Do Rich (white) people (in brooklyn) hate noise?

A look at noise complaint data.

Brooklyn native Xochitl Gonzalez’s 2022 article ‘Why do Rich People Love Quiet’ featured in The Atlantic not only landed her as a finalist for the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary but created quite a stir. In her article, Xochitl interrogates the politics of sound within a city writing, "...attempts to regulate the sounds of the city (car horns, ice cream truck jingles) continued throughout the 20th century, but they took a turn for the personal in the ’90s. The city [of New York] started going after boom boxes, car stereos, and nightclubs. These were certainly noisy, but were they nuisances? Not to the people who enjoyed them."

The article gained traction, and plenty of criticism as one Redditor lamented:

"I learned nothing from this article and it pissed me off. Noise - rural or urban, pluses and minuses. We’re hearing it based on the comments. But apparently it’s an under-researched topic since we get nothing here in the way of science, philosophy, urban design, architecture, acoustics. You know, evidence of how cities require a healthy awareness of the noise in order to coexist. But that’s hard to find when you’re yelling at your friends over the stereo, in Brooklyn, 2am, summer night, windows open, and the new mother down the hall desperate for an hour of sleep."

Later, in an NPR segment, the author defended her article and addressed the backlash and the critics. The interviewer, pushed back in favor of the right to peace and quiet, even going so far as to cite the Geneva convention:

MICHAEL MARTIN (HOST): You know, there is a concept in Jewish law called gezel sheina, which literally translates to theft of sleep. The Geneva Convention identifies ongoing sleep deprivation as a violation of human rights. I mean, it literally is used to torture people. So what do you say to people who argue that, you know, in dense environments, it is reasonable to take steps not to disturb others, particularly when they could be sleeping or should be sleeping? And that, in fact, if people live in certain environments where they have not been able to regulate their quiet or their sleep environment, it's indicative of their lack of power, not necessarily of an affirmative statement about their culture. What do you say to that?”

XOCHITL GONZALEZ: Well, it's been really fascinating because I got a lot of reaction from people of color and some people that grew up lower-income - like white people that grew up lower-income - that were like, thank you so much. I'd never been able to articulate this feeling of, you know, being shamed for just sort of being myself. And then I got a lot of people that kept repeating the point which I was countering, which is that quiet is superior and I'm not smart enough to understand that. And what I thought was fascinating about that and all of the people that came back to me with that sort of response was that no one acknowledged the sense of shame that is passed on to people - mainly people of color - as they are being told to quiet down. Like, what it feels like to be told - like, a group of grown adults, like, you know, completely capable of paying for their bill, that they need to quiet down or leave because there's another table of patrons with two people that's upset that these eight people are having a good time.

The tension at the heart of the backlash appears to circle heavily around the poignant headline, and the racial context of exertion of power over another person when asking, or telling, someone else to be quiet. Within the context of the urban fabric, the criticism of richer, whiter residents exerting control over the aural aesthetics of a neighborhood could perhaps be considered something along the lines of sonic gentrification. While gentrification can be difficult to track and quantify, factors often associated with gentrification are an increase in White residents, and an increase in median household Income. In order to pressure test and attempt to quantify Xochitl’s question ‘Do Rich People Hate Noise’ with the added layer of race, this article explores 311 noise complaint data and census data. To maintain consistency with Xochitl’s focus on noise complaints surrounding what she describes as ‘lifestyle choices; music and parties and people talking loudly,” this analysis looks solely at complaints regarding ‘loud talking’ and ‘loud music.’ To further illustrate and explore the concept of exerting power over one another through complaints, this analysis only takes into account complaints regarding public spaces, places that I, and many other urban planners, believe should be available for people to act upon, rather than being prescribed or told what to do or how to use a space. 

Following the logical thread of Xochitl’s article against the data, it would appear that both Crown Heights and Bushwick would be neighborhoods experiencing the change she so despised when coming back to the city after college. 

Crown Heights and Bushwick both experienced above-average increases in median household income, percent increase in White residents, and noise complaints. 

Bushwick’s median household income rose by 57%, nearly four times the citywide average while the area’s white population grew by over five time the city’s average (172% increase in Bushwick vs. city average of 33%). And when it comes to noise complaints regarding ‘lifestyle’ in public spaces, they surged 1334%, almost twice the Brooklyn average.

In Crown Heights, the median household income rose by 56%, more than three times the city-wide average while the White population nearly doubled and noise complaints outpaced the borough average by nearly 200%.

While Xochitl Gonzalez’s article, and this data, paint a picture of richer, whiter neighborhoods being more noise-averse, the tides may be changing as the uber-rich continue to spew helicopter noise pollution throughout the city, spurring a growing cry to ‘stop the chop.’ While it is possible to file a helicopter noise complaint, the data has yet to show if local law enforcement is as quick to respond as they are to complaints about ‘lifestyle’ noise.