left except when it comes to their own lives and their neighbors and in that case ethnic cleansing is their policy. For them progressive values are limited to gay rights, abortion, white feminism, sexual fetishes, tofu and the need for cities to be reclaimed by whites. They have no place for the needs of the poor, homeless victims of the prison industrial complex, racial justice and other needs in Americas cities.
They will march for the poor of Iraq, and I will march with them, but will call the police in ten seconds if they see two black men talking in front of their home. They will be activists until they are called upon for personal sacrifice and they have a lifestyle short on sacrifice. To them living in a building with interesting architecture is more valuable than affordable housing for the masses.
New York and Americas other great cities have always been home to the poor, working class immigrants and families, but not in the cultural liberal gentrifier’s world. They see a future city that is not child friendly, where they are not burdened to pay for schools for black and Latino children.
They see a city populated by the young, wealthy singles, gay couples and married couples with either no children or one child that the couple probably had in their forties or imported from China because they were too damn lazy to have one the natural way.
An anthropologist once said that the future of Americas cities will look like the apartheid-era South Africa were the wealthy whites, and wanna-be whites as Walter Fauntrouy would say, live in the city and the workers and minorities live in townships outside of the city and come in to serve the wealthy and get the hell out before dark. After all they need someone to serve the latte and tofu, to sell the bottled water, to sweep the floors at the independent book stores, to clean the cum of the floor at art house move theaters and to take care of the elderly and children of the left-elite while they are out catching the latest installment of The Vagina Monologues.
Umar ben-Ivan Lee is a Muslim activist and freelance writer and may be reached at ummahboxing@hotmail.com
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Goddamn!!!!!!! Took the words right out of my mouth. As someone from Austin, TX, this shit is right on point. Having moved away, because of the lack of econ opps for peeps of color, and every of econ type for the white, liberal,green conscious Austin left/conservative, going back to a diner to get some breakfeast, I felt like I was in Selma 1960. Previous sides of towns that where Africans lived, were “cleaned up”. What was ubiquitous was the indie art, groovy green areas, and clearly a lack of melanin. It’s like the article said, when they see black faces, them fools turn that artsy fartst shit off, and then the white sheets come out like Wolverine’s claws!!!!!!
I’m responding to this post as a white leftist who moved into a predominantly black neighborhood in Atlanta, GA not long ago. I accept that I am part of the gentrification process, like I am perhaps part of the imperialism of the US. I admit to being raised in racism, colonialism, etc as basically normal. I agree that we live under a culturally imperialist system of white American supremacy. I want this to change because it makes me sick that people would be oppressed, disenfranchised, and discriminated against like that. I wouldn’t want that for me.
However, I take offense that you would group all white leftists together in terms of their thoughts, feelings, actions, circumstances, background, etc. I feel like you made an awful lot of nasty assumptions about me by stereotyping folks like that. I feel like you blamed me for something I don’t feel I have much direct control over, like gentrification, white supremacy, etc.
For instance, I am incredibly concerned with homelessness, the prison industrial complex, and racism. I care that people are being displaced and kicked out and I support groups that help families reoccupy their homes. Why would you think all white leftists would literally prefer the continual class/race divide and not want the best schools for the whole community, etc?
I like tofu but I work for myself and have no contact with my parents. I’ve supported myself for the last year. I support a Participatory Economy where everyone shares the sh*t work and there is no total revolution without an overthrow of racism. And I wouldn’t call it lazy to choose not to have kids, like I have, but not wanting that kind of pain. Are you a man or a woman?
I don’t think it’s fair to put people in a box. I try not to do that to people because I don’t think a better world will have that kind of thing toward anyone. It’s not fair and it makes me into the enemy. I don’t think it’s fair that I have unearned privilege, but I also don’t think it’s fair to get mad at me just because I was born into this system. It’s easier to point to someone who is more likely to listen than some abstract system or mindset that WE ARE ALL RAISED UNDER.
What would you have me do to sacrifice for change? How should I change my lifestyle to reject white privilege? Is everything good that happens to me because I’m white? Because besides standing against racism when I see it, there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot I can do. Am I an imperialist because I pay taxes when I buy things and live in America?
I can understand you being pissed. I would be too but I don’t know how to have practical solidarity besides organizing regular discussions about race or something so people don’t stay so segregated and calling something out as racism when I recognize it as such.
I don’t appreciate you saying I don’t care though because that hurts when I do care. I’m sure I’ve got some blind spots and I’m sure there’s always more I could do. But don’t run me off as an ally because I’m not the enemy – the system is. So let’s change that instead of being nasty to each other cuz that just causes bitterness and hurts our common culture of humanity.
I think our strategies for a better world should ever dehumanize others, especially as groups. That’s why racism sucks isn’t it? Let’s make sure not to recreate the same oppressions we fight against.
I agree with a lot of this but think it’s a serious omission when gentrification is condemned as something that “gentrifiers”, and, in this case, white people, do. Gentrification doesn’t happen just because people want to move into a neighborhood. Its always dependent on the local rel estate developers that drive a frenzy of speculation in the housing market, landlords that kick people out to achieve higher rents or sell housing, politicians that offer tax breaks to developers locating housing projects in low-income areas, city “boosters” that talk up a part of town as the next great spot to buy in. People who move in looking for cheap rent are not the enemy, and racebaiting them is a narrow way of looking at the problem that gives you a narrow range of solutions, most of them not too radical.
The separate argument that (often) white lefties are drawn to “causes” that disregard the crap going on right in front of their eyes is valid, but casting ll of those people as wanting to whiten up cities is just ignorant ranting. People don’t move into places unless there are housing options there. A few rentals here and there does not constitute gentrification, but new development projects, more cops, unaffordable restaurants and other services, these all take a lot more money than the average white lefty can put up. The issue is using neighborhoods that people create s a profit scheme, and the color is, foremost, green. How come older black radicals understood this but the current crop reduces it all to race again?
@ misty – I am also a white leftist so I understand your emotional response to this post, but I think as white leftists who want to be anti-racist allies is to make sure that we listen to and prioritize the experiences and stories of people of color who are victims of racism.
@ lenny – Similarly, I don’t think it’s ignorant to raise the idea that white leftist are whitening up cities whether that is their intention or not.
So I definitely appreciate the post. My concern is how to balance the desire not to be a gentrifier (which I already am) or a cultural imperialist with a that other white-lefty desire to live in a diverse neighborhood where my children will grow up in a community where whiteness is not ubiquitous and the only norm. Moving into a “diverse” neightborhood, at least in Chicago where I live, for the most part means fruthering the gentrification process.
So I don’t know how to resolve that dilemma (I realize that it is a dilemma of white-privilege), but thanks for the post.
Oh really you’re a gentrifier are you? You sound more like a liberal with an extreme case of white guilt that inhibits your ability to understand gentrification as a process where capitalism turns cities into commodities, displaces whole communities of people for the profit motive. You’re just a beacon for investors not a force of gentrification itself. I’m not saying that the most commonly displaced people aren’t darker skinned people, that’s the staple of American history. Sure there are people who want to remake city neighborhoods for a white (read higher income) population, but gentrification is real estate. Real estate market has a long history of discriminatory practices based on color, but to think of gentrification as only about black and white is extremely naive at best, and intentionally to push a race-centered agenda at the expense of class politics. And that leads to dead ends like black capitalism as liberation.
Try to imagine patriarchy with no men inside it.
Gentrification is a system of course. The author’s critique of the behavior of individuals inside gentrification has some validity. We shouldn’t get derailed by the defensiveness of the guilty and their threats to abandon us if we don’t kiss white ass.
The reactionary tendencies of radical posturing: Somebody’s ass must get kissed. It feels good to take such an uncompromising, maximum position, until you realize that it doesn’t dovetail with the more liberatory examples of rebellion, instead it fits in more with the dictatorial fakes. Sometimes people are too pissed to think clearly. And the majority of white liberal hipsters, like the majority of every color in the US, aren’t even politically engaged enough to be considered “on the left”.
@lenny – You came in with your own sarcasm. Two posts later you wanna call out posers. Okay. If you are interested in discussing the issues presented by the author, please do so.
@lenny – And to be clear, that first post where you refute claims about the author seeing it as all about race-the author doesn’t say that so I don’t see that as a response to the issues raised but more of a deflection.
The hypocrisy the author highlights is real, very widespread and a serious obstacle. You dismiss all of it as backwards racial monism.
I don’t know why this article has generated the small amount of controversy that it has, the main argument boils down to scolding some spoiled, oblivious white liberals. My argument: Big deal. These people are not the engine of gentrification, just part of its ugly face. Solutions to gentrification are not to be found in demonizing these people, who are, as I said, not the left. The author probably walked past some new vile little artsy cafe that morning and went home to rant. And I agree with his assessment to a degree, I live nearby the same idiots, I have gone on anti-yuppie crusades in the past. (Although the author really goes a bit loony with his ideas on adoption).
All I’m saying is that gentrification IS the urban real estate market these days. The old mayor of Oakland said “You can either have gentrification or slumification”. And he fast tracked all sorts of developments and increased cops and used other strategies to make the former happen. Those are the gentrifiers, the people who can push capital around town as they see fit. You have to challenge the problem from this angle other than trying to inflate white guilt to the point where the “gentrifiers” feel bad and go away.
I’m a white leftist that moved into a primarily Latino neighborhood in NYC after I graduated from college. I moved in with my own pitiful wages, and get jerked around by the landlord. I don’t doubt that I am paying more than the tenant before me, but it’s no where close to the middle-class white neighborhoods. If the area gentrifies further, I will probably be priced out too.
Where would you have liked me to move when I graduated? If I moved into white neighborhoods, would that weaken gentrification or the rule of the real estate moguls in the city? I’m not from NYC and I don’t know anyone in these white neighborhoods. Culturally I don’t think I connect with a lot of the white — and frankly racist — enclaves.
I do, on the other hand, have friends who live a few blocks away from where I am now. I’m cool with all my neighbors. I’ve joined marches for affordable housing on my block.
I don’t want to change the culture of the neighborhood I am in. And I don’t like tofu.
Looking forward to hearing what you would have me do with myself.
You can stay where you are Ty, as long as you have the decency to feel guilty about it.
why are there so many white people here?
cant even let us have a website to ourselves, gotta gentrify it…
(^joke)
IDK how I feel about this.
I am arab and I’ve had my fair share of discrimination but I still /feel/ white. However, despite how I feel, I will never be fully accepted by whites and I’ll never be fully accepted by blacks, or latinos.
I feel out of place in a white neighborhood, an arab neighbrhood (because I am westernized) a latino neighborhood and a black neighborhood.
As someone who recently moved into a black neighborhood in Pittsburgh and is mixed race with light face and rural origins, I approached the local community association to see how I could get involved. I helped with the community garden and built solid relationships that have resulted in mutual respect and aid. I’ve shared food, cigarette conversations, beer, and other times with folks on porches.
I’ve shared my story with folks, listened to theirs, and talk at the bus stop, often giving people advice on unemployment comp claims (my job).
When the cops swarmed in after two shootings earlier this year, I stopped everyone I saw and gave them the number to the citizens police review board just in case they witnessed abuse. That resulted in really awesome conversations and friendships.
I came out to picket a grocery store after a union member told me she was in contract negotiations there and asked me to join.
Ultimately, moving into a neighborhood, joining someone’s organizing, or doing solidarity work in general, people of class, racial, gender, sexuality privilege need to be allies. Make clear you’re available to support neighbors who need help, get involved in community orgs, and don’t act like you’re an invader.
Moving into a community as an activist/leftist should make it grow and flourish, not diminish it. That might be a way to measure whether you’re gentrifying or supporting a neighborhood.
Just a thought.
Also, smile, make eye contact, and initiate friendly conversation. Wish a “good day” to people, offer cigarettes on the corner if you’re smoking one, tell someone when you’re cooking, what you’re cooking and that they’re welcome to stop by and share it. If you see a single mom, offer her child care, tutoring, or food. Tell people about the organizing you’re doing and how it might relate to them. Tell them about meetings, events, speakers, music, and shows that might be happening and offer to introduce them to friends there.
Those are some things I do to try and be a better ally as well as supporting the community organizing directly.
Hi, cool story you got telling there in America . . .
. . . . but so, why is it that you lot in the USA with the true story, can’t do it?
We begun just recent, to have to face up that we done . . . and hell on wheels, this road show has only just begun, . . . begun to be saved by a black man, . . .
love from a white Rebekah, (aka anonymouslegals-ubordinate)
“How dare women exercise reproductive autonomy?! It’s racist and imperialist to deny your destiny as a fetus-factory. If you have no child or one child, something is wrong with you.”
Seriously? Fuck you.
So…should white people make an effort not to move into non-white neighborhoods? Because that might not be a great thing, either.
I know I already commented, but it’s difficult to contain my rage. OP’s comments about reproduction are heterosexist misogynist tripe that disgrace this community.