West Oakland is a traditionally black neighborhood that surrounds the Port of Oakland. It has been heavily gentrified, developed, and restructured over the past three decades. Now there is an upper class enclave that has been established near the West Oakland BART station, in Jack London, and in the city of Emeryville.
Oh fuck you and your dreadlocks.
There are only two photos on that page, so I don't definitively know who these protesters were (although there are no "traditional" blacks in those photos) -- but I know (I have a strong suspicion, I don't factually know) that the protesters were not drawn from the group mentioned above. These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families.
The actual, working, poor people in West Oakland were at their first of the two or three jobs they hold. Or they were spending a few rare moments resting, or with their kids. Or they were lining up to get a meal at community kitchen. Actual black people were not part of this protest, because a mob of black people attacking a bus would be getting wall-to-wall coverage on every channel. It would have been responded to with a swift and overwhelming police presence.
The same thing happened a few years ago when these same non-workers shut down the Port of Oakland in the name of workers. The people who actually work the port asked that they not disrupt the port, but in the end these dreadlocked, shiftless complainers cost those longshoremen a day in wages -- Viva El Proletariado!
What we have today is a group of young, electively poor white kids who are upset that the price of unheated lofts and dingy Victorians are being driven up by people who have the means and motivation to actually own and improve them. That they wrap themselves up in the image of the poor (and yes, mostly black) -- whom they themselves displaced by rushing in to bid up rents with mom and dad's money -- makes this appeal all the more ludicrous. At least the tech gentrifiers will actually improve the fucking place, unlike these leeches!
Since almost everything else you said is anecdotal, it's hard for me to respond to, but your statement about the longshoremen, that's certainly wrong.
In general, the people that you are deriding and caricaturing represent the first wave of gentrification, and those people actually do make meaningful contributions to the areas they move into. Think of the excellent restaurants, concert venues, boutiques, bars, etc. that exist in Oakland now--that's first wave gentrification. Those people are also historically more aware of their surroundings and the culture that they are moving into and tend to show solidarity with the lower income residents that they are paving the way towards displacement for. On the other hand, the second wave of gentrifiers tends to dramatically increase the cost of living, rate of displacement, and tends to care very little about the plight of their fellow citizens.
The Google buses are a convenient symbol for economic disparity though, and I often wonder why Google doesn't try to do a real public works project instead of simply creating a segregated system of buses. Why not add wi-fi to public buses? Why not extend the light rail system into the valley? Why not donate a whole lot of money to a public mental health project so there aren't so many deranged lunatics screaming on public transit? If they did that, then they will have created a more comfortable environment not only for their own employees, but for the entire community.
...but your statement about the longshoremen, that's certainly wrong.
No, it's right. ILWU (the union) leadership has made statements such as
"Organization from outside groups attempting to co-opt our struggle in order to advance a broader agenda is quite another and one that is destructive to our democratic process and jeopardizes our over two year struggle in Longview." [1]
So I may not have been right about them speaking out specifically against the Oakland shut down, but in general the union leadership is against strikes. Although, of course, they take great pains to not alienate potential ideological allies while rejecting calls to shut down ports.
The sentiment is at least mixed, as you can see from other coverage: [2]
"Leaders of the ILWU, which represents thousands of longshoremen, spoke out in recent weeks against the coordinated effort by Occupy protesters to blockade ports from Anchorage to San Diego"
"This is joke. What are they protesting?" Christian Vega, 32, who sat in his truck carrying a load of recycled paper from Pittsburg said Monday morning. He said the delay was costing him $600.
"It only hurts me and the other drivers. We have jobs and families to support and feed. Most of them don't," Vega said.
> "Think of the excellent restaurants, concert venues, boutiques, bars, etc. that exist in Oakland now--that's first wave gentrification. Those people are also historically more aware of their surroundings and the culture that they are moving into and tend to show solidarity with the lower income residents that they are paving the way towards displacement for. On the other hand, the second wave of gentrifiers tends to dramatically increase the cost of living, rate of displacement, and tends to care very little about the plight of their fellow citizens."
First wave? Only if you define "first wave" to coincide with the current discussion. There was a wave of bio-tech (e.g Genentech) shortly before the "tech" (e.g Google) wave.
This goes back all the way to the founding of California, the state. The '49ers were the first wave. Since then there has been a sadly repeating history of picking on a group to blame for any ill in society - usually racist - but it appears this time around it's a soft target.
So the claim here is that wave zero, original inhabitants don't have "excellent restaurants, concert venues, botiques, bars etc.", and their displacement by the first wave is excusable by this fact, and some hand-waving about "solidarity."
On the other hand, the second-wave and later are callous Scrooges who just take what they can get, and thus deserve to be vilified.
This is special pleading at its most naked. I've heard the saying that you pull up the drawbridge just after you enter the castle, but you seem to want to scrape out a privileged little Goldilocks zone on both sides, where first-wavers are each an embodiment of a noble Jake Sully, fighting to save the Na'vi against the invading hordes.
First, a few places in the neighborhood are rehabbed by developers.
Next the "...Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the ... overprivileged..." move in to the rehabbed areas and the (usually) blacks have to move out.
These hippy - artist types make the neighborhood more attractive to people even further up the food chain. (Read techies). And soon the time comes for the hippy - artists to move out.
The hippy - artists are unhappy... but the reality is... this is no more than what they did to the blacks.
Soon the time will come for the techies to move out... and, I'm sure, they will be unhappy as well when their time comes.
This same progression happens all over. I think Harlem is probably one of the best examples. (It's WAY ahead of SF area in that regard). Blacks had to move when the artists showed up because they could no longer afford it. Then, when the techies and yuppies showed up... the hippies, artists and teachers hit the roof, because it was their turn to move. Harlem is at the stage now where the celebrities and bankers are showing up ... and like clockwork ... the techies are hitting the roof because it's their turn to move.
The thing is ... in the end ... they all moved. They didn't engage in violence.
That people are upset should be expected... but I would point out that places like Harlem have gone through this process with multiple populations without violence. It can be done.
These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families.
Oh, get off it, man.
All that we "know" about the perpetrators at this point is that they were apparently (1) young and (2) non-black. As to the rest the attributes you impute to them -- as of yet we don't "know" any of these to be fact. At best all you can honestly say at this point would be:
Now I don't know for a fact, but ya know, I have a hunch these are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, etc etc ...
This is not nit-picking. The fact that you're saying that you "know" everything about their demographic / psychographic makeup when in fact you are merely speculating is what's part of the broader problem here: rather than elucidating the problem, you're subverting the discourse.
And more to the point: you're pushing people's buttons, by appealing to stereotypes and their own identity- and privilege-based insecurities.
a) I have no objection to this phrase and will edit my comment thus.
b) I'm reacting to the race card being employed by people who are tokenizing and mascotifying (to coin phrase) the same people who they themselves pushed out!
"These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families."
That describes a huge fraction of today's protestors and activists, which is why despite many things in the world sucking I rarely take today's "activism" very seriously. It's mostly activism-as-entertainment for trustafarians.
> That describes a huge fraction of today's protestors and activists, which is why despite many things in the world sucking I rarely take today's "activism" very seriously. It's mostly activism-as-entertainment for trustafarians.
The irony is that your comment only emphasizes the severe disconnect between relatively wealthy & employable 'techies' versus the rest of the struggling recession-hit population.
It's hard to understand how life has changed since 2007 when, coming from a tech-related field, one generally doesn't suffer the everyday hardships that most Americans endure [1].
But, how is it that we recognize "many things in the world sucking" and criticize today's activism as lacking; yet have not done more ourselves to reduce the world's suckage?
Silicon Valley technology, this is Manhattan finance with a word of advice. We know the roots of the problem are housing supply restrictions and a lack of mass transit. In essence, City Hall problems. So why are they able to pin the blame on you?
Because you're painting a target on your back. Ducking your heads makes you a low-risk scapegoat. Scoffing at the less fortunate, regardless of whether they "deserve" it, makes you a juicy red political filet.
I'm not saying you need to up volunteering incentives for technology workers or visibly join hands with your foes and fight City Hall for more housing including, yes, the affordable kind. But don't throw daggers when you're down. As it stands, you're right but you're down.
In Houston I, and several others who live behind the gates on Sunset, have taken to volunteering A LOT of time in Third Ward for this very reason. You're a lot tougher target when your head is raised and you have a track record of advocating for the REAL underprivileged. Because chances are, the people denigrating you would never dare go to a place like Third Ward. (Which is a shame... because the people there are quite nice actually.)
And a super-easy place to start, techies, is making sure that the janitorial/cafeteria/security staff you've contracted to work with are paid at least reasonably. "Living wage" can be hard to compute in the overheated Bay economy, but at least don't be screwing them with 35-hour-per-week jobs with no benefits. This is something that your own company can influence.
I've gotten into some 'debates' with friends on facebook who are are in the 'anarchist/burner/hipster' persuasion. And It's mostly scape-goating programmers for rents going up. But I do think the Startup community in particular could do a better job interacting with the communities we live in. Especially as more and more people jump on the startup bandwagon and don't really understand the hacker/nerd ethos of protecting the little guy that most of us embrace. The recent remarks of the founder of Anglehack come to mind as something that gives the community a very bad name http://valleywag.gawker.com/happy-holidays-startup-ceo-compl...
I think the rent issue is definitely real, but isn't the fault of techies. It's the fault of several interacting factors:
(1) Anti-development mentality on the part of city councils, zoning boards, etc.
(2) Geographic containment of the area.
(3) Shitty public transit and overcrowded roads.
(4) Foreign investors driving up the price of RE.
... in roughly that order.
#1 is largely the fault of this same stereotypical bunch of braindead trustafarian hippies, since they tend to oppose building pretty much anything because it destroys the Earth, man. In so doing they play their role in the gentrification cycle, constraining supply to drive up rents and drive out the genuinely underprivileged.
So... we need to organize a working class resistence against the... pretend working class resistance?
Not even joking. If the imposter protestors make it acceptable for "civilized" folk to have a reactionary attitude against equality concerns, they will become a (perhaps unwitting) tool of oppression of the poor, who do have valid (if unvoiced) concerns.
Like I said elsewhere I used to live in a "trendy" place that had a huge contingent of these obnoxious faux-radicals. They would organize this silly clownish protests of GMO foods, "chemtrails," free this, liberate that, whatever, and they'd march around looking like clowns in front of all kinds of trendy businesses catering to hippie-tourists and retired old white people.
These businesses in turn paid their workers shit wages with no benefits. How do I know? Because I was good friends with a number of these workers, who never had anything to do with the IndyMedia traustafarian clown show.
I never saw a single one of these outrage-er-tainment fuckups protests unfair wages or lack of benefits. They only protested trendy issues of no relevance to the actually underprivileged.
It's a good point. These protesters, far from helping the 'locals', are giving them a worse reputation. Among it's other problems, Oakland is now "the city that smashes buses", even if the people who did it really have nothing to do with Oakland. The residents of Oakland have every right to be angry with these protesters.
People with enough of their parents money don't move to West Oakland. People who can't afford anything else and aren't afraid of getting robbed once a year do. Typically, yes, there's a bunch of kids from the "middle class", but most the ones I know are also "working poor" because they work in some sort of service industry.
Other parts of Oakland, sure. Not the core part of West Oakland though.
But you are also right, this wasn't West Oakland, or even lower class vs. Google. This was "activism class" vs Google. Which tends to describe hippies and burners.
Source: I've spent inordinate amounts of time near Willow Park.
Your disdain for people who attend Burning Man, have so-called 'useless degrees,' and are self-styled-artists does nothing but discredit you as a reasonable person. Plenty of people who fall into any combination or all of those groups are productive and capable, many of them in the technology/tech startup sectors (and don't have a problem with Google's buses.)
He's nopt expressing venom for people who/are those things, but for those who use such status to justify the sort of violent nihilism on display in this article. I know lots of Burning Man/weirdo artist types who work hard, care about their neighbors, and manage to express their political views without slinging bricks through windows or justifying intimidation by calling it 'direct action.'
>These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors
This is such a stupid position to take. First of all, do you realize that those "Burning Man Hippies" are, uh, literally the people who started google? Do you realize that google has made enormous donations to those "burning man hippies"?
And yes, "uesless degrees". History, art, literature, these are all "useless" of course, the only valid degrees are either hard science and hard engineering, I'm sure?
What aspects of life do you enjoy, man? A good design aesthetic? Cause that's art...
Or, perhaps good food? That's also art.
Maybe a good book, wait...
Architecture?
Beauty? Something? Possibly something that poets and artists have given you a context for, or study?
--
This is such a stupid lazy attitude to take. Come out of your hole sometime and you'll find a whole world out here full of things that you can enjoy. Just try to steer clear of those pesky "artists" who got useless degrees.
--
The people who are crying about google's buses are idiots. Don't group them together with artists or "burning man hippies".
Eh, you know what? I think you've gone way out of your way to construe my comments as meaning something different than what they do. Do you think that it was your local bookstore owner and restauranteer throwing bricks in the window? Do you even think it was someone so dedicated to their art that they've appeared in galleries and have become known for their craft? Maybe there was some brilliant author in the crowd?
Somehow, I doubt it.
As for "useless" degrees -- I majored in Political Science so I know what a useless degree is. The point is not to denigrate them for having an economically useless degree. The point is to expose what I think is the real motivation here, that slackers have found it increasingly difficult to float without having any real contribution to make back. It used to be that you could graduate with a soft humanities degree, rent a shitty loft in a neighborhood like West Oakland and still live pretty well. Now, you're gonna have to move out to the suburbs unless you can contribute, generate and capture substantial, financial value.
Certainly engineering is not the only field worth a damn. My comment was an allusion to a strategy employed by a certain class of privileged people, which is essentially to find a local minimum of effort/reward even though they typically come from a background which affords much greater opportunity. I contend that it's the demands of these people on display today, being presented as if it were aligned with the needs of Oakland's truly poor.
In short, the people protesting today are poor for different reasons than the people whose struggle they are claiming in the passage I quoted.
Local blogs are reporting the story: http://sfist.com/2013/12/20/angry_protesters_smash_google_bu... and it seems to back your theory. I dont think I see a single person of minority in the protest. Also the local sites are doing a better job at reporting the story then this bias site.
I wouldn't call it hipsters or nerds. The nerd angle has little to do with it actually, in another city it would be financial workers, or lawyers, or local university students.
The problem is that a big corporation like Google gives less than it takes as of now, tax wise, and guarantees their employees a standard of living out of reach for most americans now, or the rest of the world for that matter.
A standard of living paid for, in part, by the very same taxes they manage to avoid, along with several other big corporations.
Not to mention they are no stranger to the US government, and probably might have helped the very development of those formerly secret and hated programs, also with direct knowledge transfer
http://cryptome.org/2013/08/assange-google-nsa.htm
It seems like you're correct in this case. Or at the very least there is no evidence for their implication that the protesters were black Oakland residents.
That said, let's not allow laziness on the part of the reporter who filed this story, and elective poor dreadlocked white kids to distract us from the real problem that is class disparity in the west. The elite live under different rules than the rest and the middle class is dwindling. That's way more important than bad reporting, which is just a footnote.
> These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families.
A very similar situation is happening in Vancouver. In the older part of town, just past Gastown, Vancouver's original neighbourhood, lies the Downtown East Side. The DTES is 'Canada's poorest postal code', and is home to a large population of Vancouver's homeless. In true Canadian fashion, it's generally a safe and vibrant area, both despite and because of the homeless population living there (compared to the suburbs, where bored teenagers assault the elderly for something to do).
Recently, a few businesses have been cropping up; one of them, Save on Meats, opened a butcher shop and a diner; more accurately, re-opened, as Save on Meats was a cornerstone of the neighbourhood for decades before the previous owners closed it. The current owner bought the building, renovated it (or, more accurately, refurbished and restored it), began hiring the homeless and poor of the neighbourhood, and began a series of social programs aimed at benefitting the area. Their sandwich counter, a street-facing breakfast sandwich dispensary, introduced 'sandwich tokens', which can be bought from them in quantity and traded in by anyone for a warm meal. It's a convenient way to give someone something that you know will be traded in for food, without having to go out of your way to purchase it. Everyone loves it, and even the police who patrol the DTES will give out tokens to people in the neighbourhood.
Another restaurant opened lately, called Pidgin, across from a location called Pigeon Park, a common area of congregation for the DTES's residents, homeless or otherwise. On occasions, it's blocked off and turned into a giant street market, where individuals sell whatever items they've managed to scrounge up, trade, for, buy, or sell. Pidgin is a nice restaurant, it's the upper end of midrange, a place you could certainly go to in jeans and a button-down, but you might fit in better in a suit and tie.
Then came the protesters. The protesters came, spurred on by a feeling that Pidgin was making fun of the homeless people across the street, like a slap in the face. Ignoring the fact that Pidgin also hires people from the neighbourhood, the protesters congregated outside of the restaurant every day, shouting and harassing the restaurant, the staff, and the patrons. All this despite the fact that the people who actually live in the area disagree with them; both the homeless and jobless poor and the more well-to-do people who live, work, and own businesses in the area.
The other facet that the protesters seem to ignore is that part of the problem with the homeless population in Vancouver is a problem of perception; many people, especially those from the suburbs, see the DTES as full of dirty violent criminals, where you'll get knifed for your sneakers before you know it, Canada's Detroit. The reality is that these are just normal people in awful circumstances, making the best of what they have. The more people who see that, and who see how wrong their horrible misconceptions about the poor are, the easier it will be to gain support from the voting populace to improve conditions there, and the less uphill the fight will be to convince others that these people aren't lost causes cluttering up the streets of Vancouver's history.
The protesters never cared though. Even after being told by police to stop harassing people, even after being told off by people who've run businesses in the DTES for years, and working against the needs and wishes of the community in the DTES, they kept protesting.
And what population of them even live in the area? What population knows anything about the homeless that they're white-knighting? None of them. They're largely comprised of people from the suburbs, people who commute from all over the region to tell everyone how these people feel without ever asking them. Some leaders of the protest were even forced to give up their allegiances with organizations who actually aim to help the homeless populations, because their missions were so at odds and they were giving these charitable organizations such a bad name.
So the idea that trust-fund hipsters and well-meaning interlopers will thrust themselves violently and unnecessarily into a 'class warfare' which didn't exist (or wasn't as heated or unpleasant) before their interference isn't a strictly Oakland issue either. This behaviour, which focusses on driving people apart and creating open conflict where none existed, contrasts directly with what is necessary, which is for people to understand one another and interact.
It's understandable that you'd be upset if you knew this was a case of rich white kids playing the race card, but you don't -- all we know is that some of the protesters were white. Making generalizations is counterproductive.
"These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families."
..because this is all obvious evidence of the article.
It's as if you are auditioning for the Glenn Beck show. That's probably where you belong
edit: Since when is political vitriol acceptable for HN? If I wanted to hear bullshit political rants with gems like "traditional blacks" or "fuck you and your dreadlocks", then I'd turn on Fox News or MSNBC. Seriously, traditional blacks with weasely scare quotes? That comment could not be less informative, disingenuous, or falsely provocative. It's like reading something by a slightly racist college freshman.
I believe the OP only put quotes around "traditional" because, in the very quote he lifted from the article, West Oakland is referred to as a traditionally black neighborhood. It is typical behavior to use quotes around words that relate directly back to the original source.
Do you understand that you are attacking some of your most powerful political allies, and that it is not helpful to solving the systemic issues contributing to poverty?
The bus remained where it was, the thought of driving to Mountain View with a broken window and flooded with cold air an unthinkable horror they could not endure.
Gotta love “TECHIES: Your World Is Not Welcome Here”
I find it hard to sympathize with a bunch of lazy thugs who do nothing to improve their situation. Engineering and white collar jobs in general have always paid well. Industries who are in demand even more so, and for just reason. Did similar protests happen in Detroit 50 years ago during the auto boom? Did unskilled rubes that do nothing all day put up banners saying "Auto boys not welcome"?
This is absurd. Take control of your own damn life. Educate yourself and learn relevant skills. The resources are out there and more accessible than ever. Spend a few good hours in your public library every day for a year and walk out of there a changed person with valuable skills to offer.
My thoughts on this are, techies are generally nice and intelligent people. Last thing they will do is to harm someone or get to a physical fight. Unionised autoworkers wouldn't be a soft target. I really hope that this is a one off incident and not beginning of some demonifying of tech sector. Incidences like this could be shocking to some people and may change their perception about poor and helpless. In this thread itself, there are so many comments with words like leeches and useless thrown in.
Being a soft and easy target has to be part of it. It stands to reason that people who smash bus windows are the same people who used to beat up nerds at school when they were children. Some people set themselves up for a life of shit from the get go and never bother to change course.
These kids never worked a day in their life, though. Their parents provided them with all the tools to succeed, but they still managed to fuck it up. They have no desire to improve themselves, they simply want to continue to leech off of whatever person will tolerate them the longest. Sickening.
I wouldn't defend these guys in particular, but I will say that things were vastly different in Detroit (and the U.S. in general) 50 years ago. Those unskilled people could much more easily become skilled to the point that they landed solidly in the middle class.
In general, there was much more opportunity to pull one's self up by the bootstraps, more even income distribution, and true mechanisms that allowed a rising tide to lift all boats.
You need a lot more skill to work in an auto plant than you need for serving up fast food. 50 years ago, auto production wasn't nearly as automated as it is today, so the guys on the assembly lines needed to know how to do welding and other skilled trades. Robots do a lot more of that stuff today.
As if the real problem with Oakland is that there are too many Google employees living there. Let's be honest - the only reason they do this is that Google employees sitting in a bus are a "soft" target. There is essentially zero chance of reprisal or consequence, at least if it's done as a one-off thing. You get to feel self-righteous for fighting "the man" without any risk.
Let's say they win this quixotic crusade and actually manage to force everyone with an income above $N to flee the area. What is the next step toward a better Oakland?
Yeah, I want to know what people think that alternative to gentrification is. Do they imagine that high income people will eventually just not live anywhere? Do they imagine that life would be better if all growth in the Bay Area were new construction sprawl out in the edges of the urban area where there's no displacement? Is it explicitly selfish, like, "go gentrify San Jose, those guys are assholes anyway"?
I don't have a dog in this fight, but there are some pretty obvious things you could do to fight the burden of gentrification on lower income original members of the population (they may have other side effects that are burdensome).
Off the top of my head:
- Massive taxes on "teardown" or size exploding renovations.
- Zoning laws that require at least 1 (or a % based) Section 8 unit per multi-unit development/renovation.
- Massive subsidies on empty lot development that implement affordable housing practices.
It would be even better if you implemented these changes throughout the entire metro area, not just the areas currently under development. But if you think protests by the poor for rich folks moving into their neighborhood are bad, wait until you see the inverse.
Not saying it's correct or fair or appropriate in this situation with these protestors, but one philosophy is an equality-of-results (or even equality-of-opportunity, depending on how you interpret "opportunity"), that says "high income people should not be wealthy, should not enjoy the comforts of upper-middle-class existence, while the masses are poor"
"a soft target. There is essentially zero chance of reprisal or consequence."
Yes, because people are looking for hard targets. Cops don't carry guns because if they confront someone they want the odds to be "even steven". The US doesn't use drones and bombers and machine guns in Afghanistan, because they want it to be a fair fight between the soldiers and the native population.
Wow, you figured out that they did something where they wouldn't all be immediately arrested and tossed in jail, that's a brilliant observation. Now explain how the people who would arrest them, with their guns and radios and SWAT teams and helicopters don't work things so that they don't go after soft targets as well?
Fact is these people all have much more massive balls than 90% of the effete whiners and snivelers here and everyone knows it. I'd love to see rich liberatarian fairies like Keith Rabois or Peter Thiel go to Oakland public housing and get up in people's faces and tell them what they think should be done with them.
Is it just me, or does the psuedo-intellectual/conspiratorial rhetoric used in this post make anybody else uncomfortable? I feel like class warfare tends to start with misplaced high-mindedness, as if there is an element of being "in the know" for those who take part in the violence. Obviously the author thought writing this way would help further his cause, so what does that say about the participants? Too uninformed to know the difference? Too angry to care?
I take that bus routinely (though not this morning), and I can assure you that its occupants are a diverse group of East Bay residents of many races and ethnicities (black, white, asian, hispanic, etc), and though I haven't done a survey, I doubt any of us are 1%s.
Many of us, myself included, support strongly progressive economic policies, but there is no real conversation to be had with people who will resort to violence like this. Sadly, use of violent and illegal methods to convey a message seems to be somewhat common in these parts.
I suspect that these "protesting" groups are acting out some sort of imagined war between rich and poor, and since the real 1% don't take a bus of any kind to work, we're their next best target.
In our industry we are privileged. I am not sure another time in history when anyone (almost) could bootstrap themselves to relative wealth compared to their neighbours and families with determined effort rather than hard labour and luck (such as the gold rush or being born into wealth). To assume that there is no problem, that everything is fine and people are just upset for the hell of it is hubris. We could become the new oil barons, and be glad of low wages so we can live like kings. Or we could adjust to our wealth, at least acknowledge it and even if you never donate to your local foodbank or get involved with a local community group or night school, understand that you have privilege. Noblesse oblige and all that.
Who said there is no problem? Not me. I'm aware and upset about many of the same problems. However, I think smashing bus windows under presumption that those inside are uniquely responsible for the problems sends the conversation backwards, not forwards.
As a resident of Oakland who is sick to death of professional protesters slapping agit-prop posters on any available surface (not least community-financed public artwork), fuck these people and everything they stand for. And no, I don't work for some billion $ startup or even a million $ one, I'm the sort of starving artist that they claim to be fighting for, but aren't.
>> Many tech employees currently reside in these locations and have driven up the property values and rent prices, creating animosity, evictions, and poverty.
Readit News
Oh fuck you and your dreadlocks.
There are only two photos on that page, so I don't definitively know who these protesters were (although there are no "traditional" blacks in those photos) -- but I know (I have a strong suspicion, I don't factually know) that the protesters were not drawn from the group mentioned above. These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families.
The actual, working, poor people in West Oakland were at their first of the two or three jobs they hold. Or they were spending a few rare moments resting, or with their kids. Or they were lining up to get a meal at community kitchen. Actual black people were not part of this protest, because a mob of black people attacking a bus would be getting wall-to-wall coverage on every channel. It would have been responded to with a swift and overwhelming police presence.
The same thing happened a few years ago when these same non-workers shut down the Port of Oakland in the name of workers. The people who actually work the port asked that they not disrupt the port, but in the end these dreadlocked, shiftless complainers cost those longshoremen a day in wages -- Viva El Proletariado!
What we have today is a group of young, electively poor white kids who are upset that the price of unheated lofts and dingy Victorians are being driven up by people who have the means and motivation to actually own and improve them. That they wrap themselves up in the image of the poor (and yes, mostly black) -- whom they themselves displaced by rushing in to bid up rents with mom and dad's money -- makes this appeal all the more ludicrous. At least the tech gentrifiers will actually improve the fucking place, unlike these leeches!
(Source: I live and own property in Oakland)
Edited as suggested below by bonemachine.
The longshoremen's union supported the Occupy shutdown, but were contractually obligated not to participate in the protest. Source:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/occupy-oakland-shuts-down-port/
Since almost everything else you said is anecdotal, it's hard for me to respond to, but your statement about the longshoremen, that's certainly wrong.
In general, the people that you are deriding and caricaturing represent the first wave of gentrification, and those people actually do make meaningful contributions to the areas they move into. Think of the excellent restaurants, concert venues, boutiques, bars, etc. that exist in Oakland now--that's first wave gentrification. Those people are also historically more aware of their surroundings and the culture that they are moving into and tend to show solidarity with the lower income residents that they are paving the way towards displacement for. On the other hand, the second wave of gentrifiers tends to dramatically increase the cost of living, rate of displacement, and tends to care very little about the plight of their fellow citizens.
The Google buses are a convenient symbol for economic disparity though, and I often wonder why Google doesn't try to do a real public works project instead of simply creating a segregated system of buses. Why not add wi-fi to public buses? Why not extend the light rail system into the valley? Why not donate a whole lot of money to a public mental health project so there aren't so many deranged lunatics screaming on public transit? If they did that, then they will have created a more comfortable environment not only for their own employees, but for the entire community.
No, it's right. ILWU (the union) leadership has made statements such as
"Organization from outside groups attempting to co-opt our struggle in order to advance a broader agenda is quite another and one that is destructive to our democratic process and jeopardizes our over two year struggle in Longview." [1]
So I may not have been right about them speaking out specifically against the Oakland shut down, but in general the union leadership is against strikes. Although, of course, they take great pains to not alienate potential ideological allies while rejecting calls to shut down ports.
The sentiment is at least mixed, as you can see from other coverage: [2]
"Leaders of the ILWU, which represents thousands of longshoremen, spoke out in recent weeks against the coordinated effort by Occupy protesters to blockade ports from Anchorage to San Diego"
"This is joke. What are they protesting?" Christian Vega, 32, who sat in his truck carrying a load of recycled paper from Pittsburg said Monday morning. He said the delay was costing him $600.
"It only hurts me and the other drivers. We have jobs and families to support and feed. Most of them don't," Vega said.
[1] http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2011/12/occupy-oakland-west-...
[2] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/12/occupy-oakland-port...
First wave? Only if you define "first wave" to coincide with the current discussion. There was a wave of bio-tech (e.g Genentech) shortly before the "tech" (e.g Google) wave.
This goes back all the way to the founding of California, the state. The '49ers were the first wave. Since then there has been a sadly repeating history of picking on a group to blame for any ill in society - usually racist - but it appears this time around it's a soft target.
On the other hand, the second-wave and later are callous Scrooges who just take what they can get, and thus deserve to be vilified.
This is special pleading at its most naked. I've heard the saying that you pull up the drawbridge just after you enter the castle, but you seem to want to scrape out a privileged little Goldilocks zone on both sides, where first-wavers are each an embodiment of a noble Jake Sully, fighting to save the Na'vi against the invading hordes.
NIMBYs, that's why.
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First, a few places in the neighborhood are rehabbed by developers.
Next the "...Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the ... overprivileged..." move in to the rehabbed areas and the (usually) blacks have to move out.
These hippy - artist types make the neighborhood more attractive to people even further up the food chain. (Read techies). And soon the time comes for the hippy - artists to move out.
The hippy - artists are unhappy... but the reality is... this is no more than what they did to the blacks.
Soon the time will come for the techies to move out... and, I'm sure, they will be unhappy as well when their time comes.
This same progression happens all over. I think Harlem is probably one of the best examples. (It's WAY ahead of SF area in that regard). Blacks had to move when the artists showed up because they could no longer afford it. Then, when the techies and yuppies showed up... the hippies, artists and teachers hit the roof, because it was their turn to move. Harlem is at the stage now where the celebrities and bankers are showing up ... and like clockwork ... the techies are hitting the roof because it's their turn to move.
The thing is ... in the end ... they all moved. They didn't engage in violence.
That people are upset should be expected... but I would point out that places like Harlem have gone through this process with multiple populations without violence. It can be done.
Oh, get off it, man.
All that we "know" about the perpetrators at this point is that they were apparently (1) young and (2) non-black. As to the rest the attributes you impute to them -- as of yet we don't "know" any of these to be fact. At best all you can honestly say at this point would be:
Now I don't know for a fact, but ya know, I have a hunch these are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, etc etc ...
This is not nit-picking. The fact that you're saying that you "know" everything about their demographic / psychographic makeup when in fact you are merely speculating is what's part of the broader problem here: rather than elucidating the problem, you're subverting the discourse.
And more to the point: you're pushing people's buttons, by appealing to stereotypes and their own identity- and privilege-based insecurities.
In so many words: you're placing the race card.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_card
b) I'm reacting to the race card being employed by people who are tokenizing and mascotifying (to coin phrase) the same people who they themselves pushed out!
That describes a huge fraction of today's protestors and activists, which is why despite many things in the world sucking I rarely take today's "activism" very seriously. It's mostly activism-as-entertainment for trustafarians.
The irony is that your comment only emphasizes the severe disconnect between relatively wealthy & employable 'techies' versus the rest of the struggling recession-hit population.
It's hard to understand how life has changed since 2007 when, coming from a tech-related field, one generally doesn't suffer the everyday hardships that most Americans endure [1].
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/02/poverty-in-a...
A rather untenable assertion, based on my own lengthy and up-close observation of e.g. Occupy at its peak.
Dead Comment
Silicon Valley technology, this is Manhattan finance with a word of advice. We know the roots of the problem are housing supply restrictions and a lack of mass transit. In essence, City Hall problems. So why are they able to pin the blame on you?
Because you're painting a target on your back. Ducking your heads makes you a low-risk scapegoat. Scoffing at the less fortunate, regardless of whether they "deserve" it, makes you a juicy red political filet.
I'm not saying you need to up volunteering incentives for technology workers or visibly join hands with your foes and fight City Hall for more housing including, yes, the affordable kind. But don't throw daggers when you're down. As it stands, you're right but you're down.
Edit: I do realize more programmers moving to the bay means higher rents I just think its the fault of SF for not building enough housing http://www.theatlanticcities.com/housing/2013/10/san-francis...
(1) Anti-development mentality on the part of city councils, zoning boards, etc.
(2) Geographic containment of the area.
(3) Shitty public transit and overcrowded roads.
(4) Foreign investors driving up the price of RE.
... in roughly that order.
#1 is largely the fault of this same stereotypical bunch of braindead trustafarian hippies, since they tend to oppose building pretty much anything because it destroys the Earth, man. In so doing they play their role in the gentrification cycle, constraining supply to drive up rents and drive out the genuinely underprivileged.
As I said elsewhere: fuck these people.
The question seems to be, if you have your own distinct infrastructure and shared spaces, are you really living in your community?
Not even joking. If the imposter protestors make it acceptable for "civilized" folk to have a reactionary attitude against equality concerns, they will become a (perhaps unwitting) tool of oppression of the poor, who do have valid (if unvoiced) concerns.
Like I said elsewhere I used to live in a "trendy" place that had a huge contingent of these obnoxious faux-radicals. They would organize this silly clownish protests of GMO foods, "chemtrails," free this, liberate that, whatever, and they'd march around looking like clowns in front of all kinds of trendy businesses catering to hippie-tourists and retired old white people.
These businesses in turn paid their workers shit wages with no benefits. How do I know? Because I was good friends with a number of these workers, who never had anything to do with the IndyMedia traustafarian clown show.
I never saw a single one of these outrage-er-tainment fuckups protests unfair wages or lack of benefits. They only protested trendy issues of no relevance to the actually underprivileged.
I propose national trustafarian beat-down day.
Other parts of Oakland, sure. Not the core part of West Oakland though.
But you are also right, this wasn't West Oakland, or even lower class vs. Google. This was "activism class" vs Google. Which tends to describe hippies and burners.
Source: I've spent inordinate amounts of time near Willow Park.
EDIT: removed some of my own frothing
This is such a stupid position to take. First of all, do you realize that those "Burning Man Hippies" are, uh, literally the people who started google? Do you realize that google has made enormous donations to those "burning man hippies"?
And yes, "uesless degrees". History, art, literature, these are all "useless" of course, the only valid degrees are either hard science and hard engineering, I'm sure?
What aspects of life do you enjoy, man? A good design aesthetic? Cause that's art...
Or, perhaps good food? That's also art.
Maybe a good book, wait...
Architecture?
Beauty? Something? Possibly something that poets and artists have given you a context for, or study?
--
This is such a stupid lazy attitude to take. Come out of your hole sometime and you'll find a whole world out here full of things that you can enjoy. Just try to steer clear of those pesky "artists" who got useless degrees.
--
The people who are crying about google's buses are idiots. Don't group them together with artists or "burning man hippies".
Somehow, I doubt it.
As for "useless" degrees -- I majored in Political Science so I know what a useless degree is. The point is not to denigrate them for having an economically useless degree. The point is to expose what I think is the real motivation here, that slackers have found it increasingly difficult to float without having any real contribution to make back. It used to be that you could graduate with a soft humanities degree, rent a shitty loft in a neighborhood like West Oakland and still live pretty well. Now, you're gonna have to move out to the suburbs unless you can contribute, generate and capture substantial, financial value.
Certainly engineering is not the only field worth a damn. My comment was an allusion to a strategy employed by a certain class of privileged people, which is essentially to find a local minimum of effort/reward even though they typically come from a background which affords much greater opportunity. I contend that it's the demands of these people on display today, being presented as if it were aligned with the needs of Oakland's truly poor.
In short, the people protesting today are poor for different reasons than the people whose struggle they are claiming in the passage I quoted.
Anyone that can be spun into an "outsider".
A standard of living paid for, in part, by the very same taxes they manage to avoid, along with several other big corporations. Not to mention they are no stranger to the US government, and probably might have helped the very development of those formerly secret and hated programs, also with direct knowledge transfer http://cryptome.org/2013/08/assange-google-nsa.htm
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That said, let's not allow laziness on the part of the reporter who filed this story, and elective poor dreadlocked white kids to distract us from the real problem that is class disparity in the west. The elite live under different rules than the rest and the middle class is dwindling. That's way more important than bad reporting, which is just a footnote.
New name for them: Hipstervists
Recently, a few businesses have been cropping up; one of them, Save on Meats, opened a butcher shop and a diner; more accurately, re-opened, as Save on Meats was a cornerstone of the neighbourhood for decades before the previous owners closed it. The current owner bought the building, renovated it (or, more accurately, refurbished and restored it), began hiring the homeless and poor of the neighbourhood, and began a series of social programs aimed at benefitting the area. Their sandwich counter, a street-facing breakfast sandwich dispensary, introduced 'sandwich tokens', which can be bought from them in quantity and traded in by anyone for a warm meal. It's a convenient way to give someone something that you know will be traded in for food, without having to go out of your way to purchase it. Everyone loves it, and even the police who patrol the DTES will give out tokens to people in the neighbourhood.
Another restaurant opened lately, called Pidgin, across from a location called Pigeon Park, a common area of congregation for the DTES's residents, homeless or otherwise. On occasions, it's blocked off and turned into a giant street market, where individuals sell whatever items they've managed to scrounge up, trade, for, buy, or sell. Pidgin is a nice restaurant, it's the upper end of midrange, a place you could certainly go to in jeans and a button-down, but you might fit in better in a suit and tie.
Then came the protesters. The protesters came, spurred on by a feeling that Pidgin was making fun of the homeless people across the street, like a slap in the face. Ignoring the fact that Pidgin also hires people from the neighbourhood, the protesters congregated outside of the restaurant every day, shouting and harassing the restaurant, the staff, and the patrons. All this despite the fact that the people who actually live in the area disagree with them; both the homeless and jobless poor and the more well-to-do people who live, work, and own businesses in the area.
The other facet that the protesters seem to ignore is that part of the problem with the homeless population in Vancouver is a problem of perception; many people, especially those from the suburbs, see the DTES as full of dirty violent criminals, where you'll get knifed for your sneakers before you know it, Canada's Detroit. The reality is that these are just normal people in awful circumstances, making the best of what they have. The more people who see that, and who see how wrong their horrible misconceptions about the poor are, the easier it will be to gain support from the voting populace to improve conditions there, and the less uphill the fight will be to convince others that these people aren't lost causes cluttering up the streets of Vancouver's history.
The protesters never cared though. Even after being told by police to stop harassing people, even after being told off by people who've run businesses in the DTES for years, and working against the needs and wishes of the community in the DTES, they kept protesting.
And what population of them even live in the area? What population knows anything about the homeless that they're white-knighting? None of them. They're largely comprised of people from the suburbs, people who commute from all over the region to tell everyone how these people feel without ever asking them. Some leaders of the protest were even forced to give up their allegiances with organizations who actually aim to help the homeless populations, because their missions were so at odds and they were giving these charitable organizations such a bad name.
So the idea that trust-fund hipsters and well-meaning interlopers will thrust themselves violently and unnecessarily into a 'class warfare' which didn't exist (or wasn't as heated or unpleasant) before their interference isn't a strictly Oakland issue either. This behaviour, which focusses on driving people apart and creating open conflict where none existed, contrasts directly with what is necessary, which is for people to understand one another and interact.
It's pretty sad.
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"These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors, and the usual constituent of the Bay Area's overprivileged poverty tourists: 20-30 y/o white kids from middle class families."
..because this is all obvious evidence of the article.
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edit: Since when is political vitriol acceptable for HN? If I wanted to hear bullshit political rants with gems like "traditional blacks" or "fuck you and your dreadlocks", then I'd turn on Fox News or MSNBC. Seriously, traditional blacks with weasely scare quotes? That comment could not be less informative, disingenuous, or falsely provocative. It's like reading something by a slightly racist college freshman.
Clearly a man with inside knowledge. Which BM hippies was it? Larry Page and Sergey Brin perhaps?
Deleted Comment
Or maybe because it was a crime scene?
I find it hard to sympathize with a bunch of lazy thugs who do nothing to improve their situation. Engineering and white collar jobs in general have always paid well. Industries who are in demand even more so, and for just reason. Did similar protests happen in Detroit 50 years ago during the auto boom? Did unskilled rubes that do nothing all day put up banners saying "Auto boys not welcome"?
This is absurd. Take control of your own damn life. Educate yourself and learn relevant skills. The resources are out there and more accessible than ever. Spend a few good hours in your public library every day for a year and walk out of there a changed person with valuable skills to offer.
And mind you I don't support these protests and the general animosity towards the techies.
Otherwise, your comment is out of line. Provide light, not heat.
In general, there was much more opportunity to pull one's self up by the bootstraps, more even income distribution, and true mechanisms that allowed a rising tide to lift all boats.
'Auto boys' are/were unskilled rubes.
Whites weren't holding up signs saying 'blacks not welcome'. They just left. It was 50 years ago, after all.
edit: They were, up to a point.
You need a lot more skill to work in an auto plant than you need for serving up fast food. 50 years ago, auto production wasn't nearly as automated as it is today, so the guys on the assembly lines needed to know how to do welding and other skilled trades. Robots do a lot more of that stuff today.
The racial distribution of the US is neither an accident or the result of voluntary actions by individuals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Race_Riot_(1943)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot
Let's say they win this quixotic crusade and actually manage to force everyone with an income above $N to flee the area. What is the next step toward a better Oakland?
Off the top of my head: - Massive taxes on "teardown" or size exploding renovations. - Zoning laws that require at least 1 (or a % based) Section 8 unit per multi-unit development/renovation. - Massive subsidies on empty lot development that implement affordable housing practices.
It would be even better if you implemented these changes throughout the entire metro area, not just the areas currently under development. But if you think protests by the poor for rich folks moving into their neighborhood are bad, wait until you see the inverse.
Yes, because people are looking for hard targets. Cops don't carry guns because if they confront someone they want the odds to be "even steven". The US doesn't use drones and bombers and machine guns in Afghanistan, because they want it to be a fair fight between the soldiers and the native population.
Wow, you figured out that they did something where they wouldn't all be immediately arrested and tossed in jail, that's a brilliant observation. Now explain how the people who would arrest them, with their guns and radios and SWAT teams and helicopters don't work things so that they don't go after soft targets as well?
Fact is these people all have much more massive balls than 90% of the effete whiners and snivelers here and everyone knows it. I'd love to see rich liberatarian fairies like Keith Rabois or Peter Thiel go to Oakland public housing and get up in people's faces and tell them what they think should be done with them.
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Many of us, myself included, support strongly progressive economic policies, but there is no real conversation to be had with people who will resort to violence like this. Sadly, use of violent and illegal methods to convey a message seems to be somewhat common in these parts.
I suspect that these "protesting" groups are acting out some sort of imagined war between rich and poor, and since the real 1% don't take a bus of any kind to work, we're their next best target.
Would really like to see a real news article - or at least several other sources discussing the incident.
Damn Google employees. Causing poverty.