4 ms·

I'm not surprised. The article struck me as particularly amateurish, which is unfortunate because the situation is an unusually nuanced and interesting one on a

I'm not surprised. The article struck me as particularly amateurish, which is unfortunate because the situation is an unusually nuanced and interesting one on a topic that's constantly talked about.

shiftpgdn 6y ago
Texas Monthly has a strong political agenda over anything else. They don't do much serious reporting other than overly dramatic fluff stories.
CobrastanJorji 6y ago
I'm interested in the nuanced version. I'm not familiar with the event. The article painted a pretty clear and unsympathetic story: "these folks have been gathering in this spot to do this thing weekly for 25 years, an expensive apartment building went up, and some of the residents who moved in don't like the event and want it canceled, citing a variety of flimsy pretexts." So what's the interesting and unusual nuance that makes this story more interesting?
- wutbrodo 6y ago
  Strip the subjectivity and emotion away from your analysis for a moment (not permanently), and it's easy to see both sides. Construct and add the same amount of emotion/bias in the other direction and you can construct just as "obvious" a one-sided story for the other side! Just for fun, you can construct a weak form from just the phrase you used: "these folks have been gathering in this spot to do this [illegal] thing weekly... residents... want it canceled, citing [the law]" I don't agree with this reductive view, but to me it's not clearly more so than the one-sided perspective you expressed. As I mention in another comment, I think the question of community rights and "the tyranny of bureaucracy" is a fascinating and complex one, and don't think the situation is covered by simply noting that the gathering is clearly against the law[1] and isn't victimless. I don't personally recognize adherence to every detail of every law as the highest moral good (a view that's clearly widespread, even implicitly, as evidenced by the PD's refusal to do anything about the plainly-illegal event thus far, as mentioned in the article). But the question of where exactly acceptable, public lawbreaking starts and ends is a complex and interesting one. Where exactly does the line fall for where lawbreaking should be grandfathered in? What's the plainly-obvious equation for how to calculate when a group of citizens is entitled to break the law, and does that apply to all citizens equally? If so, how widespread is this legal bubble? If the law itself is irredeemably flawed, why not repeal it? If it hasn't been repealed, and implicitly has the support of our democratic system, on what basis do we determine that the exception being granted has the consent of society? None of these are rhetorical. Laws can obviously be unjust, as can specific by-the-book applications of overall-just laws. On top of that, not all important communities are concretely well-defined and not all important norms are codified. But I'm really puzzled by the claim that it's trivial and unnuanced to draw lines between the rule of law and the (many! contradicting!) uncodified moral convictions that it's being claimed should transcend collective decision-making about society's norms. [1] The article mentions consistent violation of ordinances. To the extent that the complaint is about the legal parts of the gathering, I agree that the topic isn't especially interesting.
  - volkl48 6y ago
    And the article gives little attention to what looks like the most serious safety issue to me: The rims pictured in the article are one of the most dangerous things you can do to a car (and are not legal as shown) and present a massive safety risk to pedestrians, cyclists, and other drivers. It's basically turning the vehicle into something that will cause amputations/maiming if you're ever near anyone, and other road users won't necessarily see your "spikes" to be able to avoid them, especially in a busier environment. You might as well just stick swords or axes sticking out from your rims, because that's basically what they'll do in motion to anyone you get a little too close to. I'm somewhat sympathetic to a lot of car culture modifications, but that particular class of modifications should be zero tolerance, car impounded on sight.
- whatanattitude 6y ago
  That a short haired Karen doesn’t want the smoke killing the trees.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  Millions of people get screwed by the healthcare system but when writing an article about what that looks like you've got to pick a few relatable cases to follow. There's no unusual nuance in this case. That's the point. It's a very typical example of a pattern that's happening all over. Money shows up and destroys culture.

I'm not surprised. The article struck me as particularly amateurish, which is unfortunate because the situation is an unusually nuanced and interesting one on a topic that's constantly talked about.

shiftpgdn 6y ago

Texas Monthly has a strong political agenda over anything else. They don't do much serious reporting other than overly dramatic fluff stories.

CobrastanJorji 6y ago

I'm interested in the nuanced version. I'm not familiar with the event. The article painted a pretty clear and unsympathetic story: "these folks have been gathering in this spot to do this thing weekly for 25 years, an expensive apartment building went up, and some of the residents who moved in don't like the event and want it canceled, citing a variety of flimsy pretexts." So what's the interesting and unusual nuance that makes this story more interesting?

wutbrodo 6y ago
Strip the subjectivity and emotion away from your analysis for a moment (not permanently), and it's easy to see both sides. Construct and add the same amount of emotion/bias in the other direction and you can construct just as "obvious" a one-sided story for the other side! Just for fun, you can construct a weak form from just the phrase you used: "these folks have been gathering in this spot to do this [illegal] thing weekly... residents... want it canceled, citing [the law]" I don't agree with this reductive view, but to me it's not clearly more so than the one-sided perspective you expressed. As I mention in another comment, I think the question of community rights and "the tyranny of bureaucracy" is a fascinating and complex one, and don't think the situation is covered by simply noting that the gathering is clearly against the law[1] and isn't victimless. I don't personally recognize adherence to every detail of every law as the highest moral good (a view that's clearly widespread, even implicitly, as evidenced by the PD's refusal to do anything about the plainly-illegal event thus far, as mentioned in the article). But the question of where exactly acceptable, public lawbreaking starts and ends is a complex and interesting one. Where exactly does the line fall for where lawbreaking should be grandfathered in? What's the plainly-obvious equation for how to calculate when a group of citizens is entitled to break the law, and does that apply to all citizens equally? If so, how widespread is this legal bubble? If the law itself is irredeemably flawed, why not repeal it? If it hasn't been repealed, and implicitly has the support of our democratic system, on what basis do we determine that the exception being granted has the consent of society? None of these are rhetorical. Laws can obviously be unjust, as can specific by-the-book applications of overall-just laws. On top of that, not all important communities are concretely well-defined and not all important norms are codified. But I'm really puzzled by the claim that it's trivial and unnuanced to draw lines between the rule of law and the (many! contradicting!) uncodified moral convictions that it's being claimed should transcend collective decision-making about society's norms. [1] The article mentions consistent violation of ordinances. To the extent that the complaint is about the legal parts of the gathering, I agree that the topic isn't especially interesting.
- volkl48 6y ago
  And the article gives little attention to what looks like the most serious safety issue to me: The rims pictured in the article are one of the most dangerous things you can do to a car (and are not legal as shown) and present a massive safety risk to pedestrians, cyclists, and other drivers. It's basically turning the vehicle into something that will cause amputations/maiming if you're ever near anyone, and other road users won't necessarily see your "spikes" to be able to avoid them, especially in a busier environment. You might as well just stick swords or axes sticking out from your rims, because that's basically what they'll do in motion to anyone you get a little too close to. I'm somewhat sympathetic to a lot of car culture modifications, but that particular class of modifications should be zero tolerance, car impounded on sight.
whatanattitude 6y ago
That a short haired Karen doesn’t want the smoke killing the trees.
throwaway0a5e 6y ago
Millions of people get screwed by the healthcare system but when writing an article about what that looks like you've got to pick a few relatable cases to follow. There's no unusual nuance in this case. That's the point. It's a very typical example of a pattern that's happening all over. Money shows up and destroys culture.