I live in a gated community.
But it was not by choice. When I moved here, this place was an ordinary apartment complex; but about a year ago, the owners decided to put in a controlled-access gate and ever since, I have had nothing but grief from that gate.
They said the reason they were putting it in was to reduce crime, but crime was never really a problem to begin with. There had only been one or two little incidents since I moved in. And in the year since, there have been a few more. So the gate has had little effect. Why? Because it is so easy for a criminal to get in, if he or she wants to. I don't know how many dozen times I have opened the gate with my special card, only to have three or four strange vehicles just follow me in. Anyone with the slightest athletic ability could hop the fence; and if they wanted to carry out something big, all they have to do is hotwire a car.
But legitimate guests sometimes have real trouble getting in. The computer which controls access doesn't always work right (and even when it does, my guests cannot get me to let them in if I happen to be on the phone or internet). One time, a computer glitch erased my code from the database and my guest could not reach me. Cars piled up behind her, honking, cursing. She could not back up. It was a total mess. Finally, they organized all the cars to back up enough so she could turn around. Then she drove around, came back behind another car, and just followed that car in.
So naturally, I have been anxious to get out of here and have spent the last few months actively looking for a new apartment complex to move to. But I have been somewhat dismayed and annoyed to discover that many otherwise-nice complexes have become gated. It is a disturbing trend which is gaining even more popularity in the South, especially Florida. In fact, one out of every eight Americans lives in a gated community, and there are over 20,000 gated communities throughout the US.
Edward J. Blakeley and Mary Gail Snyder have written a book entitled Fortress America: Gated Communities in the United States which examines the social and economic factors which prompt people to move into gated communities and how the realities differ from the myths once they do. They have statistics which show that despite the perception, crime really does not go down with the inclusion of a gate. In fact, sometimes gates hinder these problems, such as when emergency vehicles are slowed down. I remember a day about nine months ago when the fire alarm went off in my building and we all had to evacuate. Less than five minutes later, I could see across the lake, the firetruck arrived at the gate, but they could not get in. We watched them struggle for several minutes before someone decided to run over there and let them in. Fortunately, in this case, the fire turned out to be a false alarm and no one was in danger, but we might not be so lucky next time.
However, the really disturbing aspect of gated communities is the sense of elitism which they create. Blakeley and Snyder point out that gates often symbolize "prestige" which "create[s] and protect[s] a secure place on the social ladder." Not merely to keep out crime, gates keep out all "undesirables," which often means people of lower social economic classes and races. Of course, racial segregation is illegal in this country, but Blakeley, who is African-American, encountered much racial discrimination during his research, as well as statistics which show non-whites make up only a tiny portion of gated community residents.
Gates tend to create an us-vs.-them mentality for many residents and isolate them from the larger communities. Crime tends to be seen as a highly localized problem which is solved too simply by putting up a gate around the neighborhood. But Evan McKenzie, author of Privatopia: Homeowner Associations and the Rise of Residential Private Government, points out that people lose sight of the larger picture. You don't solve crime by putting up a gate -- you just push it elsewhere. He believes we need to look at the root problems of crime -- poverty and violence -- and address those issues.
When we feel the need to put barriers between ourselves and our neighbors, something is wrong with the American Dream. Robert Frost may have touched on the beginnings of this problem in his famous 1914 poem "Mending Wall," but it is only in recent years that the trend is growing so rapidly. As Earl M. Starnes, Professor Emeritus at the University of Florida, puts it, "Balkanization of our cities is a manifestation of fear, selfishness, and exclusion."
If, as Blakeley says, social equality is the foundation of the American Dream, then gated communities make that dream ring hollow. He and Snyder conclude their book saying, "Gated communities create yet another barrier to interaction among people of different races, cultures, and classes and may add to the problem of building the social networks that form the base for economic and social opportunity."
Sure, I'll be happy to get out of here. But even happier if they tear down all the gates. Good fences do NOT make good neighbors.