by Sean Orr | Carole James has announced she’s resigning. Like a groundhog on a cloudy day, the winter of discontent will end early. Although I suppose Vancouver Island Marmot is more appropriate – you know, because she’s from Victoria and not because she looks exactly like one. So I guess that means the party is switching their allegiance to Dix? You. See. What. I. Did. There?
Earthquake-prone Vancouver Unprepared for Catastrophe: Report. Judging by how we handle the snow, it isn’t a far stretch to imagine we’d be fucked. Take for example the Convention Centre, which is built almost entirely of glass.
B.C. homeless camps OK only at night: court. Which is when you can’t see them. Which is only when their rights apply.
Police announce program to protect women. Now that they have the right to vote, it just makes good political sense.
Vandals attack East Vancouver spa. Again, how the fuck can small businesses be blamed for gentrification, especially when the entire neighbourhood is a product of a long and proud history of resistance to it? Do these idiots know nothing of history? What of the Japanese internment; the dismantling of the BCER; Project 200 and the rise of the suburbs; shifting liquor licences to the Granville Entertainment District; the collapse of the forest industry and the ensuing shift from resource town to tourist town; the cancellation of the Federal Housing Fund in 1993; the introduction of crack cocaine; the dismantling of Welfare; not to mention the successful gentrification of Kitsilano and The West End? Yeah, the vanguard of gentrification is totally a spa run by a lady who lives a couple of blocks away. Derp.
Americans, be vigilant. “Little Mosque” just the tip of the Canadian iceberg. Wait until they find out make up that we are implementing Sharia Law.
Canadian PM’s aide urges Assange assassination. The War on Information has officially been declared.
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The irony of the statement, “Get out” is that the vandals are probably new transplants to the area themselves. I’m picturing beards, half-completed-but-completely-paid-for Arts/Poli-Sci degrees, and a heavy dose of cognitive dissonance.
Again, how the fuck can small businesses be blamed for gentrification, especially when the entire neighbourhood is a product of a long and proud history of resistance to it?
I don’t follow you, Sean. Strathcona has been going through a serious gentrification process for several years now — yuppies like Claudine Michaud have been buying homes there and moving in, driving up prices and presumably driving out poorer residents. The spa is an obvious part of that trend; like the Wilder Snail or the high-end cheese shop that appeared on that part of Hastings a year or two ago, it’s a place that caters to the people who are making the neighborhood less affordable.
Great, way to quickly and easily transfer the argument onto a heavily worn stereotype. Doing so, like the vandals themselves, is a disservice to history. Yes, hipsters are the dead end of civilisation after all. Nevertheless I can probably go to Vancouver archives and find countless references to long-haired student pseudo-maoists spreading agit-prop and starting riots, from the “professional protesters” at Woodsquat, to the hippies in Stan Douglas’ Abbott and Cordova, which oddly enough is the centrepiece of the Woodwards Redevelopment. But congrats on the continued, easy vilification of stylish, bearded, passionate, University dropouts like myself.
The Wilder Snail is a gentrifier? Jesus…
“The Wilder Snail is a gentrifier? Jesus…”
I can buy neither crack nor stolen cheese; ergo, gentrifier.
^ Giggle.
Dear anon and idiots like them: Do you see a) an IGA MarketPlace, Capers, Urban Fare? b) Canadian Tire, Best Buy, Winners, HomeSense, Urban Barn, fucking whatever else c) Starubucks, Blenz, Earls, Cactus Club, Joeys at anytime moving into the area? d) the disappearance of Pat’s Pub, Astoria, or any of the myriad of hotels along Hastings? Or have they in fact been revitalized?
The area is too rich in history for your attack on a spa to be taken seriously. It belies the very real struggle of diverse groups like DERA andthe Chinese community which prevented the area becoming a Freeway. Or the proud resistance to the condofication that swept the rest of the city. To include the Wilder Snail just illuminates the idiocy of your point.
Fair enough, but I just call it like I see it, Sean. I see a bunch of “stylish” kids move into Strath’ where many young families have been rebuilding community for years. Them youngins, in turn, make Strath’ a popular place to live, and drive up rents all by themselves. Then, business owners see a market for services, and the “stylish” kids revolt because they don’t want a spa in their secret gritty ‘hood. They cry “Don’t gentrify!” when they really mean “Cool kids only!”
You know, like when your mom said she liked Jane’s Addiction, and you were bummed because now you had to turf the cassette.
Anyway, I see your point. Not trolling, just debating.
I really don’t think you have it right. I’m thinking these guys are Commercial Drive crusty punks, not bearded students.
How dare you play into the Commercial Drive stereotype! 😉
After living in Strathcona for 27 years, I complained to my mother about how the neighbourhood is going to shit because the rich/yuppies were moving in and pushing “working class” people out.
My mom told me that was a weak argument and that we pushed out the poor Chinese families, we are just as much to blame.
Strathcona/DTES/East Van doesn’t belong to anybody.
old news..strathcona was gentrified long ago. now it’s more into the hyper-gentrification stage. 27$ t-shirt boutiques and the sort.