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Fifty wrote:

Makarov wrote:For the US I would have to say Detroit.

I got lost in Detroit whilst driving around in a brand new Mustang Convertible. I was fecking terrified until I got back on the Interstate.

As for saying London is a dump, what the hell are you smoking? London is one of the best places in the world to live. And even if the gang crime is bad in some parts (and believe me, I know. I am just thankful I am just barely on the fringes of it, not mixed up right in it like some people I know) then most of London is as safe as anywhere in the world.

...Most of the country is "safe" to live. There is more to life than fear of criminal gangs. London is a dump; it smells, there's too many people, everyone's rude, you can't talk to strangers.

PapaPiggy wrote:Gangs in London? What is this world coming to? What you guys have drive by arguments? Not to troll, but it is just hard to believe that there are violent gangs in London.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_England_riots

The riots were not all that much to do with gangs.

I am Head of Year for an inner city school. One of the kids who is theoretically still part of my year group is actually in prison for a murder he committed when he was 12. Another of my pupils got stabbed twice in the neck and also in the lungs last July, on his way home from school, and was lucky to live. Back in November I had to throw himout of school because he was found with a knife on the way into an exam. Another kid had to go when a sawn-off and ammo was found under his bed by the police.

From other year groups, we had a 14 year old put away on high-level drug distribution charges. A pupil got stabbed in the back of his thigh just outside the front door of school and nearly bled out in reception a few years ago. At least five or six more kids have been stabbed in the last coupld of years. Last week, an ex-pupil for put away on drug-dealing charges. Two girls got put away trying to bring almost $1,000,000 of drugs back from the Caribbean.

That is the stuff I can remember off the top of my head, so it includes most of the worst stuff, but there is a constant stream of less serious stuff. And I haven't even spoken about the deprivation and child neglect issues I deal with on a weekly basis, just the actual violent stuff.

Plus they don't have any Greggs.

http://sites.google.com/site/londonstreetgangs/gang-lists/east-london-gangs

But despite this, I still love London.

Is PappaPiggy a real person, d'you think?

Or do you think he's just excellently playing the character of the 'ignorant Yank' stereotype, for humourous purposes?

Fifty wrote:

Makarov wrote:For the US I would have to say Detroit.

I got lost in Detroit whilst driving around in a brand new Mustang Convertible. I was fecking terrified until I got back on the Interstate.

As for saying London is a dump, what the hell are you smoking? London is one of the best places in the world to live. And even if the gang crime is bad in some parts (and believe me, I know. I am just thankful I am just barely on the fringes of it, not mixed up right in it like some people I know) then most of London is as safe as anywhere in the world.

There is a reason why everyone I known who lives near Detroit has a Concealed weapons license. I know there have been issues with wild dogs in the city, and I remember here they found a bear well within the city limits.

Albatross wrote:Is PappaPiggy a real person, d'you think?

Or do you think he's just excellently playing the character of the 'ignorant Yank' stereotype, for humourous purposes?

It makes me feel better about humanity to believe so.

I'm going to get hate for this, but Chicago is the most overrated city in America and possibly on earth. I've been there a few times, and I have hated it more with each visit. If Adepticon wasn't in the area I'd never set foot in that area again. Honorable mention goes to Portland, Maine. Nuke it from orbit.

Ah. I was thinking about Chicago for next year, when me and the missus cross the pond for our holiday. Actually, this thread is good in that it helps me know where to avoid!

In terms of the UK? Don't go to Bradford. It's a gak-tip.

If you haven't been to NYC, I'd say go there.

For purely selfish reasons, I say you should come to the San Diego area and let me take you on a Ron Burgundy-esque tour of the city.

Everyone goes to New York though, don't they? I just wanted to try something different. I was thinking of heading further south, maybe visiting my uncle. He trains race horses in N. Carolina.



I love telling people that. It makes me sound debonaire.

Albatross wrote:Everyone goes to New York though, don't they?

That or Las Vegas.

Which I also heartily endorse.

PapaPiggy wrote:Gangs in London? What is this world coming to? What you guys have drive by arguments? Not to troll, but it is just hard to believe that there are violent gangs in London.

According to some recent statistics London has a violent crime rate 3 times higher than New York...

I vote Toronto for the sheer level of utter stupidity that pervades the city...

- Because we have a Conservative federal government and a Conservative Mayor, the citizens of Toronto decided to vote the provincial 'Fib'erals back into power just to avoid having conservatives at all three levels of government.
So, instead of 'usefull' things like 'job creation' and killing moronic programs like the 'go green initiative', we instead get to pay-out 1.5+ billion dollars for tax-payer funded all-day daycare. (otherwise touted as 'full day kindergarden')

- Toronto wants to call itself a 'world class city!' on the level of New York, London et all. What do all world class cities have in spades to keep people moving? Subways!
Toronto has some of the worst gridlock in the entirety of North America! (Yay! We're even worse than LA!!!) The 'leftist loonies' & 'moronic middle' on city council vote to reduce commute times by building... Light Rail Transit... On a street that's already jam-packed with vehicles... In a climate where the rail lines typically freeze in the winter months.
So, what were the area residents asking for? Yep, you guessed it, subways!
Why did city council vote for LRT's? To peeve-off the Mayor and make him look bad.

- In January 1999, the city of Toronto declared a 'snow disaster' and at taxpayers expense called in the army reserve to... shovel snow!


- Toronto hockey fans willingly pay the highest ticket prices in the entire NHL. The 'cheap seats', will run you around $80-$90 per ticket.
The 'Make-ya-Laughs' as they are known, haven't played in a single play-off game since 2004! (longest streak of any team in the entire league IIRC!)
The seats of the Air Canada Center are still full every single night...
The 'fans' decry the woefull state of the team and lament endlessly about how awful things are demanding change...
Somehow, with the money still rolling every single year even when icing one of the worst teams in the league, nothing has changed?!!

Makarov wrote:For the US I would have to say Detroit.

Yeah. Detroit is a toilet.

Swindon...

Decatur, Illinois.
East St. Louis, Illinois.

Squidmanlolz wrote:Camden, NJ. Guns get hauled in from across the Delaware river. people shoot each other, nonstop. The police just try to keep themselves safe, and nearly allow the shootings to resolve themselves as long as no innocents get injured (most of them have moved out anyway). It's the closest thing to a post-apocalyptic hellhole warzone I've ever encountered.

http://www.cityrating.com/crime-statistics/new-jersey/camden.html

.... No words can explain how horrifying just reading that is.

Edina, Minnesota. Fething cake-eaters.

How new jersey was created btw.
Its not violent. Its so loveable.

Albatross wrote:Is PappaPiggy a real person, d'you think?

Or do you think he's just excellently playing the character of the 'ignorant Yank' stereotype, for humourous purposes?

I don't know if i should be mad at this, Or are you calling me a robot? Either way i don't know how to feel about this. First off, living in the USA, We see and get it all. Gang violence to a level that its hard to believe. Drug labs out the ares. You name it and we got it. But i personally was half joking about the gangs in London. I had always thought gun laws in London made it harder to get a gun.

But when it comes to gangs, Not warlords or warring bodies with in a country, The us takes the cake. You walk about certain parts of La wearing certain colors and you get shot. Not even the freedom to wear colors.Its just hard to believe the same crimes happen in jolly old London, A year ago the police raided a home i have past a ton of times, only to find a full scale meth lab, and three bodies burried in the back yard. And if you couldn't tell yes i am a real person. And yes I might be a ignorant yank, But then again calling me a yank is a stereotypical brit, now isn't it.

My vote is still for KC,KS-MO, Mo is a lot worse than KS, Its like the KS side is the rich side, and the MO side gets poor very fast. But if you stay to the street lights and don't get out of your car, they are both ok.

And i try and be funny, There isn't a point in talking about how screwed up our cities are with out some humor. It keeps us focused on the fact that this wasn't made to mock or point out the deaths of so many it was made to mock and make fun of the cities we all know and hate for what ever reasons. Please remember this when you post. We aren't posting in this thread to disrespect those who have died or their families. This thread is here to compare cities to one another and to pass the time. Thank you

PapaPiggy wrote:

hotsauceman1 wrote:

Grakmar wrote:I'm sorry, but no where in America or western Europe should even be mentioned in a "worst cities in the world" debate. At worst, you're talking about bad weather or some local gun violence.

Compare that to, say Mogadishu in Somalia, where there's a civil war that's been going on for 20 years now, and bandits walk the streets with AK-47s. Bogota, Colombia or Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, where violence and murder is a constant part of life.

Or, perhaps you should compare to Dallol, Ethiopia. It's in the middle of the desert, with temperatures reaching 148F, and has pretty constant earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and rivers of acid flowing just underground. And, the only real employment is working in the mines to mine salt.

But!!!!
I have to walk 30 minutes for a decent burger.

First off, FUNNY. I have to drive thirty mins to get a good burger. And hate to tell you dude. but when you don't live in a third world country the problems change. Here in america we don't have war lords killing every one. I get people like the BTK killer, who you don't know who he is, At least a warlord you know who not to screw with. Around here Who knows, you could be shot by a nice little old lady. You could die while picking up your children from school. Doesn't mean our cities aren't any worse, Just means they are on a different scale.

Kinda like lower class problems and upper class problems. I don't have the season packet to my Ramen noodles, They don't have a $500 bottle of wine, Different problems for different people.

versus

PapaPiggy wrote:Gangs in London? What is this world coming to? What you guys have drive by arguments? Not to troll, but it is just hard to believe that there are violent gangs in London.

Every country has scum:



Though tbh they're a tad too comical to be gang members...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_England_riots

That's more illustrative, but of course it's because of 'people abandoned by society' with 'no prospects', waah waaah waah people do bad things because we poor liberals have failed them. Nothing to do with the prevalent sense of entitlement amongst a lot of folks... A Gangster got in iffy circumstances (I'm not really bothered - at the end of the day a bad man was removed from the world) and a legitimate protest came out about it; but then people used that as a veneer to engage in common looting.

Not really sure what I can say about gangs without getting censored by the mods... Racial profiling is a hot topic after all and, ultimately, a sheltered white middle class kiddy like myself is going to give a very skewed and biased view about London gangs that is formed entirely by what I see in the media; but if we look at gang stabbings there's a pattern in the victims.

PapaPiggy, untwist your knickers. Your thread is depressingly dismissive of the problems that are faced in the third world and gives me a negative impression of you. When posting on an international board, you've got to post with a sense of scale and think about this stuff, and you should reflect rather than getting defensive.
You want to talk about gang violence, talk about mexico. Talk about columbia. You think warlords are somehow better than gang members? Gimme a break. Go read about it. Then come back.

Da Boss wrote:PapaPiggy, untwist your knickers. Your thread is depressingly dismissive of the problems that are faced in the third world and gives me a negative impression of you. When posting on an international board, you've got to post with a sense of scale and think about this stuff, and you should reflect rather than getting defensive.
You want to talk about gang violence, talk about mexico. Talk about columbia. You think warlords are somehow better than gang members? Gimme a break. Go read about it. Then come back.

You're getting awfully preachy; the board over-represents Westerners and ultimately that's the PoV that will be over-represented. OP was just making a fun thread about cities we knew. Are you really so tetchy as to jump down peoples' throats because of ways in which the phrasing of a topic could possibly be construed?

Do you feel like a white knight? A noble crusader defending the destitute and the helpless? Was jumping down OP's neck your good deed for the year?

You're not this guy and until you are you shan't have my respect (though you do seem to talk like him):



Edit:

Actually, I'm a huge hypocrite because I just jumped down *your* throat without reading what OP had written in response to the allegations (the original ones being silly). I think saying the US 'takes the biscuit' is a wee bit silly and the phrasing is certainly off; but at no point does he deny that Mogadishu is a gakhole. I think the original purpose of the thread still stands.

Da Boss wrote:PapaPiggy, untwist your knickers. Your thread is depressingly dismissive of the problems that are faced in the third world and gives me a negative impression of you. When posting on an international board, you've got to post with a sense of scale and think about this stuff, and you should reflect rather than getting defensive.
You want to talk about gang violence, talk about mexico. Talk about columbia. You think warlords are somehow better than gang members? Gimme a break. Go read about it. Then come back.

Everyone might untwist theirs as well. Again the OP noted craptacular cities in each country.

Sure Dallas doesn't have the wanton violence of Detroit, or to a lesser extent Somalia.
Sure Dallas isn't as hot as the Sahara.
Sure Dallas isn't as stuck up as say Manhatten.
Sure Dallas isn't as flat as say Oklahoma.
but you know, its Dallas.


*To the unknowing its the law in Texas that people from Houston and Dallas make fun of each other. Its what we do. Its not personal, unlike our mutual disike of Austin metro. Thats personal.

The thread was made for fun, Its in the off-topic forum of a website that is geared toward people with enough money to waste on plastic men. Now if you want to be a d-bag about how i worded it then fine, But that isn't going to stop others from having a little bit of fun.

Gang members vs warlords, Are they the same. No they aren't. Now I have never heard of a gang trying to take control of a country to rape the land of its diamonds or drugs. Gangs don't have control over the general population. Gang members are low level hoodlums that want to control very little. And its not the people they want to control its the other criminals that they want to control. So they can sell drugs and what not with out being harassed by other gangs. That isn't the same thing as ENSLAVING YOUR OWN PEOPLE TO WORK DIAMOND MINDS AND DRUG LABS. Maybe you don't know what a gang is, or you are crossing the line between them.

Do i honestly care about third world nations that can't feed their own people because they are in a civil war every other week because their leaders can't control them? No... I really don't. Its their leaders job to lead. Should i feel bad because there are places in the world with out clean drinking water? No, Its not my problem, I have to worry about feeding my child daily, I can't worry about the countries in the world that haven't done anything to help them selves in the last 60 years. China Needed to feed their people, what did they do? Found a way to get the most use of their land to feed their people, What are the people in africa doing? Killing one another for the few crops they can get. and the few supplies that come in. Why haven't they come up with ways of growing food? Ways of distilling water to make it drinkable? Why hasn't any of this happened? Because that would take to much time and raping and killing your own people works better.

Don't talk down to me. The sheer fact that you bring it up means that you have white people problems. You don't care about the people in your own country going through the same things, but will jump on a chance to donate to countries that have ruined themselves. When was the last time you helped a single mother with buying diapers? Or did you just yell at them to get a job?

As for the bigger American cities its parts of the cities that suck. New York is a great City, but when you get closer to the older parts. They start to get run down and rather crappy. I haven't heard any one name a place that no one knows . Personally i can't stand Bladwin city KS, There is nothing going on there. Their only Mc Donalds is in the same building as a gas station. I swear time stops there. Or Alma KS, The local hang out for teens, the only gas station. Cities like that never get named. Don't know why though.

Of the places I've visited, parts of Philly and almost all of Baltimore.

Back in the UK, Coventry, bloody awful place.







Automatically Appended Next Post:

PapaPiggy wrote:Gangs in London? What is this world coming to? What you guys have drive by arguments? Not to troll, but it is just hard to believe that there are violent gangs in London.

There were 5,500 knife crimes in inner city London in 2011.

There were 2,600 gun crimes in inner city London in 2011.

There were 36,000 personal robberies in inner city London in 2011.

There were 137 murders in inner city London in 2011.

There were 170,000 physical assaults in inner city London in 2011.

Do you seriously think we all go to work on penny farthing bycycles and wear top hats? Are you that naive? Most of them don't possess guns, so actual fatalities are far lower, but many criminals carry knives and the overall reduction of risk by firearms leads to a massive rate of physical assault and attack. If you have no fear that the other guy is packing, you're far more likely to beat snot out of him, especially if drink is involved, and the British are a nation of drinkers.

Considering how many people live in London, those figures tend to support the impression that it's a rather civilized place.

Manchu wrote:Considering how many people live in London, those figures tend to support the impression that it's a rather civilized place.

Note the figures did not include Greater London; which is a pretty big place.

Not so many people live in the inner city.


Also in other places crime is common; I imagine this is normal in the US too, but I'd say everyone has a friend who has been a victim of a mugging/assault in the last few years.

Henners91 wrote:Not so many people live in the inner city.

Isn't it well above three million?

Manchu wrote:Considering how many people live in London, those figures tend to support the impression that it's a rather civilized place.

It is, but the notion we don't have crime or that some parts of any major city in the UK are dangerous places smacks of trolling.

Bristol, where I lived for several years, is, overall, a mild city with rural tendencies. Yet go skipping merrily though St Pauls or Western at night and see how long it is before you're bereft of your valuables or missing a limb.