Kosmograd has written an excellent post attempting to tie together the strange nostalgia for neighbourhoods on the threshold of gentrification and the sheer irrelevance of these thoughts when faced with comprehensive capitalist development, such as in Shenzhen and other such 'free zones'.
For anyone who (like me) lives in a neighbourhood that is indeed "teetering on the cusp of the future" it's very thought provoking.
If I could just extend Kosmograd's irony into a circle ever so slightly, I'd suggest that what goes on in gentrifying neighbourhoods is indeed the spatio-political equivalent of the invisibility of the labour in the luxury ipad. I'd be able to enjoy the artisan baguettes, fixed wheel bikes and oh-so-fucking-ironic barbour jackets more if I thought for one second that the smuggernauts around me felt the slightest bit guilty about being the vanguard of such deeply unpleasant social forces.
But of course; artisan baguettes, ipods, and lively neighbourhoods brimming with loft parties are very nice! Who would deny themselves such things, and to what end?
2 comments:
The Barbour jackets actually make me feel violent in a way no previous hipsterism has.
"Yeah, don't worry, 'cause my dad like, voted Labour when he was young and poor, yeah?, I'd never REALLY vote tory..."
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