03-10-2021, 10:26 PM
(03-10-2021, 09:16 PM)danbrotherston Wrote:(03-10-2021, 09:07 PM)dtkvictim Wrote: First of all, I want to agree with you and the general sentiment of this thread. 1) I don't believe the use of this land is in the purview of anyone but the property owner, and the city to make judgements based on infrastructure capabilities. This is despite the fact I don't really like this building. 2) It's hard to imagine any showstopping complaints against this development even if neighbourhood feedback is taken into consideration...
With that said, I want to call you out on "anti-progress". I think it's a unfair term used to put down and build public resentment towards those you disagree with. As far as I'm concerned, progress is subjective. It suggests a goal with measurable progress, and the reality is there is no such "goal" to life, humanity, society, etc... Your personal goal(s) have been built up layer by layer over the course of your life, and your circumstances may have built up a very different idea of progress from other individuals. On top of that, it's extremely difficult for us to go back and reflect upon each layer, one at a time, and see if the foundations even hold true. I try to do it, but it's hard to admit when we are wrong, and it's even harder to propagate a fundamental change throughout the outer layers because we aren't computers.
Basically, the older I get, the more times I've experienced being wrong, to the point that I'll never consider my ideas (such as what progress is) to be uniquely correct. There seems to be the notion in our current political climate that all change is progress, and I don't think it's fair to label those who disagree as anti-progress.
Would you prefer if I used the word anti-change? The problem I see is that these folks would be upset about anything they perceive as a change to their neighbourhood.
As for whether putting people down like this is productive, it probably isn't, but I also don't think coddling them helps. Probably we just need to refocus things on the need for housing, and ignore the anti-change folks.
By the way, you have no idea how old I am (nor I you), I've also experienced being wrong plenty (I have literally been wrong about this before). But I also know exactly what to think about NIMBYs during a housing crisis. There is a lot I don't agree with how development is going on in the city (I think we should have a LOT more 3-6 storey developments, and then there'd be less need to focus on larger developments), but ultimately, I want to see as much housing built as sustainably as possible as quickly as possible, IMO we're beyond the point where we can realistically be choosy about what we get. We're seeing the price of homes rise 10% per month...that doesn't have a good outcome.
I do think anti-change is much more fair, if applied accurately. Of course people often disguise being anti-change behind other arguments, so there is still the difficulty of accurately reading between the lines, and the difficulty of not subconsciously morphing all opposition into one super-NIMBY entity.
I'm not the language police, so keep writing however you please. It was just more of a suggestion for how you may be framing your thoughts, and maybe how what you write may cause your readers to "Other" people with different... let's say, viewpoints.
And I didn't mean to make any ageist comment, I was just trying to detail my own experiences.