[sudo-discuss] Dystopia News: No-Sex Apartments.
GtwoG PublicOhOne
g2g-public01 at att.net
Tue May 21 05:47:14 PDT 2013
Re. Romy:
>From what I've observed, from 1/3 to almost half of the folks at SR are
in seriously difficult economics, a few are borderline homeless, and one
or two are actually homeless.
So while it's true that most everyone here is smarter than most of the
MBAs we know, the fact that so many smart people are scraping it for
rent every month, and in some cases scraping it for food, means something.
This is what chronic underemployment looks like, and it's maddening.
And it's directly related to corporate lobbying for unlimited H1B
visas. When they say "they can't hire enough workers," what they mean
is, "...at decent wage levels." What they want are non-citizens with no
rights, who they can exploit ruthlessly. And along the way, folks we
know can't find work in their fields.
It would be interesting to take an anonymous survey (using paper forms
with check-boxes, put into a cardboard box) to find out more about our
own circumstances as a community.
---
A lot more poor people used to go to Burning Man, before it started
going corporate. I can't recall any protests at WalMart in the Bay
Area, but the Situationist "improper shopper" tactic of a group of
protesters peacefully but humorously pushing empty shopping carts around
the store for an hour, could be interesting.
Some years ago I visited a small town in Northern CA where a new WalMart
had just opened, and almost every store along the main strip was
boarded-up. That stuff really does happen. It was as if some kind of
plague had wiped the place out. Hell, not "as if," it _was_ a plague, a
virus that sucks money and jobs out of local economies to fatten up the
fat-cats far away.
What the world can't afford, is the Oligarchy.
-G.
=====
On 13-05-21-Tue 5:10 AM, Romy Ilano wrote:
> Well Matt one thing that everyone here has to consider is : are you
> the oligarchy?
>
> SudoRoom isn't made up of the downtrodden of society. Everyone here is
> probably smarter than most any MBA I've met
>
> Poor people don't go to burning man, poor people don't protest Walmart.
>
> (Devils advocate)
>
>
>
> ---
>
> Romy Ilano
> Founder of Snowyla
> http://www.snowyla.com
> romy at snowyla.com <mailto:romy at snowyla.com>
>
> On May 21, 2013, at 1:02, Matthew Harbowy <hbergeronx at gmail.com
> <mailto:hbergeronx at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>> G.,
>>
>> Your personal biases and hang ups are more of a prison than anyone in
>> the so called oligarchy could construct. I'm tired of these troll posts.
>>
>> At Rutgers, every undergrad on campus had a twin bed. Almost anyone
>> who wanted a sexually active relationship, who was capable of social
>> graces, had one. For two people who want to fuck, you'll fuck
>> anywhere. Don't like a twin bed? Sleep on a futon or blanket on the
>> floor. I've personally witnessed five person orgies on a twin bed and
>> on a dorm floor. Expand your mind. For me, this model you invoke of
>> monogamous sleeping arrangements is far from my personal nirvana.
>> Being able to sleep two to a bed and having a good sex life have
>> never been correlated for me.
>>
>> Furthermore, look how my grandparents immigrant generation lived.
>> They'd squeeze families with children into rooms not much bigger, and
>> yet had no problems making more kids.
>>
>> There's so many fucked up ways that our society and government puts
>> us at a disadvantage: sexism, classism, racism, and the ugly specter
>> of lowered expectations. Moral mores and prudery. On and on. But
>> making up new ways the "oligarchy" are "fucking us" isn't helpful. If
>> you don't want to live in 200 sq ft, fine, but I would think its a
>> hell of a lot better than living on 8 sq ft of wet cardboard. If you
>> don't want to eat bugs, fine, but don't ignore thousands of years of
>> grasshopper consumption by Jews (locusts and grasshoppers are
>> specifically enumerated as Kosher!) and Mesoamericans.
>>
>> If you don't like the oligarchy, fine, but this made up world with
>> your rules is just your own oligarchy or dictatorship, and I don't
>> want to live in that world either. These modest proposals are not
>> helping me find how to better participate at sudoroom.
>>
>> Matt (the other one, hbergeronx)
>>
>> On Monday, May 20, 2013, GtwoG PublicOhOne wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> No-Sex Apartments.
>>
>> (Creative commons, with attribution to "G.")
>>
>> In cities across the USA, a new "solution" to affordable housing is
>> being promoted: micro-apartments of less than 200 square feet. New
>> York's conrol-freak in chief, Mayor Bloomberg, is promoting them (New
>> Yorkers call them "Bloom Boxes"). A developer in San Francisco is
>> promoting them. And developers in Seattle WA are building them
>> by the
>> hundreds.
>>
>> The Seattle apartments were recently covered in a CBS News
>> article, here:
>> http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57582327/tiny-apartments-are-creating-a-big-backlash-in-seattle/
>>
>> If you look at the picture, something immediately stands out: a
>> TWIN BED.
>>
>> As the article says, "...(the) apartment comes with a small private
>> bathroom, a microwave and a mini-refrigerator. There's just
>> enough room
>> for a twin bed, a neatly hung rack of clothes and shelves." (There's
>> not even room for a desk, so forget about working from home: it's
>> back
>> to the plantation for you, worker-bee.)
>>
>> And therein lies the catch, or more accurately the "nudge," to
>> use the
>> Newspeak word for "manipulation."
>>
>> A twin bed is sufficient for sleeping, but not sufficient for a
>> regular
>> sex life with others, much less a stable relationship.
>>
>> Sure, you can manage it occasionally, but for the long term it's
>> right
>> out. Squeezing two people into a bed meant for one is miserable,
>> particularly in the hot summer.
>>
>> This is one form of "birth control" that won't be controversial
>> with the
>> Vatican or other right-wing religious denominations. I suppose that
>> also qualifies as a "feature." (We won't mention the fact that
>> you can
>> carry on a satisfactory solo sex life in a twin bed, lest the
>> twin beds
>> be replaced with "stand-up beds" consisting of straps on the wall.)
>>
>> There's no need for the Oligarchy to make an explicit No Sex
>> rule. They
>> don't have to, when they can just "nudge" the architecture to enforce
>> that outcome by "nudging" people who might think to disobey.
>>
>> Best of all (from the Oligarchy's perspective), there's nothing to
>> revolt against. A revolt against a type of architecture is like a
>> revolt against traffic jams or weather: there's no obvious
>> evil-doer to
>> hurl ballots and tomatoes at.
>>
>> The Oligarchy likes micro-apartments because they are more profitable
>> per square foot of building, compared to apartments that let you
>> have a
>> bed big enough for two people, and a fridge big enough to let you
>> keep
>> enough food that you don't have to go shopping every day.
>>
>> The working masses (that would be us) who are being lined up to
>> live in
>> these boxes would do well to recognize that they are also about
>> the same
>> size as prison cells.
>>
>> The only difference is that you have the key to your cell, just like
>> inmates in "honor system prisons" for white collar criminals.
>> That, and
>> there isn't a guard staring at you whilst you poop, though I'd be
>> careful about the tiny apartments that come with internet and TV
>> service
>> included (no choice of carriers either), as the "smart sensors"
>> won't be
>> far behind.
>>
>> Smaller houses and apartments are of course part of a viable
>> approach to
>> sustainability: primarily through lower energy consumption and
>> proximity
>> to public transport. Some years ago, a close friend and I came
>> up with
>> various designs for micro-houses, from about 160 square feet, up to
>> about 400 - 500 square feet. A building with a 500 square foot
>> "building footprint" was sufficient for a family of four. We were
>> designing for the sake of sustainability, and for the ability of
>> individuals and communities to build these houses for themselves
>> at low
>> cost.
>>
>> But as with eating bugs, it's one thing to do it by the choice of
>> your
>> own free will, quite another to do it by way of getting mercilessly
>> milked by the Oligarchy. Especially when the Oligarchs continue
>> to live
>> in 12,000 square foot (and larger) mansions with sprawling lawns
>> on all
>> sides.
>>
>> What the world can't afford, is the Oligarchy. Darwin, take note!
>>
>> -G.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> sudo-discuss mailing list
>> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org <javascript:;>
>> http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> sudo-discuss mailing list
>> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org <mailto:sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org>
>> http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> sudo-discuss mailing list
> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
> http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://sudoroom.org/pipermail/sudo-discuss/attachments/20130521/c1eedc7f/attachment.html>
More information about the sudo-discuss
mailing list