tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post8649960615984164661..comments2023-08-14T11:44:27.299-04:00Comments on Jeremiah's<br> Vanishing New York: Anti-Gentrification TantrumJeremiah Mosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11791516443125872364noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-72545510475945480392015-07-23T00:54:47.835-04:002015-07-23T00:54:47.835-04:00People were paying over $1300/month in the origina...People were paying over $1300/month in the original 1997 tech bubble (CPI calc says = $1900 today). Already the hotel porters and cleaners were way out in the valley, with BART and bus rides of over 2 hrs one way. Was it Bernal Heights housing they tore down then? And Yerba Buena Plaza? In the midst of near 1% vacancy rate? <br /><br />Why now and not then? Is it just the smart phones? Did people think they could have a piece of it too, and two recessions later plus compounding interest, that shiny soap bubble has burst...?<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-54692372662336326302015-07-19T19:40:40.814-04:002015-07-19T19:40:40.814-04:00This is all spot-on. However, I would like to add ...This is all spot-on. However, I would like to add that those who are being gentrified are perpetuating the gentrification, that is, those who work in the minimum-waged jobs that have taken over the neighborhood, such as the chain stores, pharmacies, and Starbucks, are only nicer and accommodating to the mostly white gentrifier customers. They make you feel unwanted and unwelcome and are rude and offensive to those who are like themselves or think they are like themselves. Yet, they bow down and lay down the carpet to the white gentrifier customers. While the gentrifiers have the Christopher Columbus syndrome, the gentrified minorities have the slave and colonial syndrome and mentality.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-68310504408469326932015-07-12T10:15:18.899-04:002015-07-12T10:15:18.899-04:00Even as of 20 years ago (if not longer), the secre...Even as of 20 years ago (if not longer), the secret to surviving well in NYC, if one didn't have a particularly well-paying job and/or familial/roots connections in the area was, as one friend of mine put it, "money from home." Not even referring to idle-rich boho "Trustafarians," but lower-level Midtown worker bees. Back then, I knew people even in their 30s who were receiving parental/familial subsidies in order to maintain the exigencies of lifestyle crucial for making professional connections and keeping up appearances of being considered viable and selectable for survival. I believe that the term most commonly used is "family money." NYC has, especially since the gentrification bug hit in the mid-'80s, been a proving ground for whether one truly make it on one's own, truly prepared for life in the Big City, or one is ultimately a product of provenance and pedigree who can just plug in and play. The wealthier and more class-divided NYC becomes, these conditions grow more magnified. Now more than ever, one has to have a profession which NYC is currently "for" or one has to receive sustenance from some numinous body of wealth linked to one's surname's collective PayPal account. (However that works – I wouldn't know.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-65840944943025797252015-07-11T11:39:44.365-04:002015-07-11T11:39:44.365-04:00You know Guillermo Gómez-Peña is on the money when...You know Guillermo Gómez-Peña is on the money when even (neo-)conservative, neoliberal economic champions like John Podhoretz are complaining about the destructive effects of hyper-gentrification. Cf. his recent <i>New York Post</i> opinion piece <a href="http://nypost.com/2015/07/08/homelessness-and-closed-stores-becoming-the-new-normal-in-nyc/" rel="nofollow">"Homelessness and empty stores becoming the new normal in NYC."</a><br /><br />Like so many commentators, he's finally noting the results of what has been happening, in overdrive, for years, but sadly he and so many cannot see that this is the result of the very policies they've pushed. He also only seems to have noticed now that it's struck his neighborhood, though this has been underway for years. (I'd say avoid the comments section, though I have to smile at the people calling for a return to the suburbs.)<br /><br />To @Wolynski, a lot of the younger people have parents who are subsidizing their children's moves to the urban spaces like NYC. Several colleagues have children who are recent graduates in creative industries, and as was the case with Lena Dunham's character in <i>Girls</i>, their parents are helping them out until they can afford to pay their way.John Khttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08073378940347627766noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-83138949324502172662015-07-11T09:34:16.142-04:002015-07-11T09:34:16.142-04:00Also, as referenced in this great essay, important...Also, as referenced in this great essay, important civic and local political community ("activists who used to protect us all from the greedy landlords")is completely destroyed. Gone forever.<br /><br />Transient people do not care about the community and they do not vote.<br /><br />As for progressive politics generally, in NYC, on the Upper West Side for example, what used to be a generally liberal middle-class community (musicians, social workers, CUNY professors etc) has steadily been transformed into a neighborhood of well-paid finance,media, corporate folks who are more right wing or libertarian.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-40389688671282058282015-07-11T08:53:55.687-04:002015-07-11T08:53:55.687-04:00Great essay.
In NYC even the middle class has bee...Great essay. <br />In NYC even the middle class has been displaced by the young and affluent. <br />We are fifth and fourth generation New Yorkers - but we are urging our kids not to come home after they graduate from college.<br />It is heartbreaking to see the demographic/social cleansing of NYC and destruction of neighborhoods.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-67455740681371509122015-07-11T00:12:44.749-04:002015-07-11T00:12:44.749-04:00Part of this are insightful but the last third rea...Part of this are insightful but the last third reads as an ordinary anti-immigrant racist rant, complete with invasion hysteria and damnations about not knowing the culture, but aimed at whites instead of [name your immigrant class].<br /><br />Want the truth? Its a free country and no one is under any obligation to learn anyone's fucking culture - who the hell decided that treacly claims on the past - as if new arrivals have to genuflect to the Way of Yore? Fuck that shit! <br /><br />NYC's premier cultural icons (Warhol, Pollack, Gershwin, etc.) broke with the past in ways profound and critical and these maudlin claims that they should somehow "respect" the moth-eaten decades of prior stasis would be absurd in any other venue.<br /><br />Ultimately, this rant is conflicted: on one hand clinging to the scale of urbanity, while on the other begging for the moribund stasis of small-town life; can't have both, and thank god for the constant change and impersonal anonymity of the city. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-11573574080797607982015-07-10T16:56:50.445-04:002015-07-10T16:56:50.445-04:00NY is NY , But this artist speaks of the Mission. ...NY is NY , But this artist speaks of the Mission. The Mission IS, WAS, and has always been an ethnic oriented area of San Francisco. No one was ever pushed out so anyone else could live here.....until now.<br /> The evictions are a result of the tech industry explosion. PERIOD.Steve Smallhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03932047693265061515noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-27491299782079037412015-07-10T00:35:56.834-04:002015-07-10T00:35:56.834-04:00I don't know where I fit in here, born (on one...I don't know where I fit in here, born (on one side) of a long line of New Yorkers and on the other of a short line thereof, as I watch from MA as both my children get on with their lives in NYC. One a doctor (just moving from Jacobi in the Bronx to Mt. Sinai in Manhattan), the other doing legal aid work while living in Brooklyn. Both are gentrifying intruders, on one level, and, on another, just good folks trying to do good while living in decent housing. It shouldn't be rocket science to work out what's good for all... I think Jeremiah represents a very republican (small r --think 1776)--spirit -- I should have posted this on the 4th!mchnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-38328557278489310252015-07-09T19:57:39.725-04:002015-07-09T19:57:39.725-04:00This is what I have been waiting for. An eloquent,...This is what I have been waiting for. An eloquent, thorough, and articulate screed of the hipster/hipsshit pandemic that has ruined all towns unique and impossible to afford. <br /><br />If anyone wants a name to vilify and shame these no-good self-entitled app consumer geeks, I constantly refer to them as Generation Gentrification. The worst generation and culture that this country and all of society has ever produced. And it includes the creators of this caste system: the hack and sell out electeds and oblivious city planners, and unscrupulous landlords, predator developers and vulture investors.<br /><br />JQnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-76208814774408538522015-07-09T18:30:51.212-04:002015-07-09T18:30:51.212-04:00dont blame the new comers. they come because this ...dont blame the new comers. they come because this is where the jobs are. blame the transnational corps for setting up shop in NY. high tech is a new industry. universites are now corps, expanding & investing in realestate. now you have people from all over the world coming in to study. (some for useless degrees). chainstores mega stores would be in NY regardless. NY became a tourist place after 9/11. it had no choice for revnue. manufacturing was brought overseas. meat & fulton fish markets closed. there were always rich people in NY w/trust funds. you act like its something new. its not. so manhattan is overcrowded w/people you dont like? so are many parts of the world. blame cheap airfares, again its corps. globalization. there were some valid points in the posts which i agree with. later senor gomex-pena turns it into a antiwhite rant. the artist forgets: NY latinos were johnny come lately's. they displaced the italians east side above 96st. they displaced the community on the lower east side. the artist doesnt know his history. its all about him. people come, they chase away the old timers. artists traditionally have taken odd jobs as waiters, house cleaners dog walkers. these jobs are not only for the lower classes or uneducated. (as in mexico). these employees can & sometimes do charge more. thats OUR culture. we are not south america. you question our ethics? its called free market. laura rubinhttp://laurarubinphotography.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-25544010638865063592015-07-09T17:13:39.143-04:002015-07-09T17:13:39.143-04:00It just anti white and racist is what it is. But i...It just anti white and racist is what it is. But its ok because hes a 'minority'. Actually CA is 60% nonwhite and Latinos are the largest group. He is the racist one dealing in stereotypes. How would CA or SF do financially if these people left? Not well. No money for 'programs'. Angry racist who lives in sanctuary city hates whites. Welcome to Mexifornia. I know black people in Compton - which was 90% black in 1970 and is now 65% Latino- who could write a similar story about how their hood has been destroyed. But thatd be racist and doesnt fit the narrative right? Pathetic. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-90163366989076117592015-07-09T13:33:31.626-04:002015-07-09T13:33:31.626-04:00The new American Urban Dystopia could not have bee...The new American Urban Dystopia could not have been more eloquently described. This "rant" completely captures the cold soullessness and emptiness that is today's urban society. Thank you Guillermo Gómez-Peña for writing this, and for you, Jeremiah, for posting it.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-80474108724843903892015-07-09T12:24:26.486-04:002015-07-09T12:24:26.486-04:00I love the video "Mission Park is Not For Sal...I love the video "Mission Park is Not For Sale". The conflict of New York vs Neo-York illustrated brilliantly.<br /><br />And to answer Anon 5:20 am's question, the techies are all over the East Coast as well now. Plus all the trust-fund people from the various universities and so on. Add in folks trying to upset their parents for the sake of it while using said parent's credit cards, folks thinking there is still a dream they can catch here, attention seekers and folks just looking to gain some kind of pre-fab street cred to show their friends in Podunk. TA DA!<br />Space Popehttps://5amfunnies.wordpress.com/the-best-deal-for-your-dollar-from-any-mind-control-cult/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-43548347086319525352015-07-09T05:20:15.362-04:002015-07-09T05:20:15.362-04:00Great blog, great post. The question is, who are a...Great blog, great post. The question is, who are all these people that can afford these rents? In S.F. it's the techies, but everywhere else? College grads take jobs at Starbucks, yet all these hipsters have great salaries? How? And how come there's so many of them?<br /><br />I think this invasion has to end eventually - another market collapse, another bubble burst... Wolynskihttp://www.vegasimages.tumblr.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-12443941406342617942015-07-09T05:13:22.752-04:002015-07-09T05:13:22.752-04:00Some people just don't and won't get it (A...Some people just don't and won't get it (Anonymous 9:02pm)... <br />This is right on the money and expressing with great accuracy this international gentrification process. We see it happening in Paris as well...<br />Thank you for putting in words what so many of us see and feel in any big city lately ! NEW YORK IN THE 1990's PHOTO ARCHIVEShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05077121250310832600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-70572967004962952562015-07-08T21:02:55.094-04:002015-07-08T21:02:55.094-04:00This is getting old. New York was cool because it...This is getting old. New York was cool because it was run down old funky and people did not want to live here. Now they do. Get over it. In life you usually don't get to live in nice places if you or your dad doesn't make a lot of money.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-70630165911944509422015-07-08T19:09:30.062-04:002015-07-08T19:09:30.062-04:00Thanks for posting this. I was actually trying to ...Thanks for posting this. I was actually trying to dig it up again and there it was. Just an amazing assessment and he captures the emotional dismantling of sense of place so well.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-30455139485023270292015-07-08T12:10:59.343-04:002015-07-08T12:10:59.343-04:00
Excellent! Outstanding piece. Totally on the mon...<br />Excellent! Outstanding piece. Totally on the money.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-683382864156505640.post-65290727692566775462015-07-08T11:39:56.261-04:002015-07-08T11:39:56.261-04:00Thanks very much for the Google Docs link of the T...Thanks very much for the Google Docs link of the Tantrum. I have to say that what it describes, and what it being decribed on Vanishing New York and EV Grive is, to me, the latest in updates of what I'd first witnessed in NYC in 1985 and have watched ever since. This is just the final phase of it, really, and although I agree with the Dalai Lama's saying that it's a sin to deprive anyone of hope, I also have to encourage others to be realistic. The progression of gentrification in NYC has snowballed, only gaining momentum, and it's now a case of getting out of the way of the big snowball barreling down the mountainside and devastating everything in its path.<br /><br />It's good to grieve and to vent and to "give it a name" and to assign proper blame - but what's any of that gonna do about what's already been irrevocably done and what inevitably will be? People have long moved to NYC to escape from America, so to speak, but NYC is now an extreme case of the strange pandemic of Affluenza gripping most major cities and decimating their unique indigenous/local character. It's practically, and most unfortunately, the way of the world, now - along with smartphones, online shopping, social media, and all the other b/s that's taken over.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com