Bros and Barbarism - The Trouble with Trustafarians

By cgordon; June 26, 2011 - Vancouver Media Co-op
http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/blog/cgordon/7595

Blog posts are the work of individual contributors, reflecting their thoughts, opinions and research.

Having read a lot of the reaction to the Canucks riot, I'm finding myself in a lot of disagreement with people I'd usually find common cause with. As the mob of the outraged turns on the mob that formed that night, a profile of the typical rioter has been coming forward. Young. Middle class. Privileged. University students and athletes from "good" families. This flies in the face of a lot of the initial reaction from anti-establishment sources.

This was not the rage of the alienated, fighting a battle that existed only in their subconscious. This was not a sudden outburst against an oppressing authority. This was the tantrum of a collection of the spoiled children of the exploiters. The Douche Suit Riot, The Broletarian Revolution, Frat Tuesday.

This wasn't an aberration, either. This sort of behavior on a smaller scale is par for the course on a typical Vancouver weekend. Near-misses with speeding luxury cars bearing an "N" [new driver] sticker pasted on the bumper are commonplace, Granville Street during weekends is often a dangerous labyrinth of thugs in designer jeans bearing scowls and simmering with hostility, especially if you're clearly not "one of the pack".

This is a problem of culture and a problem of capitalism. In a strongly stratified city such as Vancouver, a new aristocracy has formed, with similar attitudes to their ancient counterparts. An arrogance that has become so powerful that it is more than simply distasteful, it's downright perilous at times for the average citizen.

In my occupation, I've had to respond to numerous beatings of homeless individuals on the Downtown Eastside, and these incidents have been increasing steadily since the initially slow gentrification has ramped up to a fever pitch. Main Street from Terminal to Hastings is quickly being developed into another Granville Street as expensive commuter bars have begun to appear, uprooting the locals and bringing them into contact and conflict with hostile affluent youth.

The constant dehumanization of the destitute in the media plays a factor. The recent comparison of Downtown Eastside residents as "Pigs" by Vancouver Sun columnist Shelly Fralic is just the latest example of corporate news sources engaging in poor-bashing slander campaigns. This type of dreck will only continue as the Vision Vancouver/Developer assault on the neighborhood ramps up.

The disappearance of "good jobs" from this city has become another factor. Paying work has disappeared in this new economy. Those of us who are not born into wealth must struggle in a market polluted by service work, where the culture of "customer service" has created an expectation of servile, submissive behavior from the working poor. I work with the mentally ill and addicted, I work with people in pain and despair, but the occasional trouble I deal with in my current occupation pales in comparison to the abuse I received in my time in the service industry. It's a mild complaint, certainly, yet the framework of these seemingly minuscule quirks of life under Vancouver's unique brand of neo-liberalism play out on a larger scale.

This divide has robbed an entire subset of the population of humility and compassion. It is imperialism at home on a smaller scale. I would dare not compare the severity of the suffering of those abroad to the problems here, but the dynamic remains the same. Abuse and exploitation reign, sowing the seeds of criminal actions by a generation constantly reminded of their inherent superiority.

This violence and strife is fueled by consumerism, a culture that glorifies the wealthy by mere virtue of their holdings and a culture quickly devolving into feudal values, where "little lords" commit crimes and menace the public with impunity. They [are] spurred on by the indulgences of their families and othering of the rest of us.

As a society and city we are regressing under the reign of capital, and it is the duty of all of us to resist and fight for the dignity, safety and health of all Canadians.