---
I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasm. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids-and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. Like the bodiless heads you see sometimes in circus sideshows, it is as though I have been surrounded by mirrors of hard, distorting glass. When they approach me they see only my surroundings, them-selves, or figments of their imagination-indeed, everything and anything except me.
Nor is my invisibility exactly a matter of a biochemical accident to my epidermis. That invisibility to which I refer occurs because of a peculiar disposition of the eyes of those with whom I come in contact. A matter of the construction of their inner eyes, those eyes with which they look through their physical eyes upon reality. I am not complaining, nor am I protesting either. It is sometimes advantageous to be unseen, although it is most often rather wearing on the nerves.
Then too, you're constantly being bumped against by those of poor vision. Or again, you often doubt if you really exist. You wonder whether you aren't simply a phantom in other people's minds. Say, a figure in a nightmare which the sleeper tries with all his strength to destroy. It's when you feel like this that, out of resentment, you begin to bump people back. And, let me confess, you feel that way most of the time. You ache with the need to convince yourself that you do exist in the real world, that you're a part of all the sound and anguish, and you strike out with your fists, you curse and you swear to make them recognize you. And, alas, it's seldom successful.
Ralph W. Ellison, 1952 (50 Years Ago!)
--Kejuan Miller
Phillips
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [Mpls] Re:Franklin avenue
Date: Wed, 11 Dec 2002 10:47:55 -0600
I Gotta' chime in on this one as I am a resident and property owner who
lives at 15th Ave & Franklin. The removal of drug dealers does not
correlate to the removal of working poor people from a neighborhood. As
the owner of 2 duplexes on 15th Ave, all of my tenants take the bus, cab,
and walk to work. Believe me, I had to do some serious sales pitches to
prospective applicants to convince them that the neighborhood is safe for
them to live in and 90% of them are Black. I am grateful that most of my
Tenants have stuck with me through the 5 years that I've owned the place
and not run away when things got really rough. Several times many of them
wanted to. One actually did leave because she couldn't take it anymore.
The drug dealing from my stretch of Franklin (11th Ave to Bloomington Ave)
moved back up to Franklin & Chicago to 24th Street and up along Bloomington
to Lake Street. Now that the drug dealing is gone and our block is as
quiet as Linden Hills or Seward, I have not seen one person of color
defect. If the drug dealers don't return, as they always have in the past,
and when Light rail is completed, I believe then we will see the fight
against gentrification truly turned up. Will I raise my rents outrageously,
screen out lower income tenants, or discourage minority home ownership on
my block. I think not; let's keep the issues clear.
Wanting to get rid of crimes of liveability is not necessarily a white
racist point of view. It's just unfortunate that most of the people who
speak out passionately on the list against crime may happen to be white
and carry other opinions about supportive housing into the discussion of
crime. If you want proof just ask my tenants who constantly complained to
me about drug activity around our house.
A homeless shelter or Sobriety house does not always lure crime.
Anishinabe Waikegan(sp) and the Simpson Shelter are two great examples of
supportive housing that you wouldn't even know existed unless someone told
you so.
Furthermore, anybody who lives in a high drug traffic zone, knows who the
drug dealers are, they know who they are, the cops know who the drug
dealers and crackheads are, and the drug dealers and crackheads know who
you are. It's hard to explain, but when you pass the same intersections 5
times a day and are on a first name basis with the crackheads in front and
behind your house, you just know the behaviors and body language of people
going about their daily lives and those that are just hanging out involved
in drug activity. You develop a 7th drug sense, not necessarily a racist
sense.
Robinson Cook
AA Male in MPLS
Ventura Village
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent by: To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
mpls-admin@mnfor cc:
um.org Subject: [Mpls] Re:frankline avenue
12/10/2002 11:56
PM
K.Miller writes,
{{{{"People want to tell the war stories because you want sympathy and you
want
our "black" neighborhoods to sound like a war zone full of drugs, pimps and
prostitutes--that way, you are the heroes who deserve the praise of
cleaning
up the neighborhoods and getting people like me to move on, just someone
trying to get on.� We'll see in five years who's left, what's taken the
place of the Free Store, Peace House, Walgreen's, the Dollar store, etc.,
and who can afford what's been "cleaned up."� It's easy to crack down--but
where does it move to and who gets swept up and out in the calls while they
are just trying to make it down the street?"} }
I agree whole heartedly with K. Miller--- the euphemisms that
attempt to disguise the motives that drive poor people and people of color
from one neighborhood to another do make me sick at heart:
among the euphemisms I have read in these e-mails are:
"crack down on crime"-- which somehow gets translated into poor
people. homeless people,and people of color being the ones who are
insinuated as the causes of crime.
"let's not ghettoize poor people by overconcentrating 'them': i.e.
let's not face the fact that Kenwood, Linden Hills, Kingfield, the burbs
etc fight tooth and nail to keep 'them' out via zoning laws, the MCDA and
MPHA catering to welfare for the rich developers (no I do not mean
non-profits that try to provide affordable housing).
The main reason that organizations like Plymouth Church have to fight
for Lydia House is because there are hardly any neighborhoods that will
"allow" such housing.
Or the city bureaucrats in the MCDA and MPHA do their stonewalling routine
and refuse to do their job and create low income housing.( I user the term
low income because the term "affordable housing" has been bastardized so
much, it now seems to mean if you can afford to buy a $205,000 home, that
is considered affordable)
In Kingfield--there was an empty nursing home for two years--about
the size of Lydia House-- the MCDA and the MPHA sat on their hands, even
after approached by neighborhood residents asking that this be used for low
income housing.
I am also disgusted with the efforts to destroy Peace House--one of
the few havens left for people who certainly do not fit into the plans for
the gentrification of Franklin Avenue.
I am tired of the overconcentratoin of wealthy people--I think it is
time for Kenwood and the Lake of the Isles area to be liberated from their
insular existence.
Let's crack down on those who live in huge houses that certainly are far
too large for any one person or family. Come on, have you checked out the
size of those mansions along the lakes?
That Lydia House is the object of such disparagement and opposition
is a sad comment. Why don't the people hiring lawyers to fight Lydia house
hire lawyers to demand that supportive housing, low income affordable
housing be required to be provided to everyone in Minneapolis? Pay those
lawyers to demand that neighborhoods cannot continue with their petty,
fearful opposition to provide housing to all who need it. Most of the
energy I see expended is still about NIMBYism, not fighting to create more
affordable housing in more neighborhoods.
Mr. Miller I thankyou for your words.
Margaret Hastings-Kingfield
p.s. For all who are interested, you are invited to the campout Jan. 30th
and 31st on the lawn of the Government Center to demand a stop to
harassment of homeless people.
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