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Of course they can. In Chicago the difference is that the problems were (and are) more confined to certain neighborhoods on the South and West Sides, and increasingly to some impoverished suburbs as well. But in those neighborhoods the problems were (and are) just as bad as what’s depicted in *The Wire*.
Note that there’s also poverty, violence, and drug problems in some rural areas as well. It’s dwindled in significance simply because less than 20% of Americans live in rural areas.
This sounds like a homework question lol
Anyways, its themes aren’t specific to Baltimore or even the US. It really applies to any city that has police and crime, which is all of them. Systemic change is hard, people in power often abuse it. Individuals can’t always change the system and the system often changes them.
Yes. By no means was any of the larger themes in that show unique to Baltimore. Some of the details were definitely Baltimore specific which helped the show feel very real, but the larger concept could have been set in just about any city with some of the details changed.
It applies the world over
The theme is institutional dysfunction, not specifically politics and corruption. The show uses the institutions of the drug organizations, the school system, the police force, the dockworkers’ union and the city government to show how institutions betray individuals.
It is not universally applicable to other cities. One of the reasons The Wire is great, and what David Simon has consistently advocated for in fiction, is verisimilitude. In other words, you have to spend time in the community and talk to people to understand them. So while the themes can apply to dysfunctional city institutions anywhere, not all cities have them; and not all cities have the same dysfunctional institutions.
For instance, one might say San Francisco is dysfunctional, but for completely different reasons. The culprit in SF might be the Board of Supervisors.
The Onion did this:
[https://www.theonion.com/new-david-simon-project-to-investigate-happy-upper-mid-1819571515](https://www.theonion.com/new-david-simon-project-to-investigate-happy-upper-mid-1819571515)
Relevant quote:
*Added Simon, “I want this show to be an unflinching dissection of how the system has in no way failed the people of this town.”*
It was. David Simon was the show runner behind both “The Wire” and “Treme” and both tackle the issues of their respective cities in similar manners.
Hell, with a little imagination you can apply it to ancient Rome.
First scene of the show has the line “This America, man”
The themes of The Wire can pretty much apply to any American city shifting from an industrialized economy backed by blue collar working class jobs to a service based economy. Switch out the stevadores for the auto workers of Detroit, the steel workers of Gary, or the coal miners of West Virginia. Switch out coke and dope for fentanyl and opioids. Switch out the Baltimore Sun for the Indianapolis Star or the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
I’d also say Baltimore has some unique challenges in its location. Its so close to DC that it is increasingly seen as a DC suburb. Chicago at least has the benefit of being the only big city around whereas Baltimore is smack dab in the middle of like the biggest Big City corridor in the US.
That said for our foreign friends, the drug war disproportionately impacts people in the [wrong zip code](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdiimfU2S_Y&pp=ygURdGhlIHdpcmUgemlwIGNvZGU%3D). The challenge that poses is hundreds of millions of Americans aren’t impacted directly by this and it makes it tough for policy and society to change because its seen as a problem that doesn’t really effect most people.
The institutional themes of the show are widely applicable. Setting wise Memphis, TN could be viewed very similarly. St. Louis and Detroit may fit well also, but watching the show while living in Memphis really made me think of how it could have easily been set there.
One of the things I like most about the show is how it shows the corruption and lawlessness of the police themselves. It’s still copaganda, but it at least shows how even the “good police” participate in beatings for retaliation or for interrogation, they never care as much as when one of their own is hurt. And, even though they have their petty infighting, they still don’t report each other for their various crimes and violations. It was as true then as it is now, and it applies to every city, we just see it in real life more now because everyone carries a video camera.
To some extent, it’s the same in most big cities… some worse than others, some with more of one problem, less of another, but the same general issues/causes.
Even if it isn’t 1:1 on the entire series, each seasons theme has relevance in todays society
1- the drug trade, failure of the war on drugs
2- death of the blue collar middle class worker
3- fucked up political system
4- failure of public school system
5- how fucked the media is
I would also say that while drug/gangs are a driving point. It’s more about institutional failure than drugs.
The overall theme of The Wire is that that no matter what we do the cycle continues.
Yes we may be able to save a few people from the game, but it’s not going to end anytime soon.
Not specific to Baltimore, but Baltimore has some specific issues that drove it to be so screwed up. Similar to Detroit or Flint or Gary, it had a solid Blue Collar population that relied on nearby industry. When the industry collapsed, the Blue Collar economy collapsed.
Very different style of show, but I really liked The Shields approach to late 90s early 00s Los Angeles. That show does such a gritty and real depiction of LA at the time, but a slightly fictionalized version of it.
It’s not quite as sprawling as The Wire, which looks at various aspects and perspectives of the city. But you get a little bit of the politics at the city council level (for that time, things are a different can of worms now).
I always thought The Shield was underrated and people unnecessarily compared it to The Wire as a reason not to watch it. Both great shows
with different styles.
The Wire is methodical and almost feels like a documentary with its realism, and with an overhead view of the city. The Shield is out on the sidewalk breathing in the car exhaust getting beat down by the sun, and you’re closer than is comfortable to what’s happening. Also one of the best endings and wrap ups of a series on television I’ve ever seen.
The first time I watched the Wire I didn’t get what was so amazing about it. It was pretty much exactly the nightly local news growing up in the Detroit area in the 80s and 90s.
These themes can be applied to any city – American or otherwise – to a certain extent.
But Baltimore really does sit at the top of the list of places with deep-rooted and intractable poverty, crime, and drug issues that surpass basically any other US city.
People will talk about Chicago, and they’ve got a terrible crime issue, don’t get me wrong, but they’ve also got a wildly successful central city too. Along with huge employment bases in transportation and logistics, finance, a huge corporations.
There are 35 Fortune 500 companies headquartered in Chicago.
I think Under Armor is the only one in Baltimore, and that’s entirely because their founder is from Baltimore.
I’m just sick of the South Boston trope as a place full of Irish mafia. Sure, 50ish years ago it was, but today? It’s one of the yuppiest parts of Boston.
PS: Mark Wahlberg is a shithead and pretty much nobody from Boston likes him.
Same thing with a different label.
I think the biggest thing that couldn’t be replicated is the relationship between the mayor of Baltimore and the Governor of Maryland. The show, especially in the final season, puts a lot of emphasis on how broke the city is. A lot of cities are broke; some are worse off, some are better. But not too many cities are in states like Maryland, hitting well above their financial power because of proximity to Washington DC.
Often you’ll find broke cities in broke states. The Wire emphasizes the political games between the broke city and the well financed state government.