“Murders were at their lowest level in the first three months of 2026 compared to the first three months of any year in the city’s recorded history, with major crime also down citywide, the mayor and police commissioner announced Thursday.”
Without necessarily agreeing with the original post, I think it's perfectly possible for it to have been more pleasant to walk down the streets of NYC in 1975 AND for it to be far more crime-ridden in 1975 than in 2026.
Crime tends to focus in the "bad parts" of town at "the wrong times". E.g., walking along Park Avenue at 3 in the afternoon in 1975 might not be any more risky than walking along it at 3 in the afternoon in 2026, AND also might subject the walker to more "low-grade micronuisancing" in the form of non-criminal "accosting" and the like. (San Francisco would be an even more vivid picture of what I'm trying to get at here - higher crime in the 1970s, but far more likely to see someone nodding out in a puddle of their own filth in the 2020s)
Now, Harlem at 2am (or even Central Park, or famously Times Square pre-Disney) would be two vastly-different experiences between 1975 and 2026. However, for a lot of people, their experience of NYC is going to be primarily the safer parts (maybe not the extremes of Park Avenue, but the middle-class areas) at the safer times, either because they're 9-to-5 office drone residents or because they're tourist doing touristy things, which are generally going to be done during the day.
I do think the post is basically just false nostalgia from people whose only experience of NYC has been through a screen, but I also don't think "the murder rate is objectively far lower" refutes it.
Right. So like how the subways today are unpleasant experience in 2026 as compared to 1975 when…wait heck no, take a look at any picture of subways circa 1975. Oh so maybe the midtown areas where there was no squeegee men or trash strewn ab…wait that’s not it either.
I can’t emphasize enough. Even if you limit your experience to the “good parts” of town or what the city looks like 9-5 or various outer borough areas, there is basically nowhere in NYC that was better off in 1975 with possible exception of the music scene and that has more to do with the general massive change in music industry pre and post Napster/streaming.
I can’t emphasize enough how much the “good” parts of town had more trash, way way more graffiti, more homeless, more potholes and more economic dislocation (you realize this used to be cited as the reason Gulliani was held up as rising star politically right?).
One last one on this. Strong argument to made the post popular movie made in the 70s set in NYC is Saturday Night Fever. It’s now known as a) the thing that made disco mainstream b) what launched John Travolta’s career. Take a look closely at the plot. Travolta’s dad is an out of work construction worker (hello stagflation!), Travolta’s character is in a dead end job at paint store living at home. The whole point is him and his buddies are going nowhere and have no options but at this one disco place him and his buddies transform into kings.
The people telling you the 70s were better are people like Sorbo who are just lying for engagement or people pining who were like 10 in this period who are actually pining to be young again.
Dude - until even approx mid-1990s, even parts of Central Manhattan - example Times Square, was legit not-fucking-suburbinate-tourist-drama-llama-whiny scary from late evening. Walking on the streets was no way better in the real 1980s, even up to ealry 1990s (I won't tust my own kid memories of the 70s but pleasant is not the case) - loons, outright scary ass people, subway cars that looked like something out of Mad Max.
I worked in Times Square area in the early 90s, liked to go the central library - the park was a fucking open air drug mart, and going to Times Square station after 7pm means putting on your mean face and walking like no one in the world should fuck with you.
Nowadays it's fucking Disney Land (and I have no problem with that, although yeah the wide-eyed tourist hordes are irritating at some level but no romaniticism from me about the Old Days - having myself been held-up at gun point twice on the street at the subway station by a strung out twit. (on other hand tokens were an easy "here dude take the tokens.")
Post-covid America (not just NYC) is a much worse place than pre-covid. Everyone alive today just has to think back to seven short years ago to make the comparison.
There's two ways that the federal government measures crime: by compiling police reports submitted by police departments (UCR/NIBRS) and polling people directly (NCVS).
NIBRS has show a drop-off in crime. The NCVS hasn't.
Compare that to 2019. Crime rates skyrocketed during the pandemic.
The late 1980's and early 1990's represented the historic highs for violent crime during the modern era. Then rates declined--until Covid. When you're talking about crime levels in the post-pandemic era you're really talking about levels of violence that the country hasn't seen for 20 years, back when crime was much worse.
In addition, that increase happened in a very shot period of time. I suspect that the public is angry because pretty much everyone alive today remembers 2019 and understands that the the country is in a much worse position today compared to seven short years ago.
Everyone here loves you, and that’s why we are here. Your relationship with “literally” has gotten out of control. You’ve used it in situations that were very clearly not literal, and in situations whose factual nature was apparent. Innocent bystanders are suffering, Nate. You’re suffering.
This is not an attack; it’s an offer of support. We believe that, with help, you can kick this, and literally return to being the writer you once were.
Social media seems to end up in a partisan death spiral. You’re dunked on for not agreeing with groupthink, so you leave, leaving like minded hyper partisans.
The good news is these morons can go and live on their own island away from the rest of us - with media still able to sustain itself.
The bad news - these irrational groups act as the activist base for our political parties. Driving them to make increasingly dumb decisions (points at the administration)
Agreed on a lot of these points. My general take is that the "echo chamber" effect isn't nearly as much of problem as the massive spread of misinformation and highly partisan content that these algorithms heavily promote. People have always seeked out other like minded individuals, but social media seems to be able to covert a "like minded" individual into a full on radicals.
I think it is interesting to study how each of these social media platforms are different based off various attributes (FB: "real" identity, algorithm pushing engagebait, nobody posts thing they just scroll; Reddit: totally anon, selective content based off user interests, people post things like crazy: Twitter/X: famous people identity know, algorithm mostly pushing engage bait but slightly based on who you follow, only famous people post everybody else just scrolls, etc etc etc).
I walk into articles like this hoping for 10 minutes of quality reading and then after 10 deep link clicks later I've spent the the entire night catching up on all of Nate's self described mistakes in the early days of 538, to somehow ending up on a wikipedia page about "Pygmy Mammoths".
I feel as if Twitter/X when used correctly (HA!) is really useful for live sports, quick breaking political stories (usually regarding votes in Congress as they are happening), and breaking weather info. Beyond that... Well good luck.
I really enjoyed Manhattan in 1975, although nothing like the picture in Sorbo's post.
The rot was the fertility. It drove out the middle and upper class, meaning cheap rents for artists, musicians and weirdos mostly in illegal lofts and sublets and tenements. CBGB's versus Max's Kansas City.
The loft Jazz scene--Sam Rivers and David Murray playing for small public gatherings in their lofts. Inventive off-Broadway shows that went mainstream from Rocky Horror to A Chorus Line. TImes Square with seedy peek shows next to Kurosawa double features--standing in line for which was like being an extra in Annie Hall--and if you were so inclined you could invite your date to step next door and see The Story of O.
Incredible club poker scene as social compression meant you could sit down with a top Wall Street honcho, a cab driver, a gal just off the boat without papers from Vietnam and a Broadway star. The seven train that brought you to the greatest fusion cuisine scene in world history in Jackson Heights and Flushing. Chinatown was exploding--flattening Little Italy--from its earlier pale imitation of San Francisco with Egg Foo Young and Sweet and Sour Chicken. The meatpacking district was still packing meat, with incredible cheap diners--not just steak.
Chasing away all the boring and fearful people was a great urban strategy, but it was unsustainable.
"But at least when you look at the leaderboard of top Bluesky accounts, it’s fairly predictable: mostly reasonably prominent left-progressives, though almost nobody who is going to challenge Democratic Party orthodoxy from either the center or the left. The problems with Bluesky are less about the individuals who find success on the platform and more about the high school cafeteria behavior that follows when you put them all in a small, confined space together."
I'm glad you mention this; the progressive Left has been hostile to the heterodox for a while, and while it's trimmed some of its more egregious excesses (a lot of cancel culture, for one), it's still pretty hostile. The demise of The Liberal Patriot here on Substack is a great example. We'll see how Persuasion and Searchlight do, two other left-of-center Substacks I subscribe to.
However, on the Right the orthodoxy and related nastiness is increasing exponentially. MAGA kicked the libertarians and old-skool Republicans out of the tent, and now they have armed guards keeping them out.
I'm probably going to have to get an X account once I finally get off my ass and start PFMT in earnest. I haven't done so yet, because I pay the county to take the sewage out of my house, and I don't need someone pumping the sewage back in.
I had thought about a Twitter account way back when, to get color commentary on the teams I follow when I see games in person. But, I don't go to games to keep my nose in my phone.
Social media is far less important to Trump's base (mostly normie suburbanites) compared to the college educated liberati that make up the activist core of the Democratic Party. That's why Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly are far less relevant than their counterparts on the left.
Hard to believe that anyone would think a walled garden model would work anymore… but I guess Musk bought it and broke it…. Oh well I think Substack is a much better writers platform because they encourage actual writing not snarky tweets 😏
My Twitter has been great lately. I'm getting posts auto-translated from Japanese. I'm getting culture, tech, sports, politics, news, etc. People aren't banned for thoughtcrime anymore.
Making that bubble chart was irresponsible. I expect accuracy from your graphics, not an attitude of "Blame Cluvio for bad data quality!" (Their data source is "Junkipedia"?)
Here's the thing though - that's not most people's experience on Twitter/X. I've been there since 2009. Of the accounts in that graphic, I follow two (Elon, who I've followed since 2012, and The Babylon Bee). I've never even heard of some of the largest red circles, and I've followed conservative politics for almost 40 years. (Although there might be a reason why I haven't heard of Jackson Hinkle: he's an avowed communist. Definitely not on the right.) This people are all grifters in a giant circle jerk of engagement. Everyone else has either blocked these losers or avoids the algorithm by using the Following tab set to recent tweets.
Nate, your differing experiences in twitter and bluesky are based entirely on privilege.
Can you imagine how your articles would go over on Twitter if you were trans?
Hell, I get rape threats for just going on multiplayer games. Let's not forget this is the place where users celebrated a live suicide of a transgender minor.
Twitter got so bad after the acquisition. I stopped using it altogether. I wish I could say that the good communities moved somewhere else (some tried on Mastedon and BlueSky), but in reality they just died entirely.
Obviously lots of caveats but the NYC crime thing is funny considering https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2026/04/02/murders-at-lowest-level--in-recorded-history--over-first-three-months-of-2026--nypd-says
“Murders were at their lowest level in the first three months of 2026 compared to the first three months of any year in the city’s recorded history, with major crime also down citywide, the mayor and police commissioner announced Thursday.”
You're going to believe a left-wing woke Cultural Marxist organization like the ... NYPD?
yes
good decision (on crime statistics anyway ... not necessarily everything NYPD says)
Without necessarily agreeing with the original post, I think it's perfectly possible for it to have been more pleasant to walk down the streets of NYC in 1975 AND for it to be far more crime-ridden in 1975 than in 2026.
Crime tends to focus in the "bad parts" of town at "the wrong times". E.g., walking along Park Avenue at 3 in the afternoon in 1975 might not be any more risky than walking along it at 3 in the afternoon in 2026, AND also might subject the walker to more "low-grade micronuisancing" in the form of non-criminal "accosting" and the like. (San Francisco would be an even more vivid picture of what I'm trying to get at here - higher crime in the 1970s, but far more likely to see someone nodding out in a puddle of their own filth in the 2020s)
Now, Harlem at 2am (or even Central Park, or famously Times Square pre-Disney) would be two vastly-different experiences between 1975 and 2026. However, for a lot of people, their experience of NYC is going to be primarily the safer parts (maybe not the extremes of Park Avenue, but the middle-class areas) at the safer times, either because they're 9-to-5 office drone residents or because they're tourist doing touristy things, which are generally going to be done during the day.
I do think the post is basically just false nostalgia from people whose only experience of NYC has been through a screen, but I also don't think "the murder rate is objectively far lower" refutes it.
Theoretically possible? Yes. Actually true for New York in the 1970s. Undoubtedly not.
Right. So like how the subways today are unpleasant experience in 2026 as compared to 1975 when…wait heck no, take a look at any picture of subways circa 1975. Oh so maybe the midtown areas where there was no squeegee men or trash strewn ab…wait that’s not it either.
I can’t emphasize enough. Even if you limit your experience to the “good parts” of town or what the city looks like 9-5 or various outer borough areas, there is basically nowhere in NYC that was better off in 1975 with possible exception of the music scene and that has more to do with the general massive change in music industry pre and post Napster/streaming.
I can’t emphasize enough how much the “good” parts of town had more trash, way way more graffiti, more homeless, more potholes and more economic dislocation (you realize this used to be cited as the reason Gulliani was held up as rising star politically right?).
One last one on this. Strong argument to made the post popular movie made in the 70s set in NYC is Saturday Night Fever. It’s now known as a) the thing that made disco mainstream b) what launched John Travolta’s career. Take a look closely at the plot. Travolta’s dad is an out of work construction worker (hello stagflation!), Travolta’s character is in a dead end job at paint store living at home. The whole point is him and his buddies are going nowhere and have no options but at this one disco place him and his buddies transform into kings.
The people telling you the 70s were better are people like Sorbo who are just lying for engagement or people pining who were like 10 in this period who are actually pining to be young again.
Great argument, I'm certainly persuaded otherwise now.
Dude - until even approx mid-1990s, even parts of Central Manhattan - example Times Square, was legit not-fucking-suburbinate-tourist-drama-llama-whiny scary from late evening. Walking on the streets was no way better in the real 1980s, even up to ealry 1990s (I won't tust my own kid memories of the 70s but pleasant is not the case) - loons, outright scary ass people, subway cars that looked like something out of Mad Max.
I worked in Times Square area in the early 90s, liked to go the central library - the park was a fucking open air drug mart, and going to Times Square station after 7pm means putting on your mean face and walking like no one in the world should fuck with you.
Nowadays it's fucking Disney Land (and I have no problem with that, although yeah the wide-eyed tourist hordes are irritating at some level but no romaniticism from me about the Old Days - having myself been held-up at gun point twice on the street at the subway station by a strung out twit. (on other hand tokens were an easy "here dude take the tokens.")
1975? No, probably not. 2019? Absolutely. NYC is a much less pleasant place than 7 years ago.
This is the point that everyone is missing.
Post-covid America (not just NYC) is a much worse place than pre-covid. Everyone alive today just has to think back to seven short years ago to make the comparison.
There's two ways that the federal government measures crime: by compiling police reports submitted by police departments (UCR/NIBRS) and polling people directly (NCVS).
NIBRS has show a drop-off in crime. The NCVS hasn't.
Is this supposed to be an argument? 😅
I'm curious. What do you think it means?
Do you have sources for NCVS not decreasing in NYC? A quick Google search suggests otherwise (but I didn't spend too much time looking into it).
Nationally there has been no drop off through 2024. In fact, violent crime victimization rates ticked higher per the NCVS Dashboard.
For NYC specifically, through 2022 the city tracked national trends with increasing victimization rates. See https://datacollaborativeforjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Crossroads_NCVS_Report.pdf
Yeah that was the same source I skimmed. Numbers now seems much lower than in 1997! (The first data points they tracked).
Compare that to 2019. Crime rates skyrocketed during the pandemic.
The late 1980's and early 1990's represented the historic highs for violent crime during the modern era. Then rates declined--until Covid. When you're talking about crime levels in the post-pandemic era you're really talking about levels of violence that the country hasn't seen for 20 years, back when crime was much worse.
In addition, that increase happened in a very shot period of time. I suspect that the public is angry because pretty much everyone alive today remembers 2019 and understands that the the country is in a much worse position today compared to seven short years ago.
Nate, we have to talk.
Everyone here loves you, and that’s why we are here. Your relationship with “literally” has gotten out of control. You’ve used it in situations that were very clearly not literal, and in situations whose factual nature was apparent. Innocent bystanders are suffering, Nate. You’re suffering.
This is not an attack; it’s an offer of support. We believe that, with help, you can kick this, and literally return to being the writer you once were.
Inshallah.
Social media seems to end up in a partisan death spiral. You’re dunked on for not agreeing with groupthink, so you leave, leaving like minded hyper partisans.
The good news is these morons can go and live on their own island away from the rest of us - with media still able to sustain itself.
The bad news - these irrational groups act as the activist base for our political parties. Driving them to make increasingly dumb decisions (points at the administration)
Agreed on a lot of these points. My general take is that the "echo chamber" effect isn't nearly as much of problem as the massive spread of misinformation and highly partisan content that these algorithms heavily promote. People have always seeked out other like minded individuals, but social media seems to be able to covert a "like minded" individual into a full on radicals.
I think it is interesting to study how each of these social media platforms are different based off various attributes (FB: "real" identity, algorithm pushing engagebait, nobody posts thing they just scroll; Reddit: totally anon, selective content based off user interests, people post things like crazy: Twitter/X: famous people identity know, algorithm mostly pushing engage bait but slightly based on who you follow, only famous people post everybody else just scrolls, etc etc etc).
I walk into articles like this hoping for 10 minutes of quality reading and then after 10 deep link clicks later I've spent the the entire night catching up on all of Nate's self described mistakes in the early days of 538, to somehow ending up on a wikipedia page about "Pygmy Mammoths".
10/10 would recommend.
I feel as if Twitter/X when used correctly (HA!) is really useful for live sports, quick breaking political stories (usually regarding votes in Congress as they are happening), and breaking weather info. Beyond that... Well good luck.
Well, what if those issues cannot be read on a major news outlet like I.e. the NYT?
I really enjoyed Manhattan in 1975, although nothing like the picture in Sorbo's post.
The rot was the fertility. It drove out the middle and upper class, meaning cheap rents for artists, musicians and weirdos mostly in illegal lofts and sublets and tenements. CBGB's versus Max's Kansas City.
The loft Jazz scene--Sam Rivers and David Murray playing for small public gatherings in their lofts. Inventive off-Broadway shows that went mainstream from Rocky Horror to A Chorus Line. TImes Square with seedy peek shows next to Kurosawa double features--standing in line for which was like being an extra in Annie Hall--and if you were so inclined you could invite your date to step next door and see The Story of O.
Incredible club poker scene as social compression meant you could sit down with a top Wall Street honcho, a cab driver, a gal just off the boat without papers from Vietnam and a Broadway star. The seven train that brought you to the greatest fusion cuisine scene in world history in Jackson Heights and Flushing. Chinatown was exploding--flattening Little Italy--from its earlier pale imitation of San Francisco with Egg Foo Young and Sweet and Sour Chicken. The meatpacking district was still packing meat, with incredible cheap diners--not just steak.
Chasing away all the boring and fearful people was a great urban strategy, but it was unsustainable.
"But at least when you look at the leaderboard of top Bluesky accounts, it’s fairly predictable: mostly reasonably prominent left-progressives, though almost nobody who is going to challenge Democratic Party orthodoxy from either the center or the left. The problems with Bluesky are less about the individuals who find success on the platform and more about the high school cafeteria behavior that follows when you put them all in a small, confined space together."
I'm glad you mention this; the progressive Left has been hostile to the heterodox for a while, and while it's trimmed some of its more egregious excesses (a lot of cancel culture, for one), it's still pretty hostile. The demise of The Liberal Patriot here on Substack is a great example. We'll see how Persuasion and Searchlight do, two other left-of-center Substacks I subscribe to.
However, on the Right the orthodoxy and related nastiness is increasing exponentially. MAGA kicked the libertarians and old-skool Republicans out of the tent, and now they have armed guards keeping them out.
I'm probably going to have to get an X account once I finally get off my ass and start PFMT in earnest. I haven't done so yet, because I pay the county to take the sewage out of my house, and I don't need someone pumping the sewage back in.
I had thought about a Twitter account way back when, to get color commentary on the teams I follow when I see games in person. But, I don't go to games to keep my nose in my phone.
Social media is far less important to Trump's base (mostly normie suburbanites) compared to the college educated liberati that make up the activist core of the Democratic Party. That's why Tucker Carlson and Megyn Kelly are far less relevant than their counterparts on the left.
Hard to believe that anyone would think a walled garden model would work anymore… but I guess Musk bought it and broke it…. Oh well I think Substack is a much better writers platform because they encourage actual writing not snarky tweets 😏
The only defense against gross misinformation is to be informed yourself. NYC 1975 vs. now is a great example.
Another good tool against the lies the lying liars tell is knowing how to research issues and vet sources.
You got the ecological analogy exactly right.
But on this island, the words get bigger which causes the number of subscribers coming from social media to get smaller.
My Twitter has been great lately. I'm getting posts auto-translated from Japanese. I'm getting culture, tech, sports, politics, news, etc. People aren't banned for thoughtcrime anymore.
Making that bubble chart was irresponsible. I expect accuracy from your graphics, not an attitude of "Blame Cluvio for bad data quality!" (Their data source is "Junkipedia"?)
Musk has really been flogging the Japanese tweets, but it seems to me that they're exactly the same as the American tweets.
Although the bits where they profess their love for American culture is kind of cute.
Here's the thing though - that's not most people's experience on Twitter/X. I've been there since 2009. Of the accounts in that graphic, I follow two (Elon, who I've followed since 2012, and The Babylon Bee). I've never even heard of some of the largest red circles, and I've followed conservative politics for almost 40 years. (Although there might be a reason why I haven't heard of Jackson Hinkle: he's an avowed communist. Definitely not on the right.) This people are all grifters in a giant circle jerk of engagement. Everyone else has either blocked these losers or avoids the algorithm by using the Following tab set to recent tweets.
Substack feels like its own walled-off social media if you use the app
Nate, your differing experiences in twitter and bluesky are based entirely on privilege.
Can you imagine how your articles would go over on Twitter if you were trans?
Hell, I get rape threats for just going on multiplayer games. Let's not forget this is the place where users celebrated a live suicide of a transgender minor.
Twitter got so bad after the acquisition. I stopped using it altogether. I wish I could say that the good communities moved somewhere else (some tried on Mastedon and BlueSky), but in reality they just died entirely.
QUESTION: Is there any serious likelihood of the Lodge shutdown leading to a change in Texas poker laws? Bonus question: Will UIGEA ever be repealed?