Are Neighbors really neighborly anymore?

[thegreatkazoo]

The question here is this:
Can a neighborhood ease stress in person's life for the better?

I will need to add a little back story to this, so bear with me.

Back when I was living in Hampton, VA, I lived in a very large apartment complex with two neighbors of ours living in the large attic-like section upstairs. We did almost everything together, and if any of us were to take a trip to the hospital or anything of that nature, we knew the first people that would be there: our neighbors.

When moving to Athens 17 years ago, that all seemed to disappear. There was only one neighbor we talked to back when I lived in my apartment. Even now, in our quiet House that's on a Cul-de-sac (the very definition of Suburbia IMHO ), we have only talked to one (of five) neighbors we have. In fact, even some high school chums that have now graduated from college were surprised to know that I live there (we moved to this place in 2006 FYI). The neighborhood seems disjointed to us, at best--and that's even with my mom going to the Neighborhood Association meetings!

I mention all of this because I wonder if is a deteriment in the isolation that people feel sometimes in living alone. Case in point: George Sodini. On Tuesday 8/4/2009, he enters a LA Fitness outside of Pittsburgh and opens fire, killing 4 and injuring 10 before turning the gun on himself. Some links follow:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8184697.stm
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=8261658&page=1
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=8264736&page=1
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/#32306120

What's more disturbing is that he kept a blog detailing his descent into insanity. The interesting take is that of the neighbors, who said they only noticed suspicious behavior the night before the shooting.

While this heinous act was premeditated to a capital P (and I fully believe that it was), my question is this: If his neighbors had been more like...well, neighbors, could this have been avoided?

 

[Fuelbi]

I dont think so and yet I do think so. You see the guy was becoming insane and I dont think nothing wouldve stopped him from murdering all those people. Although there is a possibility if there was a neighbor who cared they couldve taken him into therapy or something. Although I am worried with his erratic behavior he couldve killed the neighbor who cared about him. Now about the question of the beginning of the thread. Are neighbors neighborly anymore I really dont think so. An example used to be that there was this lady with her 5 year old son that used to live next door to us. It turned out that she really didnt care about being chummy with my father but that she was just interested. Her son used to come into my room and ask for some of the things in my room. For example I had these really old model cars from my childhood he wanted those. At first I gave him one but then he wanted the rest. My dad said to do it and his mother didnt stop him. I told him but he said he didnt see the problem until the day that the kid asked my dad for his model toy of Massinger Z (I think I spelt that right. Its that robot from that old TV show that my dad used to love as a kid) that he had in his special corner with the rest of his decorations there (He had about one thousand CDs there and he had toys and stuff there like a tiki thing, a 3d model of one of his most favorite CDs, which ironically I ended up buying in a store, a mask of that guy from the movie scream, etc) He then decided to put a stop to it and said no to him. Then he apologized to me and promised me hed end up buying something else for my room (which ended up being a model of the character Marcus from Gears of War). When she moved she invited my dad to her house and after that we never saw her again. Apparently he didnt like the fact that she had asked him to go to Disney World with her in Orlando just because she didnt have anybody to drive her. So that just proves that no there arent as many neighborly neighbors these days anymore. Most of them are jerks, or interested, or do not care at all. Im not saying that there arent neighbors that care but that they are rare to find anymore

 

[Shadow13]

Well, since neighbors are something that about everybody in the world has and they are all different, generalizing them seems a bit like generalizing people. I've had two very different experiences with neighbors in the two neighborhoods I've lived in.
The neighborhood I lived most of my life in was considered to be in the ghetto. Since that was when I was young, I would mainly try to talk to kids that were my age (4-7 years old). I met them by seeing them in the neighborhood, since I was in catholic school and there weren't any kids I knew from school who lived in the area. The few kids I did talk to I would hang out with on a once every week or so basis. There were a few people that my parents knew okay, but most people that we didn't know wouldn't do anything so much as say a casual "Hi" if we saw them. The thing is though, we didn't even talk to the people we did know that often.
The neighborhood I live in now is a suburban area. When my family moved here the neighbors from across the street welcomed us and we soon knew many of the neighbors around us. However, outside of the neighbors we know well now, we don't really talk to any other neighbors that much. Unlike my old neighborhood, however, many of the kids in my neighborhood are/were classmates, since I now go to public school. If we see one another we often exchange hellos, but we don't get into a conversation often.
Overall, how neighborly you neighbors are does depend on the neighbors themselves, but most people aren't really neighborly anymore.

 

[balladechina212]

From my personal experience, neighbors haven't really been friendly in all 6 (7?) neighborhoods I've lived in. These have included university apartment complexes, townhouses, private apartments, and private homes and there really has been no difference where I lived. However, there is a trend. I am Asian American, and other Asian American families will immediately seek us out and be "neighborly" with my family. Neighbors of other races rarely put forth effort to be friendly towards us.

 

[F1ZZ]

I believe how neighborly a neighbor is really depends on who that neighbor is. My personal experience with my neighbors is different with each person. My one neighbor, Joe, talks to my family all the time and even helps out with some of our gardening. He is a great person and he doesn't even seems like an adult sometimes. On the other hand I have a horrible neighbor on the other side of my house. Whenever me and my brother are playing hockey outside we sometimes shoot the ball over into her yard. I go and get the ball but each time she is watching me out of her window. (This neighbor previously allowed me to get balls that may go over into her yard.) Yes, this is scary and freaks me out greatly. Other than her my neighborhood is great, it is quiet and happy place to grow up. Overall she is not kind to my family and shows us no respect. No one in the neighborhood likes her or even knows her. The personality of people may shape how neighborly they are in my opinion, remember each person is different.

 

[spookyskeptic]

I think it's something that has to be looked at based on people's personalities and circumstances. I'll dredge up the dreaded Hurricane Katrina for my example.

I'm not an outgoing person. I make eye contact and try to smile to everyone I pass. It's really a Southern thing, but I do it. I've worked public-facing jobs too long. I won't, however, stop and do the "How's ya mom 'n' dem?" thing. Honestly, I don't care. I, like, most people range between self-absorbed and busy. That said, I try to be a good neighbor and, for the most part, so do my neighbors.

Take the dude that was living in the apartment next door to me prior to Katrina. I'd had a few interactions with him. Helped him move furniture, bring in groceries, and the like. He reciprocated. Now, one day, Richard walks out side and he finds a hypodermic needle sticking through the sole of his boot. He was, not surprisingly, angry. Over this event, we got to know each other pretty well. The man was crazy, though, but awesome crazy. The upstairs neighbors, in the days after Katrina, were being absolute jerks. My husband and I had been putting long days in at our jobs and helping my parents fix their house. We stayed exhausted, so the Michael Jackson karaoke sessions were making it worse. We asked them to chill it out and they wouldn't. Shouting began, but our new friend Richard... Well, Richard pulled a gun on them and the upstairs neighbors were quiet. Forever. We never had a problem with Richard, though, because as he pointed out we were good neighbors.

The situation with Richard, though, comes down to the fact that I initiated the contact. People are so isolated in our society and I think that people have forgotten that functional relationships go both ways. Someone really has to start it. If you want good neighbors, you have to make them.

The other Katrina-related situation revolves around my parents' neighborhood. Dad had a working chainsaw, but no gas. The guy next door had gas but no chainsaw. They both had frozen meats that were beginning to thaw, but had lost their grills. In exchange for tree removal, two other neighbors volunteered grills and charcoal. Sometimes, community has to be created by crisis. It stems, to an extent, from people taking other people for granted. One never knows who their friends are until they need those friends. Like F1ZZ's neighborhood, my parents' neighborhood also has the old woman. Despite their crappy attitudes, you should still try to be nice. It might be the motivation for them getting their head out of their ***.

 

[thegreatkazoo]

You bumped my thread from before I was a DHer for what now? :S

The example is relevant, but you could have just left this one alone. IMHO.

 

[#HBC | Dark Horse]

@spooky

Don't necrobump threads.