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In Somerville, residents urged to chill out about parking spaces
By adamg on Wed, 02/25/2015 - 8:21pm
A Somerville resident posted these signs today. Erin Nolan captured one. How long do you think they'd last in South Boston or JP?
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Comments
Bravo!
Somerville has had "junk trucks" picking up the wretched refuse for some time now. So it is a good bet that if someone had a space saver out, it is gone now because it was littering, not legal.
This is an awesome FAQ.
littering
I wonder if these so called so gooders thought of the environmental impact of their little game. Doubtful.
Enoiugh
Self serving, confratulatory Witty comments. Blah blah Blah.
Actually
As a friend of the person that posted these, I can assure you they will be taken down (you know, like yard sale signs). There were only 25 posted
Wow
That's a particularly weak, thin-blooded, insipid little whine you've got there.
I like it
The anti-saver zealotry is absent, replaced by niceness.
zealotry
Most of us are living our lives in cosmic universal harmony, buttercup. We're just pausing to toss your space savers in a snow bank whenever we see them.
There is a difference
Between people whose blood pressure goes through the roof at the very thought of someone making a temporary claim to public space, people who decide on their own to foster confrontation by disposing of space savers like a vigilante, and this.
I can debate the issue. Heck, unlike some I can see both sides. The vitriol is another thing. This sign is nice. Those passive aggressive notes Adam has been posting, on the hand, have been less than nice.
Of course, we could go with what Random House, an actual dictionary, says:
.
Live and let live says just let these morons put their cones out. I don't think the saver haters really live and let live. It is more like the opposite.
Illegal behavior
I'm rather amused that you think that action taken to combat illegal behavior and prevent subsequent righteously undertaken illegal behavior is "zealotry" or "fanaticism".
I hope that you realize that your expressed mindset and behavior toward illegal space saving and the people who question it is very much like the attitudes that protected organized crime activity in many communities for a very long time.
Zealotry is what zealotry is
The anti-slavery movement in the mid nineteenth century is a prime example of zealotry, but you would be hard pressed today to find someone who thinks slavery is okay. Could slavery have been ended without the Civil War? It ended in Brazil and throughout the British Empire with a lot less bloodshed. So, if you think that it's okay to foster conflict by unilaterally chucking a space saver, so be it.
I think that comparing putting out a cone to mark a spot once shoveled out to organized crime, which involves drugs, human trafficking, and murder proves my point.
One way or another, it's just a parking space. People on both sides are making out to be much more than that.
Way to miss the point
Your attitude that an illegal behavior that begets violence and destructive behavior is acceptable because "lots of people do it" and "we've always done that" is the same "community" attitude that covered for organized crime.
You can't see it, because you were probably raised that way.
You seem to miss my point
Which is that unlike this nice sign, those who have been campaigning against space saving have been fanatical about it.
And to the point of violence and the threat of violence, didn't you once claim to brandish a u-lock to raise the point that you were not to be messed with while cycling? When respected, the practice of space saving is usually devoid of violence. Taking some of Adam's posts at face value, it was the zealous anti-savers that have been the genesis of some violence by pitting savers against unsuspecting parkers. Yet in places like Dorchester and Mattapan, where the practice is accepted, no such incidents have been noted.
Fanaticism
Fanatical? Really?
One person chucks a space saver, or writes a note. Doesn't vandalize anything. Doesn't threaten to vandalize anything. Doesn't threaten or commit any act of violence.
Another vandalizes a car, or threatens to do same.
Who's more fanatical?
The person who chucks the saver
They are essentially responsible for a third party being injured (though thankfully, it is car that is injured.)
It is up to the city to enforce these things. In the case of Boston, for decades there has been tacit approval of marking a shoveled space. For the driving public, even if they respect the saver, a lack of saver means that the person who shoveled doesn't care who parks there. By an individual deciding to move a marker that someone else left, the implication is that anyone can park there. It reiterate, there is tacit approval of the practice, so the decision was made to invite two people into conflict.
What I don't get is this. I think the sign is great, even in the quote you give, yet that's not good enough. So again, who is the fanatic, and who takes a rational approach to this issue?
Here's a task for you
Examine your shaky rationalizations for space saving even though it is an illegal and often subsequently violent entitlement behavior.
Alone. On your own. In terms of your supposed "community values" and religious values and all those things. Now, would you make the same excuses for someone in your family who was prone to an anti-social and illegal activity which led to occasional violence or claiming things which didn't belong to them?
When it comes to space savers, your "reasoning" is that of both an apologist and an enabler.
You're assuming a lot here
I challenge you to find anywhere where I have written that violence is okay. Heck, somehow at one point the both of us agreed on a good nonviolent means.
Can I within my value system find a justification for space saving? Yes. In fact, it works quite well in my neck of the woods. 3 savers in front of my house (none mine), 6 across the street (no snow between 4 of them), and 2 on the street that runs from opposite my driveway (one dug out on Sunday from scratch, and the first time a car has parked there since January!) There has been no violence, no notes, no damaged vehicles, because everyone knows the deal. How do I know how long it takes to clear my driveway cut? Someone called one morning after a storm and said they were coming over. I did note that there were a few spots dug by neighbors who have left for the day, but being a local, she deferred and asked for me to clear a spot in the driveway. As I noted earlier in the season, I was chagrined a few winters back that someone "took" someone else's space for a visitor while at the same time (literally the same time) "saved" their own space up the street. Is the answer destroying property? No. That is almost never the answer. As I thought about it, a nice car wash on a 20 degree day seemed to send the message that it was not cool to do that, but thankfully that didn't come to pass. Yes, thankfully.
As far as family who might be engaged in activities that are anti-social or illegal, that happens. You might not agree with it, but it's family. Sure, you do something when, say, your cousin told you he killed someone, but where's the line on, for example, heroin addiction? I will say that I would not help someone vandalize anything, and if someone asked for my opinion of their act, I would say it was not cool.
Wait...
You're the one who brought up "The anti-slavery movement in the mid nineteenth century" as "a prime example of zealotry", and compared it to "unilaterally[sic] chucking a space saver" (unilaterally, really???). And then you say "One way or another, it's just a parking space. People on both sides are making out to be much more than that." Physician, heal thyself?
My point is
There are things people should be opposed to, such as slavery. Did John Brown do the right thing by trying to ferment an armed slave insurrection? That's the difference between being on the right side of an argument and being a zealot about it.
Look, there are sane people on both sides of this debate, which is a debate a lot less important than slavery (heck, I wouldn't even put it on the top of issues facing Boston now.) And to get to my original comment, there are certainly good ways to get across to your neighbors that space saving is not cool in Somerville (or the South End, or some other place where the community as a whole has agreed it is not cool), and this sign is great because accomplishes just that. Passive aggressive signs (and yes, there are examples on both sides) and acts of vigilantism (and yes, the reactions of the shovelers when the saver haters decide to move their savers and someone else parks there are worse) are not the best ways by a long shot.
In short, I think people should start being more understanding and considerate of each other, which this sign shows.
LITERALLY HITLER
If you're going to Godwin the thread, Godwin the thread. Otherwise, stick to your horrible analogies and repeated assertions that tire-slashing is morally equivalent to moving trash out of the road, so that the rest of us can finish our game of bingo.
I don't do Hitler
Yes, there is a difference between moving a space saver and raiding the armory at Harper's Ferry, but my point goes back to your horrible point, which was that no, the definition of a zealot is not "someone who disagrees with you." Are there better examples? Sure, but come on, it's slavery. Who is pro-slavery now? I've seen the other side compare a traffic cone on the street to separate drinking fountains, though I don't remember you going all Godwin on that thread.
Again, for the sake of those too thick in the head to get this-
There is a difference between being right and being nice about. Being nice is much better than being right.
(And before that sentence is thrown back at me, being nice could be seen as understanding that someone has spent considerable time clearing snow off the street just as well as it could be seen as letting people enjoy the fruits of spending considerable time clearing snow off the street.)
Oh, and one more thing
I think you means "figuratively Hitler" as Hitler was one person, so only one person could be "literally Hitler."
Another article about parking
Another article about parking. Lets keep beating that dead horse!
Don't forget about the
Don't forget about the countless anti-Olympics banter
And when it gets warmer
It's all bicycles, all the time, baby! Well, except for when I'm posting complaints about the T ...
I shoveled my bicycle out yesterday
and put a space saver there instead.
Don't you move that dead horse
I spent ten hours shoveling out that space
And if you put _your_ dead horse there
I'll slash its fetlocks.
You think that's a long time?
I spent 15 hours shoveling out the horse! And he wouldn't even move after I did!
Personally, I'm a fan of all
Personally, I'm a fan of all this snow. I could go for 12 months of this, that'd be awesome.
seek
please seek professional help :)
We break the record
with .. what is it now? Seven more inches?
I say, what the hell. Let's give up the complaining and just go for it. Boston Snow!!
I'm going to disagree with you there
Look, I've been fighting the fight on space savers, but I so look forward to the day where even I will see one and cry "Come on! There's no snow on the street! Give it up!"