This Week’s Column
Kill All White People.
That’s what the red scrawl said at the 163rd Street subway station. Every morning, I stood in front of it to commute to work. Standing there guaranteed I would take the right stairway when I exited; standing there ensured I would save a precious three minutes of morning commuting time.
But all those three minutes gave me was more time to think about that bleeding scrawl. Kill All White People.
I live in Washington Heights, a neighborhood of Dominican families and much public housing. Besides the other residents of my brownstone—all young professionals, all either white or Hispanic, but a lighter shade of Hispanic than our Dominican neighbors—besides these people I know and sometimes commute with, I hardly ever see white people.
When I do, I note them. That’s how rare they are.
I’ve only lived here a month, but so far I’ve found my neighborhood friendly. Women smile at me; children turn shyly away; men reach down to pet my dog and flirt as I walk him by the stores that line Amsterdam Avenue. As I always do, I went on my walks looking for friends.
But after Kill All White People appeared, I started looking around differently. That tattooed young man I saw every evening leaning against the side of his building with his friends, did he feel that way? How about the woman hustling across the street with her skipping 5-year-old? I hadn’t felt endangered before, not in this neighborhood, not in the predominantly poor, African-American neighborhood I lived in when I first moved to Chicago. Was I in danger now?
This is what it feels like, I know, to be part of a minority, especially when members of the majority—even one member—expresses active hatred.
But then other writers started adding to the bleeding on the wall. “There are better solutions,” someone wrote. Someone else said, “Go home tourists.” Another writer wrote a few lines in spidery black pen, explaining that when white people moved into a neighborhood, rents went up. White people could afford those increases; “black and ethnic people” need to move out. The dialogue helped me understand.
So. This wasn’t really about hatred after all, but about fear.
Fear of gentrification. Fear of having nowhere to live, of being forced to move far from the other immigrants that are part of your community, fear of having to sacrifice too much to support your family.
At first, when I realized this, I was angry. I wanted to shout back, “I’m not here to gentrify! I’m just here to live, like you. I just want to live in Manhattan, and this is what I can afford.” I don’t want to gentrify. I don’t need a Starbucks. And I certainly don’t want to be paying more in rent.
But my roommate gently pointed out that I was gentrifying—and he was, too. The fact is, he said, we are paying more rent. And because we are both so well educated, our income will keep going up, and so will our ability to pay. There are no easy answers, he said. We’re gentrifying, whether we want to or not.
Both my roommate and I are gay, and it struck me that white gay people are often in this position---in fact, some cities love us because we do exactly this. We move into edgy neighborhoods, partly because we may start off with lower incomes if we begin careers in social service, or teaching, or the arts. Partly, I think, because we are accustomed to being the minority. And being a white-and-gay minority as opposed to simply a gay minority doesn’t really make much difference.
Gays and lesbians with lower wages move into these neighborhoods, and we form a community and are followed by higher-wage gays who buy instead of rent, renovating and gentrifying and raising housing prices further.
We are responsible for gentrifying. We are responsible for people being unable to live in their own neighborhoods.
This is a complex issue. There are no easy answers. Its not even clear whether, long-term, gentrifying is good or bad for cities or neighborhoods or immigrant communities. But I found myself distressed—instead of relieved—when the Kill All White People discussion was papered over this morning with an ad from the NBA holiday store.
The way our community affects others is something we need to talk about. Instead, like the new ad, we paper the discussion over.
Kill All White People.
Really, if someone believes that, I’d rather know.
Jennifer Vanasco is an award-winning, syndicated columnist based in New York. Read her occasional blog at jennifervanasco.com and email her at jennifer.vanasco@gmail.com.
The Perils of Gay Gentrification
Wednesday, December 6, 2006
