Chuck0:
> I think the Eugene anarchists, at a knee-jerk gut level, understand the
> basic things that scare Yuppies: their property values. I come from the
> suburbs of Kansas City and periodically have to rub elbows with the
> brainwashed nouveau riche suburban Kansans. You wouldn't believe how
> much their worldview revolves around fucking "property values." Heck,
> you can't even paint your house purple without the neighborhood
> association hanging a scarlet "PV" around your neck.
>
> How do people with little political power fight gentrification? Folks
> can band together and organize, yes, but what else?
>
> I don't think these anarchists are saying that poor people have no right
> to beauty, rather that a little short term ugliness may help preserve a
> working class community from a Yuppie onslaught.
I think we need to remember that the "yuppies" are themselves being driven out of other neighborhoods by yet richer people. At least, that's what's been happening in New York City. One of the reasons erstwhile slums like the Lower East Side, Williamsburg, and Harlem suddenly begin to appear desirable is that the neighborhoods the somewhat-better-off used to occupy are no longer available to them. When I was a boy, the Lower East Side was considered too poorly served by police, public transit and other services to be desirable for a young Wall Street striver, but if now the question is the Lower East Side or Edison, New Jersey, the answer is clear, unless the striver is truly fond of the vacancies of suburban culture.
This means that scorched-earth tactics will probably not succeed in the end -- the "enemy" has an infinitude of troops to send against it, and they'll keep on coming, people not so different from the people they're kicking out, and not so differently motivated. (Hence the humor in the Suck article linked from the Mission Yuppie Eradication Project, http://www.suck.com/daily/99/07/07/index.html .) Really, what's wrong with a pretty little boutique? It's not its prettiness but the savage rent conceded to the landlord, who himself is no doubt enslaved to mortgages, taxes, insurance, and the inflated expenses of his own dog-eat-dog life.
People become crazed about property values because they themselves are under attack. We need to get everybody out. Not that some tactical holding actions may not be a good thing until we can get something bigger going.
Gordon gcf at panix.com