Machine is Bored With Love
We’re not sure how Zac Peskowitz manages to conflate Richard Florida’s creative class theories, which at least purport to exalt the gritty, low-rent artist (we’ve heard that “artist” has now become a euphemism for “hipster”) life, with the sensibility of Whole Foods, even if both can be said to promote “design as the centerpiece of a holistic consumption experience.” What can’t be said to promote design as the centerpiece of a holistic consumption experience, after all? The Daily did print the cedilla in the headline correctly, though.
I don’t know what that kid is talking about. Fresh Fields looked so much like Whole Foods all along that when they got bought out I literally didn’t notice.
Anyway, as Paul Kingston will tell you, there’s no such thing as class.
posted by Alex on March 15th, 2004 at 8:14 am eI’m not sure what the hell he’s talking about with Whole Foods; maybe the connection was purely in his mind. I know that instead of feeling compelled to purchase, the obnoxious angled aisles and infuriating parking situation makes me feel compelled to snack out of the bulk bins and contemplate shoplifting.
posted by js on March 15th, 2004 at 10:24 am ejs
I thought Zac had it exactly right. Florida, as nearly as I can tell, is the guru of gentrification, and that seems to tie in with this Austin-based organic food chain store.
posted by Lucky Jackson on March 15th, 2004 at 11:42 am eThe lack of parking at Whole Foods was caused by the Planning Commission caving in to developer greed. The site was planned and approved in accordance with local requirements for more than 200 more spaces but the deveoper whined and the politicians jumped.
posted by mucho gusto on March 15th, 2004 at 1:03 pm eWhy would the developer want less parking? Well, unless they had to buy more land, I guess. But what would have been really nice is to only let them have half the number of parking spaces they do now. Then people would either have to ride the bus or get their organic soy boysenberry and shallot foccaccia somewhere else.
posted by js on March 15th, 2004 at 2:25 pm ejs
But did Whole Foods’ expansion into the newer, larger store on Washtenaw herald some kind of demographic shift (i.e. gentrification) in Ann Arbor? Hardly! Gentrification has already happened here. In the case of Tree Town, at least, the expansion of Whole Foods is a symptom of gentrification, not a cause. Opening a Whole Foods near Wayne State, say, might be a whole other ball of wax.
posted by Alex on March 15th, 2004 at 2:29 pm eLook at me! I use words like “polis” and make allusions to historical trivia I just learned is class this morning! I call NYC “Gotham!” I can pepper my writing with Yiddish. I use this to make up for having no sodding point! Aren’t I *smart*?
posted by AntiZac (not ProZac) on March 15th, 2004 at 2:40 pm eI don’t think it’s fair to necessarily equate R. Florida with gentrification - he doesn’t really argue that all cities should be cut in the same “cool” mode, but that places where diversity and eclecticism are encouraged will tend to thrive economically as well because growth these days is driven by the talents of independent-minded, creative people who prefer to live in such places. I also think that Whole Foods is a symptom of AA’s broader gentrification rather than a cause - if the problem of g’fication is that living spaces become homogeneous, how is a town whose economy seems to consist entirely of overpriced sandwich shops (at last count, I believe there are 14,489 Jimmy Johns locations in Ann Arbor) resisting it?
As far as Florida’s creative class schtick, a more substantive criticism of it is that it doesn’t have much of a place for the very sizable unskilled labor force in our society, and that the situation of blue-collar workers merits very serious discussion at a time when taxpayer support for the traditional social safety net is on the wane. A very similar issue to that raised by Greg Mankiw’s recommendation that outsourcing service-sector jobs is a good thing - before rushing headlong into an economy of software designers and research scientists, we need to give serious thought to those we’re leaving out. Given the high cost of living in Ann Arbor, this is certainly germane to the cool cities discussion.
posted by Nick on March 15th, 2004 at 3:21 pm eActually, India is a tremendously diverse place with a lot of music and good food, thriving arts, etc. So I guess it proves Florida’s thesis.
posted by Lucky Jackson on March 15th, 2004 at 3:37 pm eYou know, Florida is on the faculty of my graduate program (at least until fall, when he departs for George Mason, of all places) and the consensus among student is that he just plain doesn’t understand the working class (which he calls “service class”) or their needs. Even less does he understand the needs of students; if you need to make an appointment to see him about an assignment, it has to be three weeks in advance.
posted by colleen on March 15th, 2004 at 4:02 pm eAh, the springing up of the A2WF brings me back to the summer of 1997 when UFCW Local 1444 paid my friend Sarah (along with about 45 others) $6/hr, 8 hrs/day to picket the Madison Whole Foods. Unions and the company are not friends: http://www.wholeworkersunite.org/
posted by Sara on March 15th, 2004 at 5:10 pm eOh, yeah, sorry for my lack of html knowledge. They don’t teach you that in the music school, you know.
posted by Sara on March 15th, 2004 at 5:11 pm eI hear you, Colleen. R. Florida’s actual involvement in the fate of Pittsburgh speaks volumes. Other than the fact that he devotes a lot of space in his book to bashing the town, he’s absolutely invisible in exactly the sort of place where you’d expect to hear from him - an economically troubled but promising city trying to re-invent itself. At no point when I lived there - either while working for RAND or volunteering on the Urban Magnet Project - was he ever involved in anything.
George Mason’s an interesting move for him, though. After all, nothing says eclectic nightlife and creativity to me like Fairfax County, VA.
posted by Nick on March 15th, 2004 at 5:39 pm eNick, you worked for RAND in Pittsburgh? If it’s not too personal a question, what’s your field?
posted by Alex on March 15th, 2004 at 8:31 pm eHealth economics, nothing classified. I started out with RAND in Santa Monica, then worked as a consultant to them there and in Pgh.
posted by Nick on March 15th, 2004 at 8:32 pm eYuk, my two least favorite fields! ha ha ha ha
posted by Alex on March 15th, 2004 at 8:37 pm eI went to Wagner at NYU for a year and ran fleeing from the public healthers. But I’m sure you’re swell. And RAND does good work.
Yeah, the U-M SPH is good people, but public health schools can be a mixed bag - a friend of mine just finished his PhD in an absolute nuthouse SPH a ways east of here. I do miss RAND a lot - thinktanks can have serious downsides, but I really liked the work and the intellectual stimulation. Not to mention that my office window in SM faced the beach, and those seminars on counter-terrorism game theory were really cool.
posted by Nick on March 15th, 2004 at 8:58 pm eNow terrorism is something I can really sink my teeth into. But game theory definitely ain’t my bag. I don’t know much about SPHs, other than the one at Columbia denied admittance to quite possibly the person who has written the best material on OSHA and health issues for prositutes in the USA as an independent scholar. I thought UM econ was sorta weak on the micro side of things?
Anyway, I never had your good fortune to work for a thinktank; more like non-profits that struggled to make their payroll twice a month. No beach views, no game theory seminars, but I got to spend my 23rd birthday on Rikers.
posted by Alex on March 15th, 2004 at 9:34 pm eAm I the only one disturbed by the idea of ‘artist’ equalling ‘hipster’? I’m in the art school, and I’m very definitely not a hipster (exhibit A: my wardrobe of nothing but tshirts, old pants, and sweatshirts. exhibit B: my non-hipsterly love of football and baseball).
I find it a little worrying that these two words are getting equated in people’s minds.
posted by Sam on March 15th, 2004 at 11:28 pm eHave you never seen the zine “Cool Beans?” It’s a zine dedicated to indie rockers who love sports. Sports-loving: it doesn’t make you un-hip anymore.
posted by Alex on March 16th, 2004 at 6:58 am eWhat should really disturb you is the idea of “hipster” equaling “artist”.
posted by DetrOIt on March 16th, 2004 at 8:50 am eThis Daily article was the single most incoherent thing I’ve read in the past month. It seemed to have no thesis, just drifted along, iceberg-style, till it slowly sank. AAIO, I also noticed that “holistic consumption experience” silliness when I read it couple days ago.
posted by Laura on March 16th, 2004 at 9:47 pm eLaura - that must mean that this is the only Daily article you have read this month. It was both pretentious and pointless, but it doesn’t even come close to a typical Ari Paul article in terms of incoherency.
posted by Rich on March 17th, 2004 at 12:29 am eRich, I try to read the Daily every day…but you’re right, some Ari Paul articles leave me befuddled as well.
posted by Laura on March 17th, 2004 at 11:47 pm e