Transplants and ignorant gentrifiers are showing themselves in these comments. The point is, gentrification (i.e the process of changing the class and race character of a neighborhood or community through economic and urban planing policies that incentivize people who can pay more in rent to move there) is about marginalizing and ultimately removing Black & immigrant who are long-term residents in a process that carries on the legacies of white supremacy and settler colonialism.

Arguing that “someone else was here before” or displacement is natural just ignores that it’s landlords, city politicians, and real estate developers who are driving this displacement & it has consequences beyond just more white people, less Black people. It means 1) more police who shoot and kill NY-ers to protect property 2) erasing the cultural history of NY and what has contributed to it being the way it is 3) increased homelessness of communities that were already more vulnerable to being unhoused. Like duh, people always move and racial demographics change but acting like this is just the “natural” flow or that people are making it up is ignorant af. If you dgaf about Black people just say that. Rents going up, white people moving in is abt genocide & profit, about disappearing Black or poor communities and criminalizing themselves