Comments on: The condo complex attached to the New Mission Theater is called Vida and here is a short film about it

By: The (Evicted) Soul of the Mission

The (Evicted) Soul of the Mission — Mon, 14 Apr 2014 04:22:44 +0000

Welceom to Gentrification Towers. I’m your host, the Soul of the Mission. Actually I’m technically the Soul of San Jose, Santa Rosa, Oakland, Antioch, Stockton, and pretty much every stink hole around the Bay Area my fucking people were economically displaced into by hipsters, techie douchehats and greedy landlords. As it turns out though, the geniuses behind the Vida complex keep invoking me to shill the hell out of this thing, so here I am. Why do we call it “Vida”? Well, as you can tell by the pasty mustachioed residents, we like to keep it hip and ironic around here, so we named it after the opposite of what it stands for: Muerte, as in “La Muerte De La Mission”. Enjoy your fucking stay and do me a favor: Dia De Los Muertos ain’t your shit – stay away.

By: chalmzer

chalmzer — Sat, 22 Mar 2014 23:39:12 +0000

missing part of the English vocabulary, Javi??
We get your emotional content loud and clear by your
inability to offer reasonable refutation to Sara’s point of view.

You’re more part of the problem than the solution.

By: Proncesskookoo

Proncesskookoo — Sat, 30 Nov 2013 19:22:08 +0000

If you are not born in The Mission you are not a native.
The celebration on dia del muerto that just passed also honored Sandy Cuadra. A daughter of The Mission. She was an important person for us NATIVES. She did not live to see the celebration she had planned but still friends and family did something special to honor her life.
Again Sara there’s a lot of things in The Mission that you and other transplants are completely clueless about.
Thank you.

By: DG

DG — Sat, 30 Nov 2013 19:01:07 +0000

I can understand why it might bother you to see the local traditions built up by longtime local Latinos invaded by yuppies and hipsters. It definitely changes the vibe. BUT I have seen a lot of posts on the Mission blogs about how these interlopers have turned Dia de los Muertos into a party instead of the reverent procession it has been traditionally, and that’s just not true. I saw people drinking and buying booze in equal numbers of brown and white. Then there was the rager over on Harrison and 24th St. thrown by longtime Latino residents waving the Niners flag. It looked like a super fun party, and I thought it was bullshit that the cops lined the middle of the street with squad cars and paddy wagons. Why? Partying While Being Brown was my friends’ reply. Nevertheless, they chose to have the biggest Mission party I’ve ever seen on that night of all nights. To conclude, if you want to make the changes in the neighborhood about brown vs. white, you probably won’t get the results you want. We need to find allies in keeping/making the neigborhood affordable.

By: david

david — Fri, 29 Nov 2013 20:32:41 +0000

For instance, I think I saw one latino guy in that video, and he was a server.

By: Javi

Javi — Fri, 29 Nov 2013 07:52:15 +0000

Live Life Enjoyably. Live Life Artfully. Live Life EXPENSIVELY. I like how Sara equates new buildings with safety. Because, you know, people who can afford expensive property NEVER break the law or harm other people. Only the POOR do that. Nice.

I have no problem with property owners taking pieces of shit and renewing them. Really, I don’t. But please PLEASE avoid saying that property in and of itself is the cause and/or solution to crime problems in neighborhoods.

Go to Cow Hollow and ask people about late night robberies. They happen there, too. Seriously. Go to Russian Hill and do the same. Go to fucking Pacific Heights. They’ll all say the same thing: expensive properties do not, in and of themselves, eliminate crime. Puh-lease.

Shitty buildings being torn down and reinvented to create more living space? Great. Don’t really care. But their mere existence serving as some kind of crime prevention measure? Give me a fucking break.

Just man the fuck up and say “I want to see more white faces in the Mission so that I feel safer” and be done with it. It ain’t like there’s that far to go, anyway. Jesus titty fucking Christ.

By: Valenchia

Valenchia — Thu, 28 Nov 2013 01:09:52 +0000

Sara: it would be nice if more housing in the area would make it easier for others to get apartments, but I really doubt that we can build our way out of increasing rents. Nice shiny buildings like this one change the demographics of the neighborhood and increase the incentive of landlords to convert dumpy, cheap apartments into nice, expensive ones. Sometimes existing tenants are evicted in that process and sometimes landlords just wait until they have vacancies. But the result is that rents generally go up and the demographics of the area continue to change.
I am not commenting on whether this trend is good or bad (and I can certainly understand why you like the Mission better now than in 1987), but I do think that some anti-gentrification advocates are being taken for a ride when they support developers’ efforts to build these luxury apartments.

By: Valenchia

Valenchia — Thu, 28 Nov 2013 01:01:56 +0000

the Alamo Draft House is next door.

By: Valenchia

Valenchia — Thu, 28 Nov 2013 01:01:05 +0000

I am not a big fan of modern architecture, but I actually think this is better than most stuff that is being built.

I agree that it is too big; but when a “typo” crept into the new zoning legislation and then Newsom vetoed the legislation that fixed the “typo” — it was pretty clear that the fix was in and that resistance was futile.

By: Herr Doktor Professor Deth Vegetable

Herr Doktor Professor Deth Vegetable — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 21:43:19 +0000

I doubt it. I’m pretty excited about the theatre restoration. It’s not perfect, certainly, but the important thing is that it preserves the space and keeps it from going the way of the Tower or Cine Latino.

By: herr douche vegetable

herr douche vegetable — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 21:08:33 +0000

i guarantee you’ll find ways to whine and complain about the new theater…assuming you haven’t been evicted by then

By: GrowUp

GrowUp — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 20:48:31 +0000

Your revolution is over, Mr. Lebowski. Condolences. The bums lost.

By: Herr Doktor Professor Deth Vegetable

Herr Doktor Professor Deth Vegetable — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 19:16:15 +0000

Yup. Very well said.

By: Grizzled Mission

Grizzled Mission — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 19:13:40 +0000

Many people who fancy themselves part of an “anti-gentrification underground” are recent arrivals who love nothing more than inventing apocalyptic narratives (in which they can play rescuing superheroes) and “speaking for the voiceless”: whose voices, coincidentally, they’ve never bothered to listen for.

By: heyballsack

heyballsack — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 16:46:41 +0000

Your feel good narrative about demographics simply changing is seriously flawed. You simply cannot compare white flight to what’s happening to the Hispanic population in the Mission today. The predominately white Irish population left the Mission as part of an overall move by whites to the suburbs in the middle of the twentieth century. Whereas, the Hispanic population in the Mission is being pushed out due to lack of economic opportunities and skyrocketing prices. When the Irish left, urban centers were decaying and prices were actually dropping. They weren’t forced out, they chose to leave. It’s exactly the opposite today and the rich, white influx into urban centers is having a large impact on the minority communities that inhabited them when times were tougher and the cities less glamorous.

There are plenty of arguments for why gentrification can be a positive force, but false equivalencies that paper over the history of racism in the U.S. is not one of them.