Just Don't Know What To Think About Philly These Days (Philadelphia: violent crime, neighborhoods)

[lpranger467]

Responsible parenting for generations to come, with a focus on impulse control/anger management in kids/teens perhaps taught in schools is what Philly needs badly. I understand it being a very poor city, yet poor areas elsewhere arent as overrun with the level of violent crime. Its multiple times a day theres stories on shootings with ## of rounds fired etc-. being poor is no excuse not to instill values in your kids.

Other than the drug shoots here and there it seems like its always neighborhood beefs between groups that turn violent and end up killing some innocent person (hence impulse/anger control)

[FindingZen]

Originally Posted by lpranger467

Responsible parenting for generations to come, with a focus on impulse control/anger management in kids/teens perhaps taught in schools is what Philly needs badly. I understand it being a very poor city, yet poor areas elsewhere arent as overrun with the level of violent crime. Its multiple times a day theres stories on shootings with ## of rounds fired etc-. being poor is no excuse not to instill values in your kids.

Other than the drug shoots here and there it seems like its always neighborhood beefs between groups that turn violent and end up killing some innocent person (hence impulse/anger control)

Short of perhaps Detroit, there is no other larger city with such a huge swath of poor communities. The pandemic sadly only magnified the desperation and anger that exists in such neighborhoods.

In previous conversations on this point, I agreed that personal family responsibility would play a role but also stressed the importance of community reinvestment, something which would require the assistance of both Harrisburg and Washington: the latter may make a positive difference soon when the city receives funding from recent federal legislation.

[selhars]

lpranger467, couldn't agree or rep you more.

Poverty -- and "community investment -- have nothing to do with parents teaching their children morals, values, and you can't use violence to respond to perceived slights or even the worst verbal insults.

But then again, some adults don't have emotional intelligence or self control, or anger management skills either.

[AshbyQuin]

Originally Posted by FindingZen

Short of perhaps Detroit, there is no other larger city with such a huge swath of poor communities. The pandemic sadly only magnified the desperation and anger that exists in such neighborhoods.

In previous conversations on this point, I agreed that personal family responsibility would play a role but also stressed the importance of community reinvestment, something which would require the assistance of both Harrisburg and Washington: the latter may make a positive difference soon when the city receives funding from recent federal legislation.

Yeah. New Orleans, Cleveland and Baltimore don't exist.

[Duderino]

Originally Posted by selhars

lpranger467, couldn't agree or rep you more.

Poverty -- and "community investment -- have nothing to do with parents teaching their children morals, values, and you can't use violence to respond to perceived slights or even the worst verbal insults.

But then again, some adults don't have emotional intelligence or self control, or anger management skills either.

I don't think we want to start a huge sociological debate, but parental involvement and community investment are not mutually exclusive.

The fact of the matter is that the most crime-ridden neighborhoods wouldn't be where they are today without many external forces of conscious disinivestment. Social breakdown only ensued AFTER that disinvestment.

Crime will always have to be addressed from multiple angles.

Why is it that so many people have a hard time admitting that extreme, one-sided approaches of either "lock them all up" or "hug a drug dealer" are both destined to fail?

[lpranger467]

Look at small town Appalachian, or rural Alabama/Georgia (even pre 1960's). Dirt poor, sometime grandma was mom and pa. What was present was a sense of order and discipline. Everyone looks for some handout from Harrisburg/DC etc when in reality it starts at home. Disinvestment doesnt equate to crime as long as there is guidance in the home.

Blaming lack of handouts is a cop out.

Originally Posted by Duderino

I don't think we want to start a huge sociological debate, but parental involvement and community investment are not mutually exclusive.

The fact of the matter is that the most crime-ridden neighborhoods wouldn't be where they are today without many external forces of consciousness disinivestment. Social breakdown only ensued AFTER that disinvestment.

Crime will always have to be addressed from multiple angles.

Why is it that so many people have a hard time admitting that extreme, one-sided approaches of either "lock them all up" or "hug a drug dealer" are both destined to fail?

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by AshbyQuin

Yeah. New Orleans, Cleveland and Baltimore don't exist.

The original sentence said "no larger city." And not even Detroit is as large as Philadelphia. This city remains the poorest of the nation's 10 largest cities — which, btw, is not the same thing as "the poorest big city in America," as the stat is often rendered here. If, as I do, you accept 500,000 as the population threshold for a "big city," there are several other big cities that have more poverty. Detroit is one of those. Baltimore is not.

There is, however, some good news regarding that stat: The poverty rate in the city of Philadelphia is inching downward. It was as high as 25 percent; as of the 2020 Census, it stands at 23.1.

The poorest big city in the country as of the 2020 Census was Detroit, whose 33.2% poverty rate nosed out Cleveland's 33.0%. New Orleans' poverty rate of 23.0% is almost the same as Philadelphia's. Baltimore's is a mere 20%.

I think it would be interesting to compare the overall and violent crime rates for these five cities — as well as Chicago, another city where crime seems to make the news a lot. (Its poverty rate of 17.1% is substantially below all of these cities'.)

But once again: How many of you have read that ProPublica article yet? "Community involvement" need not necessarily require state assistance; many of the intervention, activity and de-escalation groups described in that story were homegrown, organized by community residents themselves. Yes, they cost some money to run, but not a lot, and the needed funds could be raised by other means. (lpranger467: And, like the adult mentoring groups Big Brothers and Big Sisters, these groups provide what the kids' parents didn't, with some success.)

But I'll conclude by echoing Duderino: It's not either-or, it's both-and. But we should strive for the preventative stuff first and rely on enforcement and punishment as backups. The get-tough-on-crime crowd has the order reversed.

[Duderino]

Originally Posted by lpranger467

Look at small town Appalachian, or rural Alabama/Georgia (even pre 1960's). Dirt poor, sometime grandma was mom and pa. What was present was a sense of order and discipline. Everyone looks for some handout from Harrisburg/DC etc when in reality it starts at home. Disinvestment doesnt equate to crime as long as there is guidance in the home.

Blaming lack of handouts is a cop out.

The biggest problem with your analogy is that Appalachia and inner-city destitution are not remotely comparable. And yes, I've seen both up-close on multiple occasions.

And if you think it's a "handout" to have enough food, or a safe and comfortable place to go to school, or to be able to pay for your heating bill, or to make sure young children aren't exposed to constant trauma, then I'd fundamentally question your understanding of the word "handout." These are human necessities.

No one should ever expect the social outcomes in North Philly to be the same as Eastern Kentucky. That's pretty absurd.

[AshbyQuin]

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

The original sentence said "no larger city." And not even Detroit is as large as Philadelphia. This city remains the poorest of the nation's 10 largest cities — which, btw, is not the same thing as "the poorest big city in America," as the stat is often rendered here. If, as I do, you accept 500,000 as the population threshold for a "big city," there are several other big cities that have more poverty. Detroit is one of those. Baltimore is not.

There is, however, some good news regarding that stat: The poverty rate in the city of Philadelphia is inching downward. It was as high as 25 percent; as of the 2020 Census, it stands at 23.1.

The poorest big city in the country as of the 2020 Census was Detroit, whose 33.2% poverty rate nosed out Cleveland's 33.0%. New Orleans' poverty rate of 23.0% is almost the same as Philadelphia's. Baltimore's is a mere 20%.

I think it would be interesting to compare the overall and violent crime rates for these five cities — as well as Chicago, another city where crime seems to make the news a lot. (Its poverty rate of 17.1% is substantially below all of these cities'.)

But once again: How many of you have read that ProPublica article yet? "Community involvement" need not necessarily require state assistance; many of the intervention, activity and de-escalation groups described in that story were homegrown, organized by community residents themselves. Yes, they cost some money to run, but not a lot, and the needed funds could be raised by other means. (lpranger467: And, like the adult mentoring groups Big Brothers and Big Sisters, these groups provide what the kids' parents didn't, with some success.)

But I'll conclude by echoing Duderino: It's not either-or, it's both-and. But we should strive for the preventative stuff first and rely on enforcement and punishment as backups. The get-tough-on-crime crowd has the order reversed.

Would be nice to see how Philadelphia ranks with the other cities in "deep/generational poverty". I can't find anything online that measures cities based off of it.

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by AshbyQuin

Would be nice to see how Philadelphia ranks with the other cities in "deep/generational poverty". I can't find anything online that measures cities based off of it.

I'm not aware of any site that offers statistics on multi-generational poverty. If there are any, I'd be interested in knowing about them.

Deep poverty, which I think the government defines as incomes in the bottom 10 percent, is something else. I know there are organizations out there that produce stats on that.