General Urban Cambridge Updates and Rumours

[Bjays93]

You guys are missing context.

If the data shows that BIPOC individuals ... lets say...are arrested by police more often (because there is actually data on that, and not on being "accosted"), the important thing is the context of why that is, and who is causing it.

Specifically we know there is a history of bias in policing, a history of racism and economic disadvantage in our society.  That is an important piece of context. Why is that? And who has benefitted...you can answer that yourself.

The same context can be put around the fact that older white people are the most common form of NIMBYs.

And not surprisingly, it is for a similar set of reasons.

Now I think it's also important to ask who has agency in both situations. BIPOC folks don't want to be arrested, but have little control over the bias in policing. NIMBYs similarly don't have direct control over the city's choice to prioritize their opinion, nor do they have control over the media's choice to feature their voice above the voice of those who are being excluded from neighbourhoods. (Although some would argue they have more power in these things than traditionally disadvantaged individuals).

But they DO have agency over what attitude they choose to have when discussing their neighbourhoods. They COULD choose to use their voice instead to stand up for those who would be excluded.

In any case, there's grey all over...but I don't think ignoring race entirely is a good solution either. Context matters.

I don't know why my reply double posted but I agree. I also believe the largest portion of NIMBYs are older white people, but that's also just cuz there's more of them in that demographic than anyone else. 

I'd like to know proportionally what sets of people are more likely to be NIMBYs. That would be data that is near impossible to get I'd imagine but I wouldn't be surprised if proportionally the numbers are much more similar. 

The reality is people of any background will likely have similar reasons for being opposed to a development, I think it's an intrinsic reaction for lots of people to not want a massive tower going up in their neighbourhood. 

There are also lots of people who are still NIMBYs but not vocally so, particularly immigrants because they feel like this country gave them a lot when they had nothing so even though they dont like it, they recognize they have it far better than before and so they dont speak up. This is fine but the underlying feelings towards the development are still the same. Lots of people are just like that, and my issue was not with singling out a demographic but rather painting that entire demographic under the same brush.