It’s become somewhat of a meme now when there is a story on crime, or other bad things happening in a city, people pipe up and say “That’s how it is in blue cities!” “This could only happen in a Democrat city!” However, I noticed they never say “… and that’s why only want to live in X” or “… that would never happen in Y”.

If living in “blue cities” are such a nightmare, where are all these Utopian “red cities” that people are apparently in favor of?

  • Fubarberry@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    121·
    3 days ago

    I suspect that’s just because of Birmingham, and possibly Mobile. They have pretty bad crime rates, and Birmingham is the state’s main “blue city”, at least based on how counties voted in the 2024 election.

    Birmingham had a violent crime rate of 1440 per 100k, making it one the worst cities in the nation for violent crime.

    Mobile had a crime rate of 825 per 100k. Mobile’s county was slightly red in the 2023 election.

    Meanwhile Huntsville (who was slightly red in that same election) had a violent crime rate of 133 per 100k, and has been proudly claiming a 100% arrest and conviction rate for homicide cases. So to answer @yarr@feddit.nl’s question, I guess Huntsville is an example of a successful “red” city (although it may be less successful in coming years due to Trump’s NASA cuts).

    Rural Alabama (excluding counties that were classified as metropolitan) had a violent crime rate of 248 per 100k, making it less safe than Huntsville but far better than the state average of 494 per 100k.

    I’m not going to actually claim that the crime rate is just from politics, Huntsville has a big aerospace industry and it’s probably more of an education/class thing than anything else. But regardless those are the violent crime rate numbers for 2023, so feel free to draw your own conclusions.