I was trying to find another word for it, but ghetto seems to be the best available, and 'economically challenged area' is no not totse. The word ghetto used to refer specifically to areas where Jews were forced to live, but now applies to any area where enough poor people have congregated. When poor, drug addicted, and mentally unstable people start to take over an area, it starts a chain reaction. Crime increases, hookers start strolling the corners, families move out, higher end business move away, and once the ball starts rolling it is hard to stop.
Charity groups set up soup kitchens and shelters, attracting even more poor people. Soon the neighborhood adjusts, the business that can survive on what the locals want to buy stay open, the rest are boarded up, and another shithole for the locals to look at and say, "It didn't used to be like that here", is born.
Every suburb of Vancouver has a few strolls and dope corners, where I live the crime is spread out over the whole suburb of Surrey (hence our wonderful reputation). Downtown there is an area called the 'Downtown East Side", some of the outlying areas are not too bad, high crime but not exclusively the domain of druggies and bums, tough hoods for sure, but nothing like the 10 block area centered around the corner of Hastings and Main, known locally as 'wasting and pain".
The guy shooting this vid is a bit of a dick, but it is the best footage I found, and shows what you would see if you went only a few blocks astray from some of the more popular night club/tourist districts downtown. The first half is bunk, you can skip it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEXtIIKzoGs&feature=related
Here is another mini doc, it is a little old, but nothing has changed, and the Alice In Chains soundtrack is cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyQnSMlPToE
I lived in the area 91-93 at a place called the Hotel Patricia. This was before crack spread up from the states, after that it got a lot worse. There is a lot of good shit in the area as well, music venues, funky bars, and of course 24 hour access to whatever drugs you want. There are still quite a few die hard residents as well, it is their home, and they are not going anywhere. I still go there from time to time, urban camo is needed, but if you look shitty and broke nobody hassles you.
So, what's your ghetto like?
C/O
"Dude this is so ghetto"
"Yeah man, this is like, the most ghetto place ever"
"Where are we anyway?"
"I think we're in a ghetto"
"Dude that is sooooo ghetto"
"Totally"
Note; I was not really sure if this fit in Humanities, but if it needs to be moved, move it.
Comments
lol kiwiland "ghetto"
Don't be fooled by the nice apartment complexes
It was built for piss-poor whites but in the 90s got filled with niggers. It's like a...err modern ghetto.
Edit to add: I mean east hastings street, the west side is ritzy as hell.
I consider myself a true citizen of the world and a friend to all people and nations regardless of race, religion, creed, national origin, intelligence, height, weight, appearance, hair color, whether or not they listen to Ke$ha, or sexual orientation. Therefore it is hard for me to condemn a section of land, and in doing so my brothers and sisters occupying it
Truly, Ghettos are a blight upon all of the human race, not just those inside of them, but those outside of them for allowing the factors that created these dens of wretchedness to spawn, thrive, and grow.
It is with a heavy heart I declare the world's ghetto to be the region known as the Ummah, or the Moslem world.
in this map of the Ummah, its brutal and imperialistic conquests are clearly visible. Among the boundaries one finds only conflict with the superiorly civlized indigenous people.
The weakness of European and civilized powers at the time allowed a merchant/pedophile with clear signs of Schizophrenia and Narcissistic Personality Disorder to raise a powerful army rather than receive the mental health care and treatment he and all other ill individuals deserve.
He convinced his followers he was a prophet, and that God (the Meccan moon good known as Hubal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia@@AMEPARAM@@/wiki/File:Palm_tree_symbol.svg" class="image"><img alt="Palm tree symbol.svg" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0b/Palm_tree_symbol.svg/20px-Palm_tree_symbol.svg.png"@@AMEPARAM@@commons/thumb/0/0b/Palm_tree_symbol.svg/20px-Palm_tree_symbol.svg.png, later changed to Allah in Arabic to confound naive enemies into believing the Moslems were a civilized, Abrahamic religion) commanded him to, among other things:
To a sane mind, this list appears as what it truly is: pure, unfiltered balderdash.
To the Moslem mind, this list is sacrosanct, and the originator of this theology is to be emulated in every way including polygamy, pedophilia, murder, armed robbery, conspiracy, vandalism, and of course bestiality (Mohammad was known to have a harem of favored goats and camels as well as women and girls as young as six)
His followers stayed true to their faith, and each generation is taught to except these clearly warped and sickening worldviews as perfectly normal, in fact ideal.
Although I abhor violence, recent Moslem terrorist actions against fearful and cowed westerners brings closer and closer a time for the drawing of a line in the sand, ACROSS THIS LINE YOU DO NOT
Furthermore, I think Mecca must be destroyed
There's a cow pasture by my house with an old barn in it. Sometimes foxes and coyotes come around the barn at night. That's kind of backwoods ghetto, right?
Morningside?
There are a few shittyish places on the other side of town from me that have a few stabbings every now and again. Apart from that its just chavs stealing and dealing.
Some of the temps at work seem proud of their stab "wounds", they all look like little swiss army knife cuts on places that are hardly life threatening.
For a real rundown shithole of a place try blackpool. A seaside "resort" trying to live up to its heyday in the 30s. The whole place is run down and falling apart, and the now only the true scum of Britain heads there for holidays.
It has the highest rate of unemployment, lowest average wage, lowest life expecty, highest teen pregnancy rates.
C/O
"now if DFG had the inclination, I bet he could top anything posted so far"
The Crime in my neighbourhood is slightly higher than average. I live in the most "multicultural" part of sydney and we earn less than the nationa average.
The Mall:
our underused sports stadium:
wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacktown,_New_South_Wales
I never realised baseball diamonds could interlock so neatly
More info can be found here
Images
My favorite thing is the seemingly endless fields of Sunflowers
This has more images that accurately depict the reservation life by Aaron Huey. Take the time to click through them. There are also a number of youtube videos but I don't have sound so I can not vouch for their validity.
That's my ghetto.
Do you have a casino on your land?
You made me LOL irl.
yep. If you were to personify Blacktown it would be the guy with his head in the convienience store freezer.
Although, The elitism that comes out of some people when they hear the term Western Sydney pisses me off a little. Even in my liberal circles you hear stupid remarks.