Condos Destroy Neighborhoods
Graphic by Paul Kjelland
“Gentrification is violence
No peace or profits for destroying lives & communities
No justice on stolen land”
Poster designed by @themme_bot
‘WE ARE NOT FOR SALE!
No Gambling Houses, No Gentrification’
Download and Print Poster Here
In 2016, upwards of 20 yuppie businesses were vandalized in Hochelaga. At a loss for how to stop these direct actions, the city and businesses have recently rallied together for a public relations campaign, with the slogan #isupportmybusinessesagainstthevandalism.
They’re trying to make us believe that ‘revitalization’ (a pretty word for gentrification) benefits everyone; that more cops harassing us on the street, more evictions, and more luxury boutiques is actually for our own good! They want to turn us against all those who are taking matters into their own hands by refusing to let capitalism make this neighbourhood even more miserable. Of course, keeping Hochelaga profitable for business is the only real priority behind a politician’s smile.
We see things differently. These yuppie businesses only serve to make the neighborhood more attractive for developers, whose grand schemes of ugly, expensive condominiums make life harder on the eyes and the pocketbooks of everyone except themselves. Those who take direct action against these types of targets serve as a reminder that, while capitalist projects of development push forward, they are not invulnerable. Yuppie gentrifiers do not have to be tolerated. It is not only possible, it is necessary, to fight back. Let’s continue the struggle!
“I would like for the police to be afraid of being attacked when they patrol Hochelag, for small yuppie businesses to hesitate before setting up shop here because their insurance premiums will be super expensive, for people to think about how if they park their luxury cars in the neighbourhood overnight, they’re risking waking up to them being trashed, that as soon as graffiti or posters are cleaned, they’re back up.” – an anarchist participant in Hochelaga vandalism
Honor the dead! Fight for the living!
Resist the destruction of all that allows us to survive and sometimes thrive. Let us mourn and rage together against a world that tears us apart, slowly in the form of ongoing gentrification, development, deportation, and imprisonment – or swiftly through tragedy that could have been prevented.
From Libby to Trump, they don’t care about us, let’s show them we don’t need them! It’s not about the artists. It’s about all of us trying to survive in Oakland. Poor people, people of color and queer people have been fighting for their existence for decades.
Communal warehouses are only one of our most recent dwellings where sometimes we get to imagine what another life could look like.
Defend tent cities and takeover vacant buildings! Fight landlords! We demand a moratorium on all evictions and affordable housing for all!