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
[email protected]

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.

[roger]

white kid in nebraska. this occurred yesterday. i gather we have no need to fear this violence either. i gather that the added security of a gated community in light of just such violence and chaos is yet another irrational reaction from racist white guys. apparently if a person is white all of their decisions are suspect.

http://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3958863&page=1

[Anarcissie]

roger -- I am curious as to what you think these anecdotes have to do with gated communities, in particular.

[Jeanne]

Angela wrote: "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."

My brother and sister-in-law live in a gated community in Florida. It's not as diverse as south Florida, but it's not all white. It is ALL upper-middle-class. So I think the gated community thing is about CLASS. It looks like they're about race because racism and classism support each other. But wealthy black doctors are welcome neighbors in their gated community.

[Anarcissie]

Of course it's about class. The interesting item here is that, according to the article, gated communities are in decline. One would think with the increasing social distance between rich and poor, and the increasing fetishization of security, they would be becoming more popular.

[Mark Hiester]

Thanks Barbara. See http://www.patternlanguage.com/archives/alexander1.htm

In a traditional society, if we ask a man to name his best friends and then ask
each of these in turn to name their best friends, they will all name each other
so that they form a closed group. A village is made up of a number of separate
closed groups of this kind (a tree).

But today's social structure is utterly different. If we ask a man to name his
friends and then ask them in turn to name their friends, they will all name
different people, very likely unknown to the first person; these people would
again name others, and so on outwards. There are virtually no closed groups of
people in modern society. The reality of today's social structure is thick with
overlap - the systems of friends and acquaintances form a semilattice, not a
tree.

Our overly-contrived, "tree" settlements, like Columbia Maryland, artificially
restrict our interactions and creativity. These tree settlements tend to arise
in the West from Roman military encampments. Their goal was order, not free interaction, creativity, and the human spirit as we
know it today.

The enormity of this restriction is difficult to grasp. It is a little as though
the members of a family were not free to make friends outside the family, except
when the family as a whole made a friendship.

True (semilattice) cities, like Manhattan, are changing over time, in relatively
smaller ways often by many more people. This is a lot like technology and
communication today.

When we think in terms of trees we are trading the humanity and richness of the
living city for a conceptual simplicity which benefits only designers, planners,
administrators and developers. Every time a piece of a city is torn out, and a
tree made to replace the semilattice that was there before, the city takes a
further step toward dissociation.

In any organized object, extreme compartmentalization and the dissociation of
internal elements are the first signs of coming destruction. In a society,
dissociation is anarchy. In a Person, dissociation is the mark of schizophrenia and impending suicide. An
ominous example of city-wide dissociation is the separation of retired people
from the rest of urban life, caused by the growth of desert cities for the old
like Sun City, Arizona. This separation isonly possible under the influence of
treelike thought.

It not only takes from the young the company of those who have lived long, but
worse, it causes the same rift inside each individual life. As you pass into Sun
City, and into old age, your ties with your own past will be unacknowledged,
lost and therefore broken. Your youth will no longer be alive in your old age -
the two will be dissociated; your own life will be cut in two.

For the human mind, the tree is the easiest vehicle for complex thoughts. But
the city is not, cannot and must not be a tree. The city is a receptacle for
life. If the receptacle severs the overlap of the strands of life within it,
because it is a tree, it will be like a bowl full of razor blades on edge, ready to cut up whatever is entrusted to it. In such a receptacle life will be
cut to pieces. If we make cities which are trees, they will cut our life within
to pieces.

[Anarcissie]

But a gated community (and a building with a doorman) permit their inhabitants to have friends, business associates, relatives and so forth outside the residential structure. As do the utopian schematics on the web site.

Old people aren't shoved out of community life by physical structure (usually) but by social forces, and, to some extent, their own preferences.

[Brian]

Gated communities are emblemtic of the privatization of American Society. It costs money to play in that game, otherwise you are banished to being one of the unwashed masses or college students living among them. Sure it breaks down by the ability of one to manipulate the system to get outsized money, or to come from a family that already has it. But aside from the profound socioeconomic partitioning of our society, have you really looked at the way the unwashed masses carry on lately? They no longer have any contact with those in the upper echelons except through rare celebrity fashion shows or short contacts with their bosses. I think this is actually bad as it creates a new class of "untouchables" and that isn't a good thing for a democracy. It also lowers the self discipline and efforts of parents to really try for good family and community structures as vital and based on old fashioned moral values of honesty, standing up for principle, and fairness. Instead they are pandered to by a manipulative media to be simple materialists under a yoke of narcissitic indulgence to at least look successful, rather than to be genuinely solid people. If your public school children never get to rub elbows with the children of corporate engineers and lawyers they will miss out on opportunities. These corporate people will simple be a class above them and not their peers. They won't hear about vacations to far away places, or be exposed to an early interest in science and hobbies of their peers. Corporate successful parents most likely studied hard in college to get such competitive jobs(usually), perhaps their parents did also, and have a good skill set, good social and language skills, and probably a decent enriched childhood often free of extreme traumas and hopefully broken families.
When they all go to private schools they just reinforce these developed and often over several generations advantages/skills. It would be unfair to be dismissive of them simply because others have terrible situations themselves. But my point is when their children go to school, play, and reinforce positive things in each other it does create a unique class in itself that is still different from the silver spoon spoiled classes. I would call them the self-empowered, self-disciplined middle class that both has to work for a living, yet gets to enjoy certain benifits many others do not have, but they may well have earned many of them fair and square. However, as this morphs into gated communities disconnected from the unwashed masses, and income gravitates up their way and away from the masses it does create a nation of discrete, noncommunicating rooms. The upper classes watch much less tv than the masses and exercise a greater independence and have the means to do so, as well as enjoy the added security's of their position both physically and mentally. The rub as in the subprime housing meltdown is for the middling middle class that is paying their mortgages at 6-10 percent interest watching as a group of lower income folks get to continue paying 0-1-2-3 percent teaser rates the next five years because they falsified their incomes even in the face of predatory lending. And the predators at the top still get to keep thier outsized bonuses and big money they made selling all those bad mortgages. The government bails out the predators at the top and the wanna be predators at the bottom leaving the middle class no holding the bag and they played by the rules. It reinforces cheaters on both ends and penalizes law abiding good solid payers. That 6-10 percent interst could put a child or two through a private school or college. So it effectively keeps them out of the gated community trapped by the unwashed masses. It all seems very unfair and again is very bad if we hope to maintain any democracy. A disaffecte middle class will be the first to sign on to a fascist state unquestionably once they are finally pandered to by manipulative politicians. If they lose faith in our society we lose our democracy, and then what you will have is extreme gated communities and extreme police states to keep the peace in the rest of the country. Its more than about fairness or money, its about the very fabric of our society that affords us social mobility and whatever freedom we have left. It benifits Bush and the Banks to give this hand out to the poor at the expense of the middle class. These are very scary times and we are being set up for even worse times. If you doubt this, watch a white house press conference when they stand up before a meekly questioning incredulous press corps with the American flag standing behind them for the photo prop. This is bigger and far more worrisome than simply the spectacle of gated communities. Consider the treasury secratary who was head of goldman sachs and who helped put in place some of the first cdo's and siv's in the first place that the rating agencies gave a AAA free pass and packaged to sell on wall street to the unsuspecting who now realize they can't even value them as they are mark to model "models". Would you buy a municipal bond "model" that theorized a value based on an undecipherable rating that mixes less than junk bonds with "sub" prime mortgages. I wish I was articulate enought to more clearly outline the ultimate scam. Well the bail out plan was crafted by that secratary of the treasury who is giving a freebee to the predatory rich and the dishonest poor at the expense of the middle class. That is how distorted our government has become in the age of spin and priveledge. I would suggest expand your lens beyond the capital and labor politics of the past into the new era. This is bigger than using the government to break up a strike. Much bigger.

[Anarcissie]

If gated communities were emblematic of class stratification, we would have nothing to worry about, because gated communities are in decline. But class stratification isn't in decline. It is, as you note, become more pronounced. Evidently the rich have better ways than mere gates and walls to separate themselves from the poor.

As for the subprime mortgage crisis, I think that is part of a much larger and deeper problem, having to do with the way in which the government creates money and manipulates the economy.

[Hattie]

The sheeple are meant to be sheared.

[roger]

anarcissie: " I am curious as to what you think these anecdotes have to do with gated communities, in particular. "

i cite these cases since it appears that nearly everyone here insists that gated communities are an expression of class division or xenophobia. there does not appear to be any allowances made for the possibility that gated communities, like doormen or private security companies, are employed for the purpose of providing security. the person who seeks these options is seen as suspect by many persons on this blog. surely we are not this jaded. it seems that seeking security is a perfectly reasonable solution to violence and yet nearly everyone here jumps to the conclusion that this is either about race or class.

[roger]

brian: " They no longer have any contact with those in the upper echelons except through rare celebrity fashion shows or short contacts with their bosses. I think this is actually bad as it creates a new class of "untouchables" and that isn't a good thing for a democracy. "

before you start throwing around words you do not understand and concepts which you are woefully unprepared to defend you might do some reading.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/06/0602_030602_untouchables.html

the class you are referencing has nothing whatever to do with celebrity fashion shows. that you would attempt to draw parallels from american society and culture to the suffering and pain inflicted upon a despised class in the asian subcontinent is exceedingly unfortunate and ignorant on numerous levels.

[roger]

again you might do some research before spouting off concerning issues about which you apparently know nothing.

http://www.ncdhr.org.in/

[roger]

click on the link concerning manual scavenging and then have the stones to complain about the injustice and pain surrounding the existence of gated communities.

[Chickensh*tEagle]

roger: "click on the link concerning manual scavenging and then have the stones to complain about the injustice and pain surrounding the existence of gated communities."

So...the rich are afraid of being dragooned into manual scavenging if they don't take refuge in gated communities? I don't see the point otherwise.

[roger]

fine let me connect the dots for you. there are real class monstrosities such as the millions of persons in india who can be murdered and abused with impunity. manual scavenging is simply another insult to be imposed on this class. residing in a gated community does not begin to rise to such injustice and yet brian would draw the congruence in error and ignorance.

[chris]

As a resident of Brooklyn, NY who walks the city streets for fun, I can tell you that the poorest neighborhoods are the ones in which the largest percentage of houses have bars over the windows.

Not bars to keep children from falling out. Bars to keep intruders from getting in.

I have no doubt that those living inside houses with barred windows and doors would happily accept a free move to neighborhoods where such protection is unnecessary. But a set of bars is far less costly than moving to a better neighborhood.

[kate]

Roger, yes it brings me great joy to see gated communities rot from within.

Roger: Yes, I have great self satisfaction when I see someone speak the truth that wealthy does not necessarily mean productive or intelligent.

Roger: You are a racist rube.

Chris: You are a racist rube.

I have also heard that in Atlanta and other areas where water resources are getting tight, the outlying suburbs are going dry. Oh what a pity!

Fact is, studies have shown repeatedly that gated communities do nothing but inculcate and incubate xenophobia and racism as the seperation of the residents from the wider diversity of real community causes their ignorance to bleed into fear; the little girl was a beautiful example. How many do you need? How about the woman in my racist small town who would count the apples on her apple tree that would hang over her iron fence. Not that she ever picked them, but if she saw a black person walk by and pick them, lo! Did she ever make a point of shouting her absolute ownership and their lack of entitlement to those apples. Of course, us kids in the neighborhood could pick them. Just not the darkies from the down the way.

Then there's my grandma who opened the curtains in her southern small town, at dusk to exclaim, on a sultry July, 1979, "Oh my! Look at that! There's a darkie out after dark, what is this town coming to!?"

Since civil rights has made it illegal to redline (at least on paper) and made Jim Crow go into hiding (somewhat), gated communities have offered the perfect solution for the lily white to stay lily white, lest their children get tainted by the scary brown people.

And wasn't there a popular book out after the Columbine shootings that illustrated with research, that the cul-de-sac communities were breeding self absorbed, violent prone, ignorant white boys?
And doesn't research show that white suburban kids have more hostility to people different to them and more anxiety about such and more tendency toward tribalism?

And hasn't it been shown over and over again that 'gangsta rap' is produced for and sold to a primarily white male audience?

Go hide under your hoods Chris and Roger.

[kate]

Oh, I might I add to those of you who profess your fear of the inner city; I live in the inner city and my three kids did too. They are fine, grew up healthy and alive and enjoyed living in a vibrant and diverse community.

Suburbanites I think should have much to fear should a national disaster strike and they find their ability to get precious resources means a tank of precious fuel.

I do a lot of work in closed communities (by the way I'm white) and I find them stifling, boring and dull. They seem an apt reflection of most of the residents I encounter there.

[Anarcissie]

roger -- I have no doubt that the people who move to gated communities are seeking security. No one disagrees with this; hence my mystification at your posting a couple of random anecdotes of violence, which prove nothing about anything.

Many, many questions can be raised about the drive for security, such as how much security is desirable considering its costs, whether the perceived need for whatever level of security is desired is realistic, and whether the means chosen are likely to be effective. There is simply no doubt that gated communities are to some extent class-based. Do they represent an effective strategy? If, as reported, gated communities are in decline, then apparently most people now think they don't, although other class-based strategies, like moving to a controlled-entry building in a gentrified urban neighborhood, or keeping two million of their fellow citizens in prison, remain quite popular.

[roger]

anarcissie: "random anecdotes of violence, which prove nothing about anything. "

the dunbar village case is barbaric even indexed against the culture of public housing. i would suggest that such an attack would never have occurred in either a controlled entry building or in a gated community. whether this circumstance has further meaning to you is up to you to decide.

" class-based strategies,...... or keeping two million of their fellow citizens in prison, remain quite popular. "

again the dunbar case is illuminating. ten teenage males commit a home invasion and gang rape the woman for three hours. the child is abused and cleaning fluid is poured into his eyes. the woman is forced at gunpoint to perform oral sex upon her own 12 year old son. both persons are then forced into the bathtub and the teenagers attempt to incinerate the two while still in the bathtub. fortunately they could not find a cigarette lighter. the teenagers took pictures of these acts of violence with their camera phones.

now when a jury comes back and recommends to the judge that they be put away for life and then they receive 25 years to life will you insist that the jury was simply carrying out the will of the rulers of the empire and forcing the lower class to submit or will you concede that these are ruthless, amoral, licentious, violent thugs who need to be removed from society.

[Chickensh*tEagle]

roger: "i would suggest that such an attack would never have occurred in either a controlled entry building or in a gated community."

What do you mean by "controlled entry"? In my experience residents of such places generally put their own convenience first, propping open doors and the like; failing that, if an outsider wants to get in he has only to ring enough buzzers. Desk clerks and guards can be sweet-talked, bribed, or overcome by force. Never say "never."

"...ruthless, amoral, licentious, violent thugs who need to be removed from society."

Of course they should be removed from society. So should we respond by removing ourselves from society?

[roger]

" So should we respond by removing ourselves from society? "

we should remove ourselves from danger and not spite those who take the option to do so.

[chris]

kate, you wrote:

"Oh, I might I add to those of you who profess your fear of the inner city; I live in the inner city and my three kids did too."

What city? What section? I live in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn.

You spoke of your kids living in the "inner city" in the past tense. Where do they live now?

You wrote:

"Suburbanites I think should have much to fear should a national disaster strike and they find their ability to get precious resources means a tank of precious fuel."

The preceding is remarkable for its prejudice. But aside from the angry subtext, why do you believe suburbanites are less prepared for a "national disaster" than urbanites? Based on the example of New Orleans, I'd say some city people are total morons when the world is collapsing around them.

You wrote:

"I do a lot of work in closed communities (by the way I'm white) and I find them stifling, boring and dull."

I've spent time working in housing projects -- closed communities -- and I know how life is contorted and strained in those settings. I am positive almost everyone who lives in a housing project would move to the suburbs, even a gated community, if they could.

You wrote:

"They seem an apt reflection of most of the residents I encounter there."

The suburbs and the city offer endless opportunities for sociological study. You, unfortunately, seem driven to your conclusions by anger and envy.

You also seem to ignore the reality that growth of suburban populations is partially driven by people who move out of cities to live a different life-style. What's wrong with people choosing their surroundings?

[chris]

kate, you wrote:

"Fact is, studies have shown repeatedly that gated communities do nothing but inculcate and incubate xenophobia and racism as the seperation of the residents from the wider diversity of real community causes their ignorance to bleed into fear;"

The best part of the preceding mythologizing is the part where you state gated communities "do nothing but..."

You wrote:

"...the little girl was a beautiful example."

Yeah. ONE example. Your sense of societal attitudes is affirmed by an anecdote that satisfies your emotional need with a single incident of doubtful authenticity.

You asked rhetorically:

"How many do you need?"

Far more than one.

And you answered by request by upping the number of anecdotes to two:

"How about the woman in my racist small town who would count the apples on her apple tree that would hang over her iron fence. Not that she ever picked them, but if she saw a black person walk by and pick them, lo! Did she ever make a point of shouting her absolute ownership and their lack of entitlement to those apples."

First. So what? Second. Did you witness the woman shouting at blacks for stealing apples? Or is this a local myth believed by all the neighbors?

You lived in a "racist small town?" I thought you lived in the inner city. Would you share a little of your history?

Second, how do you know you lived in a racist small town? If a woman yelling at a black apple thief is the shocking evidence of rampant racism in your "racist small town", then your judgment is poor.

You wrote:

"Of course, us kids in the neighborhood could pick them. Just not the darkies from the down the way."

From what you've written, the old bag sat by the window all day keeping an eye on the apple tree because she worried about darkies picking a few apples. Did she stay up all night watching it too?

Okay. Anecdote number three:

"Then there's my grandma who opened the curtains in her southern small town, at dusk to exclaim, on a sultry July, 1979, "Oh my! Look at that! There's a darkie out after dark, what is this town coming to!?""

I see a pattern here. The first person made anxious by non-whites was a little white girl. The next two were white women. Can I conclude from your claims that white women have irrational fears of non-whites? Of course their fear is stirred by non-white males. I'm sure none of the offending darkies were female.

You wrote:

"Since civil rights has made it illegal to redline (at least on paper)..."

Anti-discrimination laws put a legal end to red-lining. But the advent of secondary markets for mortgages and changes in the structure of banking were the factors that eliminated it. In fact, subprime mortgages have been a boon to black and hispanic home-buyers.

I know you know nothing about finance, but here's the facts. Blacks and hispanics have benefited enormously from the expansion of the mortgage market. Subprime mortgages have literally opened doors for them. On the other hand, mortgage default rates are higher in black and hispanic communities than white communities. I'm sure you'll find some screwball way to blame white bankers for the high default rate among non-whites, but if you do, you will prove only that you know nothing about housing finance.

You wrote:

"...and made Jim Crow go into hiding (somewhat)..."

Have you a got even a SINGLE example of Jim Crow laws still in existence? By the way, where do affluent blacks and hispanics live? Every black athlete and celebrity I can think of lives far from the "inner city", far from the ghettos they often came from. IN other words, everyone who can leave crappy surroundings leaves.

Have you ever read "A Raisin in the Sun"? You probably have not. The fictional black family of the story eventually concludes it is better to move to a white suburban town where the white residents have racist attitudes than stay in the "inner city" where they are subjected to the daily grind inflicted on them by their neighorhood.

You babbled:

"...gated communities have offered the perfect solution for the lily white to stay lily white, lest their children get tainted by the scary brown people."

Crime in America is down. But, as always, there is far more violence in black and hispanic communites compared with white and asian communities. This is a simple fact. Moreover, educational achievement among blacks and hispanics is abysmal. It's not the schools. The problem is with the students.

You wrote:

"And wasn't there a popular book out after the Columbine shootings that illustrated with research, that the cul-de-sac communities were breeding self absorbed, violent prone, ignorant white boys?"

It was so popular I never heard of it. By the way, what does it mean when a book is "illustrated with research"? Does that mean pictures of happy white people at home, at play, at work and at school?

You wrote:

"And doesn't research show that white suburban kids have more hostility to people different to them and more anxiety about such and more tendency toward tribalism?"

Who's more likely to get mugged? A black kid in a white neighborhood or a white kid in a black neighborhood? Your prejudices make you an absurdity. YOu seem to dwell in the alternate reality that black leaders have created to provide emotional ease and a basis for denial of real social pathologies.

You wrote:

"And hasn't it been shown over and over again that 'gangsta rap' is produced for and sold to a primarily white male audience?"

Your attempt to indict whites backfires again. White kids may be the largest consumers of rap and hip hop, but the real thugs are still black and hispanic. Check the crime stats to see for yourself.

Your impaired reasoning leads you to create one non-sequitur after another.

[jult52]

My lord this blog is embarrassing. Thank you chris for a hilarious take-down of this silly post. And, no, I wouldn't ever consider living in a gated community myself.

[steve]

I live in a gated and guarded/patrolled housing area in another country where you really do need them. Crime there is serious. In the USA, however, the idea of a gated "community" seems absurd, and exposes the owner to the whims of micromanaging community association officers. "What? You want a motorcycle?? Sure, just not here." Or, "No basketball backboards allowed, so take it down."

Ik.

Good point about the walls at the border, and anywhere for that matter. Better to have friends on the other side who will watch your back than an enemy who won't.

[SadPanda]

"no one under 50 wants to live in them". The ones above 50 have the cash, so who cares?

And about the Berlin wall: a majority of (former) Western Germans want it back to keep out the (former) Eastern Germans.

[Brian]

roger: its ok to disagree but give your ego a rest as its just your way to poke other people in the eyes because you have issues of your own. Regarding comparisons, we do live in a relativistic world, and everything is duplicative, but differs only by degree. Nature has structures within that repeat endlessly. There is a growing divide between the have's and have nots once again here in America after the great democratization of the post-WW 11 boom and middle class build out. The rich and powerful(try Goldman Sach's) have been progressively reclaiming this wealth ever since the post-industrial era starting in the 70's, some say the late 60's. We, here in America now have a tier class of untouchables, and its growing. They do still have much more than the lower castes of the Indian subcontinent, but its all relative and since money is worshipped here as an implacable God its the same structure, just different window dressing. Yes, there are untouchables here too sadly to say, but they still have the pocket change to rent a strip mall apartment, dine on poptarts and fries, and maybe get into a big city emergency room when they break something. Its certainly paradise to some in India, but its surely not paradise here. And its growing.

[M.Dodge]

I don’t think people move to gated communities to escape crime. I think they run to gated communities to escape difference. These are people who find life unbearable without a HOA. God forbid that your neighbor should paint his door purple or choose to have the kid’s swimming pool in the side yard where everyone can see it. The property values might go down and then even more “undesirables” will move in.

These are the people I would love to grab by the shoulders and yell, “grow-up”. Life is richer and more meaningful if you embrace difference and not run from it. From my own experience the bigger the difference the more exciting, fun and fulfilling the interaction is.

For you ones who tremble in fear, break your chains of self inflicted bondage and come on out and join the rest of us. You will find that a diet of white bread is not as tasty as you think.

[Robin LESLIE]

Gated communities and ghettoes are the two polar dramatisations of a broken, fragmented and rootless society. Ghettoes
are quite unlike gated communities in that the members are there involuntarily and by force of social pressure and political control, that assigns the poor to such roles and such spaces!
Gated communities, whilst
they may be the product of the irrational compulsions of human hatred and fear, at least have some element of choice to them. However
both sets of community members are trapped in destructive social and political
relationships,which ultimately lead to conflict and violence, if they were not already expressions of violence and conflict by virtue of their original formation.
Market capitalism has reached the end of the road! By all means a return to Keynseianism and the Welfare State, but the private State is finished, it's lost its credibility and is fast losing it's corporate power through this crisis. So let's ALL talk about living together shall we, not all in one house you understand, but
as guests of one another!

[Vanessa Martins]

A recent report on gated communities (GCs defined them as: “Walled or fenced housing developments to which public access is restricted, often guarded using CCTV and/or security personnel, and usually characterised by legal agreements which tie the residents to a common code of conduct.” (“Gated Communities in England” - R. Atkinson et al, ODPM, 2004).

According to a recent report by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) up to 12% of Americans live in gated communities though the proportion in the UK is thought to be much smaller (“Space invaders”, RICS, 1-05-06). GCs typify a trend to creating segregated areas of affluence which aim to keep themselves separate from nearby, more deprived communities. GC’s tend to be popular in areas like Chorlton where affluent and exluded live cheek by jowl. Compare, for example, the different communities of ‘old’, Victorian Chorlton with the significant areas of poverty on the Nell Lane and Merseybank Estates.
----------------------
Vanessa

Hawaii Drug Treatment
http://www.drugtreatments.com/hawaii

[MichaelS]

We deal with a lot of gated communities. The people moving there are neither racist, all caucasian or elitist. Most of them are older, financially minded retirement age folks looking for a low yard maintenance, community activity oriented lifestyle.

I don't understand the contant animosity toward "gated communities". We're not talking about exclusive fortresses here, just community standards.

[Penisa]

outgoing line buddy. yearning to get more from your side :)