A Fox News guest host this week argued that it was good for rich people to gentrify poorer neighborhoods because they were "ratty" and smelled bad.
Tom Shillue, a comedian who was filling in for regular Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld on Tuesday, noted that New York City was "no longer the dangerous hell hole" because Chase Bank was able to replace a deli that opened in 1954, and a favorite family-owned pizzeria had been turned into a Verizon Wireless store.
"This thing with the gentrification, I've been hearing about this my whole life, you saw those pictures, those old places looked ratty and they stunk," Shillue told the panel. "Now, they made room for the new... Wouldn't these mom & pop stores be around if these whiners would go buy the mom & pop merchandise?"
The host asked Miss New York USA 2013 Joanne Nosuchinsky if she agreed that New York's strategy should be "out with the old, make way for the new."
"I mean, you were Miss USA New York, right? And now they have a newer, younger prettier one," he pointed out.
Nosuchinsky speculated that younger Americans were to blame for gentrification because millennials only wanted to shop at chain stores.
"Isn't it telling that the people who are against this kind gentrification, the ones who don't want any change are often people on the left?" Shillue asked. "But right-wing people, who are supposed to be conservative -- like, you know, they are resistant to change -- we are the ones who are saying, let it change!"
