Letters to the Editor
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Matters of Authenticity?
Sorry, sugarman but the "bedstuy, do or die" quote is legit and has been around since the late seventies, early eighties, or around the time I came to New York, went to law school and took a job in the Brooklyn DA's office.
I lived with my great aunt, a long time resident on Buffalo Avenue off of Eastern Parkway in the Lincoln Terrace Park area of the borough, while attending school. The slogan was and is commonly used. Again, the poster sounds legit, to me.
As for Rice, she's a fascinating-if perverse-sign of progress, racially; an assessment that isn't vitiated by her undeniable disservice to the welfare of the country. I mean, let's face it, an african-american every bit as adept, not to mention ruthless, at climbing the career ladder as many european-americans have long done would have been an rara-avis, and exceedingly so, thirty five to forty years ago.
Upshot? Perhaps blacks, like their european-american counterparts, are well on their way to navigating what was, initially, an alien cultural landscape in order to attain their share of wealth and power.