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Third Hand Bike Co-Op

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Started 4 years ago by Tigertree
Latest reply from TomOver

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biking

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polymethylmethacrylate

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Way to revive a 3 year old thread. WTF?

Posted 11 months ago #
mrsgeedeck
Castle of Lions
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TomOver said:

Just thought you might want to get caught up to speed on the white savior industrial complex you seem to have there.
I know I've criticized your writing style in the past and will continue to do so, I don't know if it's just for the sake of sounding dramatic and trying to paint a story, but your description of the people you met at the co op 1. objectifies them and 2. assumes a lot with seeming lack of evidence (poor black children, hungry for attention).

Good try with the rubber glue argument, I'll let you know the next time I walk in a room and count the racial demographic.

Posted 11 months ago #
lifeontwowheels
Highland West
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polymethylmethacrylate said:
Way to revive a 3 year old thread. WTF?

If you bothered to read someone revived to get information on Third Hand's organizational changes.

Posted 11 months ago #
TomOver
lovecause.org
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A person working at Third Hand said the owner of building wants to use the space for something else. So the co op has to move.

He said there are a plenty of spaces for a reasonable price in 'bad' parts of town, but so far nothing feasible for having the type of loca they have now.

Either way, ur point---LOTW---about more folk stepping up to help should be acted on. Am looking for practical ways to apply my ideas, but am still organizing it via websites and other means.

Posted 11 months ago #
TomOver
lovecause.org
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polymethylmethacrylate said:
Way to revive a 3 year old thread. WTF?

Don't think a user-driven community forum should mimic the short attention span of mainstream, corporate media.

Whether or not it's Walker's intention to promote continuity and resolution of community issues, am glad he does little, if any, 'pruning.'

Posted 11 months ago #
TomOver
lovecause.org
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mrsgeedeck said:

Just thought you might want to get caught up to speed on the white savior industrial complex you seem to have there.

The link doesn't work.

I know I've criticized your writing style in the past and will continue to do so, I don't know if it's just for the sake of sounding dramatic and trying to paint a story, but your description of the people you met at the co op 1. objectifies them and 2. assumes a lot with seeming lack of evidence

Useful feedback. Thanks. Sincerely.

(poor black children, hungry for attention).

Interesting. Reminds me of what I read some time ago in a philosophy of art essay. The writer said art depicts the specific and the unique. Describing unique individual human beings as part of the categories of -"poor", "black"---might have been an 'unartful' short cut.

Am processing. Not sure what to think. On the one hand, don't like to ignore or gloss over issues such as race and class. But harping on it and playing the race card in a knee jerk way isn't good either. Striking a balance between those extremes can require work and skill.

As for the youth there, one, though not all 3 or 4 of them, seemed 'poor' in that there was an unhealthy cast to his complexion and his eyes had a glazed unfocused quality.

I could have been more specific, but this one particular kid was indeed hungry for adult attention. He seemed to want me to duplicate with him one-to-one every aspect of what he observed me doing with one of the other kids.

For example, as I changed the flat tire, he insisted repeatedly that I change one of the tires on his bike. I kept smiling and cheerfully telling him his tire wasn't flat. Then when working on the chain of the other kid's bike, he insisted repeatedly I do the same for his bike, though his chain was fine.

As I crouched down to re-install his friend's tire, he came up from behind and jumped on my back, wrapping his little arms around my neck. Maybe I'm overly sensitive and reading into things, but how hard he seemed to work at engaging with me pains me as I write this sentence, though helping out at the co op was a good experience.

As far as I could tell, there were no adults with these two 6 or maybe 7 year old boys, but only a 10 or 11 yr old girl who came and went from the adjoining building, the Sporeprint Info Shop.

Good try with the rubber glue argument, I'll let you know the next time I walk in a room and count the racial demographic.

OK. Shouldn't belabor racial issues. But we shouldn't ignore them or pretend they don't exist.

The devil is in the details of striking the right balance between being, on the one hand, aware of the societal structures that shape our lives; and, on the other hand, appreciating one another as unique individuals.

Posted 11 months ago #
rus

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mrsgeedeck said:
Just thought you might want to get caught up to speed on the white savior industrial complex you seem to have there.
I know I've criticized your writing style in the past and will continue to do so, I don't know if it's just for the sake of sounding dramatic and trying to paint a story, but your description of the people you met at the co op 1. objectifies them and 2. assumes a lot with seeming lack of evidence (poor black children, hungry for attention).

Good try with the rubber glue argument, I'll let you know the next time I walk in a room and count the racial demographic.

Here's the working link to the white savior industrial complex article.

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/the-white-savior-industrial-complex/254843/

Worth a read for anyone that hasn't.

Posted 11 months ago #
TomOver
lovecause.org
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@ Rus and mrsgeedeck : did you read Teju Cole's article that you linked above ?

Would be interested in what either of you think about what he writes about (1) racism, (2) White privilege, and (3) the systemic causes of the suffering in Africa.

Seems part of what Cole is saying is some Westerners want to treat the symptoms without addressing the cause of the problems in African, which have at least something to do with hundreds of years of exploitation from Europe, the US, and Arab empires. Factor in too corrupt elites in Africa who've done the bidding of imperialists.

Would be interesting to hear what Cole might have to say about the Gates Foundation and its ties to big agro-chem companies doing work in Africa.

This is not self-hating, US/Western-Culture bashing from a lefty. China has its own form of 'involvement' in Africa. And a useful question to ask people on the left (and the right, Ron Paul ? ) who call for dismantling US global power : better us than China ?

@ mrsgeedeck: Kind of wonder whether your irritation with my post comes from not wanting to be reminded about White privilege and racism.

Posted 11 months ago #
bucki12
wp
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TomOver said:
A person working at Third Hand said the owner of building wants to use the space for something else. So the co op has to move.

He said there are a plenty of spaces for a reasonable price in 'bad' parts of town, but so far nothing feasible for having the type of loca they have now.

What about over where the Idea Foundry is. I think that's South Linden but it is mostly just warehouses in that part. It is blighted, but doesn't seem that bad from the times I have been there. That isn't too far from Weinland Park. Adding something like 3rd Hand would just make that even better.

Maybe off topic, but would Infospore and Food Not Bombs be moving also?

Posted 11 months ago #
TomOver
lovecause.org
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bucki12 said:
What about over where the Idea Foundry is. I think that's South Linden but it is mostly just warehouses in that part. It is blighted, but doesn't seem that bad from the times I have been there. That isn't too far from Weinland Park. Adding something like 3rd Hand would just make that even better.

Maybe off topic, but would Infospore and Food Not Bombs be moving also?

Guy working at the co op said the owner doesn't want to use the spot where Sporeprint is. BTW, FNB doesn't meet there anymore, last I've checked. Have been some at the Occupy Columbus site in front of the Statehouse.

As for Third Hand, some folk are concerned about being in higher crime areas or areas perceived to be higher crime. Seems they want to serve 'communities in need' but don't want to lose support from the Short North/OSU area. That's reasonable; we need a wide variety of folk coming together to achieve goals in the community.

Calls to mind that the catch phrase of Occupy was flawed---"we are the 99 percent." Finding solutions requires all segments of society to be involved, including the 1 percent.

Posted 11 months ago #