'The city is in worse condition than I knew' -- Time blogger

[EastsideAl]

My guess is that the author isn't talking about the blight you can see off of a main drag like Mack, Gratiot [[not very close to Grosse Pointe, but you get my drift), Jefferson. I can see where someone would not have a full grasp of what is going on in some of those East Side pockets of third-worldness, which is exactly what it is. I mean, just because someone can drive down Chalmers off Jefferson towards Mack, I wouldn't knock 'em for not doing it. Just because someone can decide to go South off of Alter, doesn't mean they will. I imagine since childhood their parents have ingrained in them not to travel down certain roads. Just saying...

Perhaps I'm a little thrown off by having grown up and lived on the east side for all these years, and being 5 generations in here with family spread out from St. Clair Shores to downtown, but I tend to think of this all being one big common area, one place, the east side of the city, the various Pointes, southern Macomb. Hell, my great-grandfather once owned some significant pieces of what's now Harper Woods and East Detroit [[ummm... Eastpointe... heh heh), in addition to land in what's now the Hayes-Kelly area, and houses on Eastlawn, Newport, and Chalmers. But leaving geographic proximity aside for the moment, it doesn't seem like you could pay attention to the news around here and not know these things. Unless you were in some sort of willful denial.

I see the idea of the "third-world" invoked all the time to describe conditions in Detroit. And on the surface level of poverty and desperation it does seem an apt comparison. However, the main difference between third-world cities and Detroit is that third-world cities are almost all suffering from OVER-population. The richest people often live near the center of these cities too. The hollowed out donut city, with most of the wealth having travelled to the periphery surrounding a once-prosperous under-populated core area largely peopled by the poor and destitute, really seems to be a primarily American phenomenon.

[bartock]

Perhaps I'm a little thrown off by having grown up and lived on the east side for all these years, and being 5 generations in here with family spread out from St. Clair Shores to downtown, but I tend to think of this all being one big common area, one place, the east side of the city, the various Pointes, southern Macomb. Hell, my great-grandfather once owned some significant pieces of what's now Harper Woods and East Detroit [[ummm... Eastpointe... heh heh), in addition to land in what's now the Hayes-Kelly area, and houses on Eastlawn, Newport, and Chalmers. But leaving geographic proximity aside for the moment, it doesn't seem like you could pay attention to the news around here and not know these things. Unless you were in some sort of willful denial.

I see the idea of the "third-world" invoked all the time to describe conditions in Detroit. And on the surface level of poverty and desperation it does seem an apt comparison. However, the main difference between third-world cities and Detroit is that third-world cities are almost all suffering from OVER-population. The richest people often live near the center of these cities too. The hollowed out donut city, with most of the wealth having travelled to the periphery surrounding a once-prosperous under-populated core area largely peopled by the poor and destitute, really seems to be a primarily American phenomenon.

I'm new here, obviously [[but have been observing for a while), but I think you are right in the sense that perhaps the third world description is a little tired in the U.S. and certainly inaccurate by your insightful and I would say accurate observation. Sadly, I think there are areas I have seen recently that may be more accurately described as "urban Appalachia" for the fact that the people there do not seem to know what is going on just a few miles from them and tend to be led like sheep by their local pastors.

[bartock]

I'm new here, obviously [[but have been observing for a while), but I think you are right in the sense that perhaps the third world description is a little tired in the U.S. and certainly inaccurate by your insightful and I would say accurate observation. Sadly, I think there are areas I have seen recently that may be more accurately described as "urban Appalachia" for the fact that the people there do not seem to know what is going on just a few miles from them and tend to be led like sheep by their local pastors.

in immediate retrospect, I only say the pastor thing from limited observations/"interviews" of several individuals who live there.