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Thursday January 31, 2008
More on the Lyric Theater in this week’s Sun Post. Including this tidbit: the Miami CRA was going to donate a parcel of land to the Black Archives to complete the Theater’s expansion. The County is blocking the donation by laying claim to the land because of something to do with an adjacent housing development, so, I rest my case.
Tags: history, overtown, theater · Comment feed: RSS, atom
Okay, so now I think I see what the problem is here, Alesh.
It appears as though you are treating the word “historic” as a type of compliment rather than as a statement of fact. And it appears that you are saying if the county is going to “compliment” and “patronize” the citizens of Overtown by renaming their MetroRail station “Historic Overtown,” that they then should follow up and start doing things, like donating land in Overtown to the Black Archives.
Why you don’t consider the donation of land as patronizing and you consider the renaming of the MetroRail station as such is beyond me, but whatever…that’s neither here nor there.
I do find it inconsistent for the County to consider Overtown “historic” and then do things that don’t preserve that history. But the fact that Overtown is, in fact, important to South Florida’s history is not negated by the County’s inconsistent, and some may call them hypocritical, actions.
Overtown is historic, no matter if the County or you recognize it. I just wish the County would be more aggressive in preserving that history. There’s a lot more to it than renaming MetroRail stations.
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Boy does this NOT prove your somewhat mysterious point, Alesh, which half a dozen commenters (esp. CL Jahn) here admirably unraveled and countered with eloquent logic.
Does it help if you interpret the term “historic,” when applied to buildings, neighborhoods, districts, etc. to denote a cultural destination? Or is that simply patronizing as well?
I can attest to the fact that many areas of my hometown (Philadelphia), including the area surrounding (historic) Independence Hall, that had devolved into ghettos and slums spilling over lower-income renters and other “undesirables,” were designated “historic” for sound historical reasons, and emerged years later as desirable places to live, work, and visit.
I can’t recall a single case of anybody complaining that the term was “patronizing.” The sole complaint was (and is), improving the neighborhood (“gentrification”) was driving out the long-term lower-income residents. This is an economic issue, and while it lands most heavily on lower-income persons who are usually (not always) ethnic minorities, money itself doesn’t discriminate.
Rick~
According to my understanding, you are incorrect. The county gave the land to the City’s CRA, which promised to give it to the Black Archives. Now, because there are issues with a development on ANOTHER portion of the property, the County is exercising a clause in the contract that allows them to re-claim ALL the land, thus scuttling (unless something else can be worked out) the Lyric Theater expansion. Nice work.
Steve~
What CL Jahn and a number of other people at the other post did was expound, with varying levels of eloquence, on the history of Overtown. Which misses my point. To recap: My point was NOT that Overtown does not have a notable history (I said “Overtown’s history is rich, tragic, and profound.”). My point is, and this applies for ANYWHERE, DUH — that adding the word “historic” to a name does nothing. All places in the world have varying degrees of history, and of course adding the label rarely has anything to do with “how much” history a place has. Sometimes it has to do with marketing. In the case of Overtown, it presumably has to do with the government’s guilt for the shit they’ve been serving Overtown throughout it’s (ahem) history, most notably with the construction of I-95 in the 60s and most recently with this Lyric Theater case (and, some would argue, Crosswinds).
Surely you realize, Alesh, that a government denominating a place “historic” does something, even if that something is marketing which is aimed at bringing funds. (Not sure how that will be bad in Overtown). It’s an acknowledgement of the historical significance of the area and buildings. Other actions (preservation, revitalization, etc) may come after and/or will be needed to fight for, and I’m not going to argue the county has anything but a shitty record. But the “historical” denomination doesn’t hurt and is certainly not patronizing.
Note bene: a “government” is not an inmutable entity. The “government” (the politicians, planners and bureaucrats) that tore down Overtown to build I-95 is not the actual one, so I’m not sure where the guilt comes in. It is perfectly acceptable and desirable that a government strives to fix the mistakes of its predecessors. This could actually be considered reparations or the start of reparations. You can say it’s insuficient and you’ll be right, but to say it’s part of a continuing conspiracy to screw Overtown is stretching the limits of cynicism.
You “rest your case?” Your “case” is that you believe it’s silly to label a historic place as such because “every place has history,” so applying such a label to a place name is “patronizing.”
The Lyric’s planned expansion has been put on hold because it needs land to expand onto; the CRA was going to give them a portion of land that it had received from the County for redevelopment. The County is taking it back because the City’s primary project for the land didn’t break ground by the deadline specified in the deed transfer, so it reverted back to the county.
The County transferred the deed for the entire parcel to the CRA so it could be developed; since there was no transfer of funds or goods, the County stipulated that the bulk of the land had to be under construction by Jan 1, or it reverted back to the County.
The County taking back the land that it had given to the CRA has nothing to do with Overtown or the Lyric Theater being historic or not, or being labeled historic or not.
How does the County exercising its deed restriction prove that Overtown’s historic designation is “a bit much” or “patronizing?”
fractal wrongness
The state of being wrong at every conceivable scale of resolution. That is, from a distance, a fractally wrong person’s worldview is incorrect; and furthermore, if you zoom in on any small part of that person’s worldview, that part is just as wrong as the whole worldview. Debating with a person who is fractally wrong leads to infinite regress, as every refutation you make of that person’s opinions will lead to a rejoinder, full of half-truths, leaps of logic, and outright lies, that requires just as much refutation to debunk as the first one. It is as impossible to convince a fractally wrong person of anything as it is to walk around the edge of the Mandelbrot set in finite time. If you ever get embroiled in a discussion with a fractally wrong person on the Internet—in mailing lists, newsgroups, or website forums—your best bet is to say your piece once and ignore any replies, thus saving yourself time.Fractal, some of us feel that Alesh can learn stuff, and that he might have stuff to teach us. While some of us tease him, most of us don’t think he’s stupid. I certainly don’t; his blog would not be worth reading if he was. He’s a bright guy with a wide range of interests, and a unique perspective.
Thus these discussions, while occasionally heated, are not a waste of time.
We might change his mind, or he might change ours, and in either case we’ve entertained each other for a brief moment.
A point you might have missed, Fractal, is that I’m not necessarily trying to convince Alesh that he’s wrong about designating an area as “historic.” I am poking holes in his arguments, because the holes are there. Years ago, in a similar forum, people poked holes in my views. I thought my opinions were built on a solid foundation, and I learned that I didn’t know what a solid foundation WAS. From this, I developed a far more critical approach to my own opinions. I’m not always right, but at least I’m less likely to be wrong.
But that does not mean that mine are the only opinions worth having; you can argue fervently on behalf of vanilla, but that doesn’t make it a better flavor than chocolate. Some things ARE subjective.
But the rest is open to occasionally heated discussion. :-)
Noooooo! Not the concept of “fractal wrongness” again!!!!
Sink me.