Escape from New York: 2023 - How a Decade of Progressive Demoralization Destroyed NYC
EXCLUSIVE: A bittersweet farewell to NYC - chronicling a historical decade of demoralization in my longest, spiciest, and most heartfelt post yet
Comrades: I am getting out of the city.
Next month, I will be moving away from the Karenland FUPAZ (Federation of Urban Progressive Autonomous Zone) that I have called home for my entire adult life. Let me start with the positives before diving into the demoralization. My parents landed at JFK in the 80s with nothing but $20 and a pocket full of dreams. I was born in the Bronx. I have lived in 6 neighborhoods across Manhattan and Brooklyn. I met Mrs. Bezmenov here. Baby Yulia was born here. I have made lifelong friends here like Rooftop K, Arthur Kwon Lee, P Lux, and many others from every walk of life and every corner of the world. I have accrued a lifetime’s worth of happy memories here, stories that I will tell my grandkids one day. My birth certificate, my wife’s birth certificate, our marriage license, and our child’s birth certificate all say NEW YORK, NEW YORK. We are real New Yorkers who leave with our hearts full of joy and broken in despair at its accelerating decline.
Yuri Bezmenov wrote a love letter to America. This is my love letter to New York. Ironically, this Substack would not exist without my immersion in and inspiration from NYC’s daily clown show. I describe it as the based written version of “How To with John Wilson”, which itself is a hilarious visual tribute. Today I will chronicle the city’s demoralization over the past decade, layered with anecdotes of what I have witnessed.
The world needs to know how wokeness and incompetence destroyed its greatest city. Please share this piece with anyone you know who cares about NYC and urban life. If it can happen here, it can happen anywhere. Our shining cities on a hill have plunged into darkness. Only by exposing the rot can we hope to heal; sunlight is the best disinfectant. This is written in the style of a war correspondent reflecting on one of the last choppers out of Saigon.
****Tweet this Substack link, tag @yuribzemenov22, and use the hashtags #EscapefromNewYork #YuriTriedToWarnUs.
Budget 15 minutes to read in full and another 5-10 for each link you follow. On Tuesday, I will publish How To Escape from New York (Part 2): a list of my favorite hidden gems in NYC and invitation to farewell drinks (for paid subscribers only). For background reading, How To Visit Karenland FUPAZ (Part 2) described the unspoken caste system of every city and How To Visit Karenland FUPAZ (Part 3) documented what the “gun-free zone” in midtown Manhattan NYC looks like.
Housewarming gifts are greatly appreciated:
2011: Occupy Wall Street
Following the financial crisis earthquake, OWS was the first political aftershock. At the time, I was getting crushed as a banking analyst near the encampment. My colleagues made snide remarks about the protestors as we walked by during lunch breaks. Little did I know that a decade later, I would find so much in common with them. In retrospect, OWS was more MAGA/TeaParty than Antifa/BLM. The horseshoe theory is real. OWS wanted accountability from corporations, while MAGA/TeaParty wanted accountability from government; now corporations and government have merged and BLM/DEI/ESG/Antifa/Greta are their shock troops. Identity politics tore apart a genuine populist movement.
pls fix thx - add the Pfizer, Moderna, Blackrock, and WEF logos to this sign:
2012: Hurricane Sandy
Like 9/11, disaster brought out the best in New York. People looked out for each other. When my apartment lost power for a week, I couch surfed at friends’ apartments. The city defiantly kept calm and carried on. No looting, no rioting. My neighbors and I bought coffee and donuts for police, who patrolled around the clock for weeks until power was restored. My building’s super stationed himself in the lobby with a baseball bat and flashlight to protect us. He was an old school New Yorker, a dying breed. Gruff grizzly bear on the outside, sweet teddy bear on the inside. I’ll never forget his accent and attitude: “I ain’t fuckin’ around with this shit. Where I come from, we take care of our people. I’ll be here all night, so sleep good. If anyone who don’t live here comes through them doors, me and my bat will say how ya doin’.” I doubt the city will be this resilient against the next real disaster, but I hope its residents will prove us wrong as they have in the past. Ever since Hurricane Sandy, I have kept a go-bag with survival essentials fully packed just in case.
2013: The peak and end of a Golden Age
After 20 years under Giuliani and Bloomberg, NYC was thriving as the safest big city in the world. Strong men created good times. The energy was incomparable to how it is now. I never read the local news or followed local politics because everything was swell. During a fun night out, our crew bumped into legendary meme mayoral candidate Jimmy McNulty. He had the greatest beard and platform of any candidate in history: “The Rent is Too Damn High”.
2014: A Tale of Two Cities
Bolshevik Bill de Blasio needed only 300,000 votes in a city of 8 million to win the Democrat primary, which is the real election. Anthony Weiner was coasting to victory behind Huma and the Clintons, but he couldn’t keep his weiner in his pants so Sasquatch prevailed with his message of inequality. The tale of two cities that unfolded was how he took a thriving city and turned it into a shithole, worsening inequality and overall quality of life. That is the end game of equity. Weak men create hard times. I began seeing more homeless and addicts, one of whom defecated on my block in broad daylight. 2 NYPD cops were executed thanks to BDB, BLM, and Obama’s rhetoric. I still felt safe day to day, but these were ominous signs of what was to come.
White pill miracle: Officer Wenjian Lu’s wife gave birth to a daughter named Angel several years after his death. The hospital was able to preserve his sperm and legislators passed “Angelina’s Law”, which allowed her to receive his benefits.
2015: Bullets fly - I’M WALKIN HERE!
One night, we were awoken by loud popping sounds. Mrs. Bezmenov was terrified that they were gunshots, but I didn’t believe it was possible so I grumbled that she should relax and went back to sleep. She was proven right and will never let me forget about it. We learned the next morning that a drug dealer had been shot and killed in a drive by. As the city deteriorated, the assault on the senses amplified. Everything felt dirtier, ruder, more claustrophobic, more dangerous. My ears were pummeled by ambulance/police/firetruck sirens, blaring car horns, blasting personal speakers, and screeching subways. My nose was rubbed into hot garbage and human/dog shit. I began looking forward more to trips away from the city. Every time I left, my blood pressure dropped; every time I returned, my blood pressure rose. Why were we still hanging around when so many good people were leaving?
Me every day:
2016: Orange Man Bad triggers a TDS epidemic
One iconic New Yorker’s wild ride from his golden escalator and into the White House triggered a TDS pandemic; many New Yorkers have terminal cases. He defeated carpetbagger Queen Clinton, who had never lived in New York until she ran for Senate. Her fellow artificial transplants loved her and hated him. Self proclaimed loving and tolerant people virtue signaled about how much they hated him and anyone who supported him. I learned the hard way that you will be attacked for blaspheming the NPC woke religion and that some NPCs are too demoralized to reason with. The wails from Javits Center could be heard around the world. The CEO of my company sent an email the day after the election offering grief counseling. I saw co-workers break down in tears. Sad!
2017: Deadliest terror attack since 9/11 goes straight down the memory hole
A diversity lottery winner who pledged allegiance to ISIS ran over and killed 8 people on a Hudson River bike path, blocks away from the World Trade Center memorial. Like many similar attacks in Europe, the headlines said it was a truck and the story got memory holed. I often biked through the path where he struck and was shocked that NPC friends were more concerned about Trump’s mean Tweets than this slaughter. In response, the city erected ugly concrete barriers in pedestrian zones to shield us from the vibrancy of diversity. The perpetrator was quietly convicted just a few weeks ago. Ask any New Yorker on the street today and they probably don’t even know that it happened.
2018: Demoralization hurricane alphabet soup - AOC, DSA, BLM, DEI, ESG, LGBTQ+
20 years after Sex and the City, NYC fell to The Current Thing. A city that prided itself on originality and irreverence succumbed to woke cringe conformity. The Sanpaku eyed sociopaths, soy bugmen, karents, and Park Slope Panthers (Pansies) ascended to the throne. Fellow Bronx native AOC went from a casting couch to Congress. Her DSA comrades took over the city and state government. Bail reform sprung hardened criminals out of jail right after their arrests. A one-day pride parade became pride week, which then became Current Thing Month full of drag queens twerking for kids. BDB’s daughter was later arrested for attacking cops at a BLM riot.
The untimely passing of Anthony Bourdain is an allegory for the fall of NYC. Like the city he symbolized, he once oozed originality, authenticity, and charisma. Then he sold out to CNN and dated a toxic SJW, spiraling into substance abuse and self harm. Anyone who loves NYC hates to see what it has devolved to. Like an alcoholic, the ruling class can’t even admit the problems so there is little hope of any real solutions. Vito Corleone would despair:
2019: Normalization and embarrassment
Yuri Bezmenov’s final stage of subversion is normalization, where the populace accepts socialism and its poor living conditions. Crime and decay were now can considered “part and parcel” of big city living. After backpacking through several “developing” countries, I was amazed that their cities were in much better condition than NYC. I never ride the subway because of how dirty it is, but marveled at other public transit systems. Russia in particular was an eye opening experience. NYC, London, Paris, Hong Kong, and Shanghai were always admired as the elite global cities. Over the past decade, they have all fallen in different ways. I used to be proud to say I was from New York, but at this point I was embarrassed.
Progressive, civilized NYC:
Regressive, barbaric Moscow:
2020: COVID lockdowns and BLM/Antifa riots put the nails in the coffin
A bodily virus and a mind virus did what terrorist attacks, hurricanes, and blizzards could not do. They gutted the soul of the city. Mass formation psychosis brought out the worst of the city’s Karens and their OCD neuroticism. NYC is like a cruise ship: you pay high prices for tiny apartments because endless entertainment awaits on deck 24/7. Once the latter shuts down, you realize you are in an expensive prison. We spent most of 2020 out of the city to avoid the lockdowns and riots. Many good folks left permanently. That winter, I worked in an empty office where the lights shut off at 5PM. I walked home in apocalyptic emptiness and darkness. There were so many images and soundbites that will haunt me forever. The silence and acquiescence of fellow New Yorkers was most damning.
Obergrupenfuhrer William Wilhelm encouraged us to use a snitch hotline if we saw groups of Jews gathering:
Il Duce Andrew Cuomo ordered 10,000+senior citizens to their deaths, but was only forced to resign because he groped a few staffers:
Riots and anarchy took over the streets, forcing businesses to board up their windows. From now on, any policing incident would result in riots in NYC and FUPAZ around the country:
Masked zombies waited in the freezing cold for hours to get tested:
2021: Meet the new boss, same as the old boss
New York had a chance to make meaningful course corrections in the gubernatorial and mayoral elections, but chose not to. The intersectional changing of the guard only made things worse. Stunning and brave first female Governor Kovid Karen Kathy Hochul preached in a church that the jab was from God and her apostles needed to spread the world, all while wearing a VAXXED necklace. Stunning and brave Black former cop Mayor Eric Instagram Adams talked a tough game about improving safety and education, but has done nothing other than take selfies.
Their vaccine and mask mandates further tore apart the social fabric of the city. Imagine how liberals would have reacted if Trump forced them to take the Trump vaccine, warned them he was losing his patience, then wished them a winter of death and disease. My employer and friends’ weddings mandated the jab. My building installed a key code on the gym because the unvaccinated were no longer allowed to use it. They will never apologize, much less admit they were wrong and were lied to. The most unforgivable sin is what they did to the powerless kids. Schools were kept closed longest in poor minority districts, jabs were mandated for extracurriculars, and toddlers were masked. I see a masked or trans kid almost every day when I walk around the neighborhood, and it radicalizes me further every time.
When you live in an area where parents pay small fortunes for their children to go to school here, then it’s an asylum. GTFO ASAP. These poor kids never had a chance:
2022: Stop Asian Hate
The demoralization accelerated. I grew numb at the zombified numbness of those around me and started this Substack to stay sane. The 9/11 Memorial Museum shut down due to lack of funding. Crimes became more frequent and gruesome. A mass shooter opened fire during a morning commute, wounding 10 but miraculously not killing anyone. 2 more cops were ambushed and killed in Harlem. Bodega worker Jose Alba was charged with murder and imprisoned for defending himself against an ex-con. He was later released but fled the country because he could no longer trust our justice system. Like the ISIS “truck attack”, they all got memory holed.
Then it got personal. A friend of a friend was pushed to her death in the subway. Another was stabbed to death after a vagrant followed her into her apartment. Stop Asian Hate rubbed salt in the wounds with its politicization. The entire movement is a disgusting astroturfed leftist gaslighting operation designed to whip Asians into intersectional victimhood, while ignoring the obvious pattern behind the perpetrators of the violence.
Data never lies. ~3% of the population commits ~50% of the violent crime in the US, and that protected class votes ~90% Democrat. Asians are ~100x more likely to be on the receiving end of violence from the protected class than the other way around. ~90% of attacks on Jews in NYC have been perpetrated from the protected class, which plays the “knockout game” on them. To blame white supremacy is a farce. Asians and Jews are well aware of the patterns, which explains why their neighborhoods have become Republican bastions. The media is shocked that the gaslighting hasn’t worked.
2023: New York City has a brand
Nativist Mayor Adams proclaimed that unlike flyover country, New York City has a brand. The brand involves innocent civilians dying and suffering every day. In January, 3 heinous crimes in the span of 3 days epitomized the brand in 3 different ways.
A helpless old woman was butchered in her own home by a man who previously served 20 years for gutting a man. She lived blocks away from Central Park and the Museum of Natural History, whose removal of its iconic Teddy Roosevelt statue clearly solved everything. The Upper West Side is a nice neighborhood where a 1-bedroom box costs $4,000+/month to rent or $1M to buy. Its residents are zealous worshippers of The Current Thing, sipping on soy lattes and munching on lox bagels while pearl clutching their way through their Bible - The New York Times. They don’t know and don’t care that their neighbors are murdered because the NYT will never report it. The brahmans are too busy virtue signaling about saving the world to notice the carnage in their backyard. You’re the asshole if you bring it up. Jordan Peterson would consider this a pathological example of criticizing the world before cleaning up your own room.
In midtown, illegals stabbed each other while trashing a hotel that taxpayers pay $500/night for them to stay in. 40,000+ have poured to NYC over the past year, which will cost the city $2 billion this year. When single men were asked to move from The Watson Hotel near Central Park to other shelters in order to accommodate families, they refused and started camping outside it. Activist NGOs stepped in to block their evictions. Productive kulaks like me continue moving out, replaced by welfare recipients who will never pay a dime in taxes. The federal government and every American taxpayer will be forced to subsidize this unsustainable ponzi scheme. Wealth taxes and repurposing empty office buildings for slum housing are inevitable.
Like their Martha’s Vineyard hivemates, virtue signaling brownstone bugmen and Karens will never host a single illegal in their multi-million dollar homes:
Finally, a weatherman was beaten to a bloody pulp by feral teenagers. He dared to tell them to stop lighting an old man’s hair on fire. I used to live near the subway station where this surreal crime occurred.
The NYC brand demands that the justice system and public art be fully demoralized:
The physiognomies of the artist and curator - demonic Karens:
Studies have found that one of the main psychological differences between liberals and conservatives is disgust. I have seen firsthand that not only do liberals have less disgust or shame, but many view living in filth as a badge of honor. Chemical imbalances are the only way to explain such bizarre behavior. Deep down you can see they are kidding themselves. Most have thousand-mile stares, baggy eyes, and receding hairlines that come from working to the bone, substance abuse, and chasing status while chained to golden handcuffs. The rat race and hamster wheel never ends. Science experiments with rats have discovered that when they are subjected to repeated stress in cramped cages, they self-harm and gnaw at each other. Are FUPAZ residents any different?
How New Yorkers see the world:
How the world sees New York:
How New Yorkers think they live:
How New Yorkers actually live:
The US is in the midst of a Great Migration as sane people continue to flee from FUPAZ like NYC. Housing in non-demoralized areas continue to see strong demand, even as interest rates reach record highs. In 2021 alone, one million people moved away from California, New York, Illinois, and Massachusetts to Texas, Florida, Arizona, and the Carolinas. The blue states will get bluer and deteriorate further, while the red states will get redder and thrive. Every national election will come down to ballot harvesting, Dominion glitches, and other shenanigans affecting a few thousand votes in Phoenix/AZ, Atlanta/GA, Detroit/MI, Philadelphia/PA, Milwaukee/WI, and Vegas/NV. Election and riot seasons are gonna be lit!
I never liked the phrase “you get what you voted for”. Many upstanding citizens of FUPAZ like me didn’t vote for this unholy mess, but had to endure it. There are still so many good salt of the earth people here, unique characters who give the city its personality and edge. Many can’t leave due to family or finances. They don’t deserve it and we don’t have to live like this. Though it may not be as bad as the 70s and 80s, the fact that all cities are backsliding to the bad old days is an indictment on our society. The commissars who enthusiastically vote blue no matter who should not be allowed to complain or move out.
There are still some rays of light. Many heroes are doing yeoman’s work in NYC, fighting hard to turn the tide. First responders perform miracles every day. Gavin Wax has revamped the New York Young Republican Club to thousands of members. James O’Keefe and Project Veritas are exposing the depths of corruption. Curtis Sliwa and the Guardian Angels have stepped up patrols. Miranda Devine and The New York Post break huge stories like Hunter Biden’s laptop. Although he didn’t win the governership, Lee Zeldin came within a few percentage points and helped swing several Congressional races that won the House. George Santos and his Top G right-hand man Vish Burra should use this opportunity to call out every swampy liar like Senator Karen Fauxahantas and Joe Biden. Every New York county shifted red in 2022:
NYC remains the best city for young ambitious strivers because of its industry, energy, and density. There is nothing in the world like the buzz of the first nice spring day and the first fall breeze. Dolphins, whales, and oysters have returned to a cleaner harbor. The new East River ferry system is a well-run and fun way to get around. NYC has fallen far from its peak and may never recover to its former glory, but it’s nowhere near as bad as the other Karenland FUPAZ around the country.
Anyone with a functioning brain and a heart has to wrangle with the choice to stick it out or ship out. Like many FUPAZ, NYC’s 70/30 blue vote ruins a 60/40 red state. FUPAZ DMZs (Demoralization Zones) are the new Mason-Dixon Lines. You have to move far outside city limits to avoid the infected suburbs in the buffer zone, which have the same FUPAZ “values” that groom children and protect criminals. Newark, Elizabeth, and Paterson make NYC look like a utopian paradise.
NYC FUPAZ DMZ:
Escape from New York was released during our last nadir in 1981, right after Reagan took office. Perhaps another Ron will save the day this time:
My journey has come full circle. As the Wear Sunscreen speech advised: “Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard.” I moved in as a soft boy, I move out as a hard man. 40 years ago, my parents came to NYC escaping tyranny and seeking a better life. Now we leave NYC escaping tyranny and seeking better life.
Despite the heaviness of this post, I am happier and more optimistic than ever. My family will enjoy a calmer, safer place where I can better protect them. I will no longer have to remind my wife to stand away from the subway platform edge and carry pepper spray. I will no longer have to check my daughter’s playground for needles and trash. I will no longer have to walk my mother-in-law to her car at night because she is scared of getting beaten up. I will no longer have to endure racial slurs from the homeless guy who roams our neighborhood. I will never take basic freedoms and societal functioning for granted again. Less of our money will be seized by the state. We are all refugees now. Perhaps I will appreciate the city more when I am not mired in it every day.
When I watch the skyline recede in the rearview mirror of the UHaul truck, what will I feel? Nostalgia? Joy? Sadness? Relief? Hope? Everything all at once? Where are we moving to? This sums it up:
2023.
New York City
is a demoralized Karenland FUPAZ.
The crime rate has risen 44%.
Moving out is inevitable.
Moving in is insane.
I am a native NYer who left about a decade ago, but all my family and most of my friends still live there, and I just need to say:
The most shocking depressing infuriating aspect in all of this for me is how ideologically brainwashed my friends are, how angry they get when you step on one of their media-generated taboos, how they remind me of Ned Flanders anytime he sees a cross, except now it's just hearing the words "Black" or "Trans" and they immediately genuflect and begin praying to their new idols.
I am in my early 50s and my friends and I spent at least 20 years living downtown (late 80s to mid 00s) and maybe discussed politics 2 hrs total, we checked all the countercultural boxes, we had no dogma and very few sacred beliefs (and these are intelligent accomplished people that I love).
Even if I live to be 1000 I will never not be in shock as to how the brainwashing blob got to my people, I can only surmise that the social pressures are too strong to resist. (And also they have been gradually culturally conditioned to believe in their bones that anyone remotely conservative is a Nazi bigot, so there is never a reason to see another side of any issue.)
The last 5ish years really have been like living in Invasion of the Body Snatchers.
There's nothing harder than leaving behind a place you love whose decline into madness and decay has broken your heart.
There's much to comment on here, but I'll pull out the comparison to the 70s and 80s. My impression, admittedly based entirely on Hollywood, is that during that period NYC had a lot of crime, but was also a lot of fun. It's the era that bred men like your superintendent. It was a dangerous city, but a free city, and that superposition of grime and crime with irrepressible independence and joi de vivre was what gave NYC its unique, rough charm.
By contrast, a decade of soys and karens has utterly gutted NYC as a fun place, while their ineffectual enabling of the underclass has deliberately cultivated a zombie horde. All the dirt and ugliness of the 70s, along with the 1984 technetronic control grid. A joyless anarchotyranny. Much worse than the 70s I'd think - certainly the current situation is utterly lacking in any sort of charm or romance.
I can't help but wonder Giuliani and Bloomberg were partially responsible. Broken windows policy, indoor smoking band, etc. turned NYC into a safer, cleaner, but more sterile and corporate environment. Once the political pendulum shifted left, the spirit of the city had been damaged sufficiently that there was nothing to stand in the way of the crushing conformity of the woke mind virus. A certain degree of recalcitrant corruption, a reflexive fuck you attitude, may make a city a spicier place to live, but also makes it that much harder to impose tyranny since such a culture produces social friction instinctively.