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May 6, 2022Liked by Tom Starkweather

Enjoyed your NY photos, especially the first one; made me nostalgic.

Been hearing what a hellhole NY is now, with anyone who can afford to leave leaving.

So that's why your photos are good.

Shame that street smart New Yorkers are such mask wearing wimps though.

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Many can't afford staying and are stuck. Rent is still going up. Common items at the grocery store are more expensive. There's a sense of lawlessness with the electric bike and scooter riders weaving through pedestrians on the sidewalk. More cops won't solve it, the misery is real.

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May 6, 2022Liked by Tom Starkweather

We here in Wellington NZ have the electic scooter riders, but they are generally hired scooters so not as many of them. But because they are hired, when the hiree is finished with them they just dump them anywhere on the street and sometimes one has to move them to back out of the drive, or walk past them.

I used to watch Tucker Carlson and he was always portraying NY as a mugger's paradise, with defunded police.

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When I was in Los Angeles in 2019 I saw the results of the ride and dump scooters. They were littered all over the place. Here it's a lot of delivery drivers and prior to the pandemic they were not as commonplace riding on sidewalks. The rise in crime is not solely due to the "defunded police." Prior to the BLM movement Mayor DeBlasio already had a terrible relationship with the police and their morale has only seemed to suffer from the shifting attitudes towards police. Not saying they don't have issues with corruption or enforcing laws that shouldn't exist but it's not just the funding.

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One of the local theatre trusts in town, that staff and book the non union part of the staff, has lifted their requirements for patrons. Yay! Cool! But uhhhh....stagehands still gotta show proof to work many of the houses, including the big touring house in town (show proof equaling your papers are already on file with the venue). #maskuphelp

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If it were truly a crisis, there would be no production. At the very least, to take the abundance of caution method would have the requirements for staff and patrons. We're witnessing a ritual of persecution violating bodily autonomy through discriminatory hiring practices.

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