I came across an article on NBC11 on a stabbing that occurred in San Jose. Normally, I would have read the story without incident, until I had noticed the location of the incident and how it was reported.

As in any big city, there are different neighborhoods that subdivides the city — whether they’re official or not. Well this incident occurred on San Felipe Road. What I found that was interesting was that the news reported the location as San Jose, not Evergreen. Evergreen’s kind of the other Almaden Valley in San Jose (really, really expensive houses).

The reason I thought this was strange was because if this were to have happened in East San Jose, the news would have annunciated “Eeeest SSaaannn HHHosai” and repeated it every 5 words to make sure everyone knew it was in East San Jose. Well, technically, San Felipe Road is Evergreen… so why didn’t the news say Evergreen? When good stuff happens, it’s always in their respective communities — Almaden Valley, Willow Glen, Rose Garden, etc… When bad stuff happens, it typically happens in 2 places, San Jose and East San Jose. When good stuff happens in a “bad area”, the news positions the story as being, “Wow, a good thing happened to an impoverished area of San Jose.” If you were watching the news, you’d think bad things happen in San Jose, and really bad things happen in East San Jose.

To most people, before Evergreen, there was East San Jose. Today, Evergreen is a boon for New Urbanists, looking to control their surroundings through artificial town centers and gated communities. East San Jose is an odd mixture of the working class everyman in almost million dollar homes, as well as the homes of the lucky and the fortunate who live in multimillion dollar homes on the hill. The area is one of the most diverse sprawls in the South Bay. There aren’t too many places that I can think of that the number of taquerias and pho places outnumber Chevy’s and Chillie’s, maybe even McDonalds and Burger King. Depending on how you look at it, fortunately or unfortunately for the East Siders, we now have a Chillie’s and a Macaroni Grill, both of which are located at the newly renovated Eastridge Mall. For those living on this side of town, this is a boon for those looking for something different to eat without leaving the community — the area has been starved of resturant chains. Previously, the only chains in the area were Sizzler, Red Lobster, Panda Express, Pasta Pomadoro and Red Robin. Like I said, take it as you will — this is either good or bad.

The irony I find in creating and associating with community labels is that the very problems people associated with this area are problems that are widespread in our society, and not just in a particular community. Listening to the news, I can’t figure out why people still think bad of East San Jose, or San Jose (the other parts of San Jose that get a bad rap because they’re not Almaden Valley, Evergreen, Willow Glen, etc…) for that matter — there’s not a whole lot of news coming out of the area, good or bad.

http://www.nbc11.com/news/10933504/detail.html

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