I have been a loud teenager who was kicked out of malls and other public spaces.
I am not black.
I do, however, when hearing loud cursing in public areas, most often either see crazy homeless people, or a group of african-american youth.
I think it is just being crazy teens, and that most white loud crazy teens are not where I am. They are off getting drunk in trailer parks and parking lots, and fucking.
I don’t know why the black teens are just wandering the streets, yelling, but if I was a parent, (wait, I am!) I can tell you which I would rather have my child doing…
Didn’t we do a/many thread(s) about why black people were always the loud talking interrupters in movie theaters? I seem to recall that there was a universal consensus that that was the case.
Why is everybody getting their underwear in a bunch about black teenagers talking more loudly than white teenagers? I’m sure that there are some actual racial (ruffle a few feathers?)-cultural differences between the two groups. May as well feel free to discuss them.
My experience is that youngish urbanites tend to largely ignore auto traffic. By youngish, I mean “don’t usually have grey hair.”
I think it’s the same phenomenon that makes people who live in high risk natural disaster areas rather blase about the possibility of those disasters happening. I’ve seen or read that people who live close under big dams tend to think much less of the possibility of the dam giving way than people who live further away, but in the possible path. People deal with ongoing but fairly low-level threats by ignoring them. They get their panties in a bunch from unusual threats, even when they are much less likely to occur. For example, in the months following 9/11 many people were terrified of flying, even though even if we had a similar event every month or so, it would still be safer to fly than it is for them to, say, drive to the airport. We seem to be wired that way - we ignore the usual dangers, but fear the unusual dangers.
So, yeah, most urban teenagers of any background tend to walk into traffic. Around here, you’ll also see young kids riding their bicycles or tossing a ball around in the street at twilight and after dark. For a driver, it’s a white knuckle experience.
I’ve noticed that different cultures seem to have different tolerance for ambient noise, but around here, pertty much all teenagers (and younger kids as well) are really noisy. It’s a pretty even mix of white, black, and Latino here.
That’s not the behavior I am talking about. These teenagers are not just careless or inattentive of traffic. The ones I am talking about walk deliberately into traffic and look you in the eye as they walk in front of your car, daring you to hit them.
Each culture tolerates various levels of noise from groups in public. I don’t know what the extremes of loud and quiet are, but it’s safe to say there is a range. “Culture” is, of course, a broad term, and each culture can be broken into smaller groups.
Americans, in general, are tolerant of louder voices and behaviour in public than, say, your average British person. While I’m sure you’ll find exceptions, I think that’s generally the case. Why it is so is harder to answer, but partly because “quiet” just isn’t considered a virtue. That varies with class; poor people can’t afford the luxury of acres of quiet space around them.
Within the group “Americans,” several subsets have been noted in this thread as particularly loud:
teenagers
urban dwellers
males
African-Americans
and my
lower socio-economic class
I think to answer the OP’s question properly, we’d have to isolate the various factors of {American} {“lower” class} {urban} {black} {male} {teenager} and assess which factors contribute and by how much.
My guess is that of these six factors, black is simultaneously the least relevant and the most visible (to other Americans, anyway).
I don’t think “loud” really is a stereotype of teenagers at all. It’s the opposite that’s said of them: they’re sullen, introverted, gloomy and generally “emo,” to use a more recent phrase.
It’s not racial bigotry to say that different cultures have different standards. What is impolite to one may be normal to another. A typical black church service is going to be nothing like a white one.
We’ve had threads about different groups’ actions in theaters, too. To some, a theater experience is vocal; you talk back to the screen and yell and scream as called for. Others feel that is too low class. It’s all a matter of perspective.
Yeah, but “cultural” does not necessarily equal racial.
My wife taught in public schools for 35 years. One thing she and her co-workers were infallable at was being to identify a “city kid” from a “county kid.” Black, white, male, female, rich, poor, native-born, immigrant family – it didn’t make any difference. My wife said city kids were invariably louder and more “in your face” than their suburban classmates.
Impossible to have a discussion on any topic critical of any non-white group on the SDMB. You’ll be bombarded by the PC army telling you you are crazy and what you see isn’t true. Then they’ll bury you under cite requests.
For what it’s worth having lived all over the US I can agree with you. Groups of blacks are mOre aggressive/louder than other groups.
Unfortunately a lot of people hate that step in the process, and it doesn’t help that this thread is turning into a proxy fight about political correctness and such. Different subcultures can have different views on politeness and I think it’s possible that white cultures in the U.S. place a higher value on keeping to yourself and not bothering other people, for example. But I don’t know that that’s true and I can’t say if my observations or the OP’s have any merit.
Once you get a group of teenagers together, they tend to be loud. The sullen thing is typically what you see when they’re stuck with their parents.
Absolutely the loudest kind of people you can get in a group is a bunch of middle aged white women. Old ones can be pretty loud too, but if I see a large table of female friends at a restaurant I ask to be seated as far away as possible. If they aren’t loud right away, they’ll be screaming within thirty minutes.
When I was in the twin cities, I noticed this phenomenon. Back home, I notice the same phenomenon with Arab and Somalian kids. I would presume, much like my answer in “why don’t blacks drink white wine?” that,** if this were somehow falsifiable and provable** (which I doubt), then it would likely be a socio-economic factor, rather than a racial one. I noticed this “loudness” riding the bus and light rail; the black men in my grad program, or the ones I play squash with, aren’t very loud at all. </anecdote>