Thursday, February 25, 2010

In a partial reenactment of one of my favorite articles from The Onion, a contingent of well-heeled activists has vanquished the specter of affordable housing, crushing it as an Escalade would an impoverished child. I’m of two minds here. Certainly I’m relieved that my home’s value will only plummet at a medium rate now, rather than extra fast, and I’m glad I won’t have to deal with increased traffic. At the same time, though, you’d have thought they were constructing a bombed-out tenement building with squalor pre-installed or something, given the fervor from some of the residents.

I avoided the public dialogue, as you can imagine. There was a hearing at a local church on Monday, apparently a standing-room-only affair, and the extent of my participation was driving by the parking lot on my way home from work and mentally noting that attendance looked great. In my mind, it was far more likely a household or two from the country club across from the church had already pulled some strings and scuttled the housing project. It was a foregone conclusion that materialized in a dark, smoke-filled study somewhere.

I also steered clear of the online dialogue, thought it was fascinating to skim it. Look below the article, if you’d like. Some of the participants are barely literate and seem hellbent on pushing a strange cocktail of Chicken Soup for the Soul, populist sentiment, conspiracy theory, and deep philosophical undertones culled straight from an Us Weekly editorial. For me, this entry was the crown jewel:

“Rich white people win again.

No fare!!”

No fare indeed, and thanks for the input. You teach us so much! You teach us all.

What the comments say and how they’re said may entertain to a point, but why people are sharing is an entirely different beast. This is what interests me the most. If you surf over to The New York Times, the users will be far more cogent, maybe a little snarky, but coherence aside the question remains: what compels someone to post a comment on the Internet? The journalist who wrote the article proper probably isn’t crying out for additional input. It’s not like this was an opinion piece. And yet there exists a fundamental human need to voice your thoughts to an audience too preoccupied with doing likewise. Wait–did I just describe social media? Perhaps I’ve happened upon the very <3 of the matter.