Mission Mission

A Mission Mission reader by the name of Concerned, in the comments section of a recent post about Mayor Newsom’s response to all the violence, says:

And why wouldn’t Hayward and Oakland thugs come to San Francisco and push around the local pussies? It is city policy to have an authenticity-maximizing, “Stuff White People Like” level of picturesque squalor. The complaints of the politicians (and “progressives”) who go out of their way to ensure this state of affairs are what the word “chutzpah” was intended to describe before it got adopted by baptists. What’s the worst that could happen to these guys anyway? This is a place where even dogs don’t respect their owners — “I feel like when you come to San Francisco and shoot up and leave syringes in planters, and have sex with $6 crackwhores in our beloved SROs, and pull guns on people, that you are not respecting me.” No shit, San Francisco is a senile heiress who writes the gardener thousand dollar checks twice a month, and also to his girlfriend. The likeliest response to street shitting is that Daly or some other self-styled “San Franciscan” will require cops to carry toilet paper (and in committee they will stipulate that the toilet paper should be hypoallergenic) for the needy bums. I was once in a New Mexico truck stop and gave some scraps to a local hobo for his dog, and when he asked where I was from I said San Francisco, and he said, Man! you guys have some fucking bums out there! This is what we have come to — our streets offend the sensibility of drifters. And all we have to do is stop sponsoring the fucking offensiveness, decline to pay for the SRO’s and fleabag deathtraps, maybe even try to cite the most appalling nuisances and let them evolve into student housing, or God Forfend, web-programmer housing (as opposed to Richmond drug dealer and pimp housing). That is what would happen naturally if the city stopped intervening on behalf of people who couldn’t give a fuck about it.

Link. Think we can get a “People Before Picturesque Squalor” measure on the ballot? Thanks, Concerned!

Myopenbar.com hips us to the news that Million Fishes is hosting a celebration of counter culture tonight:

RE/Search ‘Counter Cultural Hour’ is a monthly TV show screening, featuring speakers who have made a mark on counter culture. This month chronicles the celebration of PUNK ’77 at Beyond Baroque. Featured are Jerry Casale of DEVO and Graeme Revell of SPK, hosted by V. Vale. Anybody angry with the state of the U.S. and the world now will find truly soul-satisfying ‘content’ in this program, and indeed, inspiration. It’s well worth seeing…

Link. Note that it looks like the event is BYOB.

Previously on Mission Mission:

Million Fishes the Most Intimate Venue in the Mission?

In the wake of yet another Mission murder, reader Subito_Piano got in touch to let us all know that there’s a District 9 Supervisor debate scheduled for Tuesday, October 7, to be held at the Victoria Theatre at 16th and Capp. On the official debate website, you’ll find links to more info on each candidate, an agenda, as well as a form with which you can submit questions of your own.

Melissa Gira of Valleywag and Sexerati and a bunch of other things just nailed all of our troubles in one bittersweet tweet. Link. BTW, I have a hard enough time defining regular irony. What is Mission irony?

Debate got pretty lively in the comments section of Monday’s post about the drive-by shooting at Farina. Frequent commenter zinzin lays out a compelling case, one we feel you all should read in its entirety. And remember to vote in November:

Iain, i could not agree more. we are 110% in accord. that’s exactly what i meant…more police presence, more dialog, more relationships, more efficacy. these gangbanger knuckleheads will respond to only 2 things in the short term: force, and a hit to their pocketbooks. More cops out there in the world can do both. deporting illegal felons, i could not agree more.

(and i certainly understand that these dudes are driven to “the life” by a world of circumstances not helped by oily hipsters (me in 1991) or yuppie scum (me now) stealing their hood block by block: lack of opportunity, lack of education, lack of services, lack of all the things that enable me & my ilk to enjoy an $800 pesto at Farina. for sure, i get it and i wish it was different. that said, i CANNOT sit by & tolerate this kind of crap where families walk with kids. hipstery or not.)

that being said, marking some imaginary (sorry katie) line between the “hipstery” mission and the “yuppie” mission…or snarking about “Baja Noe Valley or Marina Annex” (sorry Josh) …is so totally lame. typical hipster apathy. these kind of views have got to be the most short sighted, immature, bullshit excuse for comments i have ever seen. this is our Mission, you lazy self-satisfied babies. you, me, the latino family on the corner, even the schitzoid homeless dude whose shit i clean up twice a week.

so you mean to say you PREFER shootings? you PREFER human feces all over the street? you PREFER crackwhores, and open air heroin markets? You say that’s keepin it real?

I say bullshit. You’re lying if you say you do. You say you “like the grit” because you’re still living in Jr High and you need to be “cool”. Fuck that. Most hipsters i know – including a younger me – are (over)educated, have decent jobs and ascribe to a surprisingly mainstream set of goals.

My guess is most of the folks commenting here do NOT live in the teeny activist stripe of the Misison hipster contingency. Most of them are probably cultural creative class, college educated, and buying lunch at BiRite along with the rest of us. Hell, most real activists and artists that i know moved out of the city along time ago….can’t afford even a place in the “hipstery” parts of the hood.

look for posts i have written in the past. unless some of this crap is taken under control, ALL of the Mission will become the “yuppie” part, because the city will sell the neighborhood to real estate developers. just like Times Square, or Williamsburg, or Astoria in NY.

Read the Eastern Neighborhood Plan that’s about to pass the Board (you all know we have a Board of Supervisors, right? And that the Mission District 9 Supe is up for election in November, right? Or maybe can’t take time out of shopping for ironic plaid pants to be educated?).

It’s going to enable – along with the usual bullshit low-income, tenants rights, mixed-use / light industrial progressive politics crap that makes the Mission a dumping ground for the city’s refuse – practically unlimited development of yuppie condos. 19th & Valencia. 20th & Valencia. 18th & Mission. The New College buildings. You watch.

so you can sit around and say “i like it gritty” or “this ain’t the mission no more” or “that’s the yuppie part of the neighborhood”. or you can open your fucking eyes and get off your lazy, entitled asses and do something to preserve the beauty, diversity and special qualities of the hood we have.

because if you dont, well, you’ll be living in West Oak. which is nice and gritty. and on the same trajectory, 2 or 3 years later. after that, i have no idea. as i have said before, there ain’t no Bushwick or Red Hook in SF, yo.

Link to comments section, if you need more context.

Today, my epic Midwestern road trip has brought me to Indianapolis. Fearing for my safety, my friend Bri (a real-live Indianan) sent me a link to a post on Take a Breather called “Indiana McCain and the Obama of Doom”:

Two nights ago, a friend (and Iraq War veteran) was walking down the sidewalk wearing an Obama 2008 shirt when a man, eating dinner with his wife looked up and said, “So, you’re a communist?”

That same night, a person in the bar shared this story with my friend: “I was wearing an Obama shirt in here the other night and three guys surrounded me and started harassing me about the shirt. Realizing I was outnumbered, I asked them what they would like me to do. They made me turn my shirt inside-out.”

Another recent evening, I was driving my mom’s car, which has an Obama bumper sticker on it. As I was using a drive-thru ATM, a truck pulled up behind me and began chanting Obama’s name out his window, but not in a good way. More like a tone that invoked the ghosts of the KKK. I didn’t look back, I just pulled away and acted like I didn’t hear them.

And then there’s this zinger, brought to light by an acquaintance: “I hope every racist person in America comes out and votes against Obama.”

Indiana is an interesting place.

Lots more analysis here. So yeah, I guess I won’t be donning the “Fuck Cars” t-shirt I picked up this afternoon in Bloomington until I get back to California. Thanks, Bri!

This poster campaign’s got us thinking, and it’s true, we are all San Franciscans. So please excuse us while we spotlight the following project even though it’s based in a neighborhood other than ours. It’s called Graze the Roof and it involves bettering the lives of low-income and homeless children in the Tenderloin, via sustainable rooftop gardening:

Graze the Roof [...] will demonstrate soil-less and container gardening methods on the rooftop at Glide, a San Francisco church and nonprofit located in the Tenderloin District. The project eliminates the use of fossil fuel consuming production and distribution methods typical of modern agricultural practices while saving energy in the building and reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Students from Glide’s Training and Employment Services Youth Build Program will construct and maintain the garden which will produce 1,440 lbs. of food in its first year. The rooftop will provide a natural sanctuary and a space to relax, inspire, educate and empower 200 homeless and low-income children between the ages of 5 and 18.

Graze the Roof on the Project Slingshot blog.

Update: Graze the Roof has nothing to do with the poster above. I just used the poster’s two messages as a segue into something not overtly related to the Mission.

Everywhere Magazine is our favorite user-generated travel periodical, and the centerpiece of a forthcoming issue will be a feature on San Francisco. From the official call for submissions:

The package will be a collection of articles, photos, and tips about how to enjoy San Francisco like the locals do. What neighborhoods, stores, restaurants, bars, or events do you put on your must-see list? The quirky, the offbeat, and the unexpected are most welcome. SF’s best places to hide on a foggy day? A visitor’s guide to understanding Frank Chu? The battle of the best burritos? The city’s most under-explored neighborhoods?

Link. Deadline is August 28. And remember, this is a quality magazine, and we’re pretty sure its readership is quality too, so don’t try to bamboozle them with some b.s. about Medjool being your favorite local watering hole or La Cumbre still being good.

See what else he does here. Visit Blue Bottle Coffee Company here.

[via items of interest to me and, possibly, to you]

Previously on Mission Mission:

Obama Just Another Fucking Puppet?

Mission Mission and Ritual Roasters

I don’t know, man. And that website they mention is kind of boring. Zzzzzz.

Photo by hailtothethief21. [via Mr. Saucy explains it all]

Previously on Mission Mission:

Live From New York: Wheatpaste Hillary in an Obama ’08 Hat