So, my regular readers (I found out recently that I actually have regular readers!) may have noticed I have repeatedly promised an indepth essay on capitalism, I have said at least once that it would be my next post, and I keep posting other stuff.
Well, it really is in progress. I've written a lot of it. But there is a lot more to go, and I decided not to start posting the finished ones until the entire thing is finished.
In the meantime - since I am saving each section in my drafts folder - I discovered a whole bunch of stuff I wrote, sometimes years ago, and for reasons I can't even guess at, I never posted.
I'm going to start posting those, while I work on my biggest writing project to date.
Oh, and by the way - if you read 5 Years Later and Not A Great Start to the New Year, and you were wondering if I was still in a bad place... noooo. I am not. Not even a little. A very very good place right now.
I don't want to get into it too much here - its very exciting, its very mutual, but its also very new and we all know my patterns. I can't be objective.
As far as I can tell thus far, there is real potential, and regardless of how it turns out I am having a hell of a fun time in the moment. If you remember, way way back, New Year's (2009); I honestly did not think it would be possible - I mean, literally, physically possible - to top that experience. Well, it turns out it is.
28 February 2014
24 February 2014
Wearing the Skirt
Been thinking a bit recently about gender.
Thanks, primarily, of all things, to being more active on Facebook than I've ever been.
Which exposed me to:
http://denisdutton.com/
http://www.buzzfeed.com/
www.buzzfeed.com/marietelling/
http://imgur.com/a/RmAjE
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/
http://denisdutton.com/
(A ruler can only lead with the consent of at least most of the people. Women make up slightly more than half of the population. Sure, today institutions are set up that hold the status quo, but how did it get this way in the first place? This is a pretty plausible theory of how and it puts a lot of other stuff into a different perspective too.)
and thishttp://www.buzzfeed.com/
(I'm afraid the larger issue is that we all assume the standard lego person is male. The standard lego person looks like this:
which has no features which indicate gender.
Kind of like when cartoons give a female animal character long hair or eye lashes, lipstick, or (human type) breasts - even if she isn't a mammal - because if a cartoon animal just looks like an animal "obviously" it must be male(??)
It goes way deeper than corporations and marketing. We have all internalized it. Even the girl who wrote the letter.)
and then thisKind of like when cartoons give a female animal character long hair or eye lashes, lipstick, or (human type) breasts - even if she isn't a mammal - because if a cartoon animal just looks like an animal "obviously" it must be male(??)
It goes way deeper than corporations and marketing. We have all internalized it. Even the girl who wrote the letter.)
www.buzzfeed.com/marietelling/
(Overall, this was great. I love that it was made, and I hope some of the guys who treat women so disrespectfully see it, and it gets through... There is one problem I have with this video though - the last scene perpetuates a belief, shared by almost everyone, which is based more on misogyny than fact.
The guy really was "asking for it" when he yelled back at the gang members. Not because of how he was dressed or any signals he gave off, but because he YELLED BACK AT GANG MEMBERS!...
every male above about the age of 13 who lives in an area with street crime knows that doing that will get the shit beat out of you. Because the reality is that men are the victims of violent crime by strangers over 1/3 more often (down from twice as often a couple decades ago). What any male with even an ounce of street smarts does when a group of 4 dangerous looking teens starts harassing him verbally is ignore it, let it go, and continue with his life. Sometimes women yell or insult them back - and the reason they think this is ok is because most of the time they can get away with it - almost all men, even the low life scum who look for excuses to attack strangers, have internalized the (sexist) rule of "never hit a woman".
But then, in the few instances where it does escalate to violence - and despite the fact that it escalates to violence more often with men - we take those examples and pretend it proves that women are disproportionately victims. It isn't because the statistics actually support it. Its because our misogynist society starts out with the premise that women are victims as a given, and then looks for the evidence to support it.)
followed by thisThe guy really was "asking for it" when he yelled back at the gang members. Not because of how he was dressed or any signals he gave off, but because he YELLED BACK AT GANG MEMBERS!...
every male above about the age of 13 who lives in an area with street crime knows that doing that will get the shit beat out of you. Because the reality is that men are the victims of violent crime by strangers over 1/3 more often (down from twice as often a couple decades ago). What any male with even an ounce of street smarts does when a group of 4 dangerous looking teens starts harassing him verbally is ignore it, let it go, and continue with his life. Sometimes women yell or insult them back - and the reason they think this is ok is because most of the time they can get away with it - almost all men, even the low life scum who look for excuses to attack strangers, have internalized the (sexist) rule of "never hit a woman".
But then, in the few instances where it does escalate to violence - and despite the fact that it escalates to violence more often with men - we take those examples and pretend it proves that women are disproportionately victims. It isn't because the statistics actually support it. Its because our misogynist society starts out with the premise that women are victims as a given, and then looks for the evidence to support it.)
http://imgur.com/a/RmAjE
(It may be true, as far as it goes - but I can think of more than a couple examples where the FriendZoner does choose to go out with the guy who WOULD take advantage of her when she's drunk, or who WON'T listen to her when she is upset. As though she is only attracted to people she wouldn't actually be friends with. Not saying it is universal, but it seems to be pretty common. She might even be even be attracted to The Nice Guy - if only he acted like more of a jerk. That doesn't make her an evil bitch. But it does maybe make her judgement a little suspect.)
and then, finally this:http://www.nytimes.com/2014/
(I can say, for me personally, I feel no pressure to fit a masculine role, but I have experienced what it talks about first hand - it could easily have been about my marriage. And it was mostly her; she wanted equality and friendship in principal, but was attracted to the jerk who didn't respect women. It looks a lot to me like what I was talking about earlier about the Nice Guy not being sexually attractive by virtue of being a nice guy - that makes him seem like a brother, which is anti-sexy... If it is because of societal expectations and gender roles, then why do lesbian couples experience the exact same patterns?)
all of which, of course, I had comments on, usually lengthy (compared to a typical online comment) and most of which drew responses from others, which in turn got me thinking even more.
I feel like there is a bit of a common theme running beneath the surface, one which is touched on, or at least alluded to, by things I've written before
but is never really spelled out explicitly, mainly because even I take the world as it is for granted, and even though I actually have thought about this in the same terms before, I didn't actually remember in the moments I was writing any of those.
but is never really spelled out explicitly, mainly because even I take the world as it is for granted, and even though I actually have thought about this in the same terms before, I didn't actually remember in the moments I was writing any of those.
Its nothing particularly revolutionary - in fact, it seems it should be obvious, and I'm sure many others have thought of, and have written about the same thing, but it still seems to escape our daily consciousness, even people whose primary focus in life it these sort of issues.
I had been trying to pin down what exactly it is that I don't like about the word feminism, why I prefer "egalitarianism", for several months now. It isn't just that all people should be treated fairly and with respect - I think it's totally valid that any group which has disproportionate challenges in society get more focus in order to change that. And its not just that using the root "fem" to apply to females implies that all women are (or should be) "feminine", which is a social construct to which not all females conform (so does feminism not aim to help them?).
The last of the essays I read finally helped solidify what it actually is...
Back in the 1800s and early 1900s, the focus was on allowing women to participate in democracy. Around the time of world war II (due to necessity) women entered the work force in large numbers and after, due partly to that, partly to politics, and partly to technology, women were more and more free to be something other than a house wife, even if they got married. In the 50s and 60s there was a struggle to change American culture to allow women to wear pants - and while that success has become so common place that its a complete non-issue today, the phrase taken from that transition still has the same meaning today - if a woman "wears the pants" in the relationship, it means she is the head of the household.
Back in the 1800s and early 1900s, the focus was on allowing women to participate in democracy. Around the time of world war II (due to necessity) women entered the work force in large numbers and after, due partly to that, partly to politics, and partly to technology, women were more and more free to be something other than a house wife, even if they got married. In the 50s and 60s there was a struggle to change American culture to allow women to wear pants - and while that success has become so common place that its a complete non-issue today, the phrase taken from that transition still has the same meaning today - if a woman "wears the pants" in the relationship, it means she is the head of the household.
We've come a really really long way in allowing a woman complete freedom to choosing any role in life that she is capable of and interested in, even though we aren't quite all there yet - there are still some roles in the military that are closed off by gender, regardless of ability, and we still have yet to have a single female president - but those last few are within sight of changing.
But what was neglected all along, because of the focus on women specifically, was, well... men, and their roles.
I don't mean that in a "it's so unfair" kind of way.
The vast majority of women are heterosexual, and the vast majority have at least one serious intimate relationship at some point in life. So the social roles expected of men are directly relevant to women. For one thing, the things that women traditionally did still need to get done. Allowing women to enter what was once men's sphere, while not allowing men to enter women's, leads directly to the modern challenges of women who want to have both a career and a family.
The vast majority of women are heterosexual, and the vast majority have at least one serious intimate relationship at some point in life. So the social roles expected of men are directly relevant to women. For one thing, the things that women traditionally did still need to get done. Allowing women to enter what was once men's sphere, while not allowing men to enter women's, leads directly to the modern challenges of women who want to have both a career and a family.
See, while it has become acceptable for women to - both literally and figuratively - wear pants, it never became acceptable for men to wear the skirt.
Again, both literally and figuratively.
A woman wearing pants is not a transvestite, no one assumes she is gay on that basis alone (never mind that the majority of male cross dressers are straight anyway, I'm just talking about public perception), and it doesn't even make her not "feminine". A average man wearing a skirt (not a kilt, an actual skirt), who isn't dressing up as a female as a sex fetish, joke, or political statement, simply isn't done. Anywhere. Ever.
In the figurative sense it is slowly changing to at least a small degree. There are male school teachers, flight attendants, receptionists, and nurses, and none of those are seen as particularly shocking. There is even such a thing as a stay-at-home dad, though its extremely rare (~3% of married couples - and this includes involuntarily unemployed fathers), and depending on the specific American sub-culture, still frequently (usually?) stigmatized.
I can imagine attempted explanations for this going along the lines of male machismo, or that patriarchy controlled the terms of change as women were allowed political and economic power, but those explanations wouldn't really explain why men would want to deprive themselves of choice, and besides, they are a bit circular. They tend to assume that half the population of the world has no influence on culture - even after political and economic power were won / granted.
I would expect some people's responses to point to the theoretical "matriarchal" societies prehistoric societies - unfortunately, as nice as that myth is, there isn't any actual evidence to support it having ever been true, anywhere: https://www.nytimes.com/books/
I remember reading an article about the difficulties of modern educated Russian women in finding husbands.
Manufacturing and other traditionally-male semi-skilled labor jobs - jobs which once provided a comfortable and respectable life - were in decline, leaving a lot of men struggling to adapt. Meanwhile, more women graduated universities than men, and began taking higher level professional jobs.
Manufacturing and other traditionally-male semi-skilled labor jobs - jobs which once provided a comfortable and respectable life - were in decline, leaving a lot of men struggling to adapt. Meanwhile, more women graduated universities than men, and began taking higher level professional jobs.
The trouble finding husbands wasn't due to a deficit of smart, kind, hard-working men. It was that the women, even though they had enough income to support themselves and a family, were unwilling to partner with someone who earned less than them.
Surveys found that the average single man was willing to marry a woman with more education or more income (as well as one with less) than himself, but this was not reciprocal.
Surveys found that the average single man was willing to marry a woman with more education or more income (as well as one with less) than himself, but this was not reciprocal.
It was women's choices, preferences, biases, that was controlling the situation.
My friend who shared that last link above (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/
suggested that the reason women insist on their partner's being traditionally "masculine" and dominant (in sexual relations, if nowhere else) is because of their internalized sexism.
I could see that. It certainly fits with the conclusions I came to in my "perceptions of rape and feminism" blog post.
That explanation definately would make sense: men have had about about half a century to get used to the idea of strong independent women, several generations have grown up taking female police officers and business leaders and politicians for granted - men my age or younger don't actually remember the time when women were barred from traditionally male roles. However the stay-at-home-dad, the sensitive nurturing husband, the sexually submissive boyfriend, these things are relatively new. Perhaps it will just take more transition time for women to adapt to egalitarianism, to start seeing "feminine" men as being sexy, the way men have accepted "masculine" women can be sexy.
That explanation definately would make sense: men have had about about half a century to get used to the idea of strong independent women, several generations have grown up taking female police officers and business leaders and politicians for granted - men my age or younger don't actually remember the time when women were barred from traditionally male roles. However the stay-at-home-dad, the sensitive nurturing husband, the sexually submissive boyfriend, these things are relatively new. Perhaps it will just take more transition time for women to adapt to egalitarianism, to start seeing "feminine" men as being sexy, the way men have accepted "masculine" women can be sexy.
That explanation is appealing, but it begs the question of why similar patterns seem to emerge in the generally egalitarian gay female relationships, but not in the generally not egalitarian gay male relationships. It also doesn't explain satisfactorily why so many straight women accept, or prefer, egalitarianism in every aspect of a relationship, except for sexually, where she enjoys it more if the male takes charge.
The alternative is that this may be rooted in biology. That could make sense too: the creep who sees every attractive female primarily as a potential sex partner, who doesn't want to take "no" for an answer, is likely to get more lifetime sex partners than the respectful guy who sees women as people first and foremost, and prefers his partner to be his friend and equal - if only because of the numbers; the bad boy is constantly trying to get some, while the nice guy is waiting for someone to give him a sign that she's interested. Pre-birth control it means jerks are going to have more children. Assuming that some degree of personality traits are genetic, from the stand point of a female who (subconsciously) wants to maximize not just the number of offspring, but of grand- and great-grand-children, then it makes sense to have sons who will have lots of kids with lots of different partners, and so it makes sense to find a partner who will pass on some disrespectful womanizing genes. She would still want a relationship with a guy who actually cares about her, who will take good care of the family, but the jerk would be sexy - after all, humanity also evolved hundreds of thousands of years before paternity tests.
This explanation is much less encouraging - it implies that this phenomenon will be a hell of a lot harder to change overtime, maybe even that there may be relatively little we can do about it. It could mean we may never expect to eliminate sexual harassment or date rape, since the dynamic set up by women being turned on by "alpha males" actively encourages both. It would mean nice guys would always continue to finish last, sleazy pick-up-artists would always be successful, stay-at-home-dads will never become common.
But not necessarily. The human brain is pretty complex, and culture has managed to have us go against instinct before (most notably in the suppression of violence).
But not necessarily. The human brain is pretty complex, and culture has managed to have us go against instinct before (most notably in the suppression of violence).
Either way, in order to address it, we have to understand it. And before we can understand it, we have to become aware (and/or admit) that it even exists in the first place.
So.
Tell me, my heterosexual female readership:
Tell me, my heterosexual female readership:
Am I totally off-base on this?
I could be totally wrong.
Correct me if I am.
I am very open to being proved wrong.
I would love it if I was wrong.
All of my personal experience, not to mention the statistics, tell me I'm not, but I'm still open to new information.
I could be totally wrong.
Correct me if I am.
I am very open to being proved wrong.
I would love it if I was wrong.
All of my personal experience, not to mention the statistics, tell me I'm not, but I'm still open to new information.
Are there actually lots and lots of exceptions, and I just don't know about it?
Do you, personally, find it sexier when your partner takes charge in the bedroom?
Have you ever turned down a male friend who was interested in you, even though you liked him and he was attractive because you "see him like a brother" or you "know him too well" or "you just don't see him that way?
If so, why are trusting and being comfortable with a person anti-sexy traits?
If you would want your partner to be your friend, why would you not consider a close friend as a candidate for partner?
Have you ever not said what you wanted, or not made the first move, because you wanted the guy to be the one to initiate?
If so, why are trusting and being comfortable with a person anti-sexy traits?
If you would want your partner to be your friend, why would you not consider a close friend as a candidate for partner?
Have you ever not said what you wanted, or not made the first move, because you wanted the guy to be the one to initiate?
Have you ever had a guy be uncomfortably sexually aggressive, perhaps even to a point that made you dislike him as a person, but still found yourself turned on by the situation?
Regardless of if you would actually want it in the real world, have you ever had a fantasy of being forced, or does the idea seem at all sexy, or if you ever actually have been, was it, on any level, sexy or enjoyable?
Do you prefer to be submissive, (even if only in terms of sex)?
Do you tend to think of intercourse as him fucking you, (as opposed to you fucking him)?
Do you sympathize with the women from the article?
Do you sympathize with the women from the article?
How about the examples in my blog post on the topic?
It certainly resonated with my own personal experience (of course, a couple of the anecdotes were drawn from my personal experience), but I have a fairly small sample size.
Do you prefer that your partner be physically taller than you?
Has the guy been the one to first express romantic interest in more than half of your relationships and/or dates?
You don't have to tell me, or answer out loud, I'm just asking you to question yourself, to be aware of the answers.
If the answer to, not necessarily all, but even just any one of them is yes, why do you think that is?
Is it something you've learned, something you've internalized from cultural expectations, or do you suspect its something deeper, more primal than that?
If the answer to, not necessarily all, but even just any one of them is yes, why do you think that is?
Is it something you've learned, something you've internalized from cultural expectations, or do you suspect its something deeper, more primal than that?
If the answer to any of them is yes, how do you reconcile that with your values and principals around feminism and equality and power?
I could see if it was just any one individual, a person can have any particular preference - "that is what I believe in principal, this just happens to be what I personally like, and my personal tastes have no political meaning". That seems to be the most common self-justification, the most common way to reconcile principal and practice, politics and desire. On the surface it seems like a perfectly reasonable answer, and it allows a person to not have to think about uncomfortable questions.
But if its universal, or an overwhelming trend, if even just more than 50% of straight women answer "yes" to any of the above questions, then there are obviously sociopolitical implications.
Or, at least, it seems obvious to me - yet it seems like nobody notices.
But if its universal, or an overwhelming trend, if even just more than 50% of straight women answer "yes" to any of the above questions, then there are obviously sociopolitical implications.
Or, at least, it seems obvious to me - yet it seems like nobody notices.
I come across sexually assertive women, anti-sexism activists, queer women who challenge traditional concepts of gender, all wanting to be dominated sexually.
In a different context these same women will object to, for example, sexual harassment, but somehow see no connection between the two. Men who harass are like spam or telemarketers or junk mail - all it takes is one positive response in 10,000 to make the strategy successful, but if the positive response rate was absolute zero, they wouldn't waste their time. And it shouldn't be surprising that some women respond positively to what others call harassment, if in other contexts a power differential is seen as desirable.
As I pointed out in the rape and feminism blog post, if we want to reduce date rape, it is absolutely vital that women not ever say "no" when they really mean "yes" - and surveys find that the majority of young, sexually active women, by their own admission, have done exactly that at some point in their lives (61%). When I first read the statistic, I assumed it was due to cultural expectations, a way to avoid 'slut shaming' - "There's bound to be talk tomorrow" ... "At least I'm gonna say that I tried" - but after reading the NY Times article that inspired what I'm writing now, I wonder if there's more to it after all.
In a different context these same women will object to, for example, sexual harassment, but somehow see no connection between the two. Men who harass are like spam or telemarketers or junk mail - all it takes is one positive response in 10,000 to make the strategy successful, but if the positive response rate was absolute zero, they wouldn't waste their time. And it shouldn't be surprising that some women respond positively to what others call harassment, if in other contexts a power differential is seen as desirable.
As I pointed out in the rape and feminism blog post, if we want to reduce date rape, it is absolutely vital that women not ever say "no" when they really mean "yes" - and surveys find that the majority of young, sexually active women, by their own admission, have done exactly that at some point in their lives (61%). When I first read the statistic, I assumed it was due to cultural expectations, a way to avoid 'slut shaming' - "There's bound to be talk tomorrow" ... "At least I'm gonna say that I tried" - but after reading the NY Times article that inspired what I'm writing now, I wonder if there's more to it after all.
"Ninety percent of these women said that fear of appearing promiscuous was an important reason for their behavior. Many said that they wanted their dates to wait, or “talk me into it.” And some said that they told their dates no because they “wanted him to be more physically aggressive." [emphasis mine]
So far the push for equality has been focused on the tangible for women - legal status, employment, dress; and the mental/emotional for men - how they are supposed to think about women.
We've pretty much ignored the physical world of men - there is no law protecting men who choose to wear a skirt to work - while the mental/emotional for women has been pretty much ignored too.
There are no college or corporate educational videos, no pamphlets or handouts, no protest rallies or petitions, that address how women view men or sexuality. We tell men not to look at women as sexual objects, and leave it at that, as though it were a given that we don't need to tell women not to want to be looked at as sexual objects - even though there is a lot of evidence that says they many (most?) do. The former will never succeed without the latter, because the message men get from women in their personal lives will always outweigh the message they get from activists or the human resources department.
There are no college or corporate educational videos, no pamphlets or handouts, no protest rallies or petitions, that address how women view men or sexuality. We tell men not to look at women as sexual objects, and leave it at that, as though it were a given that we don't need to tell women not to want to be looked at as sexual objects - even though there is a lot of evidence that says they many (most?) do. The former will never succeed without the latter, because the message men get from women in their personal lives will always outweigh the message they get from activists or the human resources department.
So.
Whoever reads this:
speak up! comment. I want to hear different ideas and viewpoints and opinions and theories and personal experiences and thoughts and feelings.
I know people stumble across this blog somehow or other - I can see the internal statistics. Some of you even stay on the page long enough to read.
You can even comment anonymously if you want.
Could you have a passionate and fulfilling sex life with a man who, figuratively speaking, wears the skirt in the relationship?
Why or why not?
Is it possible that the current dynamic will ever change, and, if so, how might that happen?
17 February 2014
Google Bus
In order to protest income inequality, instead of attacking the corporations who pay minimum wage or outsource their labor, despite huge profits and huge executive compensation, we attack a corporation that actually pays well - and goes beyond good pay to provide (among other things) an alternative to car commuting.
Which means the goal isn't to actually ensure everyone has a living wage and can afford decent housing, its just to drag everyone else down to the lowest common denominator.
Actually, its not even that, since its the buses that have drawn anger, representing reasonably paid people moving into poor neighborhoods. Our solution to inequality and poverty is... segregation!
Really?
When middle class whites moved out of urban areas, it was called "white flight", and activists objected, because it made life harder for poor residents by turning them into ghettos. Now middle class whites are moving back, and even though you can't evict someone just to get higher rent in a rent controlled city, we call it "gentrification" and claim it is making life harder for the poor residents.
Now, I understand it is easier and more gratifying to pick an enemy to hate, and to throw stuff and be destructive than it is to think critically about complex issues - but is it too much to ask to go after WalMart and McDonalds and all the other low wage and outsourcing companies?
When I have pointed all this out to people, they mostly agree that it isn't productive, but say it points to a larger issue regarding gentrification's affect on housing.I 100% agree with the notion that having a place to exist should be a basic human right. I have a major problem with the idea that one person can "own" the land that another person lives on. (More on that in upcoming posts)
However, living in the SF Bay Area is most certainly not a basic human right.
Not all 7 billion humans in the world can live in the Bay Area.
High eviction rates didn't start because of tech companies. They started in 2008 with the foreclosure crises.
High rents didn't start with tech companies. Rent has been higher than average here for at least a good hundred years.
High rents are because everyone wants to live here - we have good weather and good culture - but there is a finite amount of space.
Increasing housing is like increasing traffic lanes to deal with traffic, the more you build, the more people drive. It is like buying a bigger belt to deal with obesity.
You are at best temporarily solving a symptom, while the "solution" itself will ultimately only encourage an increase the size of the original problem.
Along the way you either increase urban density (which has a direct correlation to crime rates) or you increase suburban sprawl (with its environmental consequences) and either way you increase traffic, parking, and pollution.
If a person has trouble affording rent here, there are lots of options:
1) Live with roommates (that's a popular one), or in an RV park (I used to), or do work-trade for rent (that's what I do now), or live in a communal house.
2) Apply for public assistance.
3) Live anywhere in the entire country other than Honolulu HI, New York City NY, or the SF Bay Area CA. Literally anywhere else. That leaves about 20,000 options.
It almost seems that the idea is people should be able to live where ever they want, even in places they can't afford (and we aren't talking about being forced out of an existing home, because we have rent control here) - except the entire objection is middle class people choosing to move somewhere less expensive. In other words, they should not be allowed to live where ever they want. Only poor people should. That seems a very odd and arbitrary way to try to even the score. I can think of a whole lot of much better ways.
Other people have said the issue is private use of public infrastructure.
How about millions of people driving private cars on public roads?
That solves the problem of transportation for yourself, while leaving everyone else behind.
How is it Google's responsibility to provide transportation for all people?
How would it benefit the people of Oakland if all Google employees drove their own personal cars to work instead, increasing the already excessive congestion on our highways?
Which means the goal isn't to actually ensure everyone has a living wage and can afford decent housing, its just to drag everyone else down to the lowest common denominator.
Actually, its not even that, since its the buses that have drawn anger, representing reasonably paid people moving into poor neighborhoods. Our solution to inequality and poverty is... segregation!
Really?
When middle class whites moved out of urban areas, it was called "white flight", and activists objected, because it made life harder for poor residents by turning them into ghettos. Now middle class whites are moving back, and even though you can't evict someone just to get higher rent in a rent controlled city, we call it "gentrification" and claim it is making life harder for the poor residents.
Now, I understand it is easier and more gratifying to pick an enemy to hate, and to throw stuff and be destructive than it is to think critically about complex issues - but is it too much to ask to go after WalMart and McDonalds and all the other low wage and outsourcing companies?
When I have pointed all this out to people, they mostly agree that it isn't productive, but say it points to a larger issue regarding gentrification's affect on housing.I 100% agree with the notion that having a place to exist should be a basic human right. I have a major problem with the idea that one person can "own" the land that another person lives on. (More on that in upcoming posts)
However, living in the SF Bay Area is most certainly not a basic human right.
Not all 7 billion humans in the world can live in the Bay Area.
High eviction rates didn't start because of tech companies. They started in 2008 with the foreclosure crises.
High rents didn't start with tech companies. Rent has been higher than average here for at least a good hundred years.
High rents are because everyone wants to live here - we have good weather and good culture - but there is a finite amount of space.
Increasing housing is like increasing traffic lanes to deal with traffic, the more you build, the more people drive. It is like buying a bigger belt to deal with obesity.
You are at best temporarily solving a symptom, while the "solution" itself will ultimately only encourage an increase the size of the original problem.
Along the way you either increase urban density (which has a direct correlation to crime rates) or you increase suburban sprawl (with its environmental consequences) and either way you increase traffic, parking, and pollution.
If a person has trouble affording rent here, there are lots of options:
1) Live with roommates (that's a popular one), or in an RV park (I used to), or do work-trade for rent (that's what I do now), or live in a communal house.
2) Apply for public assistance.
3) Live anywhere in the entire country other than Honolulu HI, New York City NY, or the SF Bay Area CA. Literally anywhere else. That leaves about 20,000 options.
It almost seems that the idea is people should be able to live where ever they want, even in places they can't afford (and we aren't talking about being forced out of an existing home, because we have rent control here) - except the entire objection is middle class people choosing to move somewhere less expensive. In other words, they should not be allowed to live where ever they want. Only poor people should. That seems a very odd and arbitrary way to try to even the score. I can think of a whole lot of much better ways.
Other people have said the issue is private use of public infrastructure.
How about millions of people driving private cars on public roads?
That solves the problem of transportation for yourself, while leaving everyone else behind.
How is it Google's responsibility to provide transportation for all people?
How would it benefit the people of Oakland if all Google employees drove their own personal cars to work instead, increasing the already excessive congestion on our highways?
11 February 2014
Motivated
Motivated by the discovery that I have a readership of at least one, in conjunction with being caught up on all the work I can get done (until the water pump is delivered), I am going to (finally!) get started on at least one of the two essays that have been waiting inside my brain
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)