An Interesting Conversation, and a Dissapointing Walk

Uptown is a neighborhood very near and dear to my heart.  My mom is the State representative for the area, and I've always been intrigued by its diversity and character. Anton, our guide, did an amazing job giving a history of Chicago and Uptown, and framing his history as a fight for affordable housing. Before our discussion in the coffeeshop in Uptown, I'd always thought of gentrification as an inevitable part of the ebb and flow of a city. Anton, on the other hand, sees it as a harmful force to neighborhoods which give lower income families a chance to build a stable community. His view was well voiced and convincing. It made me understand peoples anger towards development, and infrastructure investment aimed towards the upper class. Hearing about the arson that happened in his neighborhood for insurance money, and the fights to stop affordable housing being teared down gave me an appreciation for what its like to love a neighborhood and watch it change. It's proximity to my house also really resonated with me. Maybe its shallow, but its a lot easier to process things going on in a neighborhood that I pass every day on the red line home. I know how badly the wilson and lawrence stops need renovation, and Anton's struggle feels a little like mine. 

So I absolutely loved the discussion we had in the cofeeshop, but then came then came the next hour and a half. For the past couple of weeks in Reel to Real, an English class I'm taking, we've been talking about slum tourism, mostly in the context of third world countries.  Now, Uptown is nowhere near a slum, but that doesn't make it any more right or justified that a bunch of well dressed white kids should parade through a lower income neighborhood. It felt that both sides were being objectified. We objectified the people of Uptown by walking around and staring at dilapidated buildings and homeless people on street corners, and I felt objectified as an outsider rich kid who came to gawk. If we had just had the conversation, I would have considered our fieldwork day the most interesting and engaging of my time in Highschool, but instead I'm left with a stale taste in my mouth, and a sickness in my belly.