The scene was cool until those womb-things betrayed it.
Richard Lloyd, an old acquaintance of mine, wrote an interesting PhD thesis about hipster neighborhood as a type of post-industrial industry. We discussed how his thesis had a commercial hook and damn if it didn't become a popular (by PhD standards) book. He even avoided "selling out" as most of the academic text remains in the more chatty version.
The Salon review by Andrew O'Heir used self-indulgent digressions about his own role in gentrifying The Mission in San Francisco, but touches on what's interesting about the book.
But no matter how thoughtful and intriguing these writers are, they are no match for Salon letter writer Thomas Garman, who takes the gentrification/bohemia issue to the next level - bitches and money:Reading this story made me feel like Andrew O'Hehir must have been eavesdropping on many of my bar conversations with women over the last few years. It's one of those topics that you bring up on a date because it can go anywhere without offending anybody. It works to impress women in bars in major media markets such as Brooklyn and Chicago, as well as smaller places like Minneapolis. You are a sensitive man with a keen eye if you know what this or that street corner looked like before Starbucks moved in. If you happen to be going out with a Punk rocker, she'll love talking all about how Sonic Youth, the Pixies and Nirvana were cool before they got famous and started playing Arena shows too. If you happen to be dating an Urban Planning major, she'll love telling you about how the development of the interstate highway system destroyed vital innner city neighborhoods in the 1960's and 70's. If you are out with a graphic designer she will probably offer to give you a graffiti tour of the neighborhood. If you are trying to chat up a small business owner, she will fall all over herself telling you about how hard it was to get a lease renewed for her boutique in Wicker Park after all the yuppies moved in and started opening dog grooming businesses.
...
But as with everything in this world, I think the overall issue that Andrew O'Hehir is talking about is directly related to women and especially the competition for women among men in such Bohemian places as Wicker Park and Brooklyn. It is one thing to spend all day everyday at the Rainbo Club drinking two dollar Pabst Blue Ribbons, living a rock and roll lifestyle, and talking about the new tattoo you got while the bartender plays your new favorite Arcade Fire song and your friends play pinball but then you sober up slightly one day in your late twenties and watch as your girlfriend walks out the door with a 20-something Investment Banker who is rehabbing a house he just bought in your neighborhood. You know? The women all defect. They defect to have babies. It's just not cool to go to alt-country shows three nights a week and smoke two packs of cigarettes while drinking Schlitz when you have a bun in the oven.
The driver of the gentrification Andrew O'Hehir talks about, therefore, is women. Women like stability. Women like health insurance. Women like men who have a dangerous rock 'n roll past but who finally pull it together and buy a house. Women defect from the Bohemian lifestyle in their late 20's and then men follow suit quickly thereafter along with the real estate. It has been that way since the time of nomadic hunter-gatherer societies, I imagine, and all through history.
I tried to discover more about this clown, but the only Thomas Garman who comes up on google is almost his opposite. I did find another letter in which he says "I have never really had a successful long-term relationship" - wonder why that is?
The Salon review by Andrew O'Heir used self-indulgent digressions about his own role in gentrifying The Mission in San Francisco, but touches on what's interesting about the book.
But no matter how thoughtful and intriguing these writers are, they are no match for Salon letter writer Thomas Garman, who takes the gentrification/bohemia issue to the next level - bitches and money:Reading this story made me feel like Andrew O'Hehir must have been eavesdropping on many of my bar conversations with women over the last few years. It's one of those topics that you bring up on a date because it can go anywhere without offending anybody. It works to impress women in bars in major media markets such as Brooklyn and Chicago, as well as smaller places like Minneapolis. You are a sensitive man with a keen eye if you know what this or that street corner looked like before Starbucks moved in. If you happen to be going out with a Punk rocker, she'll love talking all about how Sonic Youth, the Pixies and Nirvana were cool before they got famous and started playing Arena shows too. If you happen to be dating an Urban Planning major, she'll love telling you about how the development of the interstate highway system destroyed vital innner city neighborhoods in the 1960's and 70's. If you are out with a graphic designer she will probably offer to give you a graffiti tour of the neighborhood. If you are trying to chat up a small business owner, she will fall all over herself telling you about how hard it was to get a lease renewed for her boutique in Wicker Park after all the yuppies moved in and started opening dog grooming businesses.
...
But as with everything in this world, I think the overall issue that Andrew O'Hehir is talking about is directly related to women and especially the competition for women among men in such Bohemian places as Wicker Park and Brooklyn. It is one thing to spend all day everyday at the Rainbo Club drinking two dollar Pabst Blue Ribbons, living a rock and roll lifestyle, and talking about the new tattoo you got while the bartender plays your new favorite Arcade Fire song and your friends play pinball but then you sober up slightly one day in your late twenties and watch as your girlfriend walks out the door with a 20-something Investment Banker who is rehabbing a house he just bought in your neighborhood. You know? The women all defect. They defect to have babies. It's just not cool to go to alt-country shows three nights a week and smoke two packs of cigarettes while drinking Schlitz when you have a bun in the oven.
The driver of the gentrification Andrew O'Hehir talks about, therefore, is women. Women like stability. Women like health insurance. Women like men who have a dangerous rock 'n roll past but who finally pull it together and buy a house. Women defect from the Bohemian lifestyle in their late 20's and then men follow suit quickly thereafter along with the real estate. It has been that way since the time of nomadic hunter-gatherer societies, I imagine, and all through history.
I tried to discover more about this clown, but the only Thomas Garman who comes up on google is almost his opposite. I did find another letter in which he says "I have never really had a successful long-term relationship" - wonder why that is?