What’s So Great about Gated Communities

Another utopia seems to be biting the dust. The socialist kibbutzim of Israel have vanished or gone increasingly capitalist, and now the paranoid residential ideal represented by gated communities may be in serious trouble. Never exactly cool—remember Jim Carrey in “The Truman Show”?-- these pricey enclaves of privilege are becoming hotbeds of disillusionment.

At the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Washington last week, incoming association president Setha Lowe painted a picture so dispiriting that the audience guffawed in schadenfreude. The gated community residents Lowe interviewed had fled from ethnically challenging cities, but they have not managed to escape from their fear. One resident reported that her small daughter has developed a severe case of xenophobia, no doubt communicated by her parents:

We were driving next to a truck with some day laborers and equipment in the back, and we stopped beside them at the light. She [her daughter] wanted to move because she was afraid those people were going to come and get her. They looked scary to her.

Leaving aside the sorry spectacle of homeowners living in fear of their landscapers, there is actually something to worry about. According to Lowe, gated communities are no less crime-prone than open ones, and Gopal Ahluwalia, senior vice president of research at the National Association of Home Builders, confirms this: There are studies indicating that there are no differences in the crime in gated communities and non-gated communities. The security guards often wave people on in, especially if they look like they’re on a legitimate mission – such as the faux moving truck that entered a Fort Meyers’ gated community last spring and left with a houseful of furniture. Or the crime comes from within, as in the Hilton Head Plantation community in South Carolina where a rash of crime committed by resident teenagers has led to the imposition of a curfew.

Most recently, America’s gated communities have been blighted by foreclosures. Yes, even people who were able to put together the down payment on a half-million dollar house can be ambushed by Adjustable Rate Mortgages. Newsweek reports that foreclosures are devastating the gated community of Black Mountain Vista in Henderson NV, where “yellow patches [now] blot the spartan lawns and phone books lie on front porches, their covers bleached from weeks under the desert sun.” Similarly, according to the Orlando Sentinel, “countless homeowners overwhelmed by their mortgages are taking off and leaving behind algae-filled swimming pools and knee-high weeds” in one local gated community.

So, for people who sought, not just prosperity, but perfection, here’s another sad end to the American dream, or at least their ethnically cleansed version thereof: boarded-up McMansions, plastic baggies scudding over overgrown lawns, and, in the Orlando case, a foreclosure-induced infestation of snakes. You can turn away the Mexicans, the African-Americans, the teenagers and other suspect groups, but there’s no fence high enough to keep out the repo man.

All right, some gated communities are doing better than others, and not all of their residents are racists. The communities that allow owners to rent out their houses, or that offer homes at middle class prices of $250,000 or so, are more likely to contain a mixture of classes and races. The only gated community I have ever visited consisted of dull row houses protected by a slacker guard and a fence, and my host was a writer of liberal inclinations. But all these places suffer from the delusion that security lies behind physical barriers.

Before we turn all of America into a gated community, with a 700 mile steel fence running along the southern border, we should consider the mixed history of exclusionary walls. Ancient and medieval European towns huddled behind massive walls, only to face ever-more effective catapults, battering rams and other siege engines. More recently, the Berlin Wall, which the East German government described fondly as a protective “anti-fascism wall,” fell to a rebellious citizenry. Israel, increasingly sealed behind its anti-Palestinian checkpoints and wall, faced an outbreak of neo-Nazi crime in September – coming, strangely enough, from within.

But the market may have the last word on America’s internal gated communities. “Hell is a gated community,” announced the Sarasota Herald Tribune last June, reporting that market research by the big homebuilder Pulte Homes found that no one under 50 wants to live in them, so its latest local development would be un-gated. Security, or at least the promise of security, may be one consideration. But there’s another old-fashioned American imperative at work here, which ought to bear on our national policies as well. As my Montana forebears would have put it: Don’t fence me in!

Comments

[roger]

" All right, some gated communities are doing better than others, and not all of their residents are racists. "

ok, some socialist writers are more popularly read than others, and not all suffer from acrimony toward the wealthy and productive.

[roger]

" We were driving next to a truck with some day laborers and equipment in the back, and we stopped beside them at the light. She [her daughter] wanted to move because she was afraid those people were going to come and get her. They looked scary to her. "

do you have any further evidence of xenophobia among the white population or are you simply willing to smear all of us together based on some anecdote/urban legend.

[Hattie]

Jumped right on it, didn't you, Roger.
Yes, I'm sure everyone trying to make a buck in overpriced real estate will be furious at Ms.Ehrenreich.
I'm productive enough, and I would never live in a segregated community, much less a gated one.
I especially hate "retirement communities," which have all the features of suburbia dullness - wise without the young people and kids to liven them up.

[Deborah Coleman]

Deborah Coleman
1030 Eha St. # 203
Wailuku, HI 96793
Deboraha07@yahoo.com

Gated community contain:

Male Penises used as a tool for mass destruction? This my experience living on Maui and deserves National attention.

What is concealed on the mainland parades here nude and unashamed. Real Estate makes billions of dollars marketing and selling a pre-civil war life-style, The south did not loose the war. It’s some liberal plot to destroy conservative values.

February 2004 I rented a condo on Maui from the internet and landed here on the 27th of February, to study for the Hawaii Real-estate exam and build a nest egg, at 52 years of age I figured this was a nice relaxing way to achieve that goal. I took a four month temporary employment at one of the most prestigious resort on the NW side, so as not to burn up all my savings. I work out six days a week and with oily skin most people guessed me to be 27.

I absolutely loved working in the Human Resources department, great memories of laughs and good conversations. They were all natives except the receptionist, a European who also served as gate keeper. Accents denote intelligence and class here. She had poor work skills and was behind in her responsibilities, I was there to assist her in getting up to date.

Celibate for 15 years as the result of a spiritual path, it was interesting to watch the men’s reactions. The ones who were aware that it was not going to happen sent every young cherub, peaches and cream complexion, handsome, pretty man to pay me a visit in human resources. I had a daily stream of wooers from several European countries and the USA, bringing me treats or just good conversation. I smiled a lot and enjoyed each one. But they were no match for my goal of Real-estate, which honestly puzzled most and deeply offended the rest I later found out.

Working at Century 21 I got no support from my 76 year old broker who was living with an Asian woman, or my co-workers. I had to call a broker in California to walk me through my first sale.

I sniffed something in the air about me wanting to start a revolution and give the natives back their land. That’ s a stretch from saying no to their sexual advances. I know how much time, resources and energy it takes to spurn a revolution, and my primary goal was to relax. The thought police were not only paranoid, they felt guilty protecting a life-style unwanted on the island, the natives needed to see themselves as second class citizens in order for it to survive. Dissociated from this fact they were cowardly projecting it on to a target they feared the least resistance from.

Isolated and harassed I went in, more meditation, yoga and working out. I needed a clear picture of what was going on and everyone was told to stay away from me.

My Broker started showing me pictures of scantily dressed girls. I joked he reminded me of Hugh. I guess an agent thought I was dull minded and said “you’re the help!”, meaning I could not say no to the master on the plantation. Well I was not in denial, so yes I could, it was written in the first amendment .

Well I left the agency and relocated to the other side of the island, mostly natives, who were too involved in their own lives to care about mine, and found out I was banned from the Real Estate field. Checked out a Real-estate investment school visiting the Island, the rumors followed me and the realtors attending were disgusted with ugly scowls on their faces. I was not going to get away with this! Their women were happy to let me know. This was the most obvious form of projection I had ever seen and I work in the field of psychology.

Purchased a condo from a FSBO, realtors were not someone I wanted to do business with at this time, he was 31 year old part native and part Caucasian. On the mainland we would say he was brainwashed, revering his father excessively and socialized into exploiting his native mother. We had good conversations, he said we thought alike, I educated and enlighten some of his perceptions, and he asked me to be a partner in his real-estate investment business, told me he could get me a better loan then the one I had.

He got me a 6.2 interest only, with a 10,000. two year penalty loan with a second back to him for 12%. It was not better then the 5.9 40yr fixed I had. I said, “I am uncomfortable with this.” He said, “it was the only way it would go through” and I was already in the home, because he had made some errors that delayed the contract. “He said we can do it,” and I figured if I flipped a house I could pay the second back in less then a year.

The partnership never materialized, it was a revenge plot, the family values men’s rumor had followed me and he said “I am not the one who wants you out on the street” Bankrupt, Homeless and off the island, was the gift he could offer his oppressors.

Two courageous men who stood up for the constitution and their right to associate with whom they pleased, now have other jobs. No lawyer or politician on the Island will touch the case because their careers and fortunes depend on this pre-civil war life-style and I am an afro-American who is considered insufficiently subservient, and a threat to their liberal supply of sexual encounters, many of the natives are married (the men are also) but afraid to say no because they may loose their job.

The males behind this character assignation are immature, undeveloped in character, sex is their priority, a body is good, but you definitely do not need a mind and if you do, you are blinded, with dinner in 4 star restaurants, rides in 50,000. SUV’s, money for shopping trips, if you consider it luck, a two carrot diamond, or home, to keep it to your self.

If I had not lived it here I would not believe it still exist at this level in the USA. Many men on this Island have a home on the mainland, which means they conceal it when they get off the plane. A front row seat to their thinking process, is a privilege in a sad sort of way. My first question when I hear a man degrading a woman is “Did she say no?”

Mainlanders who visit here, own condos or come to be married, need to know what their money is supporting, and the degrading of the environment it takes to sustain it.

[Hattie]

OH, the world owes me a living!

[Hattie]

I live in Hawaii and we get a lot of unhinged people here like Deborah. It's kind of sad, really.
Sorry I was harsh.
Mental health care is so bad.

[Brian]

It's to be expected the way that Roger uses the word productive, like it's some kind of timeless, easily defined, old as the hills thing like say limestone. I don't think that being productive is something to head for ever, unless being productive means doing activities that are in tune with the so called productive persons own desires. For me for example, I wish I had a lot of leisure time to sit around and use my own creativity to shark websites because by my definition, that would be a productive activity. But by my businessman logic, the human consumer (homo consumeanomicus) is unproductive unless it is either shopping or working, which are by this point, increasingly similar activities. (Ever seen somebody on their 3rd Mocha with bags under their arms and eyes? Why not just give them a punchcard and be done with it.)

[roger]

it is interesting that the original column and the comments here appear to demonstrate animosity toward persons who would seek some manner of security in a gated community. as if seeking security is, in and of itself, racist. as if this lack of obeisance to the magic of diversity is, in and of itself, some manner of dereliction.

the following link is a case in florida. my question to all here however especially to women is whether there is something amiss when persons seek to separate themselves from violence and misogyny.

http://electronicvillage.blogspot.com/2007/11/protecting-black-women-from-rape-dunbar.html

[roger]

"and not all of their residents are racists."

thank you barbara for allowing that not everyone who has earned a few dollars is a racist. at what percentage would you put the racist index and at what annual income does the average ignorant, fat, white, rich guy begin to be more inclined to racist thought and action.

[roger]

not even harrington stooped this low.

[Barbara E]

Yikes, it should be Setha "Low," not Setha "Lowe." My apologies.

[Chickensh*tEagle]

Brian: "But by my businessman logic, the human consumer...is unproductive unless it is either shopping or working..."

I've always thought this definition too narrow. "Productivity" should also include leisure-time consumption of goods and commodities that will have to be replaced by more shopping. :-)

[Buena]

Good essay, Barbara. Seems like whatever you write, "roger" is right there to berate and ridicule. I think roger is really Ann Coulter.

We have one gated subdivision in our small town, but it's not selling, even though it's a beautiful place. Just a little too snooty, maybe? Eventually, though, it will fill up with people escaping the big cities with lots of money.

Damn, there goes the neighborhood.

[chris]

What’s So Great about Gated Communities

Barbara writes:

“Another utopia seems to be biting the dust… the paranoid residential ideal represented by gated communities may be in serious trouble. Never exactly cool—remember Jim Carrey in “The Truman Show”?-- these pricey enclaves of privilege are becoming hotbeds of disillusionment.”

Where to start? There is no decent apartment building in any city in this country that lacks a doorman. Been that way for more than a century. In other words, access to peoples’ homes is often restricted. What’s wrong with that? Here’s the answer: Nothing.

The Truman Show? Who cares what happens to some clown in a feature movie? This reliance of feature movies to explain life must mean Oliver Stone got it right in JFK. It’s deeply troubling when a culture mistakes certain metaphorical and emotional aspects of feature movies for matters of fact.

Barbara writes:

“At the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Washington last week, president Setha Lowe painted a picture so dispiriting that the audience guffawed in schadenfreude.”

I see. In other words, the audience enjoyed hearing about problems suffered by people they appear to dislike. Just deserts. Is that their view? Swell.

She says:

“The gated community residents Lowe interviewed had fled from ethnically challenging cities, but they have not managed to escape from their fear. ONE RESIDENT REPORTED that her small daughter has developed a severe case of xenophobia, no doubt communicated by her parents”

One resident reported? One! Yeah, that’s a majority. So what? I know white families who left the Bronx in the 1970s when the borough became a nightmare. Would anyone with children and a choice have stayed? I know white families who left Brooklyn and Manhattan in the bad years. Meanwhile -- news flash -- black families left too.

What is a “severe case of xenophobia”? Every parent in the country today has said to his children repeatedly: Don’t talk to strangers. Don’t talk to strangers.

She claims to quote:

“We were driving next to a truck with some day laborers and equipment in the back, and we stopped beside them at the light. She [her daughter] wanted to move because she was afraid those people were going to come and get her. They looked scary to her.”

There ARE scary-looking people in the world, the country, the city, the town, and the neighborhood. Some of them ARE dangerous. Just ask pro-football player Sean Taylor. Actually, you can’t. He’s dead.

Barbara gets foot way in:

“Leaving aside the sorry spectacle of homeowners living in fear of their landscapers”

See Sean Taylor. He’s still dead. It looks like the guys who cut his lawn shot him to death. Thus, let’s consider that people who have access to your property might steal something, and, in a very bad moment, they might kill the homeowner. The list of examples is stunningly, painfully long.

She boobulates:

“According to Lowe, gated communities are no less crime-prone than open ones, and Gopal Ahluwalia, senior vice president of research at the National Association of Home Builders, confirms this: There are studies indicating that there are no differences in the crime in gated communities and non-gated communities.”

Where do these crazy researchers come from? Lowe must be high to conclude, as Ahluwalia, that crime is equal in gated in non-gated communities. Because that means stealing a few beers out of someone’s garage refrigerator is no worse than shooting the homeowner to death. One of these incompetent researchers should list the specific crimes and the frequency of their occurrence in gated-communities vs everywhere else.

She rambles on:

“The security guards often wave people on in, especially if they look like they’re on a legitimate mission – such as the faux moving truck that entered a Fort Meyers’ gated community last spring and left with a houseful of furniture.”

The preceding sounds like material from an Urban Legend. Though it’s possible the theft occurred as claimed, the odds are against it. If it did happen, did anyone check on the security guard? Was he part of the plan? Was he bribed?

She blathers:

“Or the crime comes from within, as in the Hilton Head Plantation community in South Carolina where a rash of crime committed by resident teenagers has led to the imposition of a curfew.”

What does this vague claim mean? Loud music? Overturned garbage cans? Beer drinking in public? Pool parties going strong after midnight?

She stumbles even more:

“Most recently, America’s gated communities have been blighted by foreclosures. Yes, even people who were able to put together the down payment on a half-million dollar house can be ambushed by Adjustable Rate Mortgages.”

Blighted? But isn’t this what Barbara wants? An end to gated-communities? Why does the mechanism of their demise matter? Of course gated communities are not going away. People seem to like them. That’s the whole story. Homebuyers want them. Like fins on Cadillacs, they are what buyers want. Meanwhile, the Adjustable Rate Mortgage issue is a separate situation, and one that is getting full throated attention from a hyperventilating and misinformed press.

She stumbles on:

“Newsweek reports that foreclosures are devastating the gated community of Black Mountain Vista in Henderson NV, where “yellow patches [now] blot the spartan lawns and phone books lie on front porches, their covers bleached from weeks under the desert sun.” Similarly, according to the Orlando Sentinel, “countless homeowners overwhelmed by their mortgages are taking off and leaving behind algae-filled swimming pools and knee-high weeds” in one local gated community.”

I see. Now the existence of gated-communities is cited as the CAUSE of poor personal financial planning. There’s nothing like working hard to create a non-sequitur. Could there be any correlation to other factors aside from linking financial problems with buying homes in gated-communities? There is a correlation between owning a bar and heavy drinking. Would it be startling to suggest that some people who move to Nevada have gambling problems?

Onward for more:

“So, for people who sought, not just prosperity, but perfection, here’s another sad end to the American dream, or at least their ethnically cleansed version thereof: boarded-up McMansions, plastic baggies scudding over overgrown lawns, and, in the Orlando case, a foreclosure-induced infestation of snakes. You can turn away the Mexicans, the African-Americans, the teenagers and other suspect groups, but there’s no fence high enough to keep out the repo man.”

Yeah. Let’s map the location of homes of non-white athletes and celebrities. Sean Taylor, for starters. Oops. He lived in a gated community. Till three blacks and one Hispanic murdered him. Moreover, I have not heard complaints from non-whites claiming they were unable to buy homes in the gated communities of their choice despite having the cash and credit.

She jabbers even more:

“All right, some gated communities are doing better than others, and not all of their residents are racists.”

That’s a relief.

She offers evidence of her own misguided views:

“The communities that allow owners to rent out their houses, or that offer homes at middle class prices of $250,000 or so, are more likely to contain a mixture of classes and races. The only gated community I have ever visited consisted of dull row houses protected by a slacker guard and a fence, and my host was a writer of liberal inclinations. But all these places suffer from the delusion that security lies behind physical barriers.”

In other words, it isn’t enough that anyone – even a writer of liberal inclinations – can live in a community with gates. It’s the delusion that comes with home ownership that really gets under her skin. Thus, since she claims that security is a delusion, we had better find other ways to secure ourselves. What does that mean? Carrying a gun? Or actually barring the people who are statistically and overwhelmingly likely to commit crimes while they are in the neighborhood? I’m just wondering. Are there any factual accounts of white intruders murdering residents of gated communities?

She sputters along:

“Before we turn all of America into a gated community, with a 700 mile steel fence running along the southern border, we should consider the mixed history of exclusionary walls.”

Good idea.

And:

“Ancient and medieval European towns huddled behind massive walls, only to face ever-more effective catapults, battering rams and other siege engines.”

Oh. I see. In other words, she admits attacking hordes were serious and they were organized and they weren’t taking castle walls, moats or mountaintop lairs as a rebuff. They were determined to enter the walled communities, sacking and pillaging all the way.. In Barbara’s world, opposition to gates appears to mean those besieged by attackers should simply submit. Oooh. Submit. Like those nasty muslims are demanding. Swell. So I gather she sympathizes with those muslims who want to behead a non-muslim woman over the naming of a teddy bear, the same muslims who think applying 200 lashes to the back of a woman who was the victim of a rape is appropriate. Wow.

She goes on:

“More recently, the Berlin Wall, which the East German government described fondly as a protective “anti-fascism wall,” fell to a rebellious citizenry. Israel, increasingly sealed behind its anti-Palestinian checkpoints and wall, faced an outbreak of neo-Nazi crime in September – coming, strangely enough, from within.”

Let’s see. Berlin Wall – Keep East Germans IN. Israel Wall – Keep dangerous bomb-carrying palestinians OUT. Yeah. All the same. Then of course, there is the unmentioned moat around Cuba. Beats a wall, especially when the acquisition of a boat is officially viewed as the act of a prisoner attempting to break out of jail. North Korea? How about the Great Wall of China? In a few more years China may have to restart construction to keep prosperity-minded people from sneaking in.

And don’t forget the ultimate wall on the ultimate street! Wall Street. About 1650 New Yorkers living way down town needed protection from the Indians who picked off the occasional resident of Peter Stuyvesant’s neighborhood. They built a wall on Wall Street. But they were too busy doing other things to maintain it. Well, it didn’t take too long to boot the troublemakers out of the area.

And:

“But the market may have the last word on America’s internal gated communities. “Hell is a gated community,” announced the Sarasota Herald Tribune last June, reporting that market research by the big homebuilder Pulte Homes found that no one under 50 wants to live in them, so its latest local development would be un-gated.”

Sean Taylor, 24 years old, did not get the news that no one his age wanted to live in a gated community. Meanwhile, even if this ridiculous claim contains a shred of truth, nothing stops the gated community from removing its gates and fences and whatever other impediments to access exist now.

In conclusion:

“Security, or at least the promise of security, may be one consideration. But there’s another old-fashioned American imperative at work here, which ought to bear on our national policies as well. As my Montana forebears would have put it: Don’t fence me in!”

There’s a few more people in Montana today than when I lived there. I think the population is closer to 800,000 today, compared with about 700,000 when I lived and worked there. What was I doing? Building the Big Sky Ski Resort, which is a collection of condo complexes in addition to being a spectacular ski area. Not precisely a gated community, but one with a private security force to protect an insulated community.

Who’s Montana’s biggest private landowner today? Ted Turner. The guy who wants no one on his property. His massive spread is by Livingston, which is not far from Bozeman, which is not far from Big Sky. So here’s the facts. Montana is the fourth largest state by land area, and it has seemingly endless stretches of open range. But nobody lives there. More people live in the Bronx than Montana. However, for those thinking of visiting or moving to Montana, you will encounter white supremacists, neo-nazis, and other examples of paranoid people whose irrational fears are truly astonishing when you meet them face to face. And you will. It’s part of life out there. If you want to participate in a discussion of how the Jews own the Federal Reserve, head to Montana. In fact, I had that discussion in a bar near Big Sky on my last trip there.

[roger]

"berate and ridicule"

barbara accuses homeowners who live in gated communities of being racists and you name me as the abusive participant.

[Book_Grrl]

I think we should fix up Roger with Chris...

[Alan Bender]

Easy targets!

[Angelia Sparrow]

I don't know about you but where I come from "safe" "low-crime" and "secure" are code-words for "no minorities."

And that's the whole point of gated communities.

[Andrea]

I don't think it's the racism, really, that is the issue. It's that sense of security founded on easily-surmounted physical barriers that is the issue.

Perhaps, down beneath that, is a call to address the problems that cause the need for the security. I know that solving social problems doesn't directly place dollars in anyone's pocket, but the attempt might make a difference to someone.

[Lulu Maude]

What nonsense. I have lived in two gated communities, and racism is a problem there. Just go to any of the annual events. Just have one of the board come to your home to make sure that the name Samuelson isn't Jewish. If so, no deal.

I don't know why I'm commenting. I'm better off reading Barbara and then avoiding all these nasty exchanges.

Grow up, folks.

[Lulu Maude]

p.s. Barbara--I found a copy of Kipper's Game at a used book sale recently. You are a wonderful novelist!

[Buena]

Thanks, Angelica and Lulu Maude, for your comments. The term "gated" definitely evokes a picture of "white upper-middle-class or above."

The real question, as Andrea notes, is what is everyone so afraid of? The gated ones don't seem to mind having minorities clean their homes, trim their lawns, and care for their children. They just don't want them living next door.

[Hattie]

I'm glad I don't have to live that way. It's boring and too expensive.

[Anarcissie]

The idea behind gated communities is an extension of the idea of "defensible space". Check the Wikipedia article, and read your Jane Jacobs. However, the quoted material says gated communities are in decline, in spite of the fetishization of Security in recent years -- an apparent paradox.

If gated communities are declining, I suspect it is because of the general decline of the suburb-as-small-town myth, rather than any shift in race or class attitudes. Today, the better-off middle-class types are moving to the cities where they are rapidly gentrifying areas formerly occupied by poor people. The suburbs have become hells of traffic jams, overdevelopment, inconveniences and -- ironically -- exhibit rising crime rates. In the future, the poor will live in them, and the rich in the inner city. There are other ways of weeding out the poor and improperly pigmented besides walls and gates.

[roger]

Buena: " The real question, as Andrea notes, is what is everyone so afraid of? The gated ones don't seem to mind having minorities clean their homes, trim their lawns, and care for their children. They just don't want them living next door. "

again the catalyst is not racism but rather security. you ask what people have to fear. you seem to insist that there is nothing to fear from those who come to provide handyman and lawn services as if security is an irrational concern.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE3D8133EF930A25750C0A9659C8B63&n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/M/Mitchell,%20Brian%20David

brian david mitchell was a homeless drifter and self proclaimed preacher hired by the smart family to help with handyman work around the property in an effort to provide brian with employment and income. this is why rational and compassionate persons would seek security in a gated community. that you would fault a family when it exercises this option is curious.