NY Values

Oh I tried -- like bit my tongue not just metaphorically but I can't do it - because I love my NY Values and if Ted Cruz wants to call them out - well then I agree they should be called out.

New York values, first Mr Cruz NY is not one spot.  It is this little thing you do not like - diverse.  What this means for you who seem to not know anything about our little state that we have a few regional differences, differences within those regions and pretty much everything and nothing goes.  It is a state that votes Democrat and Republican and where we have politicians that fit neither of their parties stereotypes.  I am sure other states can relate but hey this is about NY.

What are New York values - first of all I will even take some of the ones he mentioned.  Yeah ok we are about marriage equality - can you tell me Mr Cruz which of those you oppose is it marriage or equality?   Pro-abortion ?? Dude no one is pro-abortion, I mean never.   For those of us who are pro-choice we know this is a hard decision, we understand that you have religious beliefs that may not lead down this path but we also know we may not have those same beliefs - hence the choice part.  We are pro-choice because we know women can make decisions about their bodies - including birth control options to hopefully not need an abortion.  Pro-Abortion - really that is a bad bad way to put it you really showed more than your ignorance in that one.

How can you possibly talk what New York values are when we are a state whose values range but our values say we are ok with all of that.   I am going to go out on a limb and say he meant NYC values.  They are the socially left leaning Republican -  you know big on common sense gun background checks, strong on crime, try to manage police brutality sometimes better than others, pro-choice because we believe that if you are able to manage to enjoy sex you should be able to manage choosing your birth control or not.   We are business friendly Democrats and Republicans with a happy history of unions. We love a protest and know that celebrations after sports wins do not mean you have to trash the city.  We hate strikes but are the strikers.  We are multicolor and accepting with a branch of the KKK in areas that hates everything that surrounds them.   We are immigrants and native born.  We are believers in everything from diet fads to religion to nothing.  We bear the scars of where we left and bring to this city what we love about our roots to share.  We do not care who you love as long as they consent to it.  We are not embarrassed by sex and sexuality but are deeply ashamed at times of the violence we commit against one another.

We are the best of America, the best of the world and act the worst at times by not stopping to enjoy what an amazing city we live in.  We are hurried but will help and we really kick ass in times of crisis.  We are able to rise from disasters be they economic, natural or terrorist.  We are the city people love to love or hate but are never ambivalent about.  We have bad accents or no accents or wha you lookin at me ??? We are the backdrop to movies and rarely anything like we are portrayed in them.  We are kind to the homeless and we walk right past them at times not seeing them.  We are rich and we are poor and we are in the middle.  We struggle and we take the subway and we hate the subway but we learned to sit next to one another in these steel traps that hurl us to our destinations though our nationalities or our races or who we love and who we worship is not possible to maintain in other places with borders.  We collectively complain about the weather at any given time of the year, we complain about the City and most of all we give you the stank eye if you think as an outsider visiting you can ever complain or compare us to another city.  We are the city that others battle in sports and eye roll at our love of our city as if it made our city less dirty, crowded, crumbling, chaotic, wonderful and alive.  

We are the poor, the tired, the hungry yearning to breathe free though in NYC breathing took years to be anything but a deep breath of free pollution.  We break down and we clean up and we complain about how we miss the dirty, nasty times in the city but we really don't we just do not want to become exactly like every other box store city but we see it creeping in.

Those are our NYC values - diverse like us - multiracial like us  - religious or not like us - and Mr. Cruz it is a shame you learned nothing from your brief time in Canada because I believe many of those values are what make us a treasure to the rest of the world including our Canadian neighbors.  I have traveled much and have seen the beauty, natural or man made, of many places but I have never seen another NYC.  Those are our values - where we welcome those that others shun - where people come for their dreams - wait isn't that what the US is, what a Eurozone wants to be, what the Middle East and every other conflict ridden area needs to be?  Full of pride, cynical and realistic ! Yeah Mr. Cruz maybe you don't need our votes but would you be so kind as to not belittle something you do not know how to embody - NY Values the best of what flawed human beings have to offer to one another and a place.

Start spreading the news (Cruz) ... if you can make it here (apparently you won't) you can make it anywhere (but we will still let you visit) ... New York, New York