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Here we have it, sarcasm from people who don't know any better. Okay, I have many stories to tell, I'll just share one. When I was a teenager, I became friends with a pair of brothers who moved down the block from me. The first week I knew them, cholos had already starting fighting with them. Over the next couple years, there were countless fights, and the one brother that I got along with really well, he got stabbed on three different occasions, two of which put him in the hospital. His brother had the tip of his finger chopped off when someone attacked him with a machete, and eventually this guy ended up being murdered in Albuquerque. My friends weren't gang members. The reason they were targeted was because they were'nt from the neighborhood.
yeah right.
Someone gets attacked several times and they are not in the wrong circles? It sounds like you didn't know these brothers very well. Even criminals have standards and they don't attack someone several times for no reason. It's not worth the trouble. Chopping fingers and murdering people just because they were not from the neighborhood after living several years there? Please, get your story straight.
When I was growing up we never referred to that area as downtown. It was either North Valley or South Valley depending on what side of Central you were on.
Obviously has no current experience worth relating on this thread.
I only narrowly avoided serious problems on some occasions.
I believe that 80skeys is honestly reporting his experience growing up in the South Valley neighborhood as a child. A friend who also grew up in the South Valley whose parents also still live there tells me that that neighborhood was considerably more dangerous when he was a child. It remains one of the roughest neighborhoods in Albuquerque. If you are concerned about crime, unless you have very limited means, South Valley would be your among your last choices of neighborhoods.
Because I live in a much safer part of Albuquerque among other professionals, my experience here is very different and very positive. That in no way diminishes 80skeys negative childhood experiences and his compassionate desire to ensure that others do not have similar negative experiences.
yeah right.
Someone gets attacked several times and they are not in the wrong circles? It sounds like you didn't know these brothers very well. Even criminals have standards and they don't attack someone several times for no reason.
I can tell you've never lived in a neighborhood with cholos.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SunGrins
Obviously has no current experience worth relating on this thread.
Albuquerque has not changed other than to get bigger and have more traffic. And you, did you grow up in the Valley? How do you know what we - natives to the area - did or did not refer to certain areas as?
I feel you guys just don't want to accept the ugly things that are a part of the city, from a native who was born and raised in one of the spanish neighborhoods, so you turn a blind eye to it.
And Sugah Ray, you seem to be interested in Colombia. You want to talk about it? Have you been there?
I believe that 80skeys is honestly reporting his experience growing up in the South Valley neighborhood as a child. A friend who also grew up in the South Valley whose parents also still live there tells me that that neighborhood was considerably more dangerous when he was a child. It remains one of the roughest neighborhoods in Albuquerque. If you are concerned about crime, unless you have very limited means, South Valley would be your among your last choices of neighborhoods.
Because I live in a much safer part of Albuquerque among other professionals, my experience here is very different and very positive. That in no way diminishes 80skeys negative childhood experiences and his compassionate desire to ensure that others do not have similar negative experiences.
That is literally not what he is saying.
He has said repeatedly that the majority of the city is violent crime ridden and among the most dangerous cities in the country. Then his anecdotes refer to his particular street some years ago when the violent crime rate was twice what it is today.
He has said repeatedly that the majority of the city is violent crime ridden and among the most dangerous cities in the country. Then his anecdotes refer to his particular street some years ago when the violent crime rate was twice what it is today.
My post above seeks to convey the same information but in a validating way. When people come on here writing from other cities to make generalizations about Albuquerque being dangerous overall, I believe most often they are (1) trolling for attention, seeking to win debates OR (2) they had extremely high expectations that moving to Albuquerque would make them happy, and they were disappointed/rejected or otherwise were never able to achieve a sense of belonging here, which distorts their perception of Albuquerque OR (3) they experienced Albuquerque from a perspective of limited means, and they are reporting on their genuine painful experiences living in a rough neighborhood.
Posters of the third category strike me as the most noble and deserving of validation even if I disagree with their generalizations. They may be speaking partly from a place of trauma (i.e., very real trauma associated with poverty), wanting to be heard and compassionately wanting to help others avoid the pain they experienced. It seems to me that minimizing or invalidating their trauma just perpetuates the conversation in an unproductive way, pressuring them to prove intellectually that indeed Albuquerque is bad and we're just not getting it.
It seems to me that the best approach the posters of the third category is to validate the realness of their personal experience while conveying enough information for potential relocators from other parts of the country who are middle-class/professional to understand that their experience of Albuquerque is likely to be much more positive.
You can almost hear them saying: "So what if middle-class and professionals folks have it good in Albuquerque. Lots of people are struggling in rough neighborhoods, and they deserve to have a voice too."
My post above seeks to convey the same information but in a validating way. When people come on here writing from other cities to make generalizations about Albuquerque being dangerous overall, I believe most often they are (1) trolling for attention, seeking to win debates OR (2) they had extremely high expectations that moving to Albuquerque would make them happy, and they were disappointed/rejected or otherwise were never able to achieve a sense of belonging here, which distorts their perception of Albuquerque OR (3) they experienced Albuquerque from a perspective of limited means, and they are reporting on their genuine painful experiences living in a rough neighborhood.
Posters of the third category strike me as the most noble and deserving of validation even if I disagree with their generalizations. They may be speaking partly from a place of trauma (i.e., very real trauma associated with poverty), wanting to be heard and compassionately wanting to help others avoid the pain they experienced. It seems to me that minimizing or invalidating their trauma just perpetuates the conversation in an unproductive way, pressuring them to prove intellectually that indeed Albuquerque is bad and we're just not getting it.
It seems to me that the best approach the posters of the third category is to validate the realness of their personal experience while conveying enough information for potential relocators from other parts of the country who are middle-class/professional to understand that their experience of Albuquerque is likely to be much more positive.
You can almost hear them saying: "So what if middle-class and professionals folks have it good in Albuquerque. Lots of people are struggling in rough neighborhoods, and they deserve to have a voice too."
I would agree with you if 80skeys would validate other people's experiences of Albuquerque and other cities. But instead of allowing that everyone else's experience of Albuquerque is equally valid, no matter what their walk of life or other comparisons they make, he is clearly trying to place himself in a position of highest authority on the subject. He wants empathy while denying it to everyone else. That is what earned my sarcasm above. The experiences he related are not unique to the South Valley or Albuquerque or New Mexico. Every ethnic group in every region of the country has its version of the "cholo" and gangbangers. I saw it even in the lily-white small city in Maine where I lived for a year, where there was a murder a block away from me.
I agree, but the question is what is the most efficient and effective way to talk someone down who is asserting an exaggerated position about Albuquerque and repeatedly reasserting it in response to others' counterpoints. If they're speaking from a place of poverty trauma, I don't think they'll stop posting this way until (1) they feel they have convinced others that Albuquerque is in fact as bad as they claim it is (given that their perceptions are distorted by unresolved trauma/living in poverty) or (2) they get some validation of the realness of their pain and the pain of others in similar situations.
There is an unfairness to the situation that I think you're alluding to. We know from political campaigning that it is much easier to hurt a reputation than to defend it. Therefore, anyone who posts a negative generalization about Albuquerque will have much more power of persuasion than the 5 people who respond attempting to rebut that generalization.
Last edited by Abraxas; 01-20-2016 at 05:46 PM..
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