There was The Look.
It was knowing and hateful--with a healthy dose of fear mixed in. The giver wanted to instill fear in the receiver. But the receiver had already done the same: Something in his walk or demeanor said, "Don't F- with me."
I know it well because I was the intended recipient of The Look. And I was getting it because I had wrapped myself in psychological barbed wire. The person who gave me The Look wanted to sell me drugs or his or her body. Or lure me into a "theatre"--or an alley. Or try to suck or force me into some other scheme or scam to part me with my money and leave me part of the sidewalk or pavement, at least for a moment.
What I have described was an experience of walking 42nd Street from the Port Authority Bus Terminal to Times Square about thirty years ago. That stretch of "The Deuce"--the street's nickname--was, of all New York City thoroughfares, the one in which a person had the best chance of being the victim of a crime.
Today Times Square has been turned into a cross between Disney World without the rides and a shopping mall. Fresh-faced families flock to the same sorts of chain restaurants and stores they could find in their home counties--with higher prices. And, instead of pimps, prostitutes and hoodlums, costumed street perfomers and "painted ladies" accost tourists and ply them for cash. Some of those performers are even more aggressive than those old denizens of the demimonde I remember from my youth.
At least, they seem more aggressive. Or, perhaps, they are because they can be to those fresh-faced families, who have no experience in walking by people they have never seen, and never will see again. They do not have the ability to wrap themselves in psychological barbed wire and be unaffected by The Look.
Now the City Council is scheduled to vote on a measure to regulate those ersatz Batmans and Wonder Women, and all of the other costumed characters who terrorize Times Square.
I used to fancy myself a libertarian. Sometimes I still do. But I know when regulation is necessary, or at least beneficial. This is one of those times. I mean, do we want people running around the fashion capital of America looking like this?:
It was knowing and hateful--with a healthy dose of fear mixed in. The giver wanted to instill fear in the receiver. But the receiver had already done the same: Something in his walk or demeanor said, "Don't F- with me."
I know it well because I was the intended recipient of The Look. And I was getting it because I had wrapped myself in psychological barbed wire. The person who gave me The Look wanted to sell me drugs or his or her body. Or lure me into a "theatre"--or an alley. Or try to suck or force me into some other scheme or scam to part me with my money and leave me part of the sidewalk or pavement, at least for a moment.
What I have described was an experience of walking 42nd Street from the Port Authority Bus Terminal to Times Square about thirty years ago. That stretch of "The Deuce"--the street's nickname--was, of all New York City thoroughfares, the one in which a person had the best chance of being the victim of a crime.
Today Times Square has been turned into a cross between Disney World without the rides and a shopping mall. Fresh-faced families flock to the same sorts of chain restaurants and stores they could find in their home counties--with higher prices. And, instead of pimps, prostitutes and hoodlums, costumed street perfomers and "painted ladies" accost tourists and ply them for cash. Some of those performers are even more aggressive than those old denizens of the demimonde I remember from my youth.
At least, they seem more aggressive. Or, perhaps, they are because they can be to those fresh-faced families, who have no experience in walking by people they have never seen, and never will see again. They do not have the ability to wrap themselves in psychological barbed wire and be unaffected by The Look.
Now the City Council is scheduled to vote on a measure to regulate those ersatz Batmans and Wonder Women, and all of the other costumed characters who terrorize Times Square.
I used to fancy myself a libertarian. Sometimes I still do. But I know when regulation is necessary, or at least beneficial. This is one of those times. I mean, do we want people running around the fashion capital of America looking like this?:
