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Buffalo crime seems to be on rise


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Each morning at 9:00am I read the am edition of the news online. The last few months I have noticed so many more stories about gangs,drugs,fighting and a million other illegal activities. Even when you read about the suburbs, there is plenty of negative stuff going on lately. With all the poverty and job loss, it makes sense, however it is hard to read each day. Our fair city is now a shell of what it use to be and I wish it was different. Having grown up away from that kinda stuff, I am not use to it. For those of you out there, am I way off?? What is it like in other cities of the same size and economic climate? Are the problems I keep reading about normal or excessive? You opinions are much appreciated. In Clearwater, there is a ton of crime, however rising property values and nice weather seem to hide a lot of it.

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Each morning at 9:00am I read the am edition of the news online. The last few months I have noticed so many more stories about gangs,drugs,fighting and a million other illegal activities. Even when you read about the suburbs, there is plenty of negative stuff going on lately.

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With nothing else going on to move it off the front page(s), crime stories get more play.

 

I don't sense any great change in the overall crime rate, however. If anything it seems less prevelant than back in the days when Irv Weinstein used to shout: "pistol packing punks...news at 11!" on a nightly basis :)

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Maybe just the city is bad. The drug dealing is bad and all the houses are old and dirty. For those of you in the nice section of town near Delaware Park save your comments. I realize there are pockets of nice areas but the majority is gross and dirty.

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A bit off topic but Once you get out and live in other metro areas (like Atlanta or DC/MD/VA)...you get back to Buffalo and realize just how segregated it is. In the larger cities, you have hispanics, blacks, Asians, etc...mixing in with the suburban white folks. In Buffalo's suburbs it's like 95% white. It's seems weird to me now.

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The key here is that if one bases your perception of crime stats or the world based on what you see in the news, you will almost certainly have an inaccurate view.

 

The newsmedia used to be a public service that happened to be a business, but today it is a business that happens to be a public service.

 

The main rule I see is one that if ANYONE depends primarily upon a single source for your news (be it CNN, Fox, the NYT or the New York Post) you are going to get a significantly inaccurate view of the world.

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A bit off topic but Once you get out and live in other metro areas (like Atlanta or DC/MD/VA)...you get back to Buffalo and realize just how segregated it is.  In the larger cities, you have hispanics, blacks, Asians, etc...mixing in with the suburban white folks.  In Buffalo's suburbs it's like 95% white.  It's seems weird to me now.

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A lot of that might be due to the fact that the city, as a whole, has been suffering so long financially. Things don't change much, when there isn't the resources available to make change...

 

However, you also have to be leary of news coverage. For whatever reason, people seem drawn to bad news, the worse, the more interesting. To anyone who is into that whole FOX News vs CNN News debate (you know, the arch conservative news organization vs the Clinton News Network) you must have, by now, observed CNN's near complete makeover into a FOX clone. I work in a health facility, where the television is balring all day long. Some days it is on FOX, but most days on CNN. Each of these networks have taken covering tragedy to all new levels. Sure, it is terrible when some lunatic kills his own daughter and her friend, but from the amount of coverage it has received, you would think it was the only thing that had happened in the country, the whole day.

 

They have caught on to this trend of covering one horrible, dark, event, until another one happens to usurp it from the front burner. If you only read the front page, or read the headlines, the whole world looks pretty grim right now. It seems much easier to impress upon people the dark side of everything, rather than the less spicey, more realistic side to things....

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A bit off topic but Once you get out and live in other metro areas (like Atlanta or DC/MD/VA)...you get back to Buffalo and realize just how segregated it is.  In the larger cities, you have hispanics, blacks, Asians, etc...mixing in with the suburban white folks.  In Buffalo's suburbs it's like 95% white.  It's seems weird to me now.

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True. Buffalo is one of the most white and black cities that I have ever seen. It used to be that Main Street was the divider between whites and blacks. No longer, as the black population has grown into the West Side. As Buffalo's economy got worse and worse, those that needed to move out, that could move out, did move out. Primarily, it was people who could afford to go who never looked back. Many of those who left were the young who went to college and never returned. My guess is that in large part those who departed were white. As the economy has gotten even worse those who remained have suffered in desperation. No surprise that this has exacerbated race relations for the worse. Unfortunately, one of the better paying jobs in Buffalo is that of a drug dealer. Whites and blacks eyeball each other in mistrust. In some other cities, sizable groups of Asians and Latinos have neutralized the white and black polarization. Every time that I return to Buffalo, there is always somebody in downtown trying to con me. I keep moving, don't make eye contact and when that doesn't work, I give them the spin move. I wish for better days for all of the people of Buffalo.

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Maybee on the East Side....

 

or now in Cheektowaga...

 

Haha I moved from cheektowaga to South buffalo....

 

The area I'm in now is so much nicer than were I was in Cheektowaga

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Cheektowag? Huh?

 

I live in Cheektowaga - Dick/George Urban area and it's every bit as nice as most of Amherst...

 

Where in Cheektowaga is it that bad? Am I blind?

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In some other cities, sizable groups of Asians and Latinos have neutralized the white and black polarization.  Every time that I return to Buffalo, there is always somebody in downtown trying to con me.  I keep moving, don't make eye contact and when that doesn't work, I give them the spin move.  I wish for better days for all of the people of Buffalo.

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I think you're looking for things that aren't there...

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