On the issue of gentrification in our neighborhoods...
Some people view gentrification as being a bad thing, they just want cheap rent, and they do not care about issues like drugs, crime, murders, and stuff like that. But, with gentrification the prices go up, and in order to live in the area you need to have some sort of means of making more money, which means that you have job training, or are some sort of educated professional, and so you end up with a higher class of people, and the crime goes down, and people begin to expect more from the community and more from themselves. Instead of jumping into a gang and dealing drugs or whatever, you expect more from your life, so instead of prisons you build colleges. Instead of raising gangsters, you are raising doctors and lawyers, and future world leaders, etc.
Making things nice and expecting more from ourselves is a good thing. Building colleges instead of prisons is a good thing. And the children have better role models. The children want to be more like Elon Musk, and less like Lil Wayne.
It is worthwhile to clean up the neighborhoods and make them nice, and to have nice restaurants and stuff, even though the prices go up.
I have seen areas go down, and I have seen areas rise, and it is much better when areas rise. And some people are taught that pride is a bad thing, or that it is only for gays, but that is all bullshit, we should all have pride, and we should try to make our Moms proud of us, etc. Pride is natural in nature too, just look at a stallion, you can see the pride in a nice stallion.
And instead of numbing their brains with drugs, the kids can feed their minds with books. They can be proud and smart instead of being self loathing and drug addicted. They can be the ones who help others, instead of always needing someone else to help them. They can be givers instead of takers.
Gentrification can be a good thing for a neighborhood. Higher rents are worth it if crime goes down, and if people expect more out of themselves and more out of each other, and if people take pride in their neighborhood instead of complaining about living in a ghetto.
Those are just a few thoughts on that.
Salute,
Tony V.