My Rambling Reply to Mr. S

In response to Greg's interesting observations on my . . . situation.

In my original pushback about the fallen nature of the city, I may have been reacting not so much to your specific argument but the social-media theme I see all the time: “everything regarding Minneapolis is doomed and it is an urban nightmare from which any sensible person would flee, at once.” As you wrote in this piece, you believe that Minneapolis was “a fallen city essentially owned by the BLM mob.” This isn’t true. I have an allergic reaction to the “X is fallen” line. It’s overly dramatic and hyperbolic. I’d reserve that for situations like “Berlin, 1945.”

Minneapolis 2025 is not Minneapolis 2020, for better, and in some ways for worse. Downtown is not boarded up with wood anticipating riots; more people are back to the office. The commercial life on the main street is moribund, but that has to do with many factors in place pre-Floyd. The well-populated North Loop is, as they say, bustling and vibrant. I never felt unsafe when I worked downtown.

Some areas are very, very bad. Many of the suburbs have the same disorders. Many city neighborhoods are perfectly fine. Where I live is quite beautiful; I take the dog on a walk in the morning into the woods, and he drinks from the clear swift creek. No one on the paths, from the moms pushing prams to the single female joggers or the WFH guys staring at their phones, worries about being waylaid on the path.

Now, at least.

There will be an incident on the paths, some day, and everyone will recalibrate for a while and fulminate on Nextdoor, and there might be neighborhood watch patrols. Then the event will fade away, because it’s still rare. So far. And it probably will be rare, as long as the population around here is all gainfully employed, invested in their property, concerned about their kids and schools and parks, and generally good citizens interested in maintaining a stable little civilization.

But. If the area is surrounded by neighborhoods that do not share these values, then there’s more crime - not enough to make people leave en masse, but enough to make the quality of life deteriorate. And then a long, slow decline begins.

We’re not there. (Yet.) And in the meantime, the amenities are wonderful. If my wife and I move - and I don’t want to leave - it will be because we’re downsizing. But our choice of our next destination will be influenced by factors like crime, of course, and property taxes - which are eye-watering.

Anyway: if things get worse, as I describe above, people will still vote for the left en masse every time, because even if their neighborhood is less livable, they cannot let go of the belief that good people vote DFL, and racists/bigots/Christian Nationalists vote for the Rs. It is a matter of faith, and pride: why, we’re the home of the Minnesota Miracle, wherein everyone agreed to pay high taxes (residents and businesses) and in return got good roads and schools and parks and government services.

That compact has been one-sided for decades, but the liberals still want to believe. They content themselves with unexamined narratives unchanged since college, and probably think that Democratic Socialists of America can’t be that bad, because all those words are good, right? (Well, two out of three.) The Reddit contingent of Minneapolis leftists is devoted to the really important issues in life, like bike lanes and hating landlords and opposing back-to-the-office edicts. The conservatives are irrelevant, and just keep their heads down, or move.

Bottom line: if someone was one of those people who are fearful of visiting a Fallen City, and got a good tour of the place, they’d be surprised. It’s a beautiful city, and life here, when balanced against cities of a comparable size, is good in general and wonderful in so many particulars. I wouldn't be here if it wasn't.

But it is run by fools, and a town can only take so much.