WNYC reporter Arun Venugopal's look at New York City street life, night life, sex, class, ethnicity -- and cats!
Time Square 1943.
double decker bus race, 1933 (www.retronaut.com)
Fifth Ave early AM from my old negatives. Oct 1970
Why do I love Queens? Among the many reasons are our elevated trains. To emerge from the tunnels...
Donald Glover talking about the comments he received...
A photo tweeted by Yoko Ono yesterday, the 44th anniversary of her marriage to John Lennon. He was shot outside the Dakota, on W. 72nd. Those are the glasses he wore the night he was killed.
“The death of a loved one is a hollowing experience. After 33 years our son Sean and I still miss him.” Yoko Ono Lennon
Caracas, the biggest city in Venezuela, “has one of the highest homicide rates in the world; last year, in a city of three million, an estimated thirty-six hundred people were murdered, or about one every two hours.” — Jon Lee Anderson in The New Yorker
To put 3,600 murders in perspective, consider this: New York City, which has nearly three times as many residents as Caracas, had 414 homicides in 2012 — an all-time low.
If NYC had the same murder rate as Caracas, it would’ve experienced around 10,000 murders.
In 1990, during the darkest days of the crack epidemic and a nationwide spike in crime, New York saw 2,245 murders. But this month it had a run of 9 consecutive days without a single killing. That’s pretty amazing, and a couple decades ago, would’ve seemed impossible.
Let’s hope Caraqueños have the same sort of turnaround in store.
—Photo credit Leo Prieto
Brooklyn-ite and Satmar Hasidic Jew Nechemya Weberman was sentenced to 103 years in prison today, for sexually abusing a girl who came to him for therapy.
But ask any of his neighbors about the sentence and you’re unlikely to hear anyone voice criticism of Weberman.
I asked dozens of people on the streets of Williamsburg how they felt, and the vast majority declined to speak. Was it the Arctic cold? That probably played a part.
But most of them seemed more repelled by the subject matter. As one Hasidic source told me, over the phone: the issue is so toxic in the community that nobody wants to go public, whether they support Weberman or think he’s guilty. There’s also a sense, he said, that the media implicated not just the accuser, but the entire community.
The few people who did grant me interviews voiced support for Weberman, and suggested his accuser — who’s now 18 — was a badly-behaved girl who couldn’t be trusted.
One man, a 48-year-old factory manager named Reuven (no one gave me their last name either), said Weberman was the victim of a “revenge” plot.
Reuven said “everybody is hoping” the revenge argument would come out in the open during the appeals process.
Another man, Charlie, argued that the whole case was politically motivated — a way for Brooklyn D.A. Charles Hynes to prove his tough-on-crime credentials. Weberman, in Charlie’s view, was simply a scapegoat.
But the judge ruled in favor of the accuser, who said she had been abused from age 12 to 15.
One Satmar resident, a woman named Rifki who runs a glove store, told me she was Weberman’s niece. She thinks he’ll ultimately be cleared.
“One nice day, he will show us that’s he going to come out of the jail and everybody’s going to see that he wasn’t guilty,” said Rifki. “He was clean of anything that was put onto him.”
Candlelight vigil I attended last night in Union Square, NYC for Jyoti Singh Pandey, the victim of the brutal gang rape in New Delhi.
The vigil, organized by Sakhi, drew a lot of South Asian women, but also men, along with whites, African Americans, and others.
How is it that this one particular act of sexual violence, thousands of miles away, has resonated so deeply with Americans and others in the West?
“What I’m seeing for the first time, really, is American feminists and American women’s organizations seeing the moment in India as an opening for us to be talking about what’s going on in the United States as well,” said Mallika Dutt, who heads the New York/New Delhi-based women’s rights group Breakthrough. “Women in the United States are saying ‘When are we going to see the day when we see young men in America really get out onto the streets and support ending violence against women there?’”
Many activists argue that the rape incident in India wasn’t the product of some far-flung, patriarchal society but speaks to global patterns of abuse.
“I don’t think we’ve had anything as galvanizing in sexual assault in more than 20 years, since the Central Park jogger case,” said Sonia Ossorio, who heads the New York City chapter of NOW, the National Organization for Women. “We’re hearing from women, and men, and fathers every single day, here in our office.”
Patrick Lemmon, co-founder or the Washington DC-based group Men Can Stop Rape, says the presence of so many men at demonstrations in India dovetails with contemporary efforts to involve American men in conversations about violence, before any crime is committed. And he’s hopeful that something good will ultimately emerge.
“We’ve seen tens of thousands of people gathering in the streets, talking about this issue in India, in ways that, from what I’m reading, has not happened before,” he said. “So this is the real moment of possibility. It’s an incredible tragedy, and we have an opportunity, as a world and as the nation of India, to say ‘This is not who we are. We choose to be different.’”
Listen to my story on how “India’s Rape Case Prompts an American Dialogue”
I’ve been asking various 2nd amendment scholars what they think will emerge from the Newtown tragedy. Randy Barnett, a professor at George Washington University Law Center, had this to say — it sounds a lot like what gun owners in other states have told me in the past, that gun control advocates like Mayor Bloomberg are hypocrites:
“It is appalling to see this tragedy exploited to advance measures that would have done nothing to prevent it. I want to know the types of weapons Mayor Bloomberg’s bodyguards use to protect his safety, and whether he will order them to disarm. If not, why not? Is his safety more important than that of mere citizens?”
Given the combative tone of the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre earlier today, we’re looking at a serious gun control brawl in the coming months.
Mayor Bloomberg, probably the country’s best-known gun control advocate, had this to say in response to the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre:
“The NRA’s Washington leadership has long been out of step with its members, and never has that been so apparent as this morning. Their press conference was a shameful evasion of the crisis facing our country. Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create, they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe. Leadership is about taking responsibility, especially in times of crisis. Today the NRA’s lobbyists blamed everyone but themselves for the crisis of gun violence. While they promote armed guards, they continue to oppose the most basic and common sense steps we can take to save lives - not only in schools, but in our movie theaters, malls, and streets. Enough. As a country, we must rise above special interest politics. Every day, 34 Americans are murdered with guns. That’s why 74 percent of NRA members support common sense restrictions like criminal background checks for anyone buying a gun. It is time for Americans who care about the Second Amendment and reasonable gun restrictions to join together to work with the President and Congress to stop the gun violence in this country. Demand a plan.” - Mayor Bloomberg, December 21, 2012
Like everyone else, I’ve found the Newtown coverage almost unbearable to follow, and yet that’s my job, so I read everything I can, and gaze at images of little coffins being carried into hearses.
There have been times over the past couple days when I’ve found myself inexplicably tired. And then I realize that this is my body’s response to the news: it’s exhausting to grow emotional every few hours.
What’s going to come of all this? Too early to say, and although terrible shooting tragedies have happened before, with no legislative impact, one activist I spoke to is feeling hopeful.
“I feel encouraged,” said Jackie Hilly, who runs New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, “because I think the emotional component of what has happened in the last week, I really think it’s a turning point.”
She turned to Civil Rights history to find an appropriate analogy.
“It’s reminiscent of the 4 girls being bombed at the church in Birmingham. There are certain episodes in our history that the tides just change, because the victims are so innocent.”
I find it almost impossible to write meaningfully about the children who died at Sandy Hook Elementary. Not just because it’s emotionally overwhelming — it is — but because it is simply inexplicable. Beyond what language can contain.
Instead, I’d like to say a word about the 6 women who died at the school that day:
As a child growing up in Texas, my Hindu parents taught me to regard education — the acquisition of knowledge — as a serious thing. That it is in fact sacred, the preserve of deities like Saraswati and Ganesha. When you’re a kid, that can be a little abstract, but certain basic rules — no defacing books, no touching books (or even paper) with your feet — take root.
One of the most fundamental principles, as far as they were concerned, was that teachers were to be respected. So for my folks, and for me now as an adult and parent, it was always mystifying to see teachers in this country, and teaching, be disparaged. Legitimate public debates over education reform seemed to cross a line at some point when they allowed the regular and casual vilification of teachers, to suggest that as a group they’re underperformers, or couldn’t make it in the ‘real world.’
And then things like this happen.
No teacher should think their lives are on the line when they enter a classroom, but tragedies like Newtown are stark reminders of the responsibility school instructors bear on a daily basis. My hope is that Victoria Soto — the 27-year-old Sandy Hook teacher reportedly shot dead as she rushed her kids into a storage room — will be remembered as not just an individual hero, but someone who helped redefine her profession.
Because just as we acknowledge with police officers and fire fighters, and with members of our military, the pay for teachers is rarely equal to the work put in. But the least we can do as a society is accord honor to those willing to serve.
As if the death of a subway commuter, pushed onto the tracks, weren’t enough, we have the following to digest:
According to DNA: “More than a minute — and possibly as long as 90 seconds — elapsed before the train slammed into him, a police source said. It was not immediately clear whether anyone on the platform tried to help Han to safety. ‘People were just standing in shock,’ said witness Patrick Gomez.” [DNA]
Well, not everyone. Certainly not the photographer R. Umar Abbasi, whose image graces the New York Post’s controversial cover.
According to the Post article, Abbasi claims he was “running” toward the victim, 58-year-old Ki-Suck Han, while simultaneously “firing off” his flash in order to alert the train. This narrative doesn’t really hold up, however, when you simply examine the photo.
Does that image look as if it were taken in mid-sprint? To me it looks like a perfectly level, well-composed picture, taken by someone whose feet were planted pretty firm — a freelance photojournalist, as it turns out.
Another day, another subway commuter pushed onto the tracks. He was just declared dead: Asian man, 58 years old.
Like a lot of other people, I can occasionally be found leaning far out over the tracks, in hopes of spying the first lights of a distant train. It’s a thoroughly useless exercise.
And then I read about incidents like this one and I’m reminded to step back, away from that bright-yellow precipice. I imagine myself hunkering down, lowering my center of gravity, planting my feet as hard as I can. I look around, sizing up the people on my platform. Who’s most likely to want to kill me?
After a few days of this, I’ll get complacent and start leaning back over those tracks again. It’s a luxury, in a sense — a sign that we trust our fellow commuters. But for now, I figure, a little paranoia pays.
(Photo by Eric Skiff)
“Two teens beat a 70-year-old Queens man after asking him if he was Hindu or Muslim, police said Friday.” [NYDN]
This happened in Corona, Queens. The cops are searching for two Hispanic males. On one hand, it’s a savage act, plain and simple. On the other hand, there’s an element of sophistication within this savagery. The stereotypical American bigot, you imagine, doesn’t stop to consider such fine nuances as Hindu vs. Muslim before initiating an all-out assault — it’s all just a whole bunch ‘o’ brown, right?
But of course, it’s not, as is made clear by the suspect profiles — “dark haired” Hispanics going after someone who’s presumably South Asian, and just as dark.
This question, “Are you Hindu or Muslim?” is so strange to encounter in a New York crime story, especially for an Indian guy like me. For anyone who has roots in South Asia, it’s the question seemingly repeated, ad nauseum, throughout all spasms of Hindu-Muslim violence.
After all, many Hindus and Muslims in India or Pakistan are ethnically identical, distinguished only by their religiously-ascribed clothing or something just as superficial. During any episode of inter-religious butchering, the question is presumably thrust at anyone who doesn’t fit into a clear category. But even rampaging mobs can be savvy, and know very well that the person being asked is willing to answer with whatever identity is most practical at that moment.
From this cynicism was born a test of sorts: if the mob doubts the veracity of the answer — suspects that the person is in fact Hindu when he said Muslim, or vice-versa — it forces him to drop his pants, and reveal whether he is circumcised (Muslim) or not (Hindu).
The body, it figured, couldn’t lie.
![As if the death of a subway commuter, pushed onto the tracks, weren’t enough, we have the following to digest:According to DNA: “More than a minute — and possibly as long as 90 seconds — elapsed before the train slammed into him, a police source said. It was not immediately clear whether anyone on the platform tried to help Han to safety. ‘People were just standing in shock,’ said witness Patrick Gomez.” [DNA]Well, not everyone. Certainly not the photographer R. Umar Abbasi, whose image graces the New York Post’s controversial cover.According to the Post article, Abbasi claims he was “running” toward the victim, 58-year-old Ki-Suck Han, while simultaneously “firing off” his flash in order to alert the train. This narrative doesn’t really hold up, however, when you simply examine the photo.Does that image look as if it were taken in mid-sprint? To me it looks like a perfectly level, well-composed picture, taken by someone whose feet were planted pretty firm — a freelance photojournalist, as it turns out.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_meiz7ouTSC1rbynwco1_400.jpg)
![“Two teens beat a 70-year-old Queens man after asking him if he was Hindu or Muslim, police said Friday.” [NYDN]
This happened in Corona, Queens. The cops are searching for two Hispanic males. On one hand, it’s a savage act, plain and simple. On the other hand, there’s an element of sophistication within this savagery. The stereotypical American bigot, you imagine, doesn’t stop to consider such fine nuances as Hindu vs. Muslim before initiating an all-out assault — it’s all just a whole bunch ‘o’ brown, right?
But of course, it’s not, as is made clear by the suspect profiles — “dark haired” Hispanics going after someone who’s presumably South Asian, and just as dark.
This question, “Are you Hindu or Muslim?” is so strange to encounter in a New York crime story, especially for an Indian guy like me. For anyone who has roots in South Asia, it’s the question seemingly repeated, ad nauseum, throughout all spasms of Hindu-Muslim violence.
After all, many Hindus and Muslims in India or Pakistan are ethnically identical, distinguished only by their religiously-ascribed clothing or something just as superficial. During any episode of inter-religious butchering, the question is presumably thrust at anyone who doesn’t fit into a clear category. But even rampaging mobs can be savvy, and know very well that the person being asked is willing to answer with whatever identity is most practical at that moment.
From this cynicism was born a test of sorts: if the mob doubts the veracity of the answer — suspects that the person is in fact Hindu when he said Muslim, or vice-versa — it forces him to drop his pants, and reveal whether he is circumcised (Muslim) or not (Hindu).
The body, it figured, couldn’t lie.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mebm7ioQ0a1rbynwco1_400.jpg)
![“Two teens beat a 70-year-old Queens man after asking him if he was Hindu or Muslim, police said Friday.” [NYDN]
This happened in Corona, Queens. The cops are searching for two Hispanic males. On one hand, it’s a savage act, plain and simple. On the other hand, there’s an element of sophistication within this savagery. The stereotypical American bigot, you imagine, doesn’t stop to consider such fine nuances as Hindu vs. Muslim before initiating an all-out assault — it’s all just a whole bunch ‘o’ brown, right?
But of course, it’s not, as is made clear by the suspect profiles — “dark haired” Hispanics going after someone who’s presumably South Asian, and just as dark.
This question, “Are you Hindu or Muslim?” is so strange to encounter in a New York crime story, especially for an Indian guy like me. For anyone who has roots in South Asia, it’s the question seemingly repeated, ad nauseum, throughout all spasms of Hindu-Muslim violence.
After all, many Hindus and Muslims in India or Pakistan are ethnically identical, distinguished only by their religiously-ascribed clothing or something just as superficial. During any episode of inter-religious butchering, the question is presumably thrust at anyone who doesn’t fit into a clear category. But even rampaging mobs can be savvy, and know very well that the person being asked is willing to answer with whatever identity is most practical at that moment.
From this cynicism was born a test of sorts: if the mob doubts the veracity of the answer — suspects that the person is in fact Hindu when he said Muslim, or vice-versa — it forces him to drop his pants, and reveal whether he is circumcised (Muslim) or not (Hindu).
The body, it figured, couldn’t lie.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mebm7ioQ0a1rbynwco2_500.jpg)
