Like all the others have mentioned, reading about the horrible conditions of the tenements where the immigrants had to live and survive daily was very disturbing and hard to imagine. There was no place to sleep, no place to go to the bathroom, nothing to eat – everyone was crammed into an extremely small area which was supposed to be there “home.” Living in such place is definitely not what these immigrants wanted or were looking forward to. Like Liz said, this was not the”Disneyfied” life the immigrantsleft their home country for. The immigrants took upon a painful journey just to experience even more painful living conditions, and not the life in America that they expected.
The concept of “slumming” was actually very interesting. I was dissapointed with the fact that the rich and better off individuals went to Five Points just to observe the wild animals- like Praveena mentioned. Its a shame that people would go on tours just to see how these individuals lived knowing that it is a tragic lifestyle. Obviously, watching these people live in such horrible conditions the tourists felt good about themselves. The term “self-fulfilling prophecy” also mentioned by Praveena, is exactly what came to my mind. Unfortunately, no matter how low and shameful this act of “slumming” is, we still see this happening. Although, people do visit other countries for their famous attractions, they also visit the poorer parts of the country for the same reason that people visited Five Points.
Five Points was a part of history that was horrifying for the new immigrants coming to America for a better life. Nevertheless, the similarities between the residents brought them together in various social ways which made the terrible conditions they lived in less painful.
