Spike Lee on Gentrification (Live in Brooklyn) by Daily Intelligencer published on 2014-02-26T03:01:52Z Genre spike lee Comment by da_barrioskid REPUBLIC OF NEW AFRIKA 2018-04-16T06:16:40Z Comment by NJ citizen "You can’t just come in when people have a culture that’s been laid down for generations and you come in and now shit gotta change because you’re here? Get the fuck outta here. Can’t do that!" (Spike Lee) 2017-02-20T01:02:39Z Comment by Thomas Meader what up girl!!! 2015-09-08T13:01:07Z Comment by Professor X @corpsicles: Proof, or STFU. 2015-02-14T22:26:44Z Comment by John DeLello Communities and realtors and politicians could care less about community or history, they are all high dollar call girls willing to play with the highest bidder. 2014-08-29T01:38:40Z Comment by John DeLello Spike has a pointe two. It's not cool to have the newcomers calling the pope on your pop for playing acoustic bass. Nice restaurants and shi shi cocktail bars and nice looking people does not counter the negatives of gentrification. Every American knows that The NYC metro area is unattainable for even educated well employed people. This same phenom is happening to those that grew up in places like Reno, Denver, mountain towns in the west and farms in the mid-west. No one living in a beach town in Cal. Has the time or. Means 2014-08-29T01:37:12Z Comment by Runnin76 "Reverse migration". Excellent point. This atrocity occurs nation wide. It's happening in my town. Basically being told, "to heck with you & the pursuance of the american dream"! 2014-07-28T15:43:36Z Comment by Lenair tucker This is why he is more than a Filmmaker. Spike is an Icon. 2014-03-31T04:36:33Z Comment by 6v4i76 http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/gentrification-spike-lee-article-1.1703113 2014-03-29T16:36:45Z Comment by StanLovesHouse! I love that. "We've been here" we weren't important enough for these services and benefits. It wasn't profitable 2014-03-05T01:33:15Z Comment by neuronburg an ignorant racist speaks 2014-03-04T15:38:03Z Comment by Akeem James 1 OOOOOhhhhhhh!!! 2014-03-03T04:21:52Z Comment by Akeem James 1 I can't wait to see the new NYC 2014-03-03T04:20:51Z Comment by Akeem James 1 Yo I can't wait till I'm back in NYC. I love living near The Whites. 2014-03-03T04:19:44Z Comment by VIVVYDOLL Spike spoke the TRUTH!! ... folks can't handle the TRUTH!! 2014-03-02T03:59:15Z Comment by guitarwizardsofthefuture this is goofy! 2014-03-02T00:50:36Z Comment by maofdeuce I totally agree with Spike. I'm not from NY but I Love it, it's my other home & my close friends in Brooklyn, Harlem and The Bronx are being treated as if they're the outsiders when they've BEEN there the whole time!! I'm from Hartford, CT and we are experiencing the same thing. 2014-03-02T00:09:38Z Comment by ImanE II Download house.me.ma/78916.htm 2014-03-01T18:37:55Z Comment by Rakita O'Neal Boom!!! Because it doesnt matter if its 1964 or 2014 our country still believes White is Right!!! 2014-03-01T08:39:12Z Comment by Crighteezy White privilege is alive and well. Black people are not treated equally in this country. Period. Whether it's Florida or New York CIty, you cannot argue against this fact. Okay, so you're white? I'm white too. And you ask me, "why should I care?", "Spike Lee needs to stop bitching," "there's no such thing as first dibs!" Well, this is what I will say to that: Yes, it is true that poor white people (mostly immigrants) used to live in Brooklyn from the late 1800s through the 1960s before the area became more predominantly black. Some stayed and some left the neighborhood because of fears rooted in racism. Yes, it is true that neighborhoods are constantly evolving and changing. This is America, and in 2014 you can't tell someone that they aren't allowed to live there. This time it's different though and it concerns anyone that has ever had a love affair with a big city. In the middle of the 20th century Brooklyn changed because people chose to leave. Property values fell because of people moving so quickly, they didn't inflate rapidly like right now. And here's another key fact, Brooklyn was a WORKING-CLASS borough. European immigrants with white skin came to Brooklyn for the American dream. Irish, Italians, Jews, whatever. Some came up and became middle-class, some stayed working-class. It had a lot of genuine culture back then because of these white immigrants bringing some of their culture to their neighborhoods and New York in general. Then the neighborhood became predominantly Black (along with Puerto Ricans and Jews), and yet again a rich culture flourished. One working class community passing over the neighborhood to another working-class community. Fast forward to the mid-90s. Brooklyn begins to change. Legitimate artists come here in search of low-rent to do their art and still live in the great city that is New York. Other poor creative-types with day jobs begin to flock to Brooklyn soon after attempting to find themselves in the Big Apple. Coffee shops begin cropping up next to bodegas. "Hipsters" become the target of everyone's hatred. Sometime in the early 2000s developers really started honing in on how to capitalize on these neighborhoods that were currently really cheap and becoming "trendy." Now in 2014, you got post-modern lofts everywhere that cost $3000/month and Williamsburg is more expensive than almost anywhere else in New York. You got a bunch of rich assholes with no appreciation for culture moving in so they can be cool. Those "hipsters" you hated can't afford to live there either. The difference here people in this supposedly "natural" evolution and change in the dynamics of Brooklyn is that torch was not passed between one culturally-rich working-class people to another. The torch was taken by force by some rich dude who isn't a jazz musician, who doesn't even like jazz, who didn't even like New York until very recently, who thinks the 90s New York was a pile of shit with no redeemable value, who buys crappy art just to look like he has an opinion, who has a 401k, who feels uncomfortable around black people, and who treats New York like a playground of wine bars, and doesn't feel the least bit guilty about being partly responsible for a family being evicted across the street. For the sake of the argument I'm gonna remove racial issues out of the argument. As an average white guy from the midwest who is apathetic towards other races but thinks New York is cool, you should care about what's happening for one big reason- the essence of what makes New York is at stake. New York is not evolving and changing, it's just getting more expensive and douchey. Some bullshit argument about white people being there first isn't relevant because we're not talking about the same white people. It's not like Brooklyn is gaining more working-class Irish and Italian small-business owners who just wanna open up cheap delis and dive bars. It's just gaining more rich pricks who don't bring anything to the table that is the melting pot of New York City. 2014-03-01T02:47:25Z Comment by StillNatural LOVE YOU SPIKE...SOMEONE NEEDS TO SPEAK UP. OUR "LEADERS" JUST DANCE TO THE MUSICE BEING PLAYED...AS LONG AS THEY GET PAID. 2014-03-01T01:14:29Z Comment by StillNatural I agree with Spike. The exact same thing is happening in Detroit. I was insulted in my city, where I have lived for DECADES by a group of white males on their way to a Lions game. I have been insulted in our suburbs before, but NEVER in my one city by racists. Yes, they have also been changeing the names of various parts of the city for the past decade. The AVERAGE current residents can't afford to live in these newly RENAMED areas...and yes, now the lights are coming back on, the police are being beefed up, along with EMS. The carpetbaggers are opening new businesses that are being hyped by our local media. Also, corporations actually run the city now and they are buying up the inner city for pennies on the dollar. We are supposed to grin and bear it AND act like we neither see NOR understand what's happening right under our noses. 2014-03-01T01:11:47Z Comment by Crighteezy Spike speaks the truth. As a white person I am disgusted and ashamed with the pace and effects of gentrification. The Old New York I fell in love with in 2007 is almost all gone now, and some would say it was already gone by '07. I've never lived there for more than 2 months but it always seems worse and worse every time I go back to visit. Some white folks aren't moving back "because of the beautiful brownstones" though. Some of us white folks actually love the idea of what New York used to be and wished gentrification had never occurred to the disgusting extent that it has. I am ashamed as a white person because of what has happened but I promise you this, it is not pre-meditated by people like me. Blame the house-flippers, the landlords that raise the rent and evict families, the real estate developers, and the wieners that call the cops on people for being loud. Even though there are a lot of white people like me that feel the same way Spike does about gentrification there's still no way to really stop it. In a place like New York it's not really as much of a skin color thing anymore, it's all about the cheddar. Cash moves everything around you. Developers and house-flippers are trying to get money the same as drug dealers. They're greedy fucks and they don't give a fuck about killing the soul of neighborhoods and driving out the people that make up the working class of America's biggest city. You think real estate developers are going to give a fuck when gentrification finally hits Brighton Beach or Bensonhurst?!? Hell no! The Russians and Italians are gonna get pushed out just the same way that Blacks and Puerto Ricans have already. They give no fucks about their European complexion and they're gonna take over their neighborhood just the same because some rich fuck will pay$2500/month to live in a post-modern loft next to some rent-control projects. It's a really sad situation but I don't know how it can be stopped without some serious legislation on the part of city officials which will never happen. All I ask is this, when you see me on the street don't frown at me when you see my white skin. I didn't bamboozle you. A lot of us white people don't respect the culture of neighborhoods but I'm not one of them and neither are the people I associate with. So don't lop us all together as a bunch of assholes. I'm not happy about gentrification either nor am I happy with the way I see a lot of white people act in historically Black/Latino neighborhoods. My neighborhood hasn't even gentrified that much but I've been stuck in the same shitty ass apartment because rents have gone up drastically all around me. Also, are you automatically a hipster if you're white and you don't dress like a bro or a square? That's the same as a white dude going around calling a Mexican a cholo or a Black dude a thug just because they're not dressed like a couple of fuckin' door to door missionaries. I'm not dumb enough to label that kinda shit racism but just don't label me with some false shit that I don't wanna be associated with. If you wanna get technical genuine "hipsters" are creative types that are usually poor as fuck and can't actually afford to live anywhere near Manhattan or Inner Brooklyn. They don't own shit so they're getting pushed out just as fast as the older renters are. The jackasses that are truly offensive to the eyes and have no regard for the neighborhood's original culture are merely quasi-Bohemian spoiled rich kids that went on a shopping spree at Urban Outfitters with daddy's credit card. It's not that hard to get the "hipster" look anymore now people, c'mon now. Don't lop all white people together as this terrible mass of evil plaid shirt-wearing assholes who want to jack up the all the rents and send your grandma away in a uhaul truck. Some of us get just as fired up about this shit as Spike. I mean, isn't that Old New York an idea worth fighting for regardless of skin color? 2014-03-01T00:17:45Z Comment by Steve Rucker 1 because its not affordable their grip will get tighter around our neck until we have to soley depend on our goverment 2014-02-28T23:41:44Z Comment by Lorena Craighead Spike, like him or not, has always been committed to Truth, with a capital T. Aché! 2014-02-28T22:41:31Z Comment by Coleman McFarland This is a great speech 2014-02-28T18:58:09Z Comment by Nathaniel Fearghaile This was the plan all along 2014-02-28T01:26:50Z Comment by Nathaniel Fearghaile Truth here more so 2014-02-28T01:26:28Z