[Noisebridge-discuss] Parking meter at noisebride

[Adrian Chadd]

On 9 June 2014 19:14, rachel lyra hospodar <rachelyra at gmail.com> wrote:
> A significant portion of the noisebridge community views the police as armed
> thugs-of-last-resort and I personally would strongly recommend speaking
> directly with individuals over invoking the enforcement body of a violent
> white supremacist system.
>
> 'Nobody' willing to step up is symptomatic of an ailing community. The
> legality of the parking meter is actually functionally less important than
> the fact that our community is ailing, and I'll tell you why.
>
> Remember when someone called the city inspectors as part of the NoiseMeme
> wars? This is symptomatic of social strife, but it is a very real threat to
> our existence. Social strife, escalated, produces conditions that threaten
> our existence. Our goal should be, where possible, not to escalate, but to
> hold ground through our unity of purpose, and to achieve a safe and
> comfortable space through the shared labor of implacably firm but kind
> hands.
>
> When our community relies on violent physical force and the authorities to
> solve our internal conflicts, we *throughout the space and community*
> reinforce class distinctions that inherently privilege some of us over
> others. Class and race background heavily determine what your previous
> interactions with the police might have been like, and also deeply influence
> how the police treat you when they encounter you. Upon entering the space,
> the police must determine who is 'legitimate', who to believe. There are
> some members of our community who would not be viewed favorably in this
> measure, because of who they are and the prejudices the police are proven to
> hold. There are enough members of our community who have had enough negative
> interactions with the authorities in the past (often, being beaten, caged,
> or abused) that inviting the police into the space will radically change the
> nature and accessibility of the space to others.
>
> I want to be clear that I am not advocating for a lawless state, but rather
> that anarchism, one of our founding notions, provides mechanisms far more
> effective than force for achieving harmony. Additionally, this philosophy
> informs us that a reliance on force will divide and destroy our community,
> rather than uniting and healing the rifts that already exist.
>
> If you are uncomfortable initiating a conversation, seek the support of
> others. If others will not help you, and noisebridge feels filled with methy
> tweaky thievery, think on this: without a community of people dedicated to
> working to create the space we would like to see, there is no way for
> external forces to create this for us. If there is a specific highly violent
> or dangerous incident, where the police might be appropriate, they will
> still eventually leave and the circumstances that created that incident will
> continue to exist.
>
> 'Enforcing peace' is not possible. Only creating it is. What the police
> enforce, my friends, is the status quo.

Cool, so are you stepping up to rally the troops and get this going?



-a