Traveling by means of above-ground transportation around our fair city gives even the casual observer a great spectrum of experiences. The different neighborhoods stretched out along the roadsides each have their own flavor, color and identity that can be read between the lines of neon signs and advertisements. Heading east from Georgetown, one can see the pristinely groomed facades and gardens melt into the hipster textures of Du Pont Circle, where the spirit of a city in motion seeps through the stonework. Farther still, trendy restaurants are replaced with crowded, dingy and utilitarian establishments, catering to the rough, dingy and utilitarian people who keep the city running by the sweat of their backs.

After a certain point, the gardens of the buildings are no longer adorned with the white smiles of picket fences, or, if they are, they are worn expressions, yellow and missing teeth. Metal grating becomes a permanent feature of the décor, as every first-story window huddles behind its own personal cage. One starts seeing the “bad neighborhoods”, places most Georgetown undergrads tend to avoid in their exploration of D.C.

After speaking with a classmate about a place I visited around First Street, I found out that some Georgetown students feel that the neighborhood we inhabit is a bastion of safety and stability. Unfortunately, that is an illusion. Certainly, the Georgetown neighborhood can hardly compare to Compton in 1992 regarding safety concerns, but looking beyond the surface of the gothic stonework and pristine white-picket fences suggests to me that the generally accepted perception of our neighborhood and campus is contrasted far too harshly to the idea we have of the rest of D.C., and (perhaps due to some inherent snobbism) this idea might actually be exposing the students to more danger than warranted.

The incidence of crimes in the Georgetown neighborhood is not negligible, as Department of Public Safety and Metropolitan Police Department reports suggest. There are routine instances of crime in the area, and the brash behavior of Hoyas, especially on the weekends, leaves them as easy targets for anyone, including other Georgetown students. Rape, manslaughter, theft and any other strain of offenses committed by one human being against another can happen here, and very unfortunately do from time to time. The case of David Shick is one bright, shining example of the underlying Hobbesian reality suddenly intruding into the campus world, constructed by faculty and students to at least seem welcoming and safe. Shick was a junior at Georgetown in 2001, when he sustained massive head trauma in a fight behind Lauinger Library from a confrontation with several intoxicated students.

My message is not, however, a call to paranoia or staying inside on the weekends, but rather for students to reconsider our definitions of “safe” and “dangerous.” Attending a prestigious university does not shield Hoyas from experiencing the violent reality of the world and should not convince us that we are any safer than the residents of the rest of D.C. communities. Such a view, which seems to arise naturally out of the appearance of this neighborhood, is misleading and exposes students to more danger than they should theoretically face. The danger comes from students operating under the assumption that Georgetown is a Hoya sandbox, rather than a community existing in the system of a modern city, with all the corollary conditions that arise from such a position. Furthermore, assuming that Georgetown is a safe haven is an idea that is deleterious to our ability to explore the rest of this fair city, which carries within its various neighborhoods the combined Zeitgeist of a freshly integrating and co-evolving world, defined by the multiplicity of perspectives and cultures that most Hoyas claim as an objective embedded in their Georgetown education.

The “bubble” is an illusion, and the faster we get rid of this memetic lens of perception, the faster we will enjoy a safer college experience and richer time allotted to us in the capital of this country. Staying in the bubble won’t let you avoid the risk of trouble, and exploring the District might put in practice all that cultural awareness we breed on the Hilltop.

Ivan Batischev is a junior in the School of Foreign Service and an assistant opinion editor at THE HOYA.